Crickets Sound Good 1 October 2001

2:53 PM: Hot weather, ah, at last. While it does. Last, that is.

Weekend Media Report: Many events on the recommendations of other people for a change.

Friday, went to see Ivy at Slim's. I feel half-certain that I've heard them before, I even have some kind of deep vague memory of looking them up on the Web. But that might just be because they are exactly the sort of band I ought to have heard of, so I'm rewriting history to make myself look smarter. Talented indie pop shiny band from New York, with brittle cute distanced French female singer. Reminded me of St. Etienne, only not so soft. And of course Stereolab, but that's really lame, it's just the French part, musically not very similar at all. They're pretty good! And so was the opening act! The Actual Tigers, from Seattle. I don't have good words here. Good mix of instruments, keyboards and slide guitar and regular guitars and drums and all, good songwriting. I liked the arrangements, I like the ways their music would surprise me. They came pretty close to being better than the headliners, say I.

Saturday was another Bottomstravaganza. John Vanderslice opened. I thought I was going to see all bands new to me, but hey, I've heard this guy before. He has a single on Alt.Now now (I know it's called "New Indie" but then I couldn't say nownow.), "Time Travel Is Lonely". It's good! So is he! Marlys says Chek It Out!!! I don't know, I'm substituting exclamation points for cogent analysis.

Then was Persephone's Bees, yet another French-girl-singer-in-front-of-indie-pop-band deal. These darn foreigners are coming over here and stealing our good American rock star jobs. They were pretty good, too. Actually, I wished that the guys in the band hadn't said anything, because I was building a story that they were all from some other country, so the reason their music was kind of odd was that they had learned all about this rock & roll stuff from TV and movies, that it wasn't native to their culture. But no, the guys are Americans. It's weird. Her singing, and the basic melodies of the songs - of the sung parts, maybe I mean - were again the shiny, kind of simple. But then the guys were totally 70s Rock And Roll! almost. Little surfish, too. All about guitars. The guitar players were really good, but it was a strange mix. I think I'm going to stick with my story, it's better than reality.

Headliners were 20-Minute Loop. It was their CD release party. I never heard them before. We were there because Carter saw them open for someone and was completely impressed and said I would be too. A very correct prediction. I loved them. They have vaulted straight up into Fave Bands of the Moment. Good singing, smart lyrics, songs that feel like they mean something. Inventive sounds. Songs that sound different from one another. That go from fun to intense and wander around and back again. Plus, I have to confess to a boy moment here. The keyboard player not only has a gorgeous voice, she is gorgeous. Kind of like Heather Graham, only not so strange-looking. Maybe it was just the pig-tails (? I don't know hair jargon), I don't know. And I am just now listening to said new CD and it's as good as I could have hoped it would be. So go see them and buy their stuff. Right now.

Whew. I'm tired again just writing all this. Not getting much rest lately.

Sunday, went with Lana and her fambly to see The Search for Intelligent Life in the Universe, the Lily Tomlin one-woman show. It was very funny at times, especially Trudy the crazy marketing lady and Agnus Angst. But when did she write this, 1980? 1975? 1985? A lot of the material is seriously dated, and time is not being kind to it. Most of the second act was the story of some lalala pseudo-hippie chick and her problems with being a drawstring-pants loser and possessive yuppie at the same time. I was less than sympathetic, you might guess. If I ever, ever start acting like that, talking about "Oh but gosh, back when the Web was young, everything was so much better...", I hope someone will have the decency to shoot me on the spot.

Today! Ex-Girl! In-store appearance at Amoeba!

Tomorrow! Buffy Lives!!!!!!!

I need a nap.

6:05 PM: Fuck. That was fun. I have McCrappy's food, and I just tried to pick up a french fry and eat it. My fingers started spazzing out so much I could barely hold on to the damn thing.

It's kind of weird to think about the very high probability that I'll be dead in about 15 years.

I didn't go to Ex-Girl after all because something broke this weekend and a lot of people who don't know what the fuck they're talking about have been yelling at me today, so leaving work 2.5 hours after getting here was somewhat contraindicated. But they didn't show up at the store anyway. So it's a shitty afternoon down all timelines.

6:18 PM: Plus it's foggy again.

Willfully blind self-indulgent nebbish or amusingly quirky old coot? And how bout that local sports team? Discuss among yourselves.

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