Wilco/Joanna Newsom, September 30 at the Hollywood Bowl

When a show is announced, I decide then whether I'm going to go or not and I try my best to get tickets. If I don't get tickets, I generally put it out my mind.  If I care enough to want to motivate myself to go to a show, I'll care at the beginning and make sure I have a ticket secured and I don't have to chance it later on.  It's hard enough for me to be decisive, but my deadline for deciding about a show is generally right off.  Every once in a while, though, if I'm not completely sure, I might just put it off, just to see what happens.  Usually I assume tickets are sold out after that and I don't bother with it again.  But there are times I get tickets later on, through whatever means, and I've sometimes had that fantasy about deciding the day of to get tickets and seeing what kind of deal I can get, if one at all in the first place. And I look at second-hand ticket sites just to stay up with the processes of getting concert tickets, and it's a source of curiosity to track ticket prices and see how much I could get for mine, even knowing I'm not going to sell them. Carla and I had talked about seeing Wilco at the Bowl but we kept holding off.  We wanted to see what kind of opener they would get, as they often seem to make compelling and unique combinations for Bowl shows, but adding Joanna Newsom to the bill didn't do much for us. Not that we have anything against the lady, and we both had heard of her through the years, but we knew enough to know that we weren't curious that it was going to automatically sell us on that show.  I don't know if it's a common approach to hesitate on getting last-minute tickets, but Carla is the same as I am in getting tickets first-off or not at all.  But no matter who's opening, it's still Wilco and it's still a show at the Bowl.  The day of the show I was monitoring Seatgeek (a site I found because of Consequenceofsound), which I'd checked out of curiosity for a while and the one I knew I'd turn to if I ever wanted second-hand tickets.  They're an aggregate of all the after-market ticket sites and sometimes there are some interesting deals.  There were still handfuls of Wilco tickets available and I was pawing around for some cheap ones.  It didn't matter to us so much where the tickets were, as every seat at the Bowl is a good one, and generally we just wanted to go in to the show.  I found a pair of tickets for $35 each, and I was still a little hesitant since I hadn't bought second-hand tickets from this site yet but it was inexpensive enough to try it out.  Even better, it wasn't through Ticketmaster and there weren't rape charges and hidden fees (at least not built into our tickets).  That show for under $100 -- a good deal.  I'm sorry for whoever had to let the tickets go for under what they paid for them but at least they got a bit of cash for them.  So in pretty short order we got a dinner and a bottle of wine together and had our night at the Bowl. It was also the first time we took the shuttle, that time from the Zoo, which made it a lot easier and cheaper than trying to park at the Bowl and getting stuck in gridlock on the way in and out or walking that distance from the subway.  The show itself was a standard Wilco show, which is not a bad thing at all, they just don't have the highs of sing-along radio hits or the lows of cuts from bad albums. But they still have a whole lot of songs, some of them buried on albums, and with a band who can play a well-known song as easily as an obscure one, a set-list can get wild, but this was a consistent show without a lot of surprises.  They played more from their newest album, which seemed a curious choice since it hadn't been as much of a hit for all the crowd to be as familiar with it, but the sound fit with the expanse of the Bowl.  And they played just enough from Yankee Hotel Foxtrot to satisfy us, especially "Jesus Etc."  Just that song and the magic of the Bowl and Carla & I together was enough for a special evening, to wrap up the season there for us, under the stars and with our arms around each other.

Newsom was pleasant enough, and if we were there for harp music it probably would have been wonderful, but as it was it was just background music to ease into an evening of other music we could digest and enjoy more easily.

Wilco's set-list:
"Dawned on Me"
"War on War"
"I Might"
"Sunken Treasure"
"Spiders (Kidsmoke)" (acoustic arrangement)
"Impossible Germany"
"Born Alone"
"I Am Trying to Break Your Heart"
"Art of Almost"
"Misunderstood"
"Jesus, Etc."
"Handshake Drugs"
"Whole Love"
"Hate It Here"
"Box Full of Letters"
"I'm Always in Love"
"Hummingbird"
"A Shot in the Arm"

"Ashes of American Flags"
"California Stars"

"Walken"
"Heavy Metal Drummer"
"I'm the Man Who Loves You"

"Hoodoo Voodoo"
"Outtasite (Outta Mind)"

Joanna Newsom's set-list:
"Bridges and Balloons"
"Have One on Me"
"Inflammatory Writ"
"Colleen"
"In California"

"Cosmia"

