Bringing the Drama

last year i spent birthday week in Europe, then in Charleston. this year i’m not going to be anywhere but home and work. however, i have some plans lined up to do some cool things. last night started the week off with a fantastic Hornets home win. today at work wasn’t all that great, but lately it’s been the same old stuff. i’m doing some work, but i’m still inexperienced (IMO) at it, so it’s frustrating at times. today was not without it’s moments though. BO Guy came up on his way to someone else’s desk this afternoon and told me to “cheer up”. then asked me if anyone has told me that before. i wasn’t sure if he was joking, and i couldn’t tell by the look on his face either, so i just said “not lately.” weird.

i slept late AGAIN this morning. i’ve been having issues waking up before 6:30 lately. this morning though i hadn’t gone to bed until after 1 last night cause i was so amped from the game then i decided i would watch part of the replay when it came on ESPN starting at 1 am. dumb move. i am getting no less than 6 hours of sleep a night, no matter when i go to bed, which is nice, but also makes me stay late at work. anyway, i left work late and skipped the gym so i could get grad school hw done. yeah, part of birthday week is grad school hw due Tuesday and i have a test on Thursday. so i got this big problem done (took me 3 pages) and can make up the other one tomorrow. i’m going to hopefully watch the video pertaining to the problem before i go to bed.

the week other than the class stuff is going to be awesome. the bulldog on wednesday, rebirth on saturday, maybe even the new fast and the furious movie on friday. hopefully the class stuff won’t make me alter any plans, esp the bulldog. i need some new pint glasses and punches on my keychain.

the last time i remember wearing my gold Hornets playoff shirt to a game was when they lost to the Celtics. i washed it and have worn it since then, but not to a game. tonight though was the Spurs, and with the way the Hornets were playing they were going to need all the help they could get. considering i got the shirt way back at game 5 of the playoff series against the Spurs (which the Hornets won….the game not the series) i figured the shirt could do no wrong. i honestly thought the Hornets would lose though.

the game was back and forth throughout it seemed. there were some fantastic plays including an alley oop from Chris Paul to Julian Wright that just about brought the house down. a good hustle play as Chris Paul fought for a rebound and was by himself against 4 Spurs. Julian Wright came running back as David West decided to jog back and watch from the half court line. CP found Julian for a tough layup and got the foul called. it was beautiful. the game came down to some clutch FTs in the end, and the Hornets ended up winning by 4.

i don’t know if it was just because it was the Spurs, but if the Hornets can play like this the rest of the year (10 more reg season games) they can get back into the group of teams with homecourt advantage. when they get Peja back that will help. 3 point shooting has been woeful since he’s been gone.

also, i went for the first time with my friend Zach, and considering the result, he is on the list for people to take to playoff games. i told him that as we walked back to the car. also as a footnote, Eva Longoria was at the game, and i (along with most others at the Arena) booed loudly when they showed her on the screen.

Ryan Adams Road Trip Part 2, Night 2

have you ever been to a show where the entire crowd seems like they’re into it? i’m not talking just the people up front, but the people in the back too. it’s loud the entire time and there’s a certain buzz in the air. when i went to see Radiohead back in 2003, that’s what it seemed like the UNO Arena was. everyone stood from the moment the lights went down and the band put on a performance to match the intensity of the crowd. last Friday night in ATL for the ‘final’ Cardinals show, that’s what it was like, only in the gorgeous Fox Theatre.

getting there was pretty easy, but we walked around for a while looking for a place to eat. we met up with a couple of CJ’s friends at hit this highfalutin restaurant that had 40,000 different wines but only 6 different kinds of beer. i struck up a conversation with Clint all about RA and live shows and setlist choices and we were lost in our own world while the girls talked about something else. with it being a Friday during Lent, i ordered a portobello mushroom sandwich that wasn’t too bad. the service took a while, and it didn’t take much to get some of us anxious. after the bill was paid we left to walk the three or four blocks to the Fox.

