you have to take the good with the bad
so i just had the best/worse weekend ever...first the best:
I went to this festival called all tomorrow's parties and it was fabulous, fabulous, fabulous i went with 6 other people and as none of us had a car we had to rent a limo (which turned out to be a shuttle) to get us there and we stayed in a hotel, all 7 of us, saturday night! atp was a relatively small, all music kinda thing with hip music but not too many hipsters, supposedely affordable but still $90 for two days, but absolutely worth it! this year it was at the queen mary, this permanently docked cruise ship and there are two stages, one actually on the ship and the main stage at a 5-minue-walk away park its curated by a musician every year, this year it was isaac from modest mouse and as much as i dislike their new albulm i have to give it to him, he still knows good music it was a two day thing and on saturday after having a frustrating experience actually getting to the place, me and my friend michelle get there just in time for the first band and plant ourselves at the main stage at the barrier, right at the front, yes!, and remain there for the rest of the day, feel free to skip over my lengthy description of whats to come
the first band is wolf parade, and let me tell, watch out for them! they're so underground they're not even on allmusic.com yet but wow! they have a very stills/interpol-ish kinda sound but definitely claim it for their own anyways they put on a great show and you could just tell how excited they were to be there! next is explosions in the sky who play only one song, but its a good one, also fabulous! then comes the black heart procession who are good, but nothing special they just kinda stand there and play and the music is good but nothing special because it has no real feeling to it....next is j. mascis (ex-lead singer of dinosaur jr.) and wow oh wow oh wow he might be old and fading but he definitely still has it, he has one of my favorite voices and seeing him play right in front of me my heart almost exploded i used to sit in my room in jr. high and listen to him sing and write bad angry poetry and it was beautiful and it was so amazing to see him and he played the doorbell in my mind song (actual title unknown by me) which is one of my absolute favorite all time songs and it was just such a moment....next is the lungfish whose music isnt actually that wonderful, but they are fronted by this crazy old guy with a huge beard and he is insane too watch and really nimble for his age and he jumps all over and has this really interesting voice and plays with the microphone and the stand and uses it to knock photographers away - definitely fun too watch, and then come the walkmen! i was really excited to see them and they played a great set but nothing ultra-noteworthy in my mind...next come modest mouse themselves, which is funny b/c isaac put himself on the lineup and they play a very bad set for them - very disjointed, no continuum between their songs and isaac's guitar is very out of tune which he mentions but declines to fix, they dont have time for all their songs b/c of set up delays and all their songs are from their new cd except wild pack of family dogs, and granted i did like their new songs much better live but they didnt seem very happy to be up on stage for some reason but they did have two drum kