I know that James Brown is the Godfather of Soul and all, but this is my latest iTunes purchase and I’m absolutely loving it:

Consider me an official fan. I guess it’s just another thing I can relate to Ally McBeal about.

and if I had one wish fulfilled tonight
i’d ask for the sun to never rise
if God lent his voice to me to speak
i’d say go to bed, world

but if I had one wish fulfilled tonight
i’d ask for the sun to never rise
if God passed a mic to me to speak
i’d say stay in bed, world
sleep in peace

- 03.45: No Sleep, The Cardigans

(photo courtesy of “westerns” on peteyorn.com)

In about 5 hours I’ll be standing in front of Pete Yorn. Nevermind that we have to drive back at five-thirty in the morning tomorrow to make it back for work. It will all be worth it. Expect a full report when I finish catching up on sleep.

baby, you hardly even notice
when i try to show you this
song is meant to keep ya
from doing what you’re supposed to
like waking up too early
maybe we can sleep in
i’ll make you banana pancakes
pretend like it’s the weekend now

and we could pretend it all the time
can’t you see that its just raining
ain’t no need to go outside

- jack johnson

I wonder if historians care that Hollywood took the newest X-men movie title from The Battle of the Little Bighorn (also known as “Custer’s Last Stand” to most people).

We watched the opening day, midnight-showing of X-Men 3: The Last Stand last night. I probably could have worded that sentence better but who cares.

It was a brilliant movie: Great cast, full range of emotions, impressive CG, great plot, great character development, good amount of darkness and light, and good looking men and women.

I have no understanding of X-men outside of the Hollywood movies so maybe that’s why I like it so much. From what I’ve read, the films deviate quite dramatically from the original comics. Even so, I think movies should be judged on two separate scales: (1) accuracy to the original source and (2) performance as a stand-alone movie. I tend to care about the latter much more. Some movie critics say that too much emphasis on the first scale ruined The Da Vinci Code as a summer blockbuster. I think it all depends on how dearly you hold the original source to your heart.

I can’t say much about the movie without spoiling it so this post has turned out pretty boring. I just think that anytime the “bad guys” in a movie are likeable, you’ve got a great movie on your hands.

Now the hard part is deciding which Mutant I like the best. I went through this same dilemma when I watched X2 but the dilemma is all the more complicated this time around.

In other news, the smartest guys in the room don’t look so smart these days. And Pete Yorn (easily my favorite artist of all time) is FINALLY taking a national tour with Austin, TX as his fifth stop. It’s on a Wednesday but I think we still might go. Who knows when he’ll ever come back to Texas…

I got the following email in my inbox today:

——————————————————————–

I’m playing an in-store, acoustic gig at The Electric Fetus in Minneapolis, MN this weekend so be sure to stop by if you live in the neighborhood (or even if you don’t)! It’ll be great to see some familiar faces.

Your friend,
PY

——————————————————————–

As far as concerts go, seeing Pete Yorn live is my ultimate dream.

Somebody please buy me a ticket to Minneapolis.

I love playhouses. It’s different than the movie theatre and even different than Broadway musicals. It’s a little known fact that I was in Theatre in high school and that I once played the role of Hermia in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Throw in my middle school years in Theatre class and there you find the roots of my love of the playhouse. A few years ago, I watched a play called Second Chances at the Austin Playhouse and I loved every second of it. I swore to go back and foolishly never did. Stage comedy is just a whole other world of laughs. The dialogue is usually witty and quick like the lines you’d find in a Woody Allen movie and the body humor is astonishingly successful. Even those who don’t admire Jim Carrey and Adam Sandler would probably find themselves chuckling through a live play. Part of the draw of a playhouse is the intimate seating. There literally isn’t a bad seat in the house. The seats fan out maybe six or seven rows with the first row only steps away from the actors. This is amazing to me. Every facial expression, every twitch or stutter is under the scrutiny of everyone in the house. There is really little room for error. There are no do-overs, no take twos.

This past Friday I had the honor of watching An Infinite Ache at Stages Theatre in Houston. The venue is great. I’ll definitely be back. The play was– well I don’t know how to describe it. The acting was good at best but the play really spoke volumes to me. Let’s rewind. It’s a two-person play about a couple, Hope and Charles, who are on their first date. Charles starts envisioning their future together and basically you see their whole life flash before your eyes. The notion of time blurs with one scene starting without you realizing that the last one ended. So the acting was okay… but the play was brilliant. There were a few cheeseball parts but the majority of it had me feeling this, well, this ache inside my chest. I’m really sorry for writing that last line because I realize how stupid it sounds– given the title of the play and all. But by the end of the play I felt like Hope and Charles were a couple of my best friends and I had just lived through 30 years of my life. I was emotionally exhausted when the house lights came on and dragged myself to my car. It was a quiet car ride home. Okay yeah, I was alone (the fiance is in Thailand and I don’t know anyone else who likes watching plays) but still, it felt extra quiet. Even writing about the play now makes my heart feel kind of heavy.