Adriene was sitting with me, and i was kind of nervous not to go all fanboy, but she’s crazy about U2, so i think it’s relative. we walked down to the seats i got for free and i was amazed at how pretty the inside of the Fox was. its got more than the ornate theatres like in Birmingham or the old Saenger in NOLA. the ceiling was bright blue with stars, the seats were covered with custom coverings, and each armrest (at least where we were sitting) had the names of people who donated to restore the Fox. (Adriene gave me a history lesson after i went “who are these people?”)

the buzz in the theatre was palpable. everyone knew this was the last show, and everyone was hoping the band would make it count. the lights went down, and the roses lit up, and the theme song from Shaft started. the crowd started cheering and then the band walked out to Shaft! i thought that was great. they took their spots on stage and immediately kicked into Magick.

every song was ended with a roar from the crowd. we were hoping for a song out of the ordinary, and we got Dear Chicago and Blue Hotel early on. not exactly Hard Way To Fall but DC has been one of my favorites for a while, so it was good to hear it again. they poured through the heavy hitters for the first set; Cold Roses, Easy Plateau, Magnolia Mountain, Peaceful Valley. it was amazing. after the night before in Mobile thinking Ryan was just kind of dialing it in, tonight i could tell he was locked in. every song was played and sung with gusto, the performance was matching the intensity of the crowd.

the 2nd half i thought was where things slowed down when they started playing the hits (CPMU, OMSC, Stars Go Blue). the thing was about those songs, was that was the first time i’ve heard a crowd at a RA show sing loud enough together where if Ryan had stepped away from the mic the crowd could have taken over. the singing was so loud, it was incredible. i keep using incredible to describe the show, but it fits. it was one of those moments where you felt a part of something bigger than yourself, and for that to happen at a concert is hard. it felt amazing.

when they started Goodnight Rose, everyone seemed to realize that it would be the last song. the jams were fantastic, and at the end the volume of the roar rose even more. the band stood at the front of the stage to soak it all in. after they left, Dust In The Wind started. i thought it was a perfect choice, much like the Shaft theme song was the perfect choice to come out to. everyone i was with, including me, felt the show merited being a final show. no massive disappointment like the Nickel Creek shows were. the band poured everything they had into the last show, and if it was in fact their last show as a band, they can be proud of it.

listen to the show here.

it rained here, pretty much all day. work wasn’t that great. BO Guy drama, realizing i was doing something the hard way only to realize later i could have been using a short cut, etc. plus, i took the following picture one year ago today. yeah.

actually, it wasn’t that bad. i went to the gym after work, even though it was raining and i wanted to just go home and worked out for the first time in at least two weeks. it was tough, but i didn’t see CGG or anything. i made it home in time to watch the basketball games and ended the evening buying some usb powered siren lights from woot. word.

today i read that Wilco is coming out with a concert movie next month. even more exciting was that they are using footage of various shows they did last spring. one of those locations was NOLA. i happened to be at both of the Wilco shows last year. i kind of started to hate general admission shows after that, because the possibility for a claustrophobic freak out was great. i really don’t like being that close to people (less than 6 inches of space if i remember correctly) for more than 2 hours, but i had to keep telling myself “it’s Wilco in a small venue, this will be over soon.” two nights in a row of standing in a packed room for 3+ hours…..but it was for a good cause. the SoCo and coke Jacob got me drinking might have helped also. anyway, i didn’t take many pictures, just because it was so crowded, but i did take a couple. i remember being close to a video camera, but i knew they were webcasting the 2nd show, so i didn’t think they were filming for a dvd. it’ll be cool to watch it and see if we are in the movie. doubtful, but you never know. the part from the NOLA show they have in the trailer though is behind where we were standing….so maybe. here’s a picture from the 2nd night:

i watched the trailer and realized the picture on the cover is from a bridge on I-65 north of Mobile. i drive over it every time i go up to Clemson. it’s a cool bridge and it’s kind of out in the middle of nowhere. i thought it was a great choice for a dvd cover.

yesterday was a sad day for me as a fan of sports in NOLA. in the afternoon, i got a call from the Saints ticket office about season tickets. i’ve been on the waiting list since 2006, but had only gotten a call to buy Voodoo season tickets. a couple of my friends had gotten calls from the Saints a couple of weeks ago with plenty of options for tickets including the cheap seats that are roughly $300 or under per year. i did not get a call though, so i figured i was too far down the waiting list to get a call this year. then yesterday a guy called me and told me i had come up on the waiting list and he had tickets for me, here’s how the conversation went:

Saints ticket guy: “your name came up on the waiting list and you can buy season tickets”
me: “really?!?”
STG: “yes. i can put you in the club level which includes access to the club and tickets in 227 for only $2150 per ticket.”
me: “ok. do you have anything cheaper?”
STG: “let me see, oh, i can get you tickets for $1350 per ticket.”
me: “is there anything less than $500?”
STG: “oh, let me see here. i can get you a single ticket for $330. that’ll get you in as a STH, off the waiting list, then next year i can help you get a 2nd ticket. you can sell this year’s tickets on the ticket exchange”
me: “hmm. i have Hornets STs already, i’m not really good with just one ticket.”
STG: “oh, well, our games are much different from Hornets games. you can definitely sell the ticket on TE.” (yeah, they are different. there are 8 Saints games and 41 Hornets games. TE jacks up the prices even if you try to sell it at face, because i’ve done that with Hornets tickets before. i wouldn’t want to deal with the hassle of going to a Saints game by myself, plus i think it’d be pretty difficult to sell just one ticket)
me: “where is that seat?”
STG: “section 6xx, row 37″ (the seats in the terrace at the Dome are very steep, row 37 would kind of be torture)
me: “oh, i’m going to have to pass.”
STG: “are you sure? you’ll be in the same situation next year unless seats come open.”
me: “i know, i’ll just have to hope the economy doesn’t improve before next year”
STG: “alright, have a good day”
me: “thanks, you too.”

i know i made the right decision, because obviously i want a PAIR of tickets, and i don’t have the kind of money to spend $2700 for 8 (not counting preseason) games. obviously i’m far enough down on the list that all they have left are the high roller tickets. my Hornets tickets are the 2nd cheapest you can buy, a lot cheaper than the Saints tickets i was offered, but i like them. plus i go to 40+ games, and it’s much less of a hassle. still though, it made me sick to turn down tickets after 2.5 years on the waiting list. i’ve waited this long though, i might as well make it count than jumping at the first chance that would cost me a ton of money. it’s more fun to have friends over to the house to watch a game on TV anyway.

last night on my way home from dinner with SS peeps at Sweet Peppers (totally overrated IMO), i stopped off at the grocery store to get some produce. i had borrowed a cloth shopping bag from a friend since i did not have my own. i really need to start keeping them in the car. i was only getting 4 things, so putting them all in the shopping bag wouldn’t be a big deal. it wasn’t the store’s official bag, but i figured it would not be an issue. i get up to the register and put the bag on top of my stuff saying “could you use this bag please?” the girl who was probably 21 or 22 looks confused. she thought i was buying the bag, but i said no, then she thought i wanted her to put the cloth bag into a plastic bag, i said no. i just wanted her to put my stuff into the cloth bag. she then scans three things and puts them in a plastic bag, but i was doing the check card thing and didn’t notice until she had already done it. then i say “you could use that bag you know?” she says “oh, i thought it was an apron! i’m sorry baby”. i don’t mind the ‘baby’ usage when it’s from an older lady, but not from a girl who’s younger than me. also, WHY would i be bringing an apron to the grocery store? i had bought a sixer of Abita Strawberry so she asked “i’m going to need to see your ID baby”. she goes to put the cloth bag in a plastic bag again, and i said “no, it’s a shopping bag. you can put stuff in it.” then she says “oh, okay, i’m really sorry baby, it’s late”. (it was about 8:20). she ended up putting my stuff in the cloth bag and i left without getting any plastic bags, but she ended up taking the plastic bag she had put my stuff in and throwing it away, so i’m not sure if i helped save the Earth, but at least i didn’t have to take it home with me.

i had hw due in my class this week, and i thought since the last hw assignment was due on a Thursday that this week’s would be too. i printed off the assignment yesterday and saw it was due yesterday. oops. for the first time this semester, the hw was relatively painless, so i was able to fax it before i left work yesterday. with the hw out of the way, i was able to go to dinner last night, and i’ll be able to go to the Hornets game tonight. another oversight was thinking the Hornets road trip started already, so i didn’t know there was a home game until yesterday. i’m usually more on top of things. at least it’s Wednesday already.

