Recently in live music & theater Category

Welcome to another edition of Rad is the new Normal. Starring all of us.

Hi.

So April was totally the best. The weather's starting to turn, people are coming out of hibernation, bands are touring, festivals are lining up the line-ups... and with a little more cred under my belt than I had last year, everything's shaping up to be just as mindblowing as it's ever been. But first, here's the best of the best of the last couple of weeks:

I'm not even going to lie, I was pretty apprehensive about Bowie cover night at the Moore -- there's only a handful of David Bowie tracks that I'd go to bat for (with the full disclaimer that Bowie is a mad genius and brilliant in ways that I can't comprehend), and even though the night was full of local all-stars, I just wasn't sure it was going to translate.

Um. I was mistaken. Thomas from the Raggedy Anns just Absolutely. Killed. It. For serious. I don't even have any more adjectives for how balls-out tremendous of a job he did opening up the show -- it was nothing short of complete and utter amazingness. The end.

Another City Arts slam-dunk I was fortunate enough to get in on was Brandi Carlile's no-opener show at the Croc. What an absolutely fantastic set this was -- I mean, it was a huge underplay and I knew it was going to be great, but I had no idea what I was in for. Truly. 

I have the new album, and I've heard a lot of odds and ends from her catalog since acquiring it, but I was completely unprepared for both her epic songstress-ry and for the overall vibe of the night. It sounds ridiculous, but you could literally hear the room smiling -- from the Beatles cover she opened the show with, throughout the entirety of her set -- up to and including a sweet acapella version of "Dying Day" from the edge of the stage (which is my favorite thing performers do ever, ps). Definitely one of the top shows of the year so far.

Moving right along... a Saturday (or two?) ago, we all went out and raged Record Store Day. I spent the morning messing around at Oddfellows and then pawing through the stacks at Everyday, and then closed the day out at Sonic Boom (both stores, ps, are looking sweet & swanky in their new spots on Le Hill).

I got to BFF with Greg Vandy for a few during his DJ set at the 'Boom, to the tune of me asking what soul music I needed to own if the world was ending and I was about to spend my last fifteen dollars ever to exist, ever. He pointed me straight to Freedom Highway by the Staples Singers, and I've been trying it on ever since... it's brilliant. Not what I gravitate to of my own accord, but historically significant, and fantastic to boot. (This bodes well as a segue for the movie playing at the NWFF this week, about the music of the civil rights movement -- it's got enough great parts to outweigh the cheesebag parts -- and besides, it never hurts to give the film forum a nine-dollar donation. You might want to stop in and see it if you find yourself on 12th with a free night sometime in the next couple of days.)

Last, but certainly not least, City Arts did another round of the Song Show at the Triple Door -- this time with Matt Bishop of Hey Marseilles taking on the headlining spot.

The event overall was a little lower-key than the last Song Show, but it was sweet and vibey and fun nonetheless. And anyhow, I would have practically sat through just about anything -- and I mean anything, like, a ninety-minute second grade violin recital kind of anything -- to get to see Matt doing a six-song solo set. Unplugged lead singers are my favorite-ist of favorites, and with Hey Marseilles on my top ten bands of the last ever list, getting to see Matt in this format was quite the treat.

So, there was much more to kick around than that -- but that's all the news that's fit to blog about. Up next: The Shearwater / Wye Oak / Hospital Ships show at the Triple Door (omg), Chris Pureka at the Tractor (!!!), me raging the weekend before my birthday on Venice Beach (where I've managed to get myself in to see Andrew Bird at Largo) (WTF), Frightened Rabbit doing a free in-store at Sonic Boom AND raging a set at Neumo's (seriously!), Greg Vandy dj-ing my birthday party with a soul-night to beat all soul-nights at the Triple Door (am I really typing all of this?), and then five minutes of downtime before I geek my face off at Sasquatch for Memorial Day weekend.

Like I said. Rad is the New Normal. Holy shit.

Lather, rinse, repeat. See you in a few weeks.

xo
*Viva

hey. hi. how's it going? rad. me too. life is busy busy busy. here's some highlights from the last month or so in my world:

the forces of whatever decided to collide, and I suddenly found myself with a recurring gig for city arts magazine as of january '10. (I know!) so there'll be a little bit of a posting delay as I have to wait for each month's ish to go to print before I can post, but I promise, they'll be well worth it. case in point, the song show at the triple door -- love love love. so much fun. such great artist, such great performances, and more hometown whole-heartedness than you could shake a stick at.

earlier that night, they sent me out to the croc to cover the school of rock's recital -- kids doing covers of northwest bands after completing a semester of music school. we heard a few cuts from built to spill, death cab, and most notably a tremendous rendition of "more than shapes" by the long winters, featuring a real live long winter -- total cute overload.

next up was the mayor's inaugural party at showbox sodo, where I got to spend my night shooting on an all-access pass (read: our mayor is rad, and he likes to chill out in the green room, ps) with the kids from fences and hey marseilles.

and this is my desk.

and this is my 'hood.

and I rode a train with a bunch of people, and they all took their pants off.