Local H, September 24 at the Troubadour

Local H may never again reach the heights that they got to for a fluke hit back in the mid-'90s -- that "copacetic" song (actually "Bound for the Floor" but no one ever seemed to get that).  Though they don't seem to mind -- part of their charm is that they're going to be pissy anyway.  The problem is that they actually keep making great albums and they keep putting on great live shows, and the fact that it's only two guys makes it all the more remarkable, but they don't draw a big crowd anymore.  One of those great albums is Hallelujah! I'm a Bum, one of my top albums for 2012, and what they were touring for for this show.  I can't tell if the pissiness is an act or not.  I might be pissed too if despite all my best efforts and even if I was making better work than I did at my commercial peak, 20 years later I couldn't get anything I did to grab much attention once the world had moved on from the rest of the genre I was stuck in, even if the rest of the stuff made by peers was dreck.  As great a venue as the Troubadour is, there's not much smaller, and Local H always seem to want to get out of L.A. faster than they'd have to bother with going to Spaceland for.  At least they can hang on to the Troubadour.  And that night they grabbed it and smashed it.  The show started off slow but only because it was new material that the crowd didn't know.  "Bound for the Floor" was early in the set, played out of obligation before they'd even really warmed up, but it also left the crowd scratching their heads as to what could come next.  It's the audience's own fault if they didn't give the new stuff a proper chance.  It might have even taken longer for them than it should have to finally smash into something the crowd recognized, the "all right, of yeahs" of "All Right, Oh Yeah" but once they had it, they really had it and the smashing began.  The tardy circle pit started and all the guys who threw the same elbows 20 years and 40 fewer pounds ago went nuts.  The whole place did.  After that it barely let up as Scott and Brian tore into one familiar anthem to anger after another (or what seemed familiar  at least).  It was a lot rougher crowd than I would have thought for a bunch of guys who got a babysitter on a weekday night.  I saw one guy in front of me get his head busted open.  If you want to judge a show by how rowdy it got, that was one of the best in a while.  Scott will probably keep plugging away at it, which will be welcome to a few, even if he can't connect it to any kind of massive success again.  And if it fuels his rage and that leads to more great albums, even when only a few aging fans are paying attention, at least he's still getting out there.  It was one of the kinds of rough shows that Carla used to go to before me so at least she was comfortable.  We also met up with Noa, who of course was in the middle of the pit just like she was the first time we saw Local H (at the same place), and Erica, who I hadn't seen in a while.

Scott apparently opened for himself but I don't know what he did, and the Ambassadors played before Local H but we didn't see them.

Local H's set-list:
"Waves / Cold Manor"
"Paddy Considine"
"Bound for the Floor"
"They Saved Reagan's Brain"
"Everyone Alive"
"Manipulator"
"Night Flight to Paris"
"Back in the Day"
"Say the Word"
"Feed a Fever"
"Another February"
"All-Right (Oh, Yeah)"
"All the Kids Are Right"
"Fritz's Corner"
"Hands on the Bible"
"Waves Again"

"2112" (Rush cover)
"California Songs"
"Look Who's W"

the Hives, September 14 at the Wiltern

As soon as I got the e-mail about the tickets, I wondered why I was initially going to skip seeing the Hives.  It was probably just being conservative: after having seen them at Coachella, there wasn't reason to make a great effort and spend the money to see them again.  They were my favorite act at the festival, as they usually are, but I didn't feel I needed more than that for this cycle.  But if tickets are free, anyone would be a fool not to go.  Rachel had tickets through her job, as she often did, and this was the first time she made the offer for a show and I could take her up on it (and thanks again, Rachel!).  Unfortunately, by the time I could get back to her to say that I definitely wanted to go, there was only one more extra ticket, so it was the very rare show that I went to without Carla, though she gave me her blessing to go.  I met up with Andrew and Heather, who had been drinking for most of the evening, for drinks and meet up with some of their friends, before Rachel met up with us and we went in to the show, scheduled to start close to midnight, which is so late it's almost not rock n' roll, but it gave us more time to drink.  The place was full but it was easy to get that maybe the crowd was stocked by people who just got tickets rather than real fans clamoring to see them.  Surely in our group I was the biggest fan, and even though I was the only one who could possibly have been prepared for the assault that is the Hives in concert, everyone else was able to get into it and maybe appreciate the majesty and sonic brutality that is a Hives show.  They never disappoint and they never give less than 100%.  As it might be a practiced show and even Pele's stage banter might be memorized, they never do less than entertain.  The only criticism could be that the crowd doesn't recognize their music enough to really get into it but that's their own fault for not paying attention to them after they stopped getting so much buzz a few years ago.  Whether the music is familiar or not, it's a show that seeks to entertain, and if you're not going to be open to that then you'll be run over.   The Hives don't care.  They're there to wreck any venue that will have them and the place is only lucky to be left standing when they're done.  If they don't get to take over the world as was their original mission statement, then they might as well obliterate it.  We were left obliterated that night.  Fidlar opened, and I listened to them a while later but at that time I didn't know a thing about them, which is a shame that I missed them, but we also had drinks to drink.