Ryan Adams Road Trip Part 2, Night 1

so after the drama of Wednesday was dealt with and Chad heroically stepped up to valiantly sit with me in the 5th row, the group going to the Mobile show met up at my house and left about 6:15. the plan initially was to get there in time to hit a sports bar and watch the Clemson game, but plans changed and it was just as well since Clemson wrecked my bracket and broke my heart. i didn’t see any of the game, but got score updates off of Chad’s phone. i was just in a fog between the Wednesday drama, the tension of the day at work, and then the game. i needed something to take my mind off it, and of course seeing RA live would work.

we got there much later than we thought, and ended up just going into the venue. no harrowing adventures of timing like the last time in Mobile or anything. Chad did bring his awesome camera, but foolishly decided to size things up before the show started. i say foolishly because of what happened next. a couple of security guys came over and told him he wouldn’t be able to take pictures during the show with such a great camera, and then tried to say something funny that wasn’t. more on them later. since we were so close i did snap some good pictures (like above), so things worked out on the photography front okay.

the lights go down, the show starts, and already the show is different from the previous two shows i had been to on this tour because the opener was I See Monsters. they did quite a few songs off Cardinology, which was cool, cause i think those songs sound better live than they do on the album. especially Born Into A Light, which was played last Thursday. the setlist was pretty vanilla though, again, which i expected, but i did get to hear a song i had never heard live before for the first time.

the first time i heard the song Evergreen, was from a 15 sec cell phone video my fellow RA super fan friend Marika sent me from a show at the Fillmore in SF (link to whole song from that show). that show saw the live debut of several new songs from Cardinology, which includes Evergreen. hearing it live for the first time made me think of when i got that cell phone video at 1 am, and how excited i was to hear a new song played live, even if it was only 15 seconds. the song sounded great in Mobile.

i thought they had really gotten into a groove by the time they played Evergreen. they had kicked out Mockingbird, Cold Roses (i love that song live), Shakedown, A Kiss Before I Go, and Peaceful Valley right in a row before playing Evergreen. i thought the feel had finally come around and they were locked in. the first part of the show i thought they were just kind of going through the motions, but when i thought they hit the groove, i thought they’d play a while. unfortunately i was wrong, because right after Evergreen they played Magick and the show was over. just like that. the house lights came up about 10:15. they had played straight through, which didn’t make it feel like a short show. and really, 23 songs (20 if you don’t count the Neal Casal songs) was fine. it had the cool moments like Jon Graboff’s pedal steel on Shakedown, so i can’t say i was disappointed. it didn’t feel packaged like Birmingham either, but it did feel like RA was just singing the songs and playing the music, hoping to get done; at least up until that string of songs i mentioned. i texted a couple of friends on the way out and told them i was not going in with many expectations for the ATL ‘final’ show.

a side note about the security guys, while they wanted to hassle Chad at the beginning of the show about his camera, they didn’t seem too interested in a girl throwing stuff on stage at RA. i forget when during the show it was, but this girl walks up the left aisle and threw what i thought were crumpled pieces of paper at RA, and then walked back to wherever she was sitting. the band didn’t stop or anything, but still. a couple of songs later the girl walks up the left aisle again and throws another crumpled piece of paper at RA. she made it behind his on stage monitors this time, which she exuberantly celebrated. she made it back to a seat, and then security said something to her. why didn’t they kick her ass out the first time it happened? i don’t know if she got kicked out, and i read later that she was throwing roses, but it could have been anything, and i thought security totally dropped the ball.