On the way home I listened to Sibelius’ beautiful Violin Concerto in D, Op.47 Symphony No.5. I’m not sure if that’s the proper syntax for a classical music citation but it was a gorgeous piece of music and I wished that there was a button in my car that was connected by satellite to iTunes where I could immediately purchase it.

Speaking of buttons, I would also like the big, red EASY button that stars in the funny series of Staples commericals. Pictured below for those of you who have no idea what I’m talking about.

That’s two gasoline related titles within two weeks. Scary.

I picked up my race packet this morning for the ConocoPhillips Rodeo Run this Saturday. I’m a little apprehensive because I’ve never participated in a 5K before. And it doesn’t help that I have never ever in my life run three miles before. I haven’t been good about training up for it (which sounds like a joke because three miles isn’t much) and given the fact that I’m writing this post two days before the race I’m pretty sure it’s too late to start. And it really doesn’t help that the weather forecast says that there’s an 80% chance of rain with the humidity at 71%. I tried to find information about how long they give you to run the 3 miles. I found the following:

The course closes at 11:30 a.m.; if you are still on the course at that time, please move to the sidewalks.

Let’s hope I finish the race before they start opening up the streets to normal traffic. Now, wouldn’t that be embarrassing?

I can’t believe I didn’t realize that SXSW was coming up so soon. Not that I had any plans to attend but this whole time I had been looking at Metric’s show schedule thinking that they had a regular gig at Stubb’s. But they’re actually playing for SXSW and tickets are horredously expensive– so I guess I won’t be seeing Metric anytime soon.

I’ve recently taken a liking to Arctic Monkeys. They’ve got a really good sound and I bet they’re great live. You can watch some of their videos here. How much you wanna bet they’ll be at ACL Fest next year?

I had my bags all packed and ready to move to Wordpress today. Unfortunately, Hostway, the company that I originally registered sockparade under, is down for an upgrade.

I know, I know that’s not really a good excuse for not blogging for the past 3 days.

Just thought you should know.

Hopefully the move to Wordpress will be completed by the end of the weekend.

Bob Schneider wasn’t as charming as I had hoped (but he certainly is pretty) and I didn’t get a chance to go to the Beats of Basquiat at the MFAH because the line was way too long and we were starving for sushi. We did check out Chrome, a supposed hotspot in Houston, where we ran into our realtor. It’s strange how dim lighting and loud music suddenly makes it okay to hug your realtor when I’ve only shook his hand in daylight. The fiance hugged him too. Of course it was the manly kind with one hand still in the handshake (or fistshake rather) and the other pounding each other’s backs.

Stay tuned.

I met Chopper (the tallest guy in the picture above) the lead singer/guitarist of Kissinger on Friday at the Sidecar Pub in Cypress this past Friday. What did I think of the Sidecar Pub? I think it’s a waste of a great live music venue. The acoustics in that place are incredible. The actual room is a comfortable size and the stage is intimate with fairly sophisticated lighting. But all this went to waste because the opening band before Kissinger was way below par and the crowd was sparse and impersonal. That means you can’t trust the management to book good bands and you won’t be meeting any new friends at Sidecar. I’ve never been to a show before where I didn’t have to go early and fight my way to the front. There was no standing crowd to fight through and no strangers beside me to grin at during a good song. Everyone hung around the back of the place– most chose to sit at the bar. They were so passive and detached from the show that when they clapped and hollered after each song I was momentarily surprised to find that there were actually a good number of fans behind me. I hated that.

I could tell the band was a bit discouraged because of the unenthusiastic crowd. They’re from Austin which means that they’re used to playing in crowded bars on Sixth to over-friendly t-shirt-clad college students instead of middle aged professionals in their button-downs and the Harley-Davidson Motorcycle Gang. At one point in their set, Chopper actually felt compelled to invite the people to move towards the stage instead of lingering around the tables in the back. My friends and I and a handful of other people were the only ones who moved closer. He later thanked us personally and gave us each a free, autographed CD.