The Hives' set-list:
"Come On!"
"Try It Again"
"Take Back the Toys"
"1000 Answers"
"Walk Idiot Walk"
"Main Offender"
"My Time Is Coming"
"Die, All Right!"
"Wait a Minute"
"No Pun Intended"
"These Spectacles Reveal the Nostalgics"
"I Want More"
"Won't Be Long"
"Hate to Say I Told You So"
"Patrolling Days"
"Go Right Ahead"
"Insane"
"Tick Tick Boom"

the Walkmen, September 12 at the John Anson Ford Amphitheatre

The Walkmen are another of Carla's bands.  I'd known about them for years and I checked them out, whether seeing parts of their sets at festivals or getting an album or two, but I just couldn't get into them.  No particular reason or anything against them; I've always thought they're pleasant enough, there's just nothing that's really grabbed me and I'd drifted elsewhere.  I've loved bands that are more abrasive and not every band has to have a rough edge, and not every band has to have a song that's grabs me early on, but there are also bands that I just pass on at the time.  But these guys are one of Carla's favorites and she had gone on about them since shortly after we met.  I was looking forward to a time when we could see them together, when I could enjoy them in her periphery, and even if I couldn't come to love them, I could see a good show and learn to appreciate them.  And getting us to see a show at the Ford Amphitheatre is an easy sell.  We saw an Irish music festival there a while before and were in awe of the venue: it's close to home, clean, well-maintained, big enough for not a huge crowd but for a good audience, and it's the rare place in L.A. that shows some kind of appreciation for nature, as the back of the stage is the edge of the forest behind the place.  There are some really good and pretty locales in the city but the Fonda is just beautiful.  They allow outside food there (another great thing about the venue) so we got some sandwiches and settled in for a great show.  And indeed it was.  The tunes were pleasant and the band blended in for a very agreeable performance.  I was more enraptured in being with Carla than the performance but the music made for a lovely setting.  It was just a joy being with her as she enjoyed the music so deeply.  That night everything just aligned and it was just a wonderful evening, one of our best that year, whether at a show or anywhere else.
Milo Greene opened but we missed him/them.

The Walkmen's set-list:
"Line by Line"
"We Can't Be Beat"
"Heaven"
"The Love You Love"
"Juveniles"
"Blue as Your Blood"
"I Lost You"
"Heartbreaker"
"Love Is Luck"
"Angela Surf City"
"Red Moon"
"On the Water"
"In the New Year"

"All Hands and the Cook"
"Louisiana"
"Dónde Está la Playa"
"We've Been Had"
"Canadian Girl"

FYF Fest, September 1 & 2 at the Los Angeles Historic Park

Music festivals can often be the beginning of a run for a band or it can be the end of one.  FYF Fest had a lot of both, from what I could see.  Going, for us, was a foregone conclusion.  Even at that point we thought our streak of attending Coachellas might be at an end and it just made sense to go.  The line-up was maybe the best I've ever seen for the festival.  This year was pretty much like Coachella, minus three or four of the top headliners and all the DJs.  The phrase "Coachella replacement" was thrown around more than once.  It just makes sense to go, and it's a lot easier and cheaper than a Coachella weekend, as much as I've always loved that festival.  A lot easier to get our friends together for it, and this year along with me & Carla it included Andrew & Heather, Noa, Vanessa, Jenn, Rachel, and the first time we met Max.  If nothing else it was a great weekend with friends in beer gardens.  But the music was great too, with a lot of bands that got much bigger after that, some bands that I was surprised to see they got, and a few bands that never showed up again (at least for a while). 

