10 years ago

I turned 33 last week. 33 really didn't feel any older than 32 until I remembered that it has now been 10 years since I had the best concert experience of my entire life. For some reason, hitting the 10 year anniversary of anything seems a lot longer than 9 years. It must be the extra digit.

February 3rd, 1999 Moxy Fruvous played at Canal Street in Dayton. Canal Street is a venue fits at most 200 people. We got there early and managed to get a seat off to the side of the stage, probably 30 feet away from the band. They started playing sometime around 10:30 and "finished" right at the stroke of midnight. When they came back onstage for their encore the girls I was at the show with (Sarah and Betsy) started yelling that it was my birthday. Then this happened:

My Birthday Medley - Moxy Fruvous

It was awesome. For years it lived on in memory only. Then, thanks to the magic of the internets, a very nice person on the fruhead.com message board sent me a copy of the show. Now I'd like to share that show with you.

Fruvous Live at the Canal Street Tavern - 2/3/1999

If you go strictly by number of concerts attended, Moxy Fruvous is my 2nd all-time favorite band (behind Barenaked Ladies) but sadly they've been on "hiatus" for 9 years. Luckily, archive.org has 45 Fruvous shows ready for downloading and since every Fruvous concert was a new experience (the banter was almost as much fun as the music) it helps fill the void of no new music for years (and probably never again.)

Enjoy.

Keep an eye on this space rest of the week... tomorrow, look for a "live" blog as the project hits song 2000. Then the plan is to make the 1001-2000 mix available by the end of the week.

Oh, and I may need to move soon.

from I Am Part... to I Can't Wait

Day 793, Session 135:
When/Where: Thursday August 21st - Another jog/walk up and down the street.
First song: I Am Part Of A Large Family by Great Lake Swimmers
Last full song: I Can't Wait by William Topley
Progress: 2068-2078 of 6049
Total Songs Heard: 1712

I've picked a bad weekend to go out of town. If you're in Chicago this weekend (perhaps you're coming into town to take my place as I head out,) I recommend setting up camp at Schubas. Friday night at 10 you'll get to see Great Lake Swimmers. GLS are Canadian and relaxed and folksy which are all things I tend to like (man do I miss Fruvous.) While I've never seen them in concert, if I was going to be in town I'm pretty sure I'd find their show to be a place where I could sit back and be enveloped by the music. And yes, I realize that wanting a concert to be a relaxing experience is just one more sign of my march into old.

I Am Part Of A Large Family - Great Lake Swimmers

Saturday night at 7, Garrison Starr is back in town. You may remember Garrison from this post. Well besides the fact that she was fun to hang out with, Garrison also put on a great show. I think this will make the 2nd time she's been back to Chicago since that awesome drunken karaoke filled night, and it's also the second time I'll be out of town. Again, if I were here, I'd be there. (She's appearing with Jim Bianco. I don't know him. I'll assume Jim is the brother of my middle school principal Mike Bianco, so don't misbehave or he may give you detention.)

I won't be at the shows this weekend because I'll be in Sea Isle City hanging out with the family and celebrating the first birthday of my nephew Orion.

Check this kid out:


Pretty awesome I know. In the hopes of eventually helping out the national team, this weekend I'm going to teach him to fall down and roll around on the ground in pain any time someone bumps him when he's near the ball.

So what kind of gifts do I get for a 1-year old? Music of course. Snack Time from Barenaked Ladies and Here Come The ABCs from They Might Be Giants. Sure the kid is only one and may not get them yet, but what does anyone really 'get' when they're one?

It should be a fun weekend. Hope your weekend is fun too.

(and yes, I realize it is somewhat shocking that I've posted twice in less than 24 hours.)

What's going on around here

So, where are we now?

I'm back from vacation. I have a new computer. We're really down to one problem... the new computer is set up for SATA hard drives, the old one had an IDE hard drives.

What _that_ means is that all my music is stuck on my other hard drive. Yes, I could just load everything back onto the new machine manually, but I'm holding out hope that there's an easier way (and yes, if I were smarter I would have thought of this before I bought the new machine, then again, if I were smart I wouldn't need a new machine at all.)

Moral of the story: we're close, but not quite back yet.

Hey, here's something about music! If The Swell Season come to your town and you like great music and hilarious Irish-accented story telling you must go see them. If you saw the movie Once, you already know how awesome the music will be, but the concert experience part was also outstanding. Glen Hansard is a madman (in the good way) and Marketa Irglova is just as charming on stage as she was in the movie. Also, she's 20! Are you fucking kidding me? 20?!?! Yes, she looks young, but 20?!?! Fuck me. I need another shot at my entire 20s and her 20s just started.

