Trumpets and Beards is the name of my Earth Wind and Fire tribute band
It was a Weekend of Awesome.
Primarily, there was my BFF J and her husband G, and I was inexpressibly happy to have them here, and there was PAX, where I had a really good time, despite not really being a part of that fandom. Enthusiastic people talking about the stuff they love is always compelling, you know? And there were lots of shiny things to see and do, and we played old-skool Golden Axe on an old-skool console, and oohed and ahhed at the new Rock Band, and just generally enjoyed hanging out in Nerdville. We also went to the Saturday night PAX concert-held in Benaroya Hall, which was cool, except for the fact that there are 2500 seats in that theater and I believe there were about 70,000 con attendees, so the math was really not in most people's favor, there. We missed the first act entirely and ended up waiting in line for two and a half hours on the hope of getting in for the second two; fortunately we did. Highlights:
- The audio mix during Jonathan Coulton's set was such that I could barely make out the words on the songs I didn't know (which was almost all of them), but even so, an entire theater full of people doing a rousing, zombie-shuffling chorus of "Re: Your Brains"? WIN.
- I'd never heard of Paul and Storm before this, but they were highly, highly entertaining. They're really more of a comedy act than they are a musical act, though they are good musicians. But they have a running gag through their set where they pick things out of their conversation and turn it into, "[x] is the name of my [y] tribute band," and they are awesome at it and it is fucking hysterical. (Some samples: "R With An Umlaut is the name of my Scorpions tribute band"; "Jaunty Little Shuffle is the name of my Pogues tribute band"; "Deploy the Yoda is the name of my Nerf Herder tribute band." SO AWESOME.) Then they pulled Wil Wheaton out on stage for their final song, which ended up being about 75% banter and 25% song, wherein Wil got the tribute band line of the night, IMO ("That's More Like It, Sheep is the name of my Justin Bieber tribute band"), and toward the end, when they were trying to wrap up the song and Wil kept interrupting to be funny, Paul turns to him and goes, "Shut up, Wesley!" and Wil went O.O and Storm literally fell over laughing and the whole auditorium just ROARED and it was really below the belt but also REALLY fucking funny. So, since the whole thing was so awesome, I'm embedding a video below:
The "shut up, Wesley" part comes at about 9:45, if you want to skip to that, but really, I would recommend the whole thing, if you're in a nerd banter mood. It's long, but it's worth it (which, BTW, is the name of my Fall Out Boy tribute band).
On Sunday I snuck over to Bumbershoot to see the Crash Kings… I was tired and hungover and if I hadn't already bought my ticket, I might've skipped it, and man, I am SO GLAD I didn't. I've seen them twice before, and they always put on an awesome show, but this one was a whole other level. I think part of it was being outside-as lame as it sounds (and is), I've never seen a band I'm a passionate fan of at an outdoor venue-and the sun and the fresh air; and I think part of it was the crowd, which was really enthusiastic (and YOUNG, overall-lots of teenagers, and I'm curious if that's going to be the Crash Kings' core audience if they continue to get more famous, or if that's just indicative of the average Bumbershoot attendee); and part of it was that Tony was just ON-you could feel the energy crackling off of him, all the way to the back row. (And some of that energy might actually have been pissed-off energy, since they were having fairly serious feedback problems and he ended up having to take out his earpieces and therefore was kind of going deaf, and was clearly really frustrated about the whole thing, as you would be.)
Anyway, whatever was going on with him, it was seriously working for him-he sounded incredible, and so did Mike and Jason. They did Carry On, 1985, Non-Believer (which I've never heard them play live before!), 14 Arms (KILLER), You Got Me (and Tony doing that kind of haunting moan at the end, bent close to the mic and caressing the keyboard? Instant orgasm), Mountain Man (which got an awesome reception, being their first single and all, which was really cool-they directed us to sing along during the "ohhhhh" part, but a lot of people sang all the way through, and it made me really happy), Second-Rate Citizen (which blew my fucking mind, they were all just so INTO it, Mike jamming out on the bass and Tony clinging to the mic with both hands, all that energy funneled into the tiny space between his mouth and the metal-I need to hunt that song down, since it's not on their album), and they finished up with a cover of War Pigs, which made the crowd flip its collective shit. It was AWESOME, with the sound all around us, in our ears and under our feet, and the sky open wide above us, and even the magenta metallic glint of the EMP, serving as the backdrop… the word I kept thinking of was "ecstatic," and I suddenly, viscerally got why people flock to outdoor festivals, and I can't imagine having been more transported if I'd actually been on drugs, you know? It was epic, and just. Yeah. Ecstatic.
And then the crowd encore-d them and they came back for one song-Tony apologetically told us that they'd cut the set short because he was going deaf and he'd rather be able to come back and play a kick-ass show another time than keep struggling through this one and damage his hearing permanently; on one hand, it was disappointing because the whole reason I'd been so determined to go to this show was that they had a longer set than I've heard from them, but OTOH, it's hard to argue with his reasoning, especially when the songs they did were so fucking awesome-which turned out to be a cover of David Bowie's "Oh You Pretty Things," and then they were done.
