Concert and Basketball
First cultural event of the year was a concert/performance called something that could be translated as Bar-ing. An event that my friend was raving about for a year, about how addictive and great it was. Tickets are almost impossible to get because they only sell 80 of them. When my friend told me that she had an extra ticket and asked me if I wanted to go I wanted to see what the fuss was about. Especially since she waited 3 hours in a line to get the tickets. My expectations were very high for a reason.
The show takes place in a newly renovated club in Lesser town. It´s a show in bar-like setting, hence the name. You sit at little tables facing the stage. But to actually get to sit at the table you have to be in the club like 2 hours before, again waiting in a line. Which I found greatly annoying. When we finally got to the table, there was absolutely no space to even move one leg. At that point I was still ready to put this all behind me in expectation of getting some great music performances. It´s a show where the organizers invite their singer friends and they can play whatever they want. Sometime it´s someone famous singing something different than what they are known for, just for the fun. Sometimes it is someone unknown but talented, getting a shot to perform in front of an audience. You never know who´ll perform that night and it´s interesting mix of genres. It´s usually around 8 to 10 performers, everyone singing one song, occasionally two. After a break the singers rotate again. I think it´s an nice concept. Unfortunately there were just a few singer/bands that stood out that night. Some performers were really good, some less good and the rest was more like a karaoke bar (aka some of the contestants of our various music reality show, like Czech Idol)
I had basically two favorites. One of them was The Calm Season, a guy playing guitar and a girl playing cello. I really liked the sound of the cello within the songs. I hope they will have a great future.
The second band was Jelení Loje, which could be translated as Lip Balms.lol It´s a group of girls singing songs from 30s and 40s. They dress the part and they are just funny. They make funny faces and tell jokes and it´s just entertaining to watch them. They all studied alternative theater at Prague´s Academy of Performing arts. I will try to see their own concert at some point.
The evening started at 8pm and lasted till 0:30 am. And apparently it usually goes almost till 2am. I was happy for the „early“ end, though. It was good to see it but I didn´t get what was so addicting about it. I have no real desire to go agian.
The Calm Season, singing Shine, One chance to live. The cellist sang with him during our night and it was even better.
Click to viewJelení Loje during our evening.
Two day after the concert I went too see a basketball game. Look at me broadening my horizons. It was my second basketball game ever. It was Euro League game with USK Praha against Ros Casares Valencia. My town against Valencia where my friend´s sister is playing. Who to root for that was the question of the evening but since we had free tickets from a Valencia player we thought it would be only kosher to root for them. It was little intimidating to openly root for Valencia in a stadium full of USK fans, though. USK played better the first quoter and Valencia seemed a bit disorganized but that changed in the second half of the game and lead to Valencia´s win, 81:70. After the game we took pictures with my friend´s sister which I look hilariously small next to. The basketball game was something so different from the events I usually visit that it was a fresh and fun experience.