Skip to main content

The Concerts: 2009

For some reason, I don't have any record of any concerts in the first quarter of 2009.  Granted, it's most likely due to the winter season making travel a bit of a pain in the ass, but it's still surprising.  Looks like I made up for it later in the year, however.  This year had some of the biggest travels in my life; at different times during the year, I was in St. Petersburg & St. Pete's Beach (Florida), Oakland & Los Angeles & Indio (California), New York City, Cleveland, Chicago, and lots of Detroit and Grand Rapids.  Sometimes, I miss all the journeys...and then I remember the solitude and I miss it lots less.  At least there were these shows to pass the time:

The Faint / Ladytron [Metro, Chicago 4.4]
Coachella Music & Arts Festival [Empire Polo field, Indio 4.17/4.18/4.19]
Franz Ferdinand / Born Ruffians [Clutch Cargo’s, Pontiac 5.3]
Holy Fuck / Crocodiles [Magic Stick, Detroit 5.29]
The Tragically Hip [The Fillmore Detroit 5.30]
Fischerspooner / Ssion [Majestic Theater, Detroit 5.31]
The Church [Magic Bag, Ferndale 6.25]
Pitchfork Music Festival [Union Park, Chicago 7.18/7.19]
The Decemberists [Royal Oak Music Theater 8.11]
The Donnas [Peabody’s Downunder, Cleveland 8.14]
Adult. [Magic Stick, Detroit 8.15]
Steely Dan [Motor City Casino, Detroit 9.5]
Death [Magic Stick, Detroit 9.25]
Manic Street Preachers [Majestic Theatre, Detroit 10.2]
Gossip / MEN [Majestic Theatre, Detroit 10.15]
Wilco / Liam Finn [Hill Auditorium, Ann Arbor 10.16]
Electric Six / Local H [The Intersection, Grand Rapids 12.29]

Lots of good memories of the '09 shows: being reminded of the eternal greatness of The Tragically Hip and The Church; seeing a stellar show from The Decemberists (including their killer cover of "Crazy On You" by Heart); looking around at the well-off crackers at the Steely Dan show and hating myself for being there; finally seeing Manic Street Preachers and Gossip live; going to my first concert with Coco in Ann Arbor, which she loved, even though she took a quick nap during
the show.

If I were to look at concert going from a rational perspective, there would be no way I'd go to shows -- standing for hours, legs and back cramping, surrounded by short people in various states of alteration -- but there's always the hope of a moment or two of musical transcendence, and most of the aforementioned shows got me there.  I'm still going, aren't I?

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

NBC -- Never Believe Contracts

Whatever side you're falling on in the recent NBC late-night "deck chairs on the Titanic " shuffle, you have to admit it's been good comedy for all parties involved. While Letterman and Craig Ferguson have been sharp (especially Letterman, who has been gleeful in his "I told you so" vitriol), the best bits have come from Leno and O'Brien. Evidence: It's hard to follow all the angles here, but two things are clear: NBC violated Leno's contract (guaranteeing the 10pm slot), and NBC didn't violate O'Brien's contract (which made no time slot guarantees). So it's not hard to see who the loser here will be. O'Brien won't get the show he wants, Leno will step into a hollow echo of his past success, and tens of millions of dollars will be up in the air. Only Jimmy Fallon will continue to gestate his talent relatively unmolested, and his security is merely a function of the low expectations of his time slot. Meanwhile, CBS (a
Post a Comment
Read more

"The Silver Gun" by Robert Palmer (1983)

I mean...Urdu? Seriously, Urdu . On an already eclectic and worldly album -- Pride , from 1983 -- "The Silver Gun" closes a chapter in Robert Palmer's career by singing a song about a horse in a language spoken daily by over 100 million people. The liquid bass line and propulsive electronics set out a bedrock for Palmer to ping phrasings rather out of place in Western music, askew astride even the peripatetic minimalism of the rest of the record. Somehow, in the middle of Michigan's Appalachia, I had this on vinyl a few years before the CD era officially commenced. It was an album of effort -- even the cover, a pointillism-and-bronze work, had Palmer's head barely above the water -- but the stitches didn't show to my pre-adolescent eyes and ears. In a career marked by zigs and zags, Pride and "The Silver Gun" were most certainly Other, and for a kid that felt like he didn't belong much of anywhere, it was nice to have those discrete feeling
Post a Comment
Read more

"I'll Drive You Home"

Upon reflection, I’ve had a fortunate life in the area of work. As a freshly minted teenager, I would visit Evergreen Park Grocery and dream of someday working there like my father did, and at the age of 14, I got $2/hour to live out that dream, such as it was. From there, I yearned to try other occupations, from record stores to teaching, and I’d be chuffed to tell Young Erick that both of those things happened in due course. ( Oh, and Young Erick, one of them got you to meet David Bowie, and one of them got you to own houses and cars, so I’ll let you ponder on which one was better. ) I even got to DJ a bit here and there, and while it never hit the heights of a professional radio gig, it was certainly better than the summer I played preset cassettes on my boom box for a nerd camp dance while my unrequited crush stayed in her room. What I never crossed off my professional life list was acting, either regular or voice, but while I still yearn for that big breakthrough -- seriously, ask
Post a Comment
Read more