So I stuck around to buy a t-shirt, since my other Crash Kings shirt doesn't really fit and I loved the new ones. And then, after waffling a bit, I decided to stick around for the "artist signing," mainly because I really felt like I needed to tell them how amazing they'd been, especially given the technical difficulties. Which turned out to be a good decision, because I actually had a nice little (very little) chat with Tony, and he was really sweet, and he kind of kept talking to me even after I'd moved down the table to Jason and Mike, and it made me flail a little. (Okay, kind of a lot. I've ended up talking to Mike after their shows both times-which, let's be clear, is MORE than fine with me, since he is a total sweetheart, and also, um, have you SEEN Mike?-and so it was kinda cool to talk to Tony, especially considering how recently I'd been overwhelmed with the desire to bone him. So yeah. Good times.)
I also confirmed during my little chat with Tony that they're going to be back here in October, opening for Anberlin; I'd been thinking I probably wasn't going to go, since it's at the !@#&*@ Showbox SoDo, but now… hmmmmmmm. On one hand, this last show was inexpressibly awesome, so it's hard not to want to sign up for the possibility of that again. OTOH, I feel a little bit like no Crash Kings show will ever be that epic for me again (at least until they're headlining their own tour, which, can we get ON that, please, oh my fucking god). Sooooo, we'll see. But it was a pretty mind-blowing experience nonetheless.
Anyway. My camera phone is shit, so most of my pictures came out commensurately shitty; this was one of the few halfway decent ones, in which I miraculously managed to capture both Tony and Mike in the same frame, plus the EMP in the background:
Did I mention that Mike's shirt was delicious, as was his sweaty, rockin' self in the shirt? Well. Consider it mentioned.
So I'm in a Crash Kings mood today, and you should check them out if you have not done so already-I've said this before, but of all the music I've discovered and loved in the past couple of years, I think their sound is the most original, while still retaining a kick-ass rock foundation:
Crash Kings on iLike
And I have also been thinking a lot about this video of Neal Tiemann playing with them on "1985":
Gaaaaaah I love that SO MUCH.
And THEN we spent yesterday in our pajamas, and made pancakes and risotto (um, not for the same meal) and mojitos and watched Justified and Proof (HELLO, hot math nerd Jake Gyllenhaal, YES PLEASE, and also I really liked the rest of the movie, very thinky, I am still chewing it over in my mind) and Army of Darkness (STILL AWESOME), which J had never seen. And then we had to get up super super super early to go to the airport this morning and now J is gone and I am sad and tired and mojitos and I are on a break for a while… but it was a pretty awesome weekend, right up until the point where it had to be over.
Primarily, there was my BFF J and her husband G, and I was inexpressibly happy to have them here, and there was PAX, where I had a really good time, despite not really being a part of that fandom. Enthusiastic people talking about the stuff they love is always compelling, you know? And there were lots of shiny things to see and do, and we played old-skool Golden Axe on an old-skool console, and oohed and ahhed at the new Rock Band, and just generally enjoyed hanging out in Nerdville. We also went to the Saturday night PAX concert-held in Benaroya Hall, which was cool, except for the fact that there are 2500 seats in that theater and I believe there were about 70,000 con attendees, so the math was really not in most people's favor, there. We missed the first act entirely and ended up waiting in line for two and a half hours on the hope of getting in for the second two; fortunately we did. Highlights:
- The audio mix during Jonathan Coulton's set was such that I could barely make out the words on the songs I didn't know (which was almost all of them), but even so, an entire theater full of people doing a rousing, zombie-shuffling chorus of "Re: Your Brains"? WIN.
- I'd never heard of Paul and Storm before this, but they were highly, highly entertaining. They're really more of a comedy act than they are a musical act, though they are good musicians. But they have a running gag through their set where they pick things out of their conversation and turn it into, "[x] is the name of my [y] tribute band," and they are awesome at it and it is fucking hysterical. (Some samples: "R With An Umlaut is the name of my Scorpions tribute band"; "Jaunty Little Shuffle is the name of my Pogues tribute band"; "Deploy the Yoda is the name of my Nerf Herder tribute band." SO AWESOME.) Then they pulled Wil Wheaton out on stage for their final song, which ended up being about 75% banter and 25% song, wherein Wil got the tribute band line of the night, IMO ("That's More Like It, Sheep is the name of my Justin Bieber tribute band"), and toward the end, when they were trying to wrap up the song and Wil kept interrupting to be funny, Paul turns to him and goes, "Shut up, Wesley!" and Wil went O.O and Storm literally fell over laughing and the whole auditorium just ROARED and it was really below the belt but also REALLY fucking funny. So, since the whole thing was so awesome, I'm embedding a video below:
Click to viewThe "shut up, Wesley" part comes at about 9:45, if you want to skip to that, but really, I would recommend the whole thing, if you're in a nerd banter mood. It's long, but it's worth it (which, BTW, is the name of my Fall Out Boy tribute band).
