Chicago — The return

I got back to my parents house around 11pm last night. It’s already been a surreal trip. I haven’t been home for more than a day since Craig and April got married last October.

That makes it eight months since I’ve last been home for any extended period of time. In that time it’s like I got amnesia about home. I’m reaching for light switches where there aren’t any. I’m forgetting names of streets I used to drive every day.

Maybe the hardest thing to handle in the past two days is how isolated my parents house is from anything. They don’t live miles down some private drive. It’s actually the opposite. They live in a 50 year old subdivision, three quarters of the way down the row of houses. On the right. Red brick. Really, you can’t miss it.

But that’s part of the problem, too. No one in the suburbs does anything at night. In Boston, if I’m on my front porch for more than five minutes – and it’s not 3am – people walk by, cars drive by. I might have a conversation while I’m out there.

Last night I went outside to sit on the porch and there was nothing. And it was dark.

Living in the city for so long has made me forget what it’s like to be dark at night. In Boston you can barely walk down a street without a street lamp flickering on once you get 15 feet past it.

Here, an old gas lamp was putting out a feeble light and everything was still. It almost felt like I had gone blind. It’s weirdly relaxing. But as I was smoking on the porch last night, I swear I could hear an anonymous neighbor just moaning.

Enough about that.

Today, I made it into the city proper to watch my beloved Cubbies lose to the Pirates 6-4. Zambrano got shelled in the first, giving up three runs. Matt Murton dropped a routine fly ball and made a throwing error. The Cubs offense came on three home runs. Aramis Ramirez and Angel Pagan hit solo shots and Michael Barret hit a two run, pinch hit homer. That was it.

But Wrigley. Oh, Wrigley. My dad and I were sitting 19 rows up from home plate and were behind the netting. I took about 40 pictures but I left my USB cord in Boston, so you’ll have to wait until I get home to upload them.

One of the best parts of the day was getting to the game. If I was going alone or with friends, I would have taken the Metra to the Davis Street CTA stop in Evanston. I would’ve transferred over to the Purple line and ridden it to Howard then switched to the Red line and gotten off at Addison – aka, Wrigley Field.

But going with my old man? Two hours on trains? “The hell with that,” he succinctly said. Instead, he decided to drive down to the Howard Street El stop, leave the car and ride the El the 12 stops to Wrigley.

I asked him how long it had been since he had ridden public transportation in the city of Chicago. He couldn’t remember.

Once he said that, I knew this was going to be the most fun I’d ever had on the El. And I wasn’t disappointed. Dad looked at map above the doors after every stop. I could tell he was counting down.

I tried to point out the Riviera and the Aragon, but he was too busy staring at a guy who was getting on the train. He was wearing ear buds and listening to his iPOD so loud that we could hear it from the other side of the train car. (I tried to explain the iPOD revolution to my dad, but he didn’t get it.)

I saw the “what’s that noise” look on my dad’s face. (Growing up, I learned to recognize it early.) He opened his mouth and went to stand up. I had to put my hand on his shoulder to stop him from saying something. Later, he asked about a smell. I laughed a lot. Then the two of us got shit faced at the ball park and I laughed some more.

I’d go into more detail, but this one, I’m keeping to myself.

End of day one and a half from Chicago.

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.

Blog life crisis?

Haven’t written in a while. Mostly because I haven’t been to a show since Upstairs at the Middle East. Mostly because I’ve been hesitant to write about what has been going on. There’s something to be said about having the onion sack to write about your thoughts and the current events of your life. It’s a lot of exposure. (Well, it could be a lot of exposure if anyone ever read this thing.)

Plus, do I really want to write about myself? Is that really interesting to anyone?

Went to the store today because I needed some shaving cream. Bought some rutabagas. Later I think I’ll pull my pants down and slide on the ice. 

Come on. With the exception of that last part (if I do that, there will be pictures), that isn’t interesting to me — and I’m the one doing it.  This makes me wonder if I need some direction for this blog. One friend has a Red Sox blog. Another has a fishing and outdoors blog. Lately I’ve been writing — with various degrees of success depending on who you ask — about music. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of music blogs in the world. Does that deter me? Not really. Writing about shows and albums is something I want to do, so I’ll keep it up. 

