Wilco on Saturday Night Live

Yeah, I haven’t watched Saturday Night Live regularly in years either. But this past Saturday, Jeff, Glen and the rest of the Wilco boys made an appearance as the musical guest. I was interested enough to at least give it a look. Their version of “Walken” was good, but not nearly as inspired as Jeff Tweedy’s suit.

Man, some guys have everything: musical ability and excellent taste in clothing.

Editor’s Note: In the time it took me to get that video posted it was pulled from YouTube. The suit was glorious, though. Trust me.

Insomnia is a Bitch

Not sleeping regularly is really starting to catch up with me. I haven’t been blogging because of it – which may seem counter intuitive. Up late at night with nothing else to do? Why not write a blog entry? I haven’t been able to concentrate enough to string sentences together. Even with so much to write about.

I’ve been to a lot of great shows lately: Voxtrot, Wilco and Maximo Park are the first that come to mind. I think there have been a couple others too. I can’t remember.

This was my fourth time seeing Wilco and it was, by far, the best performance I’ve seen them put on. I was in some VIP box seats at the Bank of America Pavillion here in Boston — they were amazing. The band played a lot of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot some Summerteeth, A Ghost is Born and Sky Blue Sky. Then they surprised me by digging back into A.M. and playing some old favorites. What a show.

Maximo Park at the Paradise was pretty good too. After the Oohlah’s (I think) played, Monsters are Waitng came out and played. The lead singer was obviously trying to steal Bjork’s look and sound but was blatantly trying to rip off Karen O’s moves. The whole time she was on stage convulsing around and playing her synthesizer, I wanted to ask whoever the primary song writer for the band is if they had ever heard of this crazy thing called a chorus.

Yeah, they are one of those bands. Good concept, I suppose, but they didn’t really pull it off. Whenever I see a band like that I wonder if a talented producer would overhaul the sound completely and make them easier to listen to and enjoy. Or, would the changes the producer tried to impose make the band loose its identity and fall apart. Maybe, assuming they were given the opportunity, they resisted those types of changes and chose to fight on with warbling guitars, electric fuzz and nonsensical lyrics — not to mention a healthy dose of vitamin Bjork.

Or maybe they just aren’t that good.

But it is still interesting to think about.

Maximo Park, on the other hand, impressed me. I’d heard one or two songs before I went to the show and wasn’t expecting too much, but I was surprised. The four guys from Newcastle, England came out and poured energy into the crowd all night. There wasn’t a ballad or slow song played – and the whole time the lead singer, Paul Smith, jumped off the stage, danced and generally had a good time. Duncan Lloyd’s guitar work was good. He carried the sound, played melodies and provided a lot of the spark the band fed off of.

My one compliant is the keyboard player, Archie Tiku. What was this guy’s deal? He looked like he was going to cry all night. He tried to make his presence known by walking around the stage like he was having a gran mal seizure then tried to steal Smith’s moves. What a douche bag.

***

Other than those shows I’ve seen over the month – has it already been a month? – I’ve been laying pretty low and working on the whole getting to sleep thing. It comes and goes but has just been hanging around a little longer than usual lately. Tonight I might try grinding up a bottle of Ambien and snorting it off a hooker’s ass.

You never know what’ll work.

Andrew Bird at Northwestern University 5/14

Before I got into town, my friend Maggie told me that she had landed a batch of tickets to see Andrew Bird put on a VH1-style- storytellers concert at Northwestern and would I be interested in going? Uhm, of course.

I haven’t listened to much of Andrew Bird’s music, so I tracked him down on MySpace and checked out his latest album, Armchair Apocrypha. I thought it was an interesting album. If you asked me about it before the show, I’d recommend it, but I don’t know that I’d go out and spend $12 on it.

After the show, I was read to jump on iTunes and download it.

I used to play at Pick-Staiger Concert Hall while I was in high school. I was constantly amazed at the acoustics and how easy it was to hear other people playing. It only holds 1100 people, so the idea of hearing such intricate music in that venue was half of the draw.

Neither Andrew Bird or the Hall disappointed. I was sitting 11 rows back on the left hand side of the stage. I’m pretty sure that Bird heard the muffled burp that I let out half way through Why. I’m not joking.

His stage set up consisted of a glockenspiel, electric guitar, violin with two looping rigs and two giant victrola looking horns. Each of the victrola horns was hooked up to a separate violin rig and altered the sound not so subtly. One of the horns kept the melody. The other had two horns pointing opposite directions and spun in front of a microphone. The effect was to completely destroy the sound that Andrew Bird had previously looped.