FYF Fest lends itself well to grazing and checking out new bands but the way they have it set up, with five stages and so many acts piled up on each other schedule-wise, there are some tough decisions to be made.  We saw only half of Cloud Nothings so we could get over to Chairlift, and we knew that was a choice we couldn't win.  I'd started getting into Cloud Nothings just a month or two before and their fury translated from album to stage.  I knew we were missing out by not seeing their whole set but somehow we also knew that they were only starting; There was no reason Chairlift couldn't be great.  They may not be best-suited to play in the middle of the afternoon in the middle of a dusty field but their music holds up.  It would have been a good set if the singer hadn't had a fit when one of her songs, which she was attempting to perform in Japanese, hadn't worked to her satisfaction and she stormed off the set, ending it early.  For what it was, it sounded fine to me.  She should have played it out.  Maybe they wouldn't have disappeared so quickly after that; Fucked Up was more grazing.  I liked that album they went big (relatively) with but I wasn't familiar with their most recent work, so it was enough to drop by and see if I could pick out enough to get a vibe from them but I think it was more of a stop in the beer garden and they just happened to be playing near there; the Pains of Being Pure at Heart was another band I was getting into, especially after their Coachella set and in the time leading up to this show, and they were good but they didn't exceed what I'd seen before.  I had high hopes for them to go big but that seemed to be the last anyone heard from them after that.  It's the worst thing about indie bands: they might get big (relatively) but it's often not for long and when they go away, they go all the way away; I adore Warpaint but they seem to fit in so well with these SoCal music festivals, it's easy to take them for granted.  After missing them for so long, it seems like they were everywhere all of a sudden.  We checked them out, maybe out of obligation, but the best thing about their set was some new tunes, a promise of new material soon, though not in the next year, which would mean they would come back, so it turned out to be a bit of an odd appearance, since they were in limbo; one of the high points for us were Sleigh Bells.  They became a favorite of mine after Carla got me into them, after I might have dismissed them as an over-loud flash-in-the-pan.  But I'm always glad that I know them well enough to check them out in concert, since they always bring the music and the form and the noise.  Loud, crazy, loud.  They definitely -- defiantly -- did not disappoint and could easily have headlined themselves.  Probably won't be long; Quicksand had been around for a while and I knew enough about them to know that their reuniting was a minor big deal.  We drifted over just to check them more just to say we did.  I probably should have done more homework but as it is I didn't get much from it. Then they disappeared from me again; M83 were a big deal at the time, having a hit on KROQ and in the world, so it made them an odd choice for a headliner, especially since in that short amount of time they were also a bigger name than pretty much the entire rest of the bill.  I would have thought they'd be a little too chill for the show, especially one with so many punk or punk-like bands.  Playing at night must have helped, but apparently they were appreciated enough that I couldn't get close enough to want to give them more than just a few minutes, and what I saw wasn't too different from what I would expect; we went over to Simian Mobile Disco, two DJs as far as I know, and they sounded great and they had a fantastic light show, but it was so packed with a whole field of people losing their minds, that we just had to move on.  There's such a thing as too much sometimes; we cruised by Refused on the way out, and I know I should have some knowledge and respect for them but it was too far for me to go at the time; we probably should have seen the Growlers, who played at the end, and Redd Kross earlier in the day, but just didn't get there.

