Van Halen, Bridgestone Arena, Nashville, TN - 04/27/2012

Wow, was that bad. A train wreck. The worst is that I had such high hopes for finally seeing a band that I truly, deeply love. As one can see from the photo, we were sitting in the cheap seats, which didn't help. It was about 90-something degrees in the venue, which was strike two. But the sound ... oh, it was a low end morass of nothingness wherein I often couldn't tell what song was being played.

Our friends and I did start the evening with a lovely dinner at the Wild Hare, which continues to impress on most every level. We then headed over and enjoyed a nice stroll down Broadway into the venue.

But then it all fell apart ... the seats, the heat, the sound ... I should definitely accept by now that if I'm going to some big show like this, I've got to spring for great tickets or just not go at all. I'm spoiled like that. I thought with an opening one-two punch like "Unchained" and "Runnin' With the Devil" that I could get past the terrible-ness of some of the aforementioned issues, but it never coalesced. And the new songs ... so, soooo bad. I felt some hope during the riff for "Dance the Night Away" and some awe when Eddie flawlessly pulled off the "Hot for Teacher" intro, but then everything would sag in on itself again, with bad David Lee Roth-isms galore, a terrible video stage show that looked pretty paltry compared to most shows of this size these days, and (did I mention this already?) insufferable sound.

Why oh why? I should have just appreciated them for the greatness that they once were rather than try to relive it today. Note to self - when the Stones or the Sex Pistols or the Stone Roses come rumbin' through, think twice before going all in.

It probably didn't help, either, that I was running the half-marathon a few hours later and had that in the back of my mind the whole time. But wow ... colossal reunion tour fail ...

For the sake of posterity, the setlist (we left during the guitar solo):
Unchained
Runnin' With the Devil
She's the Woman
Romeo Delight
Tattoo
Everybody Wants Some!!
Somebody Get Me a Doctor
China Town
Hear About It Later
Oh, Pretty Woman
Drum Solo
You Really Got Me
The Trouble with Never
Dance the Night Away
I'll Wait
Hot for Teacher
Women In Love
Girl Gone Bad
Beautiful Girls
Ice Cream Man (preceded by a loooong video montage of DLR's dogs ... seriously)
Panama
Guitar Solo
Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love
Jump

Andrew Bird w/ Eugene Mirman, The Ryman Auditorium, Nashville, TN - 3/19/2012

We met up with friends and pre-partied for this one at Fleet St Pub in Printers Alley, which continue to impress me time and time again. I highly recommend the Hatton Cross Hot Hen and the fish and chips, of course.

We got into the Ryman in time to see Eugene Mirman, whom I met back in 2004 when he opened for Modest Mouse:

He's gotten a good deal more famous since then to be sure, and his act was good. Not the greatest, funniest thing ever, but it was fun and smart.

Andrew Bird, on the other hand, just didn't really turn my crank this time around. He's certainly beyond talented and has some fine material, but this felt very dialed in to me. He played some classics during the set ("Measuring Cups," "Plasticities" [which he totally flubbed]) and closed out with "Tables and Chairs" and "Fake Palindromes," but it was just a very meh show for me. We left after the main set, and I hear that he played quite the slew of encores, so maybe I missed the best part. Having seen him many times over the years, though, this was probably the least memorable performance I've witnessed.

Radiohead at the Scottrade Center, St. Louis, MO - 3/9/2012

We made the drive up to St. Louis from Nashville in around 5 hours on a sunny Friday afternoon and got checked in at the Westin, where we pre-partied in the room a bit and pretty much walked right over the show (about a 1/2 mile). Lots of other Radiohead fans there, obviously, but this hotel really made me want to make it back for a Cardinals game. Fantastic location right by Busch Stadium.

We were general admission on the floor, which I thought could be terrible but turned out great, maybe 30 yards back, great sightlines, etc. Other Lives, the openers, were pretty good but nothing that I'd run out and buy.

Radiohead came out and played a fairly glorious set. I'd say that apart from missing "Paranoid Android," I really can't find anything wrong with this show. Parts were absolutely fantastic ("There There," "Lucky," "Karma Police"), the new songs sounded great, the band sounded tight ...

Bloom
15 Step
Airbag
Little by Little
Morning Mr. Magpie
Myxomatosis
Kid A
Videotape
The Daily Mail
The Amazing Sounds of Orgy
Karma Police
Identikit
Lotus Flower
There There
Feral
Reckoner

Encore 01:
Separator
Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
Lucky
Everything In Its Right Place (w/ Electrolite intro)

Encore 02:
Give Up the Ghost
You and Whose Army?
Idioteque

We had big plans to go out after the show and enjoy a night away from "the kids" (the 2 beagles) but wound up ordering room service and crashing out (of course).

We grabbed brunch at Rooster the next day (as did half the concert, it would seem), and it was ridiculously good ... including ...

an excellent Bloody Mary:

Finnish pancake (in front) and crepe:

The piece de resistance, the Rooster slinger (andouille sausage, eggs, toast, breakfast potatoes, and sausage gravy):

Top notch!

