Guilty Pleasures, Mercy Lounge, Nashville, TN - 3/5/2011

This evening found us heading out to the Mercy Lounge en masse in party mode (meaning we were up for a night out past midnight).  The Guilty Pleasures always put on a fun show with a totally oddball mix of 80's songs, from the obvious to the sublimely obscure.  This was no exception, and it again really showed off the talent of these guys.

The coolest part, though, and the super memorable aspect of the show, was when Jonathon Cain of Journey joined the band for "Faithfully," "Touchin' Lovin' Squeezin'," "Separate Ways," and "Don't Stop Believing." His daughter joined, as well, as she is an aspiring singer.  He sounded great and took lead vocals along with his daughter on "Faithfully."  I didn't realize that he wrote/co-wrote all those songs.  Pretty cool to see him in such a tiny venue when Journey still plans arena gigs.

Definitely an "only in Nashville" type of thing ...

The Dismemberment Plan, Paradise, Boston, MA - 1/28/2011

It's funny how excited I was for this show, being a fan of only their last 2 records and not really not a fan of their other output.  I saw the D Plan twice in their original existence, once at Cat's Cradle in Chapel Hill/Carrboro, NC, and then on their farewell tour (July 2003) at Echo Lounge in Atlanta, GA.  The latter was an especially rocking show.

We decided to make a Boston (family, friends)/New York City (friends, food, shows) trip with this as an added bonus, timing it all right with a big nasty snow storm.  Amazingly, we got up there and got around without much issue at all.  Foodwise on this particular day, I enjoyed a Legal Seafoods lobster roll (not the greatest ever, but dependable), pizza from Figs in Beacon Hill (excellent) and a post-show Chinese pigout at the Peach Farm (not for the faint of heart).

My sister, on first moving to Boston, had lived a couple of T stops down from the Paradise in Allston, MA, but I had oddly never been to a show at this venerable venue.  That was exciting in and of itself to me.  Similar to other storied venuse like First Avenue or Exit/In, they are not shy about promting the parade of rock legends that had once played there.  I love that stuff, though.

Openers the Forms were pretty bad, like a less inventive (but heavily indebted to Animal Collective.  Then came the D Plan, who both looked and sounded exactly as though 8 years had not passed since I last saw them.  It was uncanny, almost reverse aging.  The beginning of the set was great for me, heavily drawn from Change and Emergency & I.  They sounded very tight, and the drumming continues to be amazing with these guys.  Travis is still a funny, joyful frontman.  The end of the main set and the beginning of the encore were heavy on the jittery early tunes, of which I'm not much of a fan.  The closing with "Spider in the Snow" and "Back and Forth" really saved it for me, though.  They covered almost all the bases and didn't leave out any hits.  Glad I made this trek ...

The Face of the Earth

A Life of Possibilities
Automatic Follow Through
You Are Invited
Sentimental Man
The City
The First Anniversary of Your Last Phone Call
Time Bomb
What Do You Want Me To Say?
Come Home
The Dismemberment Plan Gets Rich
Gyroscope

If I Don't Write

Girl O'Clock

I Love A Magician

Ellen and Ben

Do the Standing Still

OK, Joke's Over

The Ice of Boston (see photo)
That's When the Party Started
Spider In The Snow
Back and Forth

The Walkmen, Exit/In, Nashville, TN - 1/15/2011

I think that there is nary a better band playing in the country right now than the Walkmen.  They have put out a remarkable string of albums going back to their debut and are making music for the ages.  To put it another way:  I was psyched for this show.

We finally tried NY Pie in West Nashville before the rocking ensued, and it was pretty great.  According to the Exit/In website, there was no opener with the Walkmen going on at 9, so we ended up getting there way too early, but it was fine as lots of friends came out.

The openers ended up being Lower Dens, who sounded great.  They very much had the early 80's new wave thing down, but the singer had some pipes.  I kind of wish they had ended their set a little earlier, as they went on a bit too long, but they were good.  As I was grabbing a beer during their set, I got a chance to shake hands with Hamilton, the Walkmen's frontman, and thank him for coming back to Nashville.  He was gracious.

So the Walkmen come out with no fanfare at all.  The crowd was nice and full but not crazy.  We were pretty front and center, much more so than normal.  And what can I say?  They absolutely killed.  One of the better shows of the nascent year, but I don't see much that could top it.  The Nashville Scene did a nice write-up with lots of pics, too.  I can hardly express how good these guys are, how amazing their songs are, how many classic tunes they could play but didn't ... just about perfect ...

Everyone Who Pretended to Like Me Is Gone (couldn't think of that one before ...)
Angela Surf City
In The New Year
138th Street (!!!)
Blue as Your Blood
Woe Is Me
Little House of Savages (!!!!)
All My Great Designs
Victory
While I Shovel The Snow (best song of the night - transcendent)
On The Water
Canadian Girl (!!!!!)
All Hands on the Cook
Juveniles

New Country (just Paul and Ham)
The Rat
We've Been Had (!!!!!!!!!!!)

Guided by Voices w/ Times New Viking, Cannery Ballroom, Nashville, TN - 1/14/2011

I first saw the "classic" GBV line-up in 1995 at the Masquerade in Atlanta, GA.  We drove down without tickets (5 hours from my South Carolina hometown), rocked out to them with support from Chavez (!!) and Sixteen Deluxe, chowed down post-show at a Waffle House and then drove back home, getting back to Sumter at 7 in the morning.  It was fairly epic.  GBV was touring Alien Lanes and were every bit as awesome as I could have imagined.  They opened with "Shocker in Gloomtown," ended the main set with "Echos Myron," and basically left me speechless.