Ahem. Sorry. Anywho, if they come to your town: GO!

These people had much better seats than we did (at a completely different show:)

Holy Fraking Schnitzel

So... I just sang Ebony and Ivory (I was horrible btw, but I'm not exactly caring about that at the moment) with Josh Joplin after he and Garrison Starr joined us for karaoke after their concert at Schubas tonight.

Were I an actual professional blogger type, I guess I would have come up with some sort of interview questions to ask them about their fantastic music.

Instead, I spent the whole time they were in our presence totally marking out and trying to figure out exactly how the evening's turn of events had turned from awesome (their show in the first place) to epic.

Anywho, if they should read this (since I gave them the blog address as part of my bugging them,) Josh, Garrison, thanks so much for coming out with us. The show was great enough, the after hours was even better. We look forward to seeing you both back in Chicago again soon. I will try to find a better song.

For everyone else, I encourage you again to check out Josh Joplin and to get on board with Garrison Starr as well.

from Englewood to Episode 22

Day 393, Session 82:
When/Where: Friday July 20th - On the train from work to home.
First song: Englewood by The Bogmen
Last full song: Episode 22: John Hodgman and the Furry Lobster by Popsci Podcasts (from the Moon)
Progress: 1132-1153 of 5184
Total Songs Heard: 959 (skipped 14 podcasts, listened to 1)

Have you ever heard a song written about Enrique Iglesias' mole?

Enrique Iglesias Mole - Clem Snide

Now you have.

It's songs like this the mystify me as to why Clem Snide isn't bigger. Of course than I think about how strange the song is and how that makes me perhaps the worst person ever to judge what music should be popular. Of course you've probably already come to realize that.

The song above comes from ClemSnide.org. It's from a live recording of a 2003 Chicago performance at the Empty Bottle. I was there. Apparently not only was I there, but I looked important. How important? Important enough for some guy to walk up to me before the show started, hand me a cd of his band and ask me to please listen to it. So I took it. And then I watched the guy, figured he'd go up to several other people and hand them cds.

Nope.

I watched him for about 15 minutes and he didn't approach anyone else. He must have known that I was only 2 years removed from the radio industry.

When I got home I listened to the cd and I actually liked it quite a bit. I figured his ploy had worked, because I was planning on actually going to see the band if I ever saw they were playing in town. Unfortunately, I never heard anything about them and have now forgotten their name. Oh well.
________

Speaking of live music... if you ever see that Ben Kweller is coming to a town near you, I highly recommend you go. Caught him last night at Schuba's and it was outstanding.

Tuesday November 28th - A little later in the morning

Day 159, Session 57:
Location: At the desk at work. Practically the entire morning.
First song: Cowboy Romance by Natalie Merchant
Last full song: Crowing by Toad the Wet Sprocket
Progress: 758-779 of 4546
Total Songs Heard: 682

In college I went through a Dave Matthews phase. I don't think it was just me. I'm pretty sure if you went to college between 1994 and 2000 or so you went through a Dave Matthews phase too. Yeah, I liked the music. It was good to drink to and the ladies liked it. Both of those were good. The problem I had with Dave Matthews was the concerts. It's not that they weren't entertaining in concert, it's just that two of the most awkward days I ever spent were both at DMB concerts.

Summer after sophomore year I was supposed to go to a DMB concert in Columbus with what was supposed to be a large group of friends from college. Unfortunately as the concert grew closer more and more people backed out until it was me, a roommate, his friend from work, a girl from school and her boyfriend from home. Now the fact that this girl's boyfriend was coming along was a bit strange for me because I had spent the better part of the last semester at school flirting with this girl like mad. (Crash Into Me had been our unofficial flirting anthem, except for the last night of the semester when another DMB song took over.) It went from strange to terribly awkward when my roommate and his friend got a late start from Dayton, then got caught in a thunderstorm related traffic jam. Show time drew close and we couldn't wait any longer, so off we went to the show. Me, the girl... and her boyfriend. It was a strained few hours. The girl played it cool, the boyfriend had no idea... I spent a lot of time shifting uncomfortably (luckily it was a DMB concert, so I looked like just another white guy dancing.)