Beermaking update

A bit off topic, but thanks to a fantastic wedding gift, I've gotten heavy into homebrewing. I could go on and on about the different beers and equipment, but the piece de resistance is a kegerator that some friends and I converted. Here's the story:

I picked up all the goodies (from Rebel Brewer, an awesome homebrewing store in Goodlettsville) as well as an old fridge on cragislist ($175 delivered):

Then my buddies (to whom I am now eternally indebted and grateful) Aaron and Dan came over and got all handy on it. First, we built a level base for the kegs to sit (that's the CO2 in there):

Then we put in 4 taps one by one, with this being the first:

After all 4 taps were in, we drilled a hole in the side for the CO2 to run in (it's not yet attached to the CO2 canister at this point):

Finally, and some may argue most importantly, I hooked up a 1/6 commercial keg of local favorite Yazoo's hefeweizen and gave it its first foamy pour:

Here are the insides with a commercial keg in there:

And here are the taps from the inside of the door, waiting for homebrew kegs to be attached (you can see where the Yazoo is attached on the far left):

I finally got the homebrews kegged and hooked up and ready and the commercial keg out, so it's all homebrews all the time:

I also slapped some chalkboard paint on the freezer door so that everything could be labelled:

Finally, I picked up a gorgeous half-sized keg so that I can put 4 in at one time (the compressor controller gets in the way height-wise in the back, so I needed something shorter):

Happy brewing indeed ...

Yonder Mountain String Band w/ the Infamous Stringdusters, Marathon Music Works, Nashville, TN - 2/10/2012

Here's a quick, no frills recap of this one. A couple of buddies and I made this show on a last minute decision. First off, this was my first visit to this venue, and it is quite awesome - great sight lines, nice bar area, $5 draft Yazoos, clear sound. Parking is an issue, which I figured.

We walked in midway through the Stringdusters' set, and just as I heard, they were pretty great - extremely good players with a more traditional mode of newgrass.

YMSB came out a good deal later and played a very long couple of sets with an encore. I used to be something of a fan, but I don't think that they are particularly great bluegrass players and find the very long, very repetitive (3 chords stretched out for 10 minutes) tunes to get a bit old at times. I enjoyed that they had a revolving cast of Nashville bluegrass stars playing with them.

Had a great time but would have enjoyed a more economical set from the headliners ...

The Walkmen, The Metro, Chicago, IL - 01/14/2012

My buddy Aaron and I ended up heading up to Chicago for a 36-hour trip centered around the mighty Walkmen doing a 10th anniversary show in honor of their debut album. I was going with my wife, but she could not extricate herself from work, sadly.

After arriving late Friday night, we started with deep dish at Lou Maltani's, which I'd heard was amazing. It was. Super heavy with a buttery crust of neverending goodness. We ordered a medium and could not finish it. You'd think we'd be ready to rock it out at that point, but no, the pizza defeated us straight into our respective beds.

Saturday started with "brunch" at Hot Doug's, the venerable hot dog institution about which I've written before. We only had to wait 40 minutes or so, with only 20 of those in the 15 degree weather. When we saw a table order one of everything on the menu, we knew it was going to be alright.

I had the Palomar (pinto beans, bacon, etc.), the Foie Gras (duck dog with foie gras) and a Chicago style. We split the fries cooked in rendered duck fat. We felt happy.

We followed this up with a trip to Revolution Brewing (quite awesome), a stroll through Reckless Records (I passed on an original pressing of OCEAN RAIN and am now kind of kicking myself), and finally beers at the Map Room (recommended). After a quick respite back at the hotel, we grabbed burgers and beers at the Grafton Pub (quite on the money) and then made the trudge down to the Metro.

I'd seen one show here before (Black Keys in 2008) and was so so on the venue. I'll say that I'm glad we got there fairly early (and talked to Paul, the guitarist, on our way in), as it got pretty dang crowded fast. About 20 after 9, they took the stage (no opener) and proceed to play a very long, very career-spanning set that never let up. In fact, I was simply exhausted at the 3-hour point. We started to make our way out right after "Thinking of a Dream I Had" and caught the last number from the coat check line. There was no encore, and they didn't need one.

There's a nice bootleg floating around of this show. The version of "In the New Year" was insane. This one will be tough to beat for 2012, similar to their jaw-dropping 2011 show.

Line by Line, We Scrape By (New Song)
They're Winning
Wake Up
Everyone Who Pretended To Like Me is Gone
Revenge Wears No Wristwatch
Hang On, Siobhan
The Blizzard of '96
We've Been Had
Love U Love (new song)
Dreamboat (new song)
Love is Love (new song)
Donde Esta La Playa
On the Water
In the New Year
Red Moon (Ham - solo acoustic guitar w/ horns)
Stranded (w/horns)
Canadian Girl (w/horns)
Louisiana (w/horns)

SET BREAK

Bottled Sand (new song)
Blue as Your Blood
All Hands and the Cook
Woe is Me
French Vacation
The Rat
No Christmas While I'm Talking
I Lost You (by request)
138th Street (by request)
Postcards From Tiny Islands (by request)
Thinking of a Dream I Had (by request)
Heartbreaker (new song)

Gillian Welch & David Rawlings, Ryman Auditorium, Nashville, TN - 12/01/2011

We had a blast at this show, the tour ender for Gillian and David. I think the biggest issue was that we saw a crazy, insanely good show from them (for 2011, second only to the Walkmen) back in August, and while they were quite great tonight (with some truly outstanding moments), the vibe at the Ryman kind of sucked the life out of this one for me a bit.

Trust me - it wasn't a bad show by any stretch, but it just didn't have that magical quality that we saw them bring to the Orange Peel a few months earlier. I did not take photos or a setlist, sadly, but the set was fairly similar to the Orange Peel show without any huge surprises, though they did end the whole thing with a rousing cover of "Jackson."