tonight begins Part 2 of the 2009 Ryan Adams road trip. from the first waking moments of today though i felt spent. it’s been a long week. the drama leading up to tonight’s show was mind bogglingly dumb. my 4th backup person to go with me bailed yesterday. here’s what happened, at least what i was told. on the way back from the BR show last week, i got into an argument with girl X over something about church and youth group. girl Y was driving, but was not involved. apparently in the two weeks since then, girl X has harbored bad feelings towards me, but instead of talking to me about it, has talked to girl Y. girl Y feels overwhelmed. girl Y was going to be my 4th backup for the show tonight, but emailed me yesterday to tell me she didn’t want to go anymore because she feels it would be hurting girl X’s feelings. not that she had too much going on at work, not that she didn’t have the money, it was that she really wanted to go but because of all that’s happened didn’t feel comfortable going to a concert with girl X. i’m not in high school anymore, and neither are girls X and Y. unfortunately, no amount of discussion could get girl Y to put everything aside and go have fun tonight. none of it makes any sense to me. when there’s a bigger picture going on (like carpooling to work, or going to a concert) i can put those things on hold in spite of how i feel to still accomplish the bigger picture.

coming through in the clutch though, Chad’s going to accompany me in the 5th row. expect some badass pictures as a result.

last night i went to a show by myself in NOLA for the first time in almost 4 years. there are pros and cons for me to go by myself. i don’t like going to a show of people i don’t know without anyone to talk to. i had no problem going to see Ryan Adams in Houston by myself, cause sometimes i like not having to worry about geeking out if a certain song’s played or if something bad happens at a show, then i have to explain it and/or feel embarrassed about it. incidentally, the last time i went to a show by myself in NOLA was to see RA. full circle i guess. last night though was Ten Out Of Tenn, a group of 10 Nashville musicians touring together. i asked around but no one could go. so i went, parked the car, grabbed a pastry at starbucks, and walked in about 7:25 for an 8:00 show. it was in the Parish room at the HOB, and i’ve seen a lot of shows there get crowded, so i didn’t know if one of the musicians would have a really strong following. i walked in though and the place was sparsely populated. even at the peak of the show it might have had 75 people. i sat down on a bench and sent texts to people while i waited. kind of tough to pass the time with no one to talk to. i’m thankful for the friends that texted back!

they were selling High Life for $2.25 a can was the bar special for the night, so that was kind of awesome. i stopped by the merch table before the show to scope out what they had, and they pretty much only had cds. they had a special to buy all 10 cds plus a compilation for $55. luckily they took credit cards, because i only brought $7 in cash with me (another reason i was stoked about the $2.25 High Life). i thought the $55 deal was good, but i needed to hear these guys before i bought anything.

i was wondering how the show would go, with 10 people all playing their own stuff, would there be set breaks, would they have to tear down the stage, would each person get 10 minutes? how it worked though was better than all of that. they all played, the whole time, and just rotated who sang. various members were up in different combinations and played different instruments. i loved that sense of community. you could tell they all genuinely respected one another’s music, and there was a good reason. they were ALL good. really, i thought each of them were great, some more than others. i kind of have a crush on Butterfly Boucher after the show. she and Matthew Perryman Jones were on stage seemingly all night playing guitar or bass, and each of them sang their own songs too. Andy Davis got the crowd to sing part of his song, which was a challenge cause there weren’t that many people. it was funny when he first did it. Katie Herzig’s voice was really good. i love hearing amazing voices live. i think the highlight of the show was KS Rhoads leading the band in “The Bayonet and the Cigarette”. it was awesome. very bluesy and raw feel, punctuated by him playing harmonica then freestyling at the end.

i was most excited to see Griffin House, but after his first song i got a bad impression. he did a war protest song, but the lyrics made me want to have a talk with him. i was talking with blog friend Mandy today, about how protest songs now just seem like they’re written to be cool. there’s plenty of war protest songs from the 60s, and the war now is about so much more than what the song was saying. it just came off as arrogant to me. at least that was my first impression. his 2nd song was good, and i left with a good overall feeling about him, but that first song bothered me.

during the last song (MPJ closed) i walked over to the merch table and bought the $55 deal. i felt it was worth it, cause i liked more than 5 of the people enough to buy their cd, and alone the cds were $10, so really i was doing it for the economic sense. plus i like supporting artists at a show, cause i know they make more money selling merch and touring than if i buy the cd somewhere else. after the show was finished, i got my parking validated (ridiculously awesome deal apparently not many people know about) and walked back to my car and made it home by 11. not a bad night at all.