Another great thing about having a great festival so local is getting in and out.  On Sunday we tried to make an attempt at rushing to get in, in time to see King Khan and the Shrines.  We got there just barely in time for the beginning of the set,then spent the whole time in the nearby beer garden with the others.  Last time we all saw them was an all-out dance fest but this time it seemed more acceptable to just enjoy them with a drink and each other and conserve our energy.  They sounded every bit as fun as they always are and I hope that they got some bodies moving in their crowd, even if it wasn't us this time. Cursive, who played at the same time, probably wouldn't have done any more for us either; I was a late-comer to Against Me!, following everyone else in on New Wave, but I never saw them on that tour or before that show.  I think it was also early in the tour for them since Tom/Laura had his/her gender-reassignment but that didn't seem to affect the crowd in the least.  For anyone who didn't know, it might have looked weird, though it wasn't too strange for a rock band and especially in L.A.  What mattered is that they rocked as hard as anyone out there, if not harder, and they sounded great.  There were a few tunes I didn't recognize so they must have been appeasing old fans or being adventurous and trying out new songs.  Whatever it was, I'm now a fan of their live shows.  If they always play like that, Tom/Laura can decide whatever in the world he/she wants to be; mid-Sunday was a really tough decision: not just one conflict but four at the same time: Paul Banks or Atlas Sound or Glass Candy or Dinosaur Jr.  We went with Dinosaur.  And I thought I might regret it.  I've always respected J. Mascus and I know he can rock a guitar (if not playing as an entire band), I've just been unable to get past his voice and the songs I've heard, in the admittedly limited time I've given them, haven't often grabbed me at first pass.  But I figured I had some kind of obligation to see them, if only just to say that did.  And I found out that not only was I wrong, but I was more wrong than I have ever been.  I should have been into Dinosaur years ago, and I should have worshiped them.  Not only did they play some songs I didn't realize that I would recognize but they played "Out there", which I've always loved in spite of J.'s voice and which I didn't think they'd do since they didn't record it with Lou, and a cover of "Just Like Heaven" and a whole lot of other songs that I didn't even have to be familiar with to love and make me want to jump up and down and scream and pledge my allegiance to them.  In short, they burned the place down.  Not only possibly the best set out there that weekend but maybe one of the best sets I've seen in years and years.   Absolutely incredible.  And of course they did it effortlessly, because of course they did this all the time, whether you're a fan or not.  All within the allotted time-frame of a music festival.  And with Uncle Hank Rollins sitting at the side of the stage, absorbing the whole thing along with us (though not jumping up and down like we were).  And it turns out Paul Banks didn't do any Interpol stuff anyway; I have to admit to not always being a gigantic Bright Eyes fan, but I have a chunk of their music and I was curious to see Oberst in his old punk band, with the Desaparecidos.  They sounded a lot heavier and louder than I would have thought. That was all I got out of them, though; we stopped in to see Liars, which I've heard about, though what I've heard has been amazingly inconsistent.  I'm pretty picky with my avaunt-garde and noise-rock and I haven't had much reason to give them time.  Their set sounded fine.  But I continue on with most of what I know of them being that Karen O wrote "Maps" about that guy.  That would be enough; Health are local, and they seemed to be doing a lot of the festivals for a while, but they seemed to be at the end of their span at that show.  We'll probably see the band members elsewhere later on; as much as I try, I just can't care much for Yeasayer. They were a buzz band for a while, and they always seem to be placed highly at fests, but I can't help but lump them in with Animal Collective and Dirty Projectors and stuff that I like less exponentially the more I listen to it.  Whatever it is in those pieces, they just don't fit with me.  But we had an open space in the schedule on our way to something else and we gave them a chance.  Still nothing for me there; we stayed in the beer garden for Beirut too and they did just as much for me but it had also been a long day. Their sound is a little more comfortable but I still didn't think of them enough to check them out outside of a festival.  We also didn't see the Faint, who played at the end, though we heard a bit of Turbonegro while we were leaving.  It makes me wonder how they determine the placement of these bands on the line-up.  At least a few of those can draw a good-sized crowd, even if I'd be ready to leave.  FYF Fest has so much to offer: a chance to say good-bye to some familiar bands or hello to some new favorites, a beautiful day at a (finally) well-run festival, great food trucks and beer, and most importantly, a day out with friends.


Sleigh Bells' set-list:
"Demons"
"Crown on the Ground"
"Kids"
"True Shred Guitar"
"Riot Rhythm"
"Infinity Guitars"
"End of the Line"
"Born to Lose"
"Comeback Kid"
"Never Say Die"
"Tell 'Em"
"A/B Machines"

Dinosaur Jr.'s set-list:
"Thumb"
"The Wagon"
"Back to Your Heart"
"Budge"
"Out There"
"Feel the Pain"
"Training Ground" (Deep Wound cover)
"Just Like Heaven" (The Cure cover)
"Freak Scene"
"Kracked"
"Sludgefeast"
"Gargoyle"

Against Me!'s set-list:
"Transgender Dysphoria Blues"
"Cliché Guevara"
"I Was a Teenage Anarchist"
"Don't Lose Touch"
"White Crosses"
"True Trans Soul Rebel"
"Turn Those Clapping Hands Into Angry Balled Fists"
"Drinking with the Jocks"
"New Wave"
"Pretty Girls (The Mover)"
"Better Days"
"Black Me Out"
"I Still Love You Julie"
"Pints of Guinness Make You Strong"
"Sink, Florida, Sink" 

Warpaint's set-list: 
Instrumental jam
"Bees"
"Burgundy"
"Undertow"
"Elephants"
"Baby"

King Khan and the Shrines's set-list:
Introduction music
"Outta Harm's Way"
"Land of the Freak"
"So Wild"
"Bite My Tongue"
"I Wanna Be a Girl"
"Shivers Down My Spine""
"Luckiest Man"

Cloud Nothing's set-list:
"Fall In"
"Separation"
"Stay Useless"
"Cut You"
"Wasted Days"
"No Future/No Past"