The second DMB concert gone bad occurred the following summer. I started the summer dating the wife's roommate, but that ended pretty quickly. After it ended however, she told me that she had bought a ticket for me to go to a DMB concert with her and her friends from high school (she apparently thought we'd still be together and wanted them to meet me, oops.) I was trying to still stay friendly with her (because I wanted to date her roommate) so, after she turned down my offer to pay for the ticket so she could give it to someone else, I agreed to go.

I was extremely uncomfortable with the whole idea and when she introduced me to her friends as "the guy who dumped me," I started feeling ill. In order to fight off the ill feelings I took some prescription meds that I was on at the time for my bad stomach. I knew I was in for a long day. Unfortunately a little later in the afternoon when my stomach was bothering me again (this time due to an unfortunate lunch choice at Steak & Shake) I took another dose of meds well before I should have. Two side effects of the medication? Increased sensitivity to light and heat. Now double those effects after double dosing and then try to sit in the mid-afternoon sun on a 90 degree July day. Not only was the situation as awkward as could be to begin with, but every minute sitting in the sun made me feel that much closer to passing out. Eventually I wandered off in a daze attempting to find some shade.

45 minutes of wandering later I accepted the fact that I had no idea where on the giant amphitheater lawn my group was seated. I took the best course of action I could think of. I staggered on stage, grabbed Boyd's violin and started playing Vivaldi's Spring. The band hired me to play second violin (my traditional preferred orchestral part) for the rest of the tour. I actually ended up touring with the band for 5 years until that fateful day when my stomach problems kicked up again as we crossed a bridge over the Chicago River. As part of the terms of the court settlement I had to leave the band AND stay in Chicago until my personal income taxes, city fees and parking tickets (mostly parking tickets) had paid off all the fines.

Tuesday November 28th - Morning

Day 159, Session 56:
Location: On the train heading into the loop.
First song: Conjunction Junction by Better Than Ezra
Last full song: Country Love Song by Stephen Lynch
Progress: 744-757 of 4546
Total Songs Heard: 660

Contender by Royale Crown Review was the first song I ever turned into a music bed during my radio days. It involved mixing and looping. It took me hours to do, but once it was done, for about 10 minutes I felt cool. This would not be the last time that Royale Crown Review tried to make me feel cool.

I'm a big fan of Vegas (the city, not the NBC show.) Not being financially set up to be a high roller however, my trips tend to stick to the sports book and the $5/10 tables. I rarely do anything cool while I'm there. I mean, sure, I've seen Sigfried and Roy (about a week before the mauling) and Blue Man in Vegas, but those are touristy things. The only cool non-gambling thing I can think of in Vegas was when we went to the Hard Rock to see Royale Crown Review.

The "cool" part of it was the show, instead of being in a club, was by the pool. Apparently at the time the Hard Rock pool was one of the places to be seen in Vegas. We definitely didn't fit in. For one thing, none of us had fake boobs or tattoos. For another, even though we were by the pool, none of us felt comfortable hanging out in just our bathing suit. It took me about halfway through the set before I warmed up to the idea of removing my shoes while standing in the sand. (Yes, the pool has a fake beach.)

All in all we enjoyed the show. The band was good and we theoretically were "being seen." Honestly though, we were more excited that the concert also featured a buffet than we were to be hanging with the high rollers.

Tuesday November 21st - Evening

Day 152, Session 53:
Location: At the end of the train.
First song: Come Monday by Jimmy Buffett
Last full song: Comfort and Joy by Simon and Garfunkel
Progress: 659-668 of 4446
Total Songs Heard: 616

Oops. Miscounted last time and totally missed the fact that 600 songs had been passed. Song 600 was Colleen Campbell, another in the long and impressive line of Fruvous fan songs.

Jimmy Buffett is an interesting case. The wife and I went with some friends to a Buffett concert at Wrigley 2 summers ago. It was a crazy day. Ten of thousands of people drunk off their asses for the better part of a day. Everyone wearing Hawaiian shirts. People singing along to every song. It was everything that's great about Buffett (community spirit, enthusiastic crowd, fun songs) and everything not as great about Buffett (too many amateurs drinking, hard to hear music over crowd, songs that all kind of start to sound the same) all rolled into one. Then I heard this story from Slate.com and I came to appreciate the whole Buffett phenomenon a little better.

That's what makes Come Monday such a strange case. It's not another song about some sort of tropical fantasy. It's a simple ballad about a guy who misses his woman during weekends away doing shows. Back when I used to make mix tapes this song ended up on one I listened to a lot after college when driving back and forth the 2 hours between Dayton and where The Wife was living at the time. We saw each other some weekends and then spent weeks apart. It was a strange time in the relationship, often we weren't sure exactly when we'd see each other next, but we made it through. Whenever I heard the song during one of those lonely rides home I would replace the word Monday with "some indeterminate weekend that hopefully will be sooner rather than later." It really didn't fit very well into the rhythm of the song.