On Sunday I snuck over to Bumbershoot to see the Crash Kings… I was tired and hungover and if I hadn't already bought my ticket, I might've skipped it, and man, I am SO GLAD I didn't. I've seen them twice before, and they always put on an awesome show, but this one was a whole other level. I think part of it was being outside-as lame as it sounds (and is), I've never seen a band I'm a passionate fan of at an outdoor venue-and the sun and the fresh air; and I think part of it was the crowd, which was really enthusiastic (and YOUNG, overall-lots of teenagers, and I'm curious if that's going to be the Crash Kings' core audience if they continue to get more famous, or if that's just indicative of the average Bumbershoot attendee); and part of it was that Tony was just ON-you could feel the energy crackling off of him, all the way to the back row. (And some of that energy might actually have been pissed-off energy, since they were having fairly serious feedback problems and he ended up having to take out his earpieces and therefore was kind of going deaf, and was clearly really frustrated about the whole thing, as you would be.)
Anyway, whatever was going on with him, it was seriously working for him-he sounded incredible, and so did Mike and Jason. They did Carry On, 1985, Non-Believer (which I've never heard them play live before!), 14 Arms (KILLER), You Got Me (and Tony doing that kind of haunting moan at the end, bent close to the mic and caressing the keyboard? Instant orgasm), Mountain Man (which got an awesome reception, being their first single and all, which was really cool-they directed us to sing along during the "ohhhhh" part, but a lot of people sang all the way through, and it made me really happy), Second-Rate Citizen (which blew my fucking mind, they were all just so INTO it, Mike jamming out on the bass and Tony clinging to the mic with both hands, all that energy funneled into the tiny space between his mouth and the metal-I need to hunt that song down, since it's not on their album), and they finished up with a cover of War Pigs, which made the crowd flip its collective shit. It was AWESOME, with the sound all around us, in our ears and under our feet, and the sky open wide above us, and even the magenta metallic glint of the EMP, serving as the backdrop… the word I kept thinking of was "ecstatic," and I suddenly, viscerally got why people flock to outdoor festivals, and I can't imagine having been more transported if I'd actually been on drugs, you know? It was epic, and just. Yeah. Ecstatic.
And then the crowd encore-d them and they came back for one song-Tony apologetically told us that they'd cut the set short because he was going deaf and he'd rather be able to come back and play a kick-ass show another time than keep struggling through this one and damage his hearing permanently; on one hand, it was disappointing because the whole reason I'd been so determined to go to this show was that they had a longer set than I've heard from them, but OTOH, it's hard to argue with his reasoning, especially when the songs they did were so fucking awesome-which turned out to be a cover of David Bowie's "Oh You Pretty Things," and then they were done.
So I stuck around to buy a t-shirt, since my other Crash Kings shirt doesn't really fit and I loved the new ones. And then, after waffling a bit, I decided to stick around for the "artist signing," mainly because I really felt like I needed to tell them how amazing they'd been, especially given the technical difficulties. Which turned out to be a good decision, because I actually had a nice little (very little) chat with Tony, and he was really sweet, and he kind of kept talking to me even after I'd moved down the table to Jason and Mike, and it made me flail a little. (Okay, kind of a lot. I've ended up talking to Mike after their shows both times-which, let's be clear, is MORE than fine with me, since he is a total sweetheart, and also, um, have you SEEN Mike?-and so it was kinda cool to talk to Tony, especially considering how recently I'd been overwhelmed with the desire to bone him. So yeah. Good times.)
I also confirmed during my little chat with Tony that they're going to be back here in October, opening for Anberlin; I'd been thinking I probably wasn't going to go, since it's at the !@#&*@ Showbox SoDo, but now… hmmmmmmm. On one hand, this last show was inexpressibly awesome, so it's hard not to want to sign up for the possibility of that again. OTOH, I feel a little bit like no Crash Kings show will ever be that epic for me again (at least until they're headlining their own tour, which, can we get ON that, please, oh my fucking god). Sooooo, we'll see. But it was a pretty mind-blowing experience nonetheless.
Anyway. My camera phone is shit, so most of my pictures came out commensurately shitty; this was one of the few halfway decent ones, in which I miraculously managed to capture both Tony and Mike in the same frame, plus the EMP in the background:
Did I mention that Mike's shirt was delicious, as was his sweaty, rockin' self in the shirt? Well. Consider it mentioned.
So I'm in a Crash Kings mood today, and you should check them out if you have not done so already-I've said this before, but of all the music I've discovered and loved in the past couple of years, I think their sound is the most original, while still retaining a kick-ass rock foundation:
Crash Kings on iLike
And I have also been thinking a lot about this video of Neal Tiemann playing with them on "1985":
Gaaaaaah I love that SO MUCH.
And THEN we spent yesterday in our pajamas, and made pancakes and risotto (um, not for the same meal) and mojitos and watched Justified and Proof (HELLO, hot math nerd Jake Gyllenhaal, YES PLEASE, and also I really liked the rest of the movie, very thinky, I am still chewing it over in my mind) and Army of Darkness (STILL AWESOME), which J had never seen. And then we had to get up super super super early to go to the airport this morning and now J is gone and I am sad and tired and mojitos and I are on a break for a while… but it was a pretty awesome weekend, right up until the point where it had to be over.