Old 97’s, August 31 at the El Rey

I've seen the Old 97's a number of times, enough to be pretty good with not needing to pile up more times (especially since I haven't gotten any of their new material in quite some years) but much for my love for them comes from my passion for Too Far To Care. They sure have a lot of great songs but that album could be the start and finish of them for me. There's not a song on that album that I don't dig.  And there's something about the album as a whole, maybe the production, that I just really like.  The sound is forward but not aggressive, and it all gels into a rousing but comforting mix.  So when they said they were going to tour playing the whole album, I knew I'd be in.  As far as I'm concerned, that's the ultimate Old 97's gig.  Playing the whole album, as is the trend with a number of bands lately, is a bit of a trick, since, as a lot of albums have the best or most aggressive songs at the front, if the band is playing the album in chronological order, they have to play those songs up front, while they're still warming up.  Some bands get around this by playing the album out of order (Sebadoh), first doing B-sides (Pixies) or a greatest-hits of the rest (Weezer, Peter Gabriel), or dropping in other songs as they play (Catherine Wheel), but there's something admirable about just jumping right in to it, if they can pull it off.  Since the crowd is there for a album, it just makes sense to come out and tear right into it straight-off, but there's something to be said about shaking the dust off and being energized enough to get it to sound as good as it should.  Of course, "Timebomb" had to open the set and the show, as it opens the album, and while it was good because it's a great song, there was something stilted and forced and maybe even cold about it. This song, one of the band's best, is what they most often close the night with, which they've been doing for years.  They play that song when they've been on fire and just one push to really put that song over the edge to finish the night, and it's a great way to end. Maybe not a great way to start.  They didn't really catch a spark until a few songs in, but once they had it they really had it.  A shame that they had to sacrifice a few of those great songs from the beginning of that album to warming up but it was still great to hear them, the few that they don't already play frequently (as they've played a lot of that album at shows I've seen anyway).  Then a break and for the second set a slew of apparently new songs, since I wasn't familiar with many of them, and the band seemed glad to be doing stuff that wasn't so worn but they seemed to be happy to play the hell out of so much of their best stuff.  As always they played energetic alt-country that veers a lot harder toward rock, not bound by any easy classification except as a great live band.  And to show that they could really do it, and do it better, they closed with "Timebomb", playing with it with more energy and enthusiasm and thrill than before, taking it beyond just being a great song.  The only bummer about the show is that I don't think I need to see another Old 97's show since I can't imagine how they could do anything to top that one (though there's some new material I could eventually get around to).  Before the show Carla & I met up with Rick and some friends but lost them when the show started.

Concrete Blonde, August 29 at the Troubadour

At this point Concrete Blonde can pretty much do whatever they please.  They had the big, hit song in the '80s and it gave them the money and fanbase for their own independence, even until today (probably since they didn't get ruined by drugs or record companies).  They never reached the same heights from back then in the time since but they've still been able to put out good records and tour whenever they've felt like it.  The group might have broken up a few times but since it's always just been pretty much Johnette and Jim, they can get back together and do as they like under the band name ​(​though Johnette has done plenty of commendable stuff under her own name or with other collaborators).  Lately they'd been doing informal concert sessions that they would broadcast online and I don't know how a real-world tour connects with that, or why they would even leave their home to tour if they didn't want to but it seemed they wanted to get out on the road for a few shows, including a tiny club date in Hollywood (still).  Of course there have been periods in their history when they've been able to play much bigger places but I'd like to say that playing such a small venue was by their choice rather than a shrunken fanbase.  They still play like it's their heyday and Johnette's voice only gets better with age.  It's completely just the two of them, along with Gabriel, who's been Johnette's drummer for quite a while.  They have no more interest in taking it slow in their advanced ages than they ever did and they still play like they have something to prove, even though by now they don't.  They mixed up their set with a few new tunes along with their old ones, knowing what the crowd wants but indulging themselves with a few things they've done recently.  Just to show that they're under no one's control, they did a Midnight Oil cover, a weird crossover with a contemporary from three decades ago, and it wouldn't have seemed like it worked on paper but they brought it.  They might have even played it more ferociously than the originators of the song.  That it was an evening of a mish-mash of songs, not all originals, it worked.  With a Heads song that Johnette sang on (sadly forgotten by anyone but me) and most of my favorite tunes by them (missing "Little Conversations" but only if if it had been a more sedate show), there's not much I would have changed about their choice of a set-list.  This is one of the bands I know much better than Carla does, and though she was of course familiar with them, she'd never seen them, and she was impressed, both how they've held up and also by Johnette's majesty.  And of course the band played "Joey," early in the set, just to note it and then get on with the rest of what they wanted to do.