They play rock and roll the way I like rock and roll. Powerful vocals, mic-ed up drums that you feel in your chest, and solid guitar rifts that make the hair on the back of your neck stand up. No teenage vocals, no screamo, no accidental speeding up at the climax of the song, good melodies, and a fair amount of dancing and power stances. Chopper slung his guitar behind his head for a few bars while his Bruce Vilanch sidekick (pictured above on the left) rocked his guitar between his legs. It made me smile. (As you might deduce, I don’t know much about rock. But I smiled because it was a nod to the rock and roll greats of the past who pulled stunts like that during their shows.)

I tried buying a Tshirt after the show but they were all out of my size. The lady working the merch table gave me a free pin as a consolation gift. Free swag makes a happy fan.

I’m going to keep my eye on Kissinger. I like what they do. Their CD is pretty amateur but I think they’ve got potential. As for the Sidecar Pub, I don’t think I’ll be back anytime soon. I know you go to a show for the band and for the music. But after Friday I realized that live music is a total experience which includes the people you’re surrounded by when you’re watching your favorite band. The only way I’ll go back to Sidecar is if Pete Yorn himself appears on that stage. I hope some other bars in Houston will book Kissinger the next time they come to town.

Did I mention that Sidecar is located in a shopping strip behind a Hartz’s Chicken? Cypress, Texas at its finest.

I completely forgot to tell you how Patrice Pike was at the Mucky Duck. It was one of the most enjoyable non-rock shows I have ever been to. Patrice was warm and quirky. Her music was pretty difficult to classify. Her music blended acoustic rock, alternative, folk, bluegrass, and jazz (complete with scat singing). I don’t even know how to compare her to an existing artist. She’s Jewel, John Mayer, Louie Armstrong, and Janis Joplin with a twist of salsa music. The rhythms she created on her guitar made me want to get up and groove with the crazy hippies right in front of the stage.

McGonigel’s Mucky Duck was cool. It’s an Irish Pub that serves things like Fish & Chips and Shepherd’s Pie. Both were delicious. But then again, I was starving so maybe that’s a biased opinion. The lighting was dim and cozy. They have tiny tables that fill up fast and we were lucky to snag a little two-seater near the back. Many tables indicated that they were reserved so the reservation route is probably the way to go. The tables are the kind where it’s so small you can’t cross your legs comfortably and they have to keep clearing your plates because there isn’t room for them to pile up. But it’s also the kind of table where you can lean in close to the person sitting across from you and whisper in their ear and hold their hand. I like their tables.

I had their Sherry Trifle which is layers of white cake, raspberry preserves, whipped cream, vanilla custard, covered with almonds and sherry drizzled over the top. No complaints there. They don’t serve liquor but they have a pretty wide selection of beer and coffee.

I’ll definitely be back.

On a completely unrelated note, I want to complain about minorities. I hate reading rants about racial issues. So if you want to stop reading right here, that’s perfectly okay. I usually avoid blogging about it but there are some things that I would like to say.

—————————————————————–

Just so that the following is read in context, I am a minority myself. Maybe that’s why all of this bothers me so much.

I was extremely annoyed when I read about Mayor Ray Nagin’s claims that New Orleans is a chocolate city and that it’s how God would want it to be. First of all, I can’t stand it when minorities are so upset about racist attitudes or comments such as the A&F T-shirts and then turn around and make even more outlandish statements themselves. I hate that there are Asians who tout around slogans like “Asian Pride” and “K-Power” while participating in groups that strive for racial equality. Equality means that everyone is equal as far as race is concerned. It doesn’t mean that your particular race is better than everyone else. If a White politician had said, “New Orleans should be built up as a vanilla city because it’s how God would want it,” you better believe that would be the end of his career. Not so with minorities. Second of all, I can’t stand it when people irreverently use the God card to scare or influence others. Unless I’m seriously mistaken, Nagin isn’t a prophet and is seriously overstepping his bounds. I cannot stand self-proclaimed mouthpieces for God who use religion for political power.

This isn’t the first time I have felt so annoyed. For example, I hated the whole William Hung obsession. For the past 50 years, Asians have tried to gain respect from the world and break out of the stereotype as cheap labor and acrobatic clowns. With one lousy American Idol appearance, William Hung took a permanent sharpie and redrew the clown image of Asians everywhere. I was appalled at the fact that his popularity was spreading like wildfire in the Asian community. This is loosely similar to the idolization of the so-called “thug life” in the Black and Hispanic community and their simultaneous defensiveness when their race is associated with crime.

I’m sick of writing this.

You know, my voicemail message on my first cell phone used to say, “Try to be consistent, okay?” And I know we’re all human, and it’s impossible to be consistent at all times. I am fully aware that the human being is often just a very contradicting mess of opinions and ideas. But could we all please just try our hardest to be consistent? I’d really appreciate it.