I proceeded to see the newer incarnations of GBV multiple times over the years, including four (!) times on their farewell tour in 2004.  I was and remain a bit of a fan.  When they announced the classic line-up tour for 2010, I was a bit peeved at myself for not making the effort to see them in Vegas or Columbus, but I just couldn't swing it.

Lo and behold, they decide to come down to Nashville for a big rock show.  My fiancee moved down here more or less the same day as this show, but she still made it out there with me for what proved to be a long night of rock.  We met up with friends and actually grabbed a great spot, which in the Cannery is a huge deal.

First up was Times New Viking, whom I'd seen in Columbus before.  They've never really done it for me, and tonight was no exception.  It was fun enough, I guess, but nothing too fantastic.

Without too much down time in between, Uncle Bob and company took the stage.  They proceeded to rock a very long, exhaustive setlist that should pop up on http://www.gbvdb.com/ any day now and from which I'll transfer to here.  They pretty much hit all the classics, even hitting a couple tunes from Mag Earwhig!.  The band sounded tight-ish though not overly professional.  Bob was great as ever, drinking hard, doing big kicks, and sounding great.  Tobin Sprout looked the same as in 1995.  The rest of the band looked a good deal older/worse for the wear, but they delivered the goods.

Similar to seeing Pavement last year, it was a great nostalgia trip but not exactly a "great" show.  I had a blast, I sang along, I loved every minute of it, but it definitely reminded me that you can't bottle the magic of a certain time/place (see 1995 above) and recreate it all over again.  All of which also underscored the very powerful reaction I had to seeing the Walkmen the following night, i.e. seeing a band in their prime and at the height of their powers.

We left after the first encore, and they apparently came back for a second encore that included "Motor Away" (doh!).  Also, Jim James was spotted by friends at the show, though we missed him personally.

Wolf Parade, Exit/In, Nashville, TN - 11/22/2010

Wolf Parade had already put on one of my favorite shows of 2010 with their set at Pitchfork, so getting to see them at the Exit/In was pretty darn exciting.  They released one of my favorite albums of the 2000's (Apologies to the Queen Mary) and one of my top 10 favorite songs maybe ever ("Shine A Light").  Good stuff.

We got inside for the opening a band, a Modest Mouse-by-way-of-Japan band whose name escapes me now.  They were good in a goofy, fun way.

Wolf Parade hit the stage and opened with "You Are a Runner ..." and really didn't let up from there.  One of the best parts of this show was that it was at a perfect capacity - not so full that you couldn't move but also very high energy and with everyone totally into it.  I kind of took down a setlist but kind of didn't.  They played "Palm Road," "Language City" (which features maybe their best outro), a killer "I'll Believe In Anything"/"This Heart's On Fire" in the middle similar to Pitchfork, and an encore that included, yes, "Shine a Light."  They closed the whole thing out with "Kissing the Beehive."

Solid show, great band.  I didn't get around to writing this until 2011, so it's a bit skimpy on the details.

Grinderman, Cannery Ballroom, Nashville, TN - 11/19/2010

Good Lord was this a rocking show.  I'm a late comer to the Nick Cave cult, having really gotten into him probably around 2004 or so with the release of his B-sides collection (which is quite awesome, by the way).  My buddy Kevin, a long-time Cave devotee who has seen him with the Bad Seeds multiple times on multiple continents throughout the years, and I bought tickets for this the day they went on sale.

It had been a while since I last hit the Cannery, a notoriously not great place to see (and especially to hear) a show, what with it's odd shape and tendency for a lot of sound bouncing around the room, but it's Nick Cave et al - what are you going to do?

We grabbed dinner at McCabe's beforehand and missed the openers entirely.  By the time we arrived, it was pretty packed out, and without much ado, the lights went down and Nick Cave came out for what was a slamming, ultra tight rockfest.  He is one crazy awesome frontman, not quite as frenetic as Iggy Pop but extremely arresting and hard not to watch.

They came on very strong, basically playing "the hits," opening with "Mickey Mouse" and rocking through "Get It On," "Heathen Child," some other rockers off their two records and culminating in a scorching "No Pussy Blues."  The biggest issue is that after that crescendo toward the end of the main set, it went all mid-tempo and gooey for the remainder of the set.  It would've been basically impossible to keep up that level of rock, but it still kind of petered out a bit at the end.  But the highs were very high indeed ... fantastic stuff ...

The Cannery, of note, offered little good viewing space unless you were at the very front.  The sound was loud and clear where we were (straight back from the stage).  I've found that you have line up with the stage and can't be caught over at the bar side for decent sound.  It was a tolerable space for the show, though it remains my least favorite Nashville venue by a long shot.

Deerhunter, Exit/In, Nashville, TN - 11/10/2010

This show was a long time coming in the sense that I had not been able to check much out recently due to studying and - finally - taking some big professional exams.  I finished my last one this afternoon and was in full on release mode.  We got there just in time for Deakin's set (of Animal Collective), which sounded like Animal Collective minus much melody.  I have the record, so maybe it will grow on me ...

Deerhunter came out to a pretty packed house and from the get go sounded awesome.  They did their usual thing, which in my eyes includes ending each song in a noisy meltdown that then goes straight into the next song.  Their rhythm section is so locked in that it really works.  Their live sound has become so minimalist in a lot of ways that it reminds me most of a Krautrock type of vibe, which is right up my alley.

They played the hits, including "Nothing Ever Happened," which killed as usual.  Probably my biggest issue was that it ended around 1 in the morning, and I'm getting old, kids.  Great show ...