Go to a show!
The weather is getting warmer and the great concert options are becoming more frequent. Check out some hotness:March 24th - Variety Playhouse - Mutemath
March 25th - The EARL - Hella and Dirty Projectors
March 25th - The Drunken Unicorn - Battles and Loney, Dear
March 26th - Variety Playhouse - Rickie Lee Jones
March 26th - The EARL - The Black Angels
March 28th - The Drunken Unicorn - Pigeon John
March 29th - The EARL - The Shut Ups
March 29th - Eddie's Attic - Sodajerk
March 30th - Variety Playhouse - Los Amigos Invisibles
March 30th - The Drunken Unicorn - Kid Koala
March 30th - The EARL - Hope for a Golden Summer
March 31st - Smith's Olde Bar - Fu Manchu
March 31st - Variety Playhouse - Ted Leo and the Pharmacists
Labels: show calendar
posted by The Security Chicken @ 3:03 PM
6 comments
6 Comments:
That Black Angels show last night at the Earl was great. Guitar madness abounded. Although I think their sound was better at Variety Playhouse when they opened for the Black Keys a few months ago. They need that big stage.
Sad to have missed that one.
Flew into Newark yesterday, feeling about half past dead. Plane was late and the Avis counter was a nightmare. Got us one of those real jazzy Hyundai Sonatas right at about 7:30 with the mission before us (me, FM Chubs, and the Lovely Ginger) of getting to Levon Helm's barn 120 miles to the north in Woodstock for one of his Rambles, an evening of music for about 100 very lucky attendees, before the gates closed around 9:00. We got there at 9:15, no speeding tickets, the gates were still open, our tickets were there and we walked in literally seconds before the Levon Helm Band cranked up "Ophelia". Helm's voice is amazing considering what he went through with throat cancer some years back. What a night. Highly recommended to lovers of American roots music; the joy these wonderful musicians take in playing this classic blues, country, and rock and roll is palpable. The other tunes from the Band's canon were "Rag, Mama, Rag", "Chest Fever" (with the legendary Garth Hudson organ intro handled on guitar by Larry Campbell, who sang the song as well), and the anticipated set closer, "The Weight". Other highlights included a slow burning instrumental take on "Ode to Billie Joe" that could have been lifted off a Stax Booker T album, a high and lonesome cover of the Anglins' "Ashes of Love", Levon picking up the mandolin for a killer Version of Springsteen's "Atlantic City" accompanied by fiddle and squeezebox, and the blazing encore, "Take Me To The River"
The Rambles are expensive (currently $150 a ticket and rumored to be going up to $200 this summer), but Helm and these musicians did a couple of triumphant shows at the Beacon Theater in NYC two weeks ago that sold out quickly. The opportunity to hear this kind of music in the gorgeous setting of Helm's Barn studio from no more than 20 feet away with a pot luck supper going on downstairs is really unique in today's pop music world. The success of the NYC shows may mean a tour and if these guys come to your area, go!
To hear an NPR interview with Helm about the Rambles:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5591685
www.levonhelm.com has information and pictures
That NPR link didn't come over right. It should be:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5591685
It still won't fit. Screw it. Go to www.npr.org and search Levon Helm. It will come up.
Thanks, fm fats! Love the ramblings...
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