Antony and the Johnsons - Walt Disney Concert Hall - Los Angeles, CA

Wow. I'm really not sure how to sum this up, so I'll use a phrase from my oftentimes concert partner in crime, Mr. Conner:

It was awesome. The musicians were amazing, the venue was amazing and the crowd was amazing.

Antony performed with the LA Philharmonic this evening at Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown Los Angeles. This is a truly inspiring venue, both inside and out. Designed by God, or at least God's Assistant, this thing is gorgeous to look at on the outside, and almost scary to be inside of. Kinda like a superstar model.

Antony took the stage at about 8:15 with a group of approximately 18 musicians, a full brass section, oboe, bassoon, piano, percussionist, and clarinet, to name a few. Not to mention the conductor, who was exciting to watch as well. He just did what he did so well.

They played for probably about 90 minutes, including one encore, which included a very long story about one of Antony's role models in New York. He also shared that he'd only met the LA Philharmonic the day before, and had practiced with them twice before the performance. Describing how he explained the songs he said, "I told them, OK, for this one, imagine you're a fish..."

Most of the songs were ones I wasn't familiar with. He only did one song from I Am A Bird Now (For Today I Am A Boy), and I assume most of the other songs were from his recently released Another World EP and from his debut album. However, I did catch his touching, yet somewhat funny cover of Beyonce's Crazy In Love. A bit different than the version David Byrne treated us to with The Extra Action Marching Band at the Hollywood Bowl a while back, but it was still pretty amazing.

Another highlight: 30 seconds of silence during one of the songs. Honestly. Without exaggeration, it was at least that long, and nobody took a breath.

This was one of two shows on this US tour. He plays on 10/16 at The Apollo in NYC(!!!!!), and then two dates in London at the end of the month. Truly, this was a special evening. It's not every day you get to see a transvestite sing torch songs with a miniature symphony.

Oh, I should mention, I went to throw out my gum in what I thought was a trash can, but had to take it outside to find one.

"I thought it was a trash can, but it wasn't, I told my companions."

"What was it?" they asked.

"It was," I started, grasping for a word, "art."

Trifecta Phase Three - David Byrne @ The Greek Theatre Los Angeles, CA

I just got home from The Trifecta, now complete after watching David Byrne perform songs he and Brian Eno worked on together. Well, mostly. The crowd kept screaming for Psycho Killer, which didn't fit the mold, but neither did Burning Down the House, as he admitted.

The set consisted of about a half dozen songs from the new album Everything That Happens Will Happen Today, and the rest of the set seemed to be made up entirely of old Talking Heads songs.

Don't get me wrong, the set was fantastic, complete with three dancers (two of them very, very sexy), three backup singers, two percussionists and another guitar player onstage. However, I was really hoping for something, hell anything from My Life in the Bush of Ghosts. I don't think he played a single song off of that all night, but I'm sure my good friend the Fountain Valley Lounge Lizard will point out if I'm right on that one.

One of the greatest things about the night was that the crowd were absolutely into it the entire time. So much so, in fact, that after two encores, David conferred with the band to see if they'd be up to do one last song. They closed out the night on a bit of a slow note with the title track from the new album.

All in all, three great nights of music, three very, very different shows, and all three exceeded our expectations.

Back to reality now. Sigh.

Look for a more complete review of My Bloody Valentine soon.

Trifecta Phase Two - My Bloody Valentine

There are two types of people in this world: People who have seen My Bloody Valentine, and people who have not.

I feel like I've evolved.

What can you say?

We all agreed on one thing. That to describe it is next to impossible.

I feel like I've had my chromosomes rearranged without a kiss.

Trifecta Phase One - sigur rós

"I think, maybe, you all should stand up," the lead vocalist of the Icelandic enigma sigur rós suggested. The band had played nearly its entire set to a seated crowd at San Diego's Copley Symphony Hall, and we happily obliged. The four piece band was joined by four extra drummers, all pounding in unison on individual drums strapped to them as the band played gobbledigook, the opener from their most recent album, Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust (With a buzz in our ears, we play endlessly).

To say they merely played this song robs them of something, as it was a celebration of the entire set, the most energy imparted from the band to the crowd, and vice-versa. The song is in stark contrast to much of the band's beautifully sad, cinematic material, with three members playing acoustic guitars instead of the usual keys, guitar (often with a bow) and bass guitar. As the crowd clapped along happily, two figures appeared at opposite ends of the stage with massive cannons, and, along with two other stationary cannons, produced an orgasmic blast of confetti the likes of which I have never seen.



Keep in mind folks, this video was taken from the balcony. We were SHOWERED in confetti.

Here's one more glimpse of what you may have missed.




Trifecta?

I haven't posted about what Conner and I are calling The Trifecta. The Trifecta is our three-day concert and drinking binge that marks the (almost) halfway mark between now and Coachella. Three shows, three days, three cities. That is, if Santa Monica is a city, which I think it is.