I'm just saying.

up & coming: a leg down to LA for chris pureka's closeout residency show at the hotel cafe (with a little love from fences), another gibbard / farrar / roderick set (showbox, this sunday), and whatever february decides to bring besides rain. and prefunking sxsw. and keeping my fingers crossed for a pass to wilco. and some kind of all-out sad bastard fest for valentine's day.

yours in the anti- of all things hallmark,
viva*

Hey there. How's it going?

Seriously. Not that I mind seeing photos of my two favorite lead singers ever (in the history of ever) every time I drive by the site, but you're all probably sick of them by now. So here's the rest of August & September:

First off, Frank Black Black Francis at the Triple Door. No bigs. (Obviously I'm joking. This was so good, it bordered on life-altering -- check it here and here.)

Then, I got to kick it imaginary-style at Marymoor for the Flaming Lips -- holy crap. The show these guys put on can only be described as what church would be like if people like me went to church. All love and music and leafblowers rigged up to shoot an endless supply of confetti. And a million balloons. And just all-around goodness. And Wayne. And then more music. And maybe some people in furry animal costumes. And more confetti. Which is my new favorite word, PS.

"Confetti."

Then some lovely people I work with got married, and we all drove out to the middle of nowhere to celebrate. Apparently Becky makes one hell of a cake(s). Amazing, edible sugar-flower laden, magical, kitchen-diva-esque cakes. The cake toppper kind of freaked me out, but whatever. Drop me a line if you want Becky to make you a cake of unicorn-like proportions for your next party.

I'm serious.


Heartless Bastards and the Avett Brothers blew my mind a few weeks ago. You can read all about it here.

Harvey Danger had their last show ever (ever) (for real ever) (not having another one next year -ever) at the Croc, and the place was so jam-packed full of semi-rabid fans that I couldn't get more than halfway through the room. Thus the shots from mid-floor. But Laura rocked the hell out of the earlier set and graciously posted her shots for our gawking pleasure.

And two weekends ago, ISB shut down and we all bus-tripped it to Fort Worden for my company retreat. The room pretty much looked like a jail cell that had been warmed up a bit, in reality we were staying in some revamped Army barracks. Except they didn't revamp the original One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest-style metal hospital beds. You could have shot a whole depressed -rexo/heroin addict American Apparel ad in our room, or maybe an album cover. It kind of sucked. But the rest of the place was magically pretty.

I'm off to ACL next weekend on an imaginary press pass, which will be my last trip in a series of crazy trips that fall under the justification of "I have a real job with sick time and a steady, decent paycheck." (I'll just have to make do with the bands that decide to stop in Seattle for fall tour. Poor me.) Until then, I'll be out soaking up the rest of the sun that our fair city has seen fit to bestow upon us to end the season -- I'm ready for fall, but I'm being told to go out and get it while I can. Apparently I'll be clamoring for days like today a few months from now. Still, it's weird to be drinking a pumpkin spice latte when it's 86 degrees out.

So I'll see you when it starts raining. Or something like that.

*Victoria

Did I really just type that? OhmygawdIreallydid. This all actually happened. Let's take it from the bottom up:

Last weekend I went on a little road trip. Air trip. See, Glen Hansard was playing what turned out to be an almost split-show with Sam Beam, for a benefit. In Austin. I talked myself into covering it a while back, not thinking prior to about how I'd be in Texas in July, or where I would stay, or how the logistics would work out. It was a hundred dollar difference in my plane ticket from the already quasi-ridiculous plan I had to go to Chicago for back-to-back Wrens shows. I mean, really. Glen. Hansard. And I'd never been to Austin. And what's a girl to do, anyway, after hearing about a show like that? Put a hundred (or two) bucks in the bank and be happy about how good it felt to be financially responsible? No way. So off I went.