It made the music sound very Phillip Glass-like.

After an hour, Bird took questions. I found out he grew up in my home town. He likes coffee and tries to tour in an environmentally friendly way. After 15 minutes of questions, he played a three song encore and closed with Weather Systems.

In that space, with that sound, it was amazing.

Ted Leo and the Pharmacists 5/4 Avalon and Chicago

Saw Ted Leo and the Pharmacists this past Friday at Avalon. Good show, interesting crowd and lots of energy from the band. Unfortunately, the sound was off all night so the band was drowning out the vocals even more than usual.

One of my friends told me that since I went to the show, I’m officially pseudo-hipster now. I don’t buy it. I wasn’t in a blazer or fedora. Although, I was sporting my usual mean goatee. Natch.

I ran into a couple of people who I met a few months back at the Toad in Cambridge. I got up at Toad to get a beer and when I came back there were four new people sitting at my table. In other bars, it’s not a big deal — I guess. But if you know Toad, then you know table seating is worth its weight in fluffy bags of weed. Turns out that this crew of people (headed by Tom and Meri), live around the block from me between Ball and Davis Square.

That was  a month ago that I met Tom and Meri. On Friday, I came back from the bathroom at the Ted Leo show and there they were. I recognized them after about a second. We reintroduced ourselves and made drunken plans to get together sometime. Hopefully, we will.

Show recap is quick today for a couple of reasons. First, I just wanted to stretch my blog legs out again. It’s been nearly a month since I updated. To my two loyal readers, I apologize. Second, because today is going to be busy. I’ve got to get a lot done this afternoon because I’m catching a 7:30pm flight from Boston Logan Airport to O’Hare International.

Yeah, I was talking about the City, not the band. I know some of you are disappointed.

That’s right, my babies, I’m heading home. It’s a working trip, so I won’t be on vacation. But I still get to grace the MidWest with my presence for 11 days. The highlights? Tomorrow I’m at the 1:20pm Cubs/Pirates game at Wrigley and a week from tomorrow I’ll see the White Sox and Yankees duke it out at the Cell. Can’t. F’n. Wait.

It’s been about two years since I’ve been to Wrigley, so this will be one of the highlights of my summer. I’m planning on bringing my camera, so I’ll throw up some snaps when I get back.

So if you read this and you’re in Boston or somewhere else, see you soon. If you’re in Chicago, I’m on my way in exactly 12 hours. Feel free to stop by and say hello if you’re in the greater Chicago-land area.

Man, it is going to feel good to not be in Boston for a while.

Review: Kristoffer Ragnstam 04/02/07

I made my way over to the Middle East in Central Square last night to check out Kristoffer Ragnstam. The show was Upstairs at the Middle East. If you haven’t been there, the room is small and intimate. It was made more intimate because in addition to Dave, Iris and me, there were about a dozen other people in the crowd. Plus the members of the three other bands that were playing.

The space always makes me feel like I’m seeing a friend play a show in his garage in high school. The stage isn’t big and the max occupancy of the room is 194. Thinking back, those garage shows might have held more people.

Kristoffer Ragnstam was hanging out by the bar before his set. Tall and skinny with glasses that looked more like Coke bottles than eye wear, he was dressed in a green and purple cowboy shirt. I couldn’t make out what was stitched onto it because his matching handkerchief/ascot was too big too see around.

As his band, The Electric Four, set up on stage Ragnstam turned to the crowd and said, “Watch out, Swedes are in the building. Swedes are in the building.” He looked to the drummer — who’s hand was pointing straight up with drumstick — then turned back to the crowd and simply said, “Thank you for dancing.” They launched into slick 40-minute set mixing pop with pop-y funk stylings that tried to channel Beck.

Unfortunately I kept thinking Devo instead of Beck. It’s worth noting that I’ve never seen a band more into their own music than this one. The drummer sang to himself, the lead guitar player danced and the bass player — who may be the bastard love child of John Daily and Curt Schilling — rocked himself hard all night.

The same can’t be said of the other 12 of us in the audience. Ragnstam definitely touched on a few musical themes that made me nod my head, but all in all his show wasn’t as incredible as I was made to believe it would be. It could have been that the room was mostly empty or that it was a Monday, but I left the Middle East wanting something more.

But, if I happening to surfing concert listings and see that Kristoffer Ragnstam and the Electric 4 are playing a show for $10, I’d go check them out again.