Deerhunter / Ponys / Jay Reatard and Whatever Else

I used to hear about The Reatards a lot in my maximumrocknroll reading days. But, I never knew anyone else cool enough to be into them (living in Youngstown, Ohio at the time might have something to do with that) and I never took the initiative to seek their albums out. Now I wish I had. Jay Reatard started the night off right after a fairly lengthy delay. The Ponys and Deerhunter were both coming from Pitchfork Fest in Chicago (you may have heard of it) so they were a little late. My buddy Noah and myself were running late ourselves so I'm glad it started late since we didn't miss anything. Above is what Jay and his band look like when Jay's singing.



And here's another one. Note the punk rockers in the shot.




And here they are rocking the fuck out. I can probably learn to crop the ceiling out of the picture, but, like the Chromeo/Flosstradamus shots and every other picture I've posted, I'm gonna keep it as is.



Here's more rockin, along with more gratuitous ceiling. It was tough to stay in one spot to get these shots since there was a small mosh pit that kept shaking everything up. It was great to see kids into the show, though. Also, it was interesting to see a Jay fan that I don't think I'd seen since the Rapture show at the Grog in 11/06. She had short cropped sandyish blonde hair, and if by some miracle that she actually reads this, I hope to see her again because she seems like someone I'd like to get to know.



The Ponys were next. I'd missed them each and every time they'd been in town, so it was great to finally catch them in action. I'd heard good stuff about their live show, and I've gotta be honest, they don't really wow me on record. Every album I'd heard just seems to be missing that little ooomph to take it over the edge. They found that ooomph on this night.




Those are some tight jeans.



I knew that keyboard was there for something other than to add stage decor.




Another tight jeam shot, although I was standing on her side of the stage, so what are you gonna do? In all seriousness, she was super nice when I talked to her after the show. And, I don't get into soap opera type BS of who's in a relationship with who and all that, but I think I saw a ring on her finger anyway. Great set by a great band.




Deerhunter is the group I knew the least about, since I just heard of them recently and tried not to get caught up in the hype machine. I've heard numerous bands name My Bloody Valentine as an influence through the years, but Deerhunter may be the best of the lot. I know that's the most obvious comparison, too, but TS.




This shot's a little better. I didn't get a lot of Deerhunter pics, since it was getting late and I was getting tired. After they were done, I had the aforementioned conversation with the Ponys bassist and purchased Jay Reatard's Blood Visions CD. Here's what it looks like:


I really like it, and I'm glad I made the purchase. It's been a while since I bought a CD at a show. And, between CDs, LPs, 7"s, and shirts, he had plenty of merch. I almost forgot that I swiped a flier the night I was at the Grog for Fujiya and Miyagi. Here's that one:



I think that's enough fanboyishness for one post. Although, this flier brings me to a point I was gonna make. The fact that the first act of the night had fliers all over the place, in addition to everyone else, let everyone know that this show was pretty important. Another thing the night had going for it was the immense diversity of the bands involved. The jumpy late 70s-early 80s sounding punk/no wave/new wave/whatever of Jay Reatard, the rock of the Ponys (I hate the term indie), and the shoegaze/ambient/rock/whatever of Deerhunter. I like seeing bands from such different areas of good music get together like that. I think that was my point, anyway.

In other news, the TNA Pay Per View was mostly boring, although the Steiners came back, so I'm pumped about that. Somehow, I don't see Scotty getting any smaller after the upcoming crackdown on steroids from the Benoit situation. Social D's playing Y-Town tomorrow, so that'll be a lot of fun. I probably won't be able to bring a camera, but we'll see. Cedar Point(?) sometime this weekend. Let's have fun.

Until Then,
Later.

A Quick One

I don't really feel like writing much after the whirlwind of the last few days. Tomorrow I'll post some pics of last night's Deerhunter/Ponys /Jay Reatard extravaganza, but that'll be then. I'm gonna catch up on all the wrestling I missed the last little while, and here's a movie I caught today at the Cedar Lee:




Jennifer Connelly got me going in 86, and she still does today. It'll be there until Thursday, so get to it. For me, it was nice to get through the entire movie in a theatre without screaming for the exits like I did the first time all those years ago. I guess that'll happen when you're four years old.

Until Then,
Later.

My Weekend Was Better Than Your Weekend (Unless You Went To Pitchfork Fest)

It all started Thursay with Fujiya and Miyagi Thursday at the Grog Shop



Their sound was super tight and contrary to these pics, their were plenty of vocals. The opener was a group of guys named Ken Rei. They weren't too terribly bad, but not really my thing. Three guys making noise out of pressing buttons doesn't really appeal to me. I like me some rhythm in my music. I didn't get any shots of them, though. Some time was also spent downstairs at the b-side Liquor Lounge. They have an outside patio now, and it was pretty nice. I had a chance to try the new Smirnoff Source, which is basically alcoholic spring water. It was awful. The flavor was a real turn off, and I had hoped that it would be flavorless. I'm glad I tried it, though. It was a good conversation piece throughout the night. Next stop: Buffalo.