I’m only kidding about this post’s title. I like Canadians. Well, most Canadians. And yes, I know how to spell Canada. It’s just more fun to say Canadia (pronounced cah-nay-dee-ah).

I arrived early because I didn’t buy tickets in advance and was afraid they would sell out. I had only found out about this band two days earlier from a coworker and had no idea how popular (or not popular) they were. Even from a distance I could see a short line forming on the sidewalk outside The Parish on 6th Street.

Initially, the crowd was pretty sparse and uncomfortably young. While we waited for the opening band, The Lovely Feathers, to set up the stage, I was overcome with the underwhelming feeling that I was at a junior high dance rather than at a show. This feeling reached its peak when a preppy, dark-haired boy in a oversized Old Navy sweater asked the girl next me if she wanted some water from the bar. She graciously accepted his offer. As he walked away (with his wingman in tow), the thirsty girl and her friends squealed and giggled in delight. I could barely contain myself when the thirsty girl exasperatedly exclaimed, “See? It’s just these mind games that he plays! I can’t tell if he likes me!”

Before I could hear the psychoanalysis from her friends that was sure to follow her confession of flirt confusion, The Lovely Feathers began to play their set. Thank You, Jesus.

They were decent. Richard (pictured above on the left) was fairly charming while Mark (pictured above on the right) gyrated his pelvis a little too much for my liking. I was only a few gyrations away from feeling like I was at a Ricky Martin concert. This had nothing to do with the fact that he was wearing pink and white candy-striper pants. That’s striper, not stripper, you gutterheads.

Next up was Death of a Party.

The music was fun and rowdy but not overly creative. At several points in their set, the lead singer, Gareth Lloyd, hopped off stage to dance and mingle with the crowd. My early arrival with the awkward high schoolers had paid off because I was pretty close to the stage and at one point Gareth actually danced with me! I tried to ignore the fact that he wasn’t particularly attractive and had fun. Dancing to rock music is such an interesting art form. It quickly got weird when he palmed my head (especially since he was slightly shorter than me) but before I could protest, he was lifted up by some guys next to me and hoisted in a short crowd surf back onto the stage. If it wasn’t for this exclusive photo I snapped while dancing next to him, I wouldn’t have even mentioned this set.

After what seemed like forever (a good cliche if there ever was one), they started to set up the stage for Metric. The process was elaborate as each microphone was carefully taped, each microphone checked, each guitar tuned and even strings of lights were draped over the speakers and synthesizer. A quick glance behind me told me that the crowd had grown considerably and there was even some pushing behind me as people vied for a better view of the stage. I chit-chatted with a lesbian couple that kept raving with childish excitement about how “fucking awesome” the show was going to be and how much they loved Metric. “It’s all about the layers you know? You hear something different the second, third and fourth time you hear a song. God, this show is going to fucking rock!” Smiling politely (thanks Homer) I nodded in agreement and craned my neck to see if there were any signs of the show starting.

The music started before the band actually came onstage… and the hour or so that followed was one of the most amazing musical experiences I’ve ever been a part of. Emily Haines singlehandedly charmed the crowd into loving her without reservation simply by dancing around the stage the way someone would in the privacy of their her own bedroom. It was terrific. At one point she snatched a flash-happy photographer’s camera and threw it across the stage, admonishing them to “take it easy” between songs. Her annoyance with the fan continued even after the concert when she left the stage saying “take photographs with your eyes.” The crowd just loved her all the more.

I’m really not too sure what it was about her that was so great. Her heartbreakingly girlish vocals, her high-kick jigs, her sisterly interactions with the guitarist and bassist, how she closed her eyes when she sang, the way she let us sing parts of the songs and laughed when we were out of tune, the way she interlaced her fingers with raised hands from the crowds, and maybe even the way she headbanged. I don’t know that many people that can headbang in a charming way.

Here she is in black and white (the lighting was SO hard on my point ‘n shoot, bear with me):

Notice her uncanny resemblance to Dooce.

Josh and Emily pretend like they aren’t sure what song to play next:

When they played “Combat Baby” during their encore, everyone in the place went nuts and the creaky wooden floor (we were on the third floor) shook so violently that I was afraid it was going to give. Talk about an awesome concert venue.

And to give credit where credit is due, Metric would be nothing without its electrical guitarist, Jimmy Shaw (pictured below). This man was relentless on the guitar and pushed each song to greater heights. He wailed on the guitar like a madman, swelling our hearts past normalcy with euphoric strains of painful, electronic beauty. The guitar solos, oh, the guitar solos. Mindblowing, ear-bleeding, face-melting guitar solos.