It's not my favorite Buffett song, but it's up there. Of course when he performed it at the show, I sang (the right words) drunkenly along with the rest of the Parrotheads... as the wife elbowed me for singing too loud at a concert.

Friday October 20th - Into the evening

Day 120, Session 45:
Location: Going home on the train, then driving around looking for pants
First song: Captain Jack by Billy Joel
Last full song: Catching on Fire by They Might Be Giants
Progress: 580-596 of 4500
Total Songs Heard: 514

Hooray! Song 500! 500 songs in 120 days. That puts me right around 4 songs per day, with approximately 4000 songs to listen to... 1000 days. So I've cut the overall project time to just under 3 years. 400 to 500 only took 18 days (or just over 5 songs a day) if I can keep that pace up this should take even less time. I suppose my goal is to actually have this whole thing wrapped up during 2007. So I'll have to push the pace a little more.

Unfortunately, coming soon there will be another decided downturn in song listening productivity. (You might be wondering how I could possibly be less productive when I'm 30+ days behind in my writing at this point.) I'm currently appearing in a play here in Chicago. It's my first actual theater gig in 8 years and I was incredibly nervous about it. The thing is, I'm not very good at remembering lines. That's one of the reasons I ended up in improv. I still get to be a goof on stage occasionally, but no one is depending on me to remember exactly what to say and do every time. Well October 20th is right around when we started rehearsing the show. Once rehearsals really started in earnest and I was supposed to be learning my lines, I put this project aside for a few weeks and concentrated almost exclusively on the show. The good news is twofold. One, since I am 30+ days behind, I still have plenty of music to write about. Two, all the hard work on the lines paid off. The show is going very very well. If you're here in Chicago or will be in the next two weeks, I encourage you to come see it. For more information on the show you can either visit the Rogue Theater website or click the link over on the right there for my other blog where I've done some more writing about it.

As for song number 500, it was Caramia by the Indigo Girls. I've seen the Indigo Girls in concert once. I went with The Wife and her roommates summer after junior year of college. At the time The Wife was not even the girlfriend, she was just the girl I had a crush on. The thing that made it weird was one of The Wife's roommates had just recently stopped being my girlfriend. Well, if you want to get technical about it, I don't think we ever passed the "just dating" phase into the "going out" phase, so I'm not even sure you could call her my ex-girlfriend, but she sure seemed to think of me as her ex-boyfriend.

While at the concert I was flirting a little with The Wife, much to the annoyance of the roommate. In a drunken "argument" later that evening the roommate accused the wife and I of having sex right there in front of everyone on the blanket in the middle of the concert. I tried explaining that I didn't think that maybe touching someone's leg exactly counted as having sex but the roommate would have none of it! (This is why we never passed beyond "just dating." She was CRAZY!) The good thing was, this gave the wife and I a little joke to share and actually brought us closer together.

Eventually The Wife and I did have sex (but certainly not until after we were married. Hi Mom!) Every time I hear a song by the Indigo Girls I think about the first time we allegedly had sex... right there on the blanket we were sharing with 5 other people... in the middle of a crowd of 2000... probably while Galileo was playing.

Tuesday October 10th

Day 110, Session 35:
Location: Walking out of work, relaxing on the train.
First song: Bowling Song (Almighty Malachi, Professional Bowling God) by Stephen Lynch
Last full song: Braver Newer World by Jimmie Dale Gilmore
Progress: 483-492 of 4447
Total Songs Heard: 416

Boxing Nostalgic by Josh Joplin is from the cd of the same name. I very much enjoy Josh Joplin, but the "Boxing Nostalgic" cd was a small release before he got picked up by a major label. Apparently copies of this cd exist out there somewhere, but they're listed on Amazon for around $40. My enjoyment of Josh Joplin does not reach the $40 per cd level. So after one of his shows in Chicago I asked him what would be the best way to get a hold of the older stuff. He encouraged me to find it on the internets and download it for free. Now that's cool. The artist telling you to go ahead and download his stuff. If only I had ever been able to find "Boxing Nostalgic" out there. I even tried using The Google. No such luck.