We got a room at the Lenox Hotel & Suites (not my pic). I had read some real horror stories online about this place but everything else was booked. Our room was about 90% renovated, and the 10% that wasn't was the bathtub. Needless to say, I didn't shower there and I don't know if I'd have stayed there if the rest of the room was in that condition.



One place I check online fairly frequently is krudmart.com. I saw on their site a little while back that they have a store in downtown Buffalo. It was a block from the hotel. Here's what it looks like from the outside (not my pic).



I had been eyeing this shirt on their site and I picked it up at the store (pic taken from krudmart.com). The guy working there (who may or may not have been the owner) was super nice and it was a great experience overall. "Streetwear" (I fuckin hate that word) boutiques generally have a rep for being elitist and stuff, but I don't have anything but nice things to say about Krudmart. FEEL THE POWER OF THE WARRIOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



Here's what their bag looks like. I told the guy at the store where I was from and what I was doing in Buffalo, and he couldn't believe that I and my buddy Noah (took way too long to mention him, sorry) would come all that way for a Chromeo show. He seemed as surprised as I was that they didn't play Cleveland, but what are ya gonna do? We agreed to see each other there and that was that. Downtown Buffalo was interesting. You had scattered hipsters and oldsters and yuppies and idiots and everything in between. We stopped at some bar before the show and went up to their rooftop patio. Then I got hit in the back of the head with the thing you use to open a beer can (I'm drawing a blank on the name). Some dude must've had a problem with me. I'm guessing either he caught his girlfriend checking me out or he thought I was hot and wanted my attention. Since I'm neither gay nor a fan of the girlfriends of meatheads, we decided to hit the bricks.



Flosstradamus tearing shit up on the outdoor patio. The venue was an outdoor patio (obviously) of a really small bar. It was nice and cool out, and the vibe was great.




I like this one. Chromeo chills while Floss slays (check Dave texting).




This text was so important that Dave had to stand up. And yes, these are my pics and I was that close. No zoom was used in any of my stuff in this post.



The crowd shot.



I was browsing through Flickr pages related to the show and saw this one. It was really unfortunate that this chick was surrounded by douchebags, since she was super hot. We gave each other a lot of knowing glances, but every time we crossed paths, she was with the people above. Note to any ladies reading this: if you want to get me to notice you, looking as close to this as possible is a good place to start.



Jacked from the same Flickr account. This one made me laugh, since all the pics I took were from this exact spot. I was standing directly to the left of the girl in the black, but I must've been getting drinks or something when this was taken. Speaking of her, she had a really nice ass and it felt marvelous (I said it). Her hair smelled really good too. The less said about the blonde, the better. Also, the kid in the pink Mishka New Era and the one next to him in the purple Mishka hoodie were in Krudmart when we were there. They had that hoodie in black for 40% off, but I didn't wanna spend the cash.




Noah's middle finger gets some face time from the same Flickr page as the other noted pics. I'm in the shot in front of the dude in the green shirt dancing like I mean it. Let's get back to some of my pics.



One's throwing up the horns while the other's crying tears of joy. Or wiping the cold out his eyes.



Nice to see the band having as much fun as everyone else.




Flosstradamus closed the night with a second set. One major highlight was Bone's Thuggish Ruggish Bone, at which point I let out a CLEVELAND!!!!!!!!! yell that was heard throughout the entire state of NY. The rest of the night isn't going to be posted on the internet for a variety of reasons. If you wanna know the story, get at me. Time to get back to work.

I hope I didn't forget anything, but if I did,




Until Then,
Later.

Coming Up For Air

I've been working off and on for more than the last twelve hours, but it's all in preparation for the long weekend that starts tomorrow (technically later tonight I guess) with Fujiya and Miyagi. Then the next stop is Buffalo for Motherfucking CHROMEO and Flosstradamus.

But the main point of this post is to rave about the latest from the New Pornographers, Challengers. Yesterday I forgot to mention I bought into their Buy Early Get Now promotion when I picked up the new Spoon. And as I write this I just realized that I missed Spoon on Letterman after waiting for it all day and night. Oh well. I'll see it tomorrow online. The internet is a wonderful thing. Speaking of the internet, I can currently only listen to the New Pornos album on an online stream, so I can't play it in the car or away from a computer. I'll make due though, but I don't get the physical CD until August 21! That's a long time to wait, but I got the Executive Edition Box Set (nothing but the best for me) so I get a ton of b-sides and such to hold me over. The album's so incredible that I don't want to overplay it before it's commercially released. It's gonna be tough, but I'll try my best.