All of that to say, if you get the chance to see Metric live, do yourself a big favor and go.

I’ll leave you with a quote from Emily that I found on their website.

“It’s all just the idea of ‘don’t freak out,’” Emily explains. “Anything that happens to you is just your life getting lived. Sometimes it feels like we’re afraid of events and action of any kind. But if you can get a little distance from it, it becomes an incredible adventure no matter how things turn out.”

I’m surprised this band hasn’t made it into mainstream yet. I think they were on the Warped Tour but they definitely aren’t getting much radioplay. Some of their songs are slow and cheesy but the fast ones are good.

Pay special attention to:

Mae - Someone Else’s Arms
Mae - Suspension
Mae - Embers and Envelopes
Mae - Last Call

While I was uploading the picture of the band I scrolled past this picture and it made me chuckle. I thought I’d share.

Say hello to the Assistant (to the) Regional Manager of Dunder Mifflin Paper Supply Company.

I was listening to Sounds Eclectic and this jazzy, swingy guy starts to sing a strangely familiar song. I don’t know much about swing (outside of the fact that it don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing) so it didn’t make sense for me to recognize the lyrics. I looked at the playlist to see who it was and was puzzled to find out that the singer was Paul Anka. I’ve never heard of Paul Anka. And just as I typed his name into my Firefox Google search plugin, he started to croon the following words:

Black hole sun
Won’t you come
And wash away the rain
Black hole sun
Won’t you come
Won’t you come

Soundgarden! Haha boy, that was the LAST thing I was expecting.

So Paul Anka’s official website refers to him as a 60’s teen idol. I know R&B rips off songs from country singers all the time but I had no idea that 60’s teen idols (who are now oldies singers) stole things from rock bands. Anyway, apparently Paul Anka was a big hit back in the day and now he’s singing Black Hole Sun, oldies version. I have no idea how he got Soundgarden’s permission but I don’t think it really works. It’s much cooler when rock bands steal lyrics from other genres.

I can’t think of any off the top of my head right now but I’m sure there are a good number of them. Will comment back when I think of them.

That’s the name of the band that opened for Snow Patrol Sunday night at Stubb’s BBQ. Yep, the whole sentence. They’re a local band and I really liked their stuff. Ignore the fact that their lead singer looks 35 and sounds like he’s 15. If you want to hear some sound clips, check out their website.

That’s right folks, my first real rock show in ATX. It’s really a shame that it’s my first one given the fact that I’m four years into my education here and I’ve never been to SXSW before. What a waste.

In the words of the articulate Jack Black, Snow Patrol rocked my face off. We were pretty close, pressed up against the girls in front of us by the pushing fans behind us. Here are some blurry pictures I snapped of Lightbody. They said no flash photography but everybody and their mama were flashing their cameras.

I loved every minute of it. It was so great feeling the drums and bassline thump against my chest. I loved how Lightbody made everyone fall in love with him by the way he rocked that guitar and the way he sang his heartbreaking lyrics to us. I love that his ridiculously curly hair was flying every which way and how he casually said that we were a better crowd than the one during SXSW.

Man, it was just awesome. Haha, I feel like I’m so inadequately describing the whole experience. But you know what I realized? We weren’t the only ones having a blast. The bands were having the time of their lives up there on stage. They loved every second of it as much as we did. The way they were jumping around on stage, eating up our screaming adoration, rocking out their hearts under the flashing lights. Cripes, it must be so good to be a rockstar.

God, I wish I was a rockstar.

Good weekends are always extreme. They are either extremely action-packed or extremely chill. This past weekend was of the first variety.

A definite highlight was the Louisiana Swamp Romp Crawfish Festival downtown on Saturday night. It was a chilly night but the food was spicy and the bands were hot. I was sitting on a parking spot concrete block with a mound of steaming crawfish that had just been freshly boiled (they were alive before they were cooked) at a crawfish booth a few hundred feet behind me. It was thoroughly enjoyable to plow through the mound of crawfish like a starved savage. You should have seen me. It was some of the spiciest crawfish I’ve ever had but I didn’t dare to stop too long for water breaks. It’s a lot like Flaming Hot Cheetoes because once you stop eating it starts to burn so you just have to keep popping more.

But now the weekend’s over and all I have are a big fat stack of decisions waiting to be made about this summer and the next year of my life. But first I need to:

-browse Flickr
-put my clothes in the dryer
-read ignored weekend email
-eat a Pho lunch with my Disney buddies
-attend the longest class in the world
-and then frantically study for a test tomorrow morning that I have yet to even begin thinking about.

It’s only after all this that I can begin tackling the fat stack. Wish me luck!!