A few weeks ago, in prep for our little vacation to Justine's hometown, I was generally just wasting time looking for live music in nearby Visalia, California. I found a show with the Helio Sequence... a band I'd heard of because they're on Sub Pop and KEXP plays them sometimes. So we sort of planned on going to that. Then I saw that they had an opener, Quarto Negro, ostensibly from Sao Paulo, Brasil but really it's only one or two guys from the Brasil band on tour, and the rest are US based... but they were great. I'd checked out some youtubes and didn't go Wow, but would put the feel of their set as something like Radiohead... lots of good shimmering guitar noise and strong angsty vocals. This was the last show of this particular tour so you missed it but I'd put them down as a band worth checking out.
Here's something from their new album:
Helio Sequence... better songwriting (for me), lots of hooks and a ton of pretty noise... I'm really glad we went. They were very familiar with the throbbing metropolis of Visalia, and were sweet about saying how much that little out of the way town has meant to them over the years. Definitely worth checking out. I'd like to see an acoustic set from them, too. I like the noise but some of their songs really had a happy pop sound that would fit in a completely different show. So anyway. Got to see some music tonite!
Location: 95.8 miles from Purgatory. (I measured it.) Gender:
Posted:
Jul 2, 2015 - 8:53am
Actual live music?
The Decemberists, who seem to have about 30 tunes in rotation (ugh), will be performing in New Haven Conn on July 27. College Street Music Hall, 238 College Street. And no, I have no investment in the band or the venue. In fact, I'm not even a fan of the Decemberists (I've given them a 3 and a 2), but I know a lot of RPers are, so I thought I'd share.
I thought so, but mis-read that page the first time around. I was hoping maybe a summer festival in California or something. Looks like the only live music we'll get when we're out there is Helio Sequence at a little club, so that's okay/great, but I would have loved to see Wire at Slim's in SF...
THE thing that I do not understand about professional musicians is their ability to play the same material over and over and over again and still generate passion in each performance. How DO they do that?
Now in their 60s, they could be doing what most artists of their vintage do, cravenly basking in the glory of their past: it’s hard not to think they’d be playing bigger venues if they’d only knuckle down and play I Am the Fly and 12XU every night. But they won’t. If they’re not quite as unyielding as they were in the 80s – when they refused to play anything they’d recorded in the previous decade, hiring a Wire tribute band as support act instead – you still get through an entire Wire gig these days without hearing a note of the music that made them famous.
THE thing that I do not understand about professional musicians is their ability to play the same material over and over and over again and still generate passion in each performance. How DO they do that?
Lots of 'em don't. Dylan blasts thru his hits, lots of bands put their biggest hits into medleys they can just knock out before they get to stuff they'd rather play.
THE thing that I do not understand about professional musicians is their ability to play the same material over and over and over again and still generate passion in each performance. How DO they do that?
THE thing that I do not understand about professional musicians is their ability to play the same material over and over and over again and still generate passion in each performance. How DO they do that?