I wrote all about it rather reservedly here, and posted the pictures as per usual. But if you want the whole truth -- you guys, really: it was fucking staggering. I almost threw up, a couple of times, watching the entire set wedged behind the stage-left speaker stacks out of view from the rest of the crowd. Glen was disheveled, and undeniably true, and about ten feet away from my face, and had the same guitar with the same holes I'd seen so many times, and he just screamed and yelled and laughed and sang his sad-bastard Irish heart out. Literally screaming, song-screaming, through the anguish of "Leave" all half-bent over with a red face and those achy, heartbreaker eyebrows... guh. Unreal.

And that was more than enough, but to boot he juxtaposed all that achy-breaky with some Pixes and some lighter notes, notably the blissy fun-ness of lines like I don' like drinkin'... I fouckin' LOVE IT... laughing and yowling and bouncing his voice throughout the venue during the chorus of a children's song for the encore. To be so close for all of that, like we were back at the Paradise, and all the disdained, broken sounds his voice made at the ends of his sentences, just piling up in little batches at my feet, and the chills that it sent up my spine in the three-figure temperatures -- it's still only an arm's length away, along with the buzz of the air conditioner and the sway of the soft motel bed, all freshly embedded in my mind. Over a week later, still stunned with the sweetest show hangover, not to mention crying through several songs in Sam Beam's set, and some elbow-bumping afterwards at the local bars.

And before I forget - the rest of Austin was great, too. Per Patrick's recommendations, I stayed at the Austin Motel, grabbed coffee at Jo's, swam in Barton Springs, and drove all over the place digging on the downtown. It was beyond hot, but then I don't know if it would have felt right without all the hot, if that makes sense.

So right before all that, there was this:

I know. Right? Jesus. I'm still crushing.

Ditto for these kids: there was much restraint of pen and a batch of shots that came out onto the imaginary internets earlier this week -- but with the equal force and blown-away-edness as I stated for Glen Hansard's performance, let me just tell you: the two nights I spent with the Wrens were positively life-altering. Both nights ruled the school, on Friday Stephanie and I got pulled up two songs into the set to play piano; Saturday, three encores and a bunch of shit off Secaucus. Friday, hang-time with Kevin and Greg; Saturday, chit-chat and an assload of complimentary merch from Jerry.

Every minute of the sets were sweaty and loud and tremendous, the energy was positively electric, and all four of these guys were just completely adorable in a rocked-out, grown-up band-guy kind of way. It's always so funny with them, to chit-chat before the set, everyone's so nice and so happy to be playing, and then cut to full-throttle freakout for the performance. Shift back to chit-chat post show, like nothing ever happened -- they're the same guys, and we're left totally reeling, wide-eyed and giddy and all wasted with show. Like it's effortless, the full-throttle plugged-in purposeful deconstructedness, like it's tuning in and out of a radio station or something. All simple and perfect and fantastic.

Speaking of radio stations, or whatever, the rest of Chicago was rad, too:

I find it quite amusing that as I type about the Wrens, I get Pfizer spam in my gmail. Awesome.

But yeah - Chicago kicked ass. The subway system was fantastic, I felt at home, I got to spend a nice chunk of time checking out Wicker Park with Mary Jones... and I stayed in the nicest hotel I think I've ever been to in my life, ever. It was gorgeous and pristine and modern and I felt like I needed to be dressed up to go to bed or something. See also: greatest shower in America, with glass walls and lit-up mirrors and fluffy bathrobes like they have in the movies. No joke. The room even had an iPod docking station with the most excellent surround sound system known to man.

It must sound like I'm exaggerating. But really - the whole thing was tremendous, start to finish.

And then right before all that, there was this:

I know. STFU, right?

Right. Not kidding.

Get this:

So Chris asked me if I wanted to shoot the soundcheck, and of course, I was all over it. After will call not having our information, and waiting around for what seemed like forever, one of the venue guys came out to tell us that it was time to head inside -- for a private press performance. This was Tori with accompaniment, full-on full production, doing a private performance for the press. And by 'press' I mean Zune, Spin, and us. Yup. So, we got a private show. A good six or seven minute song, during which I shot close to a hundred and eighty pictures, and tried not to throw up on my shoes.

The actual real-time performance was as exquisite as our prequel - you can read all about it here.

Another groovy thing I got to do a few weekends ago was shoot a bunch of Joni's art. I've made the poor gal wait just about forever to do this job for her, and it's finally done. We did some huge hi-res cropped files that she can make prints out of, for the pieces that were too big for her scanner. I've got to say, the set really came out nice. I'm so excited to work with new friends, and of course to have more juju for my portfolio.