Here's the itinerary:

10/1/2008 - Sigur Ros - Copley Symphony Hall - San Diego, CA
10/2/2008 - My Bloody Valentine - Santa Monica Civic - Santa Monica, CA
10/3/2008 - David Byrne - The Greek Theatre - Los Angeles, CA

The Juan MacLean Rewrites the Manual

Just got back from seeing The Juan Maclean in Los Angeles.  I have to say that overall it was pretty amazing.  At their worst, this group highlighted just how hard it is to perform electronic music live.  At their best, they blew the doors off the place.  I thought the girl from The Octopus Project played a mean theramin, but she's got nothing on Juan.  He was like a symphony conductor with that thing.

They opened with a song from their upcoming album The Future Will Come, available "In a month that's not this one."  I'm not sure if that means next month or just some month in the future.  Hopefully it's coming out soon, because the first song, and many of the other new ones, sound very promising.  Wikipedia says 2009 but who knows.

After the second song of the set, a familiar spectre revisited the band.  Massive technical difficulties.  This time, instead of delaying the start of the show, it stopped it.  The band gathered around a malfunctioning device for about five minutes while the small but dedicated crowd heckled the band.  Juan responded by being totally transparent.

"We're going to do something now that's really embarassing," he began, "we're going to have to pull out the manual," he finished, holding up the user guide for the synthesizer.  The crowd laughed.  It felt like the crowd was made almost exclusively of true fans and people who genuinely understood how difficult it is to do electronic music live.

It takes Nancy Whang, Holy Ghost! and Juan MacLean to technically support an ailing device necessary to perform Give Me Every Little Thing 20080913 - The El Rey, Los Angeles, CA

When they finally got the thing going, the crowd came back in full force.  Though their biggest track was a little rough, it showed great tenacity for the band to come back from such a long break at the beginning of the set.

There were some great moments and some not-so-great moments during most of the rest of the set.  When Juan announced that the band had only one more song to play, "but don't worry", I looked at my watch. The band had only been playing for about 50 minutes, and I wondered if they could possibly have an encore planned.  Nope.  I have no idea what the last track was, but it was an 18-minute multi-orgasmic opus that started minimal, built to a climax, exploded, went back to climax level, and repeated the pattern over and over.

Juan admitted that it wasn't a perfect performance, but we don't go see The Juan MacLean for perfection.  We go see this act because, as one girl at Coachella put it, "We wanna dance."  

And dance we did.

The Juan MacLean plays The Casbah in San Diego this Monday night.  Don't be stupid.  Check it out.

Antony and the Johnsons To Play Walt Disney Concert Hall 2008-10-16

The first time I heard I Am A Bird Now, the most recent release from Antony and the Johnsons, I wasn't quite sure what to make of it.  Here's a guy with an almost angelic voice, race car driver-like control of trills and a torch song range reminiscent of Nina Simone, but I couldn't see it.  Not on the first listen.

Still, I was intrigued enough to listen again.  And fairly quickly, again, and again, and again.

It's puzzling to me now, when I can't listen to songs like Hope There's Someone without tearing up, that I didn't get it the first time I heard it.  But I knew there was something there, and that kept me listening.  His voice absolutely destroys me, makes me hurt in the pit of my stomach as if I'm actively experiencing what he's singing about.

The act has an album due Oct 7, 2008, so it's strange that this tour is so truncated.  Using the business model of Radiohead's Kid A tour, there are two dates.  One in New York, and one in LA.

If you're up for something truly unique, please, please, please catch this show.

Radiohead

We managed to catch the Monday show at the Hollywood Bowl and the show at Cricket here in San Diego, formerly known as Coors. Both were sold out, and apparently the Cricket show's attendance was almost 20,000. It's hard to pick which was better, but if pressed, I'll take the Monday show at the Bowl. We got Tell Me Why, a cover of a Neil Young song from the album After the Gold Rush, as well as Go Slowly, a hauntingly moving song from CD 2 of the In Rainbows box, which everyone was calling "the blue song" due to the cool lighting.

We got to Cricket at 3:45 p.m., saw the show, and got out of the parking lot in TWO MINUTES. To put this in perspective, our pal Bill didn't make it out of the lot for TWO HOURS. Yeah. Not only did we get Talk Show Host, Airbag, How To Disappear Completely, Paranoid Android, Climbing Up the Walls, Lucky (damn, so many songs from OK Computer!!), but we made it back to my place in a record 25 minutes. Not too shabby.

I'm embedding a link to Thom and Johnny playing Portishead's The Rip from Portishead's fantastic return to form, Third. Also, here's a link to a YouTube video I made at the Bowl of the end of Karma Police, and the entire closing track, Idioteque.

We'll miss you, Radiohead. Thanks for Webcasting your final show from Santa Barbara. It was a little choppy at first but after the first half it was nearly flawlessly transmitted from the 'net to the lappy to the TV and sound system. To quote Homer Simpson, "A class act, all the way." Then again, he was talking about God, but I'm pretty sure I could worship this band and not be poked with a pitchfork in the afterlife.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hI-TRf-Yt0Y



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