Concrete Blonde's set-list:
"Rosalie"
"Beds Are Burning" (Midnight Oil cover)
"I Know The Ghost"
"Joey"
"God Is a Bullet"
"Damage I've Done" (The Heads song)
"Take Me Home"
"Someday"
"Mexican Moon" (with Johnette on lead guitar, Jim on bass)
"Ghost Riders in the Sky" (Stan Jones cover)
"True"
"Everybody Knows" (Leonard Cohen cover)
"Happy Birthday"
"Roxy"
"Les Cœurs Jumeaux" (with Bernadette Colomine sharing lead vocals w/Johnette)
"As Tears Go By" (Marianne Faithfull cover)
"Caroline"
"Ghost of a Texas Ladies Man"
"Heal It Up"
"Scene of a Perfect Crime"
"Run, Run, Run"
"100 Games of Solitaire"
"Bloodletting (The Vampire Song)"

"The Real Thing"
"Still in Hollywood"

The Aquabats, July 14 at the House of Blues San Diego

I've gone to the San Diego comic con every year since I was 16 and the last few years I've been able to meet up with Seth, who's there reporting for CBR, and we party a few nights after the con is over for the day.  We both check the local concert listings when he's here but rarely does anything come up.  (There have been chances at seeing Soundgarden and the Toadies while he's been here but those would have involved a trek up to L.A.  Better to just keep it in San Diego.)  This year we noticed that the Aquabats were playing downtown during the convention.  As it turned out, it happened to be promotion for the Aquabats' TV show (which I knew nothing about) and Seth got to interview a few of the band-members for CBR during the day, which he's done before but this time they put him on the guest-list for the show.  We were planning to go anyway so he put me as his +1 and we were set.  Carla was going to hang out with Dayna that night, until Dayna said that she had an event for work she'd have to go to, but maybe she could meet up with Carla beforehand.  We were communicating about this over text as I was on my way to the show, then when we got there it turned out that Dayna's work-event was the Aquabats show, so all we really had to do was get Carla in.  Turns out it was just about chatting up the guy with the guest-list and it was that easy.  We figured it was just getting into a show, no big deal (except for getting in for free, which was awesome enough), though they were shuffling us in to the overhead balcony area.  Turns out we were on the VIP list.  Well, okay.  And that included an exclusive area away from the pit crowd down below.  Cool.  And also a catered buffet of mini-pizzas and munchies.  Cool, we hadn't eaten beforehand.  Then... an open bar.  Oh, shit.  Unlimited drinks with this crowd... it was on.  There's always an intention to be careful when drinking at an open bar, just because too much of that kind of good thing can't always lead to all good, but after three or four free drinks, all that good intention goes out the window.  Seth and I, along with Dayna's boyfriend Carlos, stayed up at the standing area, easier to hang out and be dudes and, especially, to get more drinks.  (Lincoln met up with us later, and I ran into Trent and Jonah, some of my HeroClix buddies from Burbank.)  The girls sat below, not knowing how much we were drinking, thinking they were the ones tying it on with the two or three drinks we brought them.  We were putting back shots and mixing drinks and talking loudly and being rowdy and drinking as much as we could, challenging how many drinks they would give us, just like any sensible person would at an open bar. Roll The Tanks opened and they were perfect in every way for an opening band: they were background music for waiting for the main band to take the stage.  And for getting a good pace for drinking.  The only thing I remember about the band is that they were a pretty straight-forward rock band, which was an interesting choice to pair with the Aquabats, who were in front of a lot of con geeks.  It's hard to see if the Aquabats were there as only promotion for their TV show, like it was an event for the convention, or if they were treating it like a standard show.  Because I don't remember a thing about the performance itself. Nothing sticks out in my mind that it was any different from the wacky show that I've seen them put on before, and that's significant enough, and enough to say that it was a good Aquabats show.  But I probably remembered more about what we were drinking than anything the 'Bats did on stage.  So maybe less than a performance and more a night out with good, fun friends, and getting our (free) drink on.  Whatever it was, we had a great time, and that's what it's about.