One more thing: the Long Winters (sort of) played a show (set) at the Sunset last week, a super lo-fi surprise bag of goodness. Between Medicine Cabinet Pirate, Car Parts, and Cinnamon -- and the fact that it was happening at a quasi-private semi-secret gig (with a stage two feet off the floor and about just as far from where I was standing) makes it all the more rad. I didn't have my camera with me, but I did shoot a little mini-clip of a video that we posted up yonder. It ruled!

I'm off to rest up for my big self-inflicted birthday present trip-a-tron 2009, wherein I will fly to Chicago next Friday, see the Wrens play back-to-back nights, sneak in an interview, geek out around the city, leave Sunday for Austin (where it will be a cozy 110 in the shade, I'm sure), dig the city, go to the Glen Hansard / Iron & Wine benefit I talked myself into getting comped for, and hop a flight home Tuesday at 6am. Bonkers, right? I should have enough time to blog all about it with all the airport action happening, so stay tuned.

Holy ____.

Hearts, fastened seatbelts, and top five lists,
*Victoria

What an excellent, excellent pair of shows to be hitting up the blog with this week. Really.

I just about lost my cookie over the Tripwires / YFF set at the Tractor two Fridays ago - it was a tremendous set of sets. I'll spare you all my adjective -- you can watch me gush all over it in the most imaginary of ways here, and dig on the full set of pictures here. Too sweet.

Then, last Tuesday, I had the good fortune of seeing my friend Tom Brosseau for more than a passing moment when he came into town for a show. Typically it's show-leave, or arrive-show-leave, but this time around it seemed like an honest-to-goodness visit: an in-studio at KEXP, a Mariners game, dinner, a gig at the Tractor, and then the leave. Phew! It feels like Tom has officially transitioned from a musician I've become friends with to a friend that's a musician... I'm so lucky to have crossed paths with him and Mary (and now Ethan and Shelly as well), and I'm as equally pleased to have a fresh new album of his in my hot little hands, Posthumous Success.

I'm quite sure I'll take some of my time with Tom into further discussion on my personal blog, but for the sake of avocados (and because I can't write about friends over at 3IG) I've got to spend a moment talking about the evolution of Tom's sound -- it's been quite the journey to witness. We chatted for a while about his stride, musically I mean... it's great to sit down and determine from an observer's perspective that there's nothing Tom sounds like but Tom. Layers of Tom, growing and passing through life and travels Tom, skeletons with and without clothes. People ask me about his songwriting (you know, "so what does he sound like?") and I always launch off into this diatribe about it: earnest young man from North Dakota with a suitcase full of punk rock records-plus-insanely observant storytelling-plus-this haunted, otherworldly sound... a good kind of crazy, an identifiable kind of disturbed that leaves most audiences slack-jawed and wanting.

That's our TB. For me, anyway.

It's still too sunny out to post much. But I'll make it back over here soon, promise.

*Victoria

better late than never, n'est-ce pas?


We'll skip the part where the crowd from 88 Keys kind of ruined the show, and just leave the pretty pictures up instead. Looks like a great show, right? Right. There definitely wasn't a patch of chicks that mistook the Crocodile for a bachelorette party stop, and they definitely didn't ruin the vibe, and J. Tillman & Co. definitely didn't turn up beyond loud to kill the din of people at the bar and eventually walk off the stage in disgust.

In all seriousness, Pearly Gate killed it, and it was almost a really awesome show.

Related news: I've got LightRoom. There's much more to follow, as soon as we run out of sun.

x.
vvb

Seriously? Seriously.

I want to go and re-edit every single big show I've shot with Lightroom. Being able to do such simple edits in RAW that come out fan-effing-tastic and to be taking about one-tenth the time it took me to suck ass at use Photoshop has completely changed my life. I mean, really. I think the shots I did of the bands at KEXP this past Saturday might be some of the best in-studios I've ever done. Next up: 35mm prime lens and permanent software. And Laura's still awesome.

I have to stop saying seriously so much. But I can't help it.

We, as they say, are in business. Check this out:

The guys in The Soft Hills were super-sweet and super thankful for the photos. Easy peasy and a great set of music. Here's the flickr-ness.

Pearly Gate Music, on the other hand, made me pretty nervous. I had spent the better part of their soundcheck thinking I had almost deleted the first band's shots, and as a result I had to kind of burst into the in-studio room with about ten minutes left in the soundcheck. Standard lines ensue, hi, do you mind if I take some shots for the station, no one minds, get the shots, make nice, get out. When it's a really loud-ass friendly band (like Lady Dottie & the Diamonds), I've even stayed in for the actual set -- and while nothing inherently awkward happened with these dudes, and there was no un-friendly, I was all sweaty armpits and tripping over my feet. Long story short, I took about 240 shots in under ten minutes and got the hell out of there.