So hey, if you're reading this and you happen to have a copy of "Boxing Nostalgic" go ahead and send me the mp3s. Josh said it was ok. I'll even trade you for the mp3s from "Projector Head" (the other independent Josh Joplin release that I happened to find on Amazon tonight for $5 while writing this entry. Score!)

I think Josh Joplin has given up touring*** (and perhaps music altogether,) which is too bad. I guess if you're a musician, it's probably not a good thing to be able to spend a few minutes talking to anyone who hung around after the show. Probably means you're not "big" enough. But Josh was always happy to spend time talking with his fans.

At one show, he talked with my friend Jon (the one who's getting married tomorrow, good luck) and me long enough that when he moved on to the next couple of folks, a girl who was standing around asked me if I was on his security team. I assured her that I most certainly was, so she gave me her phone number and asked me to pass it along. I offered the number to Josh, but he declined.

I had something more depressing to say about Boxing by Ben Folds Five, but I like that story better. I'll save depressing for another day.

***Updated March 2008: This, thank goodness, turned out to be totally wrong! He took some time off to be a dad and to recharge his batteries, but he's now back on tour.. Hooray for all those things. This is one case where I'm happy to have been wrong.

Thursday, August 17th

Day 56, Session 20:
Location: Thursday after work? That's practically Friday!
First song: Baby I Love You by Natalie Merchant
Last full song: Back in N.Y.C. by Jeff Buckley
Progress: 272-280 of 3960
Total Songs Heard: 272

All Baby and Back tunes today. In case you didn't know, Travis does an outstanding cover of Britney Spears Greatest Hit Baby One More Time. The way they did it makes it sound like a serious musical effort instead of piece of ultra-disposable pop. Well ok, the band may or may not be drunk when they're performing it, so maybe serious musical effort isn't the right phrase, but it still sounds better than Britney. I'm guessing, however, that the guys from Travis don't look nearly as good in a school girl outfit.

Back by Barenaked Ladies is now the song that I hope to hear from them in concert. I've probably seen BNL 10 times in concert, but I've never heard them play Back. Unfortunately, I don't think I'm ever going to get to see it. The wife and I have given up going to see them after our last experience at a BNL concert.

We were in the balcony and pretty far from the stage. In fact, we were so far from the stage, that the two drunk suburban women behind us forgot they were even at the show. They spent the entire time talking to each other and they were LOUD.

Think back to 3 entries ago... when I talked about how I used to sing along at concerts. At least I was singing along, never trying to talk over the band. Being dumb, I didn't go inform the usher of this situation. Instead, at some point, after shooting about a thousand dirty looks their way, I turned around and kindly requested that they please shut the fuck up. They responded a few minutes later by "accidentally" spilling a beer on my wife. (Beer their drunk asses never should have been sold in the first place.) Once the wife convinced me not to throw both of their gross leathery hides down the stairs, we seethed our way through the rest of the show. When the final lights came up, I turned around and absolutely lit into them. The drunker one's response was to grab me by the arm and tell me she was getting security. I invited her to please go ahead as the wife started polling people around us to confirm that they had seen the woman intentionally spill beer on her. Sadly, the slightly less disgusting troll pulled her friend away just before security could get there.

You might be wondering what all this has to do with the song Back. The song is about a guy who trips over a pair of shoes, falls down the stairs, and breaks his back. As they were bumbling their way up the stairs through the crowd and making their escape, I thought that was the least those bitches deserved.

BTW, if anyone thought of Chili's when I started this post by saying it was all Baby and Back... shame on you.

Friday August 4th

Day 43, Session 17:
Location: Heading home for the weekend.
First song: Aquarius by Neutral Milk Hotel
Last full song: Ashes of American Flags by Wilco
Progress: 233-244 of 3940
Total Songs Heard: 243

Featuring multiple listens to Army by Ben Folds. Because the original tune contains a large part with a horn section, he does a great bit in concert where he divides the audience in two and has each side cover one of the horn parts. It's one of those rare occasions where I'm actually encouraged to sing loud at a show.

I freely admit that for years and years I had the terrible habit of singing along a little too loud when I would go see a show. After two or three concerts with me the wife (who at the time was just the girlfriend) pointed out that as much as she liked my singing, she didn't come to the show to hear me perform. At the time I remember feeling defensive about it. I couldn't possibly have been singing that loud... and besides, everyone sings like that at a concert.

Of course when I thought about it later, it turned out that (as would become a recurring theme for us) she was right. Now when I go to shows I'm the guy who looks like he's mumbling along with the lyrics, but you won't actually hear me unless the band asks for it.