Back to work for me. The weekend can't come soon enough.

Until Then,
Later.

You Got Yr. Spoon Cd (and Ep) (and 7")

So I skipped out of work early today and made the jaunt to the semi-local independent record store near a favorite concert spot of mine (you may have heard of them) and grabbed the new Spoon CD. And, if you read the title of this post, you can see that I was lucky enough to receive both the limited EP attached to the CD and the 7" that is apparently pretty darn limited in it's own right. I haven't gotten around to listening to the 7" yet, but I threw both the album and the EP on the old iPod for my fun run.

Before the run could start, however, I was accosted by a pretty cute girl banging on my window. It scared me pretty good (the banging on the window, not the fact that there was actually a girl so interested in me that she was trying to break my window with her fists just to get to me). But, she thought I was someone else. I guess she was waiting on a friend that drove the same car as mine. She must've been waiting fairly long, since it took me almost an hour to do all six miles, and she was still in her car talking to the guy in the parking lot when I was done. I also didn't see her out on the path the entire time. The dude seemed like a real dweeb too. I guess there's no accounting for taste sometimes.

So I'll have to listen to the album/EP a few more times before I really can give an opinion. As of now, it reminds me more of Girls Can Tell and Kill the Moonlight than Gimme Fiction, and the latter is my favorite Spoon album. However, the listen was exceptional enough to outrun some guy that started his fun run at the same time as me. He looked like he could have run in some races, too, so I was fairly proud of myself. "Not to toot my own horn, but toot toot." - Arn Anderson

I mentioned the Justice Cross album recently, but when I was running through today's releases yesterday, I forgot to mention it. I didn't mention Against Me! either, but I was never really a fan of theirs. I have one 7" I ordered from No Idea Records about five years ago, but that's it. I wasn't too impressed.

One thing I am impressed with is the video for Spoon's The Underdog. Here it is:



Fujiya and Miyagi in two days, CHROMEO in three.

Until Then,
Later.

Youngstown Rocks the Hardest

Youngstown was pretty fun. No pics though. I brought the camera but the mood never really struck me.

Saturday I went to Cedar's for a friend's 25th birthday celebration. I hadn't been there in at least five years and I was reminded why fairly quickly. I hate paying a cover (even if it's only $5) for a band I have no interest in whatsoever. Besides that, before they played (I don't remember their name) some guy got on the mic and was bragging about how they'd been on MTV and Jimmy Kimmel and a bunch of nonsense that no one wanted to hear. Youngstown had Nyabinghi and I liked that place a whole hell of a lot more. Don't get me wrong, Cedar's has the best crowd of any bar in Youngstown (probably), but I really dislike having to spend $5 to get in. I also didn't see my friend until it was almost time to leave, so that kinda sucked too.

I wanted to catch the UFC Pay-Per-View Saturday since it looked really good on paper. I got the hook-up today, though, so I'm gonna give that a watch shortly. Maybe I'll write some stuff about it tomorrow. I said I'd give some thoughts on the ROH PPV a little while back, so I'll do that in due time. I might have to watch it again, though, since it's been a while.

In other news, tomorrow looks like the biggest CD release date in some time. Here's what I'm seeing:

Bad Religion - New Maps of Hell
I said some stuff about this in an earlier post. It's not listed in the Best Buy or Circuit City ad this week, though. So that can't be good.

Interpol - Our Love to Admire
I completely ignored these guys until early 05, when I fell pretty hard. I can't listen to Antics without flashing back to Saturday nights at Thursdays Bar in Akron. Good Times.

Smashing Pumpkins - Zeitgeist
I was never the biggest fan, but I gave it a listen anyway. I only heard it once, but it's pretty blah. It'll probably sell more than the other ones I mentioned, but whatever.

Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
This is the big one (Elizabeth). I plan on grabbing this one tomorrow at the semi-local independent record store and I hope they'll still have a limited edition 7" for me. I intentionally avoided any previews of this, aside from The Underdog. I mentioned seeing the video on MySpace, and I saw it on MTV2's Subterranean last night. I'm excited.

That's it for now. UFC for me, and Spoon listening tomorrow!
Oh, and I ended up grabbing the new Dizzee Rascal (which was pretty tough since it's not really sold in the US). Good stuff, although Pussy'ole (Old Skool) is easily the best tune. And yes, it's much more randy than the video version.

Until Then,
Later.

It's Going Down

Seven days away. I got my tix today and I'm pretty f'n pumped.

Fujiya and Miyagi the night before at the Grog Shop. That should be good too.

Youngstown in a few hours for the weekend. We'll see how that goes.


Until Then,
Later.