But what about the rest of the time? Do you want to know about what is or isn’t going on with Melody? Most of you reading this have never met her. Would I feel bad writing about it? No, because I like to think I’d try to be objective about it, but, really, who of you cares?

But, man. That personal writing… it always makes for the most compelling and interesting stuff to read. Beth keeps telling me I’ve got the chops to blog on a daily basis if I wasn’t so lazy. She’s probably right and I appreciate the support, but I’ve got to have something to put on paper. Or screen. I’ll keep working on it. And hopefully I’ll keep you interested.

Until then, Melody, I am going to pull my pants down and slide on the ice. 

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.

Review: Menomena at Great Scott 3/27

I made the trip out to Allston on Tuesday night for the second show of the week: Menomena at Great Scott. I met up with Iris and Dave for a burrito and a few beers before heading over to the show. Doors were at 9pm and the line up was Menomena, Field Music and Land of Talk.

Talk about a night of indie music and indie people. Sorry, pretentious indie people.

Great Scott hasn’t changed much since the last time I was there. Walking in, you’re in a square room with a checkered floor. A big wooden bar runs the length of the far wall and tables, rails and barstools are littered around the room. The beer selection was decent. Jutting out of the main room was a long rectangular hallway about 20 feet wide and maybe 40 feet long, which opened up at the head and had the stage. The whole place is shaped like a dumbbell.

Montreal-based Land of Talk opened the evening up with a 40 minute (!?) set. They sounded like a poor man’s version of Rilo Kiley. I couldn’t hear the lyrics over the guitar fuzz. The drums and bass (Bucky and Chris) were unimpressive. The smoking hot indie chick lead singer Elizabeth Powell was the most redeeming part of their show. All in all, they sounded like a relatively new band trying to massage out a live sound while still trying to be relevant. They finished their set up and retired to the swag stand for the rest of the night.

Field Music (David Brewis, Peter Brewis and Andy Moore) is a UK-based trio that I checked out for a few minutes before heading over to the show. Their tracks sounded pretty interesting and I figured that seeing two good bands out of a three band lineup would make the evening worthwhile. Unfortunately, they were pretty benign. One guy I met at the show called them derivative and a rip off of Yes. (He was a little bit older.) Rather than trying to forge their own sound, they picked bits and pieces of other bands they must have listened to and tried to cobble it together into a mosaic. Unfortunately, I didn’t think it worked.

The drumming was less than inspired. It was just there to keep the beat and didn’t add to the sound. I suppose there is nothing wrong with that, but I challenge you to name me a truly great band that didn’t have a good-to-great drummer. It’s hard. And even bands that skate by on poor drumming make up for it another way. Take the White Stripes. Say what you will about them, but Jack White’s blistering guitar work overshadows Meg’s drumming and makes the sound work.

Not so much with Field Music. Dave and Iris disagreed with me and the random guy from the bar. But after the sound of the first act, anything was going to be a step up.

Menomena finally came out an hour after Field Music left the stage. The Portland, OR three piece (I guess that was the theme for the night) consists of Brent Knopf on guitar, keyboards, glockenspiel; Justin Harris on bass, guitar, baritone sax and alto sax; and Danny Seim on percussion. It was apparent from the first song that these were the professionals and everything up until that point had been wrapping — here was the real present.

What struck me most was the difference between the sound on the album and the sound live. I gave the record Friend or Foe two listens before the show. It felt slow and melodramatic. I remember thinking ‘Here we go again.’ But live, these three guys put on a show. All three of the guys sing, but Harris’s voice was the standout. The addition of the two saxes and glockenspiel to the sound gave it less of an Indie feel and more an experimental rock sound. Me likey.

Menomena played for about an hour an a half, finishing up around one. Although the encore was delayed because, as the band left the stage after their set, the drummer skipped out for some food. Harris and Knopf came back on stage and explained to the crowd: ‘This is probably the lamest encore you’ve ever seen, but our drummer went to get something to eat.’ They hung around until he got back, played their encore and strolled off to wherever experimental rock bands go after shows — probably a bar around the corner.