Grant Lee Buffalo, June 28 at the Echo

I missed out on Grant Lee Phillips in the mid-’90s.  I just wasn’t anywhere near the acoustic side of the “alternative” rock world.  Not enough loud guitars for me.  And he’s actually a pretty good singer, so that threw me.  Probably a little too earnest for me as well.  But that was totally Carla’s world back then and she's gotten me more into that.  Phillips survived the ‘90s and while he was never considered a big name enough to stick around in the alt-rock world after those boom days, he was big enough then that he could do tour now and people will come out for it.  I don’t know what kind of crowd he could have pulled at his peak but now he’s doing venues like the Echo though at least he packed it out.  And it was a dedicated crowd.  He probably originally had a slightly older fanbase back in the day since he didn’t have the kind of pop music that teeny-boppers chased, and he’s probably lost some of his fans to the trappings of age but at least when that crowd comes out for a show now they’re respectful and appreciative.  Phillips still makes appearances, notably at Largo, but this was apparently part of a rare, short tour.  I wasn’t familiar with most of the music but I recognized the vibe.  Yes, I knew “Mockingbird.”  And I realized I probably should have been paying more attention back then.  I wouldn’t say that I’m mellowing in my old age and gravitating toward more quiet music but I have a greater appreciation of more structured, delicate songwriting now. Sometimes I can catch some things that I missed, one of the many things that Carla has aided me with.  It’s amazing that such a tuneful, earnest singer-songwriter could get traction at any time, but that’s how much of a pull being considered “alternative” had two decades ago.  I’d rather think it’s because the man had and has talent.  It’s happened to some songwriters since but the forms of music shift and age is important (both in the performer and the audience).  Phillips’ time might be over but at least there are those who carry some appreciation for what he made as well as a memory of a time when he had as much a chance as anyone at getting it out to a larger audience.

Toadies, May 19 at the Roxy

Carla says the Toadies are a Texas Pixies. It’s hard to argue. They’re from Texas and their music is as fried as a hot Texas day. To say there they’re a step from the Pixies would also mean they’re a shorter step from Nirvana, who got a lot of bands that sounded like the Pixies signed 20 years ago. Nearly every band sounded like the Pixies in the ‘90s but not all of them did much with it. At least the Toadies had a hit song, though their reunion wasn’t as big a deal as their forefathers’. The downside to some of those bands getting back together now is that sometimes their legend, such as it is, didn't grow and now they play much smaller places.  Some bands get bigger while they're away, some don't. The Toadies are probably widely regarded as one-hit wonders, and it’s doubtful even a lot of their old fans know they got back together, much less that they broke up in the first place. Which is a shame, since they were about a lot more than “Possum Kingdom” (the "So help me, Jesus" song). But they still made an effort to reunite and tour, and while they might have wished to play somewhere bigger than the Roxy, and even deserved to, it was great for us since we got to see a great rock band in a space close enough that we were nearly all sweating on each other. It could almost feel like a secret show. It paid off that those fans who stayed in the loop about the band got into such an electrified show. They, both the band and the fans, seemed to appreciate it. It helps that the Toadies still sounded great, as good as they were back in the day; the extra years on them just galvanized them. They were certainly more enthused and happy to be there than most bands that have reunited, those usually sick of each other again after a few months of being together, but that could also be Todd's rough-and-tumble charm or his appreciation that anyone showed up at all. From the sight of the ages of those around us it was easy to tell that the crowd was pretty clearly original fans, even if that was every Toadies fan left in L.A. packed in there. The band deserved to have picked up some fans in the time they were gone -- it worked for the Pixies -- but what might work in Texas or the other parts of the country might not work as well in Southern California anyway. Of course they played “Possum Kingdom,” knowing that their fair-weather fans that knew them only for that song have already left, and playing it like it was just another one of their songs, not relying on it for the climax of the show (no, that would be “Tyler,” as any good fan knows) but also not being pissy about having to play it like they were back in the day. That night it fit with the rest of their stuff, as that song actually did when it was big, showing that it wasn’t them trying to write a hit song but rather being another one of their songs that just happened to get big because it’s pretty good and that’s the kind of thing people were into at the time.  Maybe it's different now. For that night, being only one generation removed from Nirvana didn't feel too bad. Their fans might be into them in particular or just slaves to hard-rocking “alternative” bands from the ‘90s but Carla and I fit into both categories anyway. The Toadies may not ever gain new fans but at least the fans that are still holding on get to see this band doing what they do best, and not swiping from the Pixies.

Toadies' set-list:
"Heel"
"I Come From The Water”
"Push The Hand"
"Happyface"
"No Deliverance"
"Summer of the Strange"
"Sweetness"
"Paper Dress"
"Away"
"Waterfall"
"Backslider"
"Animals"
"Song I Hate"
"400 Bucks" (Reverend Horton Heat cover)
"Little Sin"
"Beside You"
"Possum Kingdom"

"Hell in High Water"
"Tyler"
"I Burn"
"Rattler's Revival"