I hopped into the soundbooth room to watch & hear the set, and literally could not believe my ears. It was as if someone flipped a switch and this flawless incredible kind of awesome started pouring out of these guys. Then I'm talking to the sound guy about how I was totally losing at Hipster Olympics as I tried not to break any equipment / throw up, and I learn that it's J. Tillman on drums, and Zach Tillman on lead. (Seriously!) You can imagine the magic that was going on as a result. The music was eighty-layered vocal amazingness: think everything that's good and echoey about Fleet Foxes (circa MMJ doing it first, but that's just my opinion), minus the leftover hippie campfire-Americana, plus some bad-ass early Neil Young-esque abstract-Americana stop-you-in-mid-everything lyrics. Something like, your [stupid good adjective] hair / and my clumsy hands... Right. Unbelievable. Pass for next Friday's J. Tillman / PGM show in process.

As I mentioned earlier, these just might be some of the best live shots I've ever taken. I was editing them and kind of freaked out about it, and then I realized that with all this band-dude-in-the-dark shooting, I'm getting an insane photography workout. So capturing epic moments in a well-lit room gets to be almost second nature, because I can concentrate more on what's going on and less on whether or not my camera is doing what I want it to. Like when I take my point and shoot out to get something in broad daylight, I don't have to think about the in-the-dark part. I don't mean to imply that it's easy per se, but more that it's getting easier. I'm noting this in particular because it's been quite some time since anything has gotten measurably easier, and now so much is getting easier. Like I'm catching up, with something.

PS, high contrast black & white is my new rad. I've used b&w a lot to hide noise, shit lighting, screwups, whatever -- but in this case I used it on two shots for that, and on the rest because it made the shots look like what it felt like when they played.

And not to be brushed aside, even though it's the wrap-up set on this week's post, Mark Siano & the Freedom Dancers (with a lineup of my other theater group favorites) brought the schtick to the Little Theater this past Friday. Fun, fun, burlesque, Blood Squad -- who you should go and spend money to see as soon as humanly possible -- Becky Poole, and the rest of the regulars. Mark's been getting some good PR lately, and I'm happy that good things are happening for these guys.

In related news: I got a job. A real, honest-to-goodness job. With benefits, and paid vacations, and sick time, and a 401k. And yoga. And awesome. And it's a nonprofit. I'm so excited for it that I can't stop talking about all the rad, and as it turns out, a significant percentage of the people I know around my age also have Real Jobs. Who knew. This is so new for me, I'm like a little kid almost -- I've done sales and worked for friends and friends of friends for so long that I forgot what this stuff even looked like. Barring any hidden insanity, I think I've got a good gig with good people at a good company. And I am completely beyond grateful that all of this is going down. More to follow.

So, it's my last BioMed-paying-for-me-to-post, first day of the rest of my Everything kind of day. Oh, and it's my eight month anniversary in Seattle today. I'm fully vested in my imaginaryness, I'm having a blast, I'm making a lot of friends -- real, honest-to-goodness friends -- and I'm consistently trying on different styles of maybe-things-are-kinda-good-these-days pants. (They all fit, by the way.)

I'm going to go now, and try not to actively be waiting for something bad to happen in the middle of all this fantastic. At least, you know, until sometime next week.

Not a ton of shows from last week to now, so I'll just beef up the photo quota.

The KMRIA / Minus 5 show was off the charts. I'm not a big Pogues fan, and I'm also not a big Celtic-flautist lovin' St. Patrick's day enthusiast type, but dammit -- these guys were good. The opening set from Minus 5 (who I could see once a week and not get tired of) totally knocked me sideways, and I managed to pull off some rad shots.

[Mental note: Tractor, stage right.]

I went to Bop Street Records after the show, and just about had a heart attack. They seriously have every record ever made, ever, in triplicate. And then more records. And then more records. I know it's totes not PC of me, but this place was absolutely retarded. And amazing. And then more records.

And then more records.

The one-a-days are really more like one-a-every-other-days, but it's all good. Like many things say, I will be patient with intermittent progress. It's yielding some rad results.

Up & coming...

Mark Siano's latest cabaret on Friday, and I get my practice on at KEXP on Saturday.
Spring is Springing, the Croc is re-opening, there's imaginary craft-fests and volunteer shifts and a handful of guest list spots I'm keeping my fingers crossed on.

Kiss kiss, bang bang & I'll see you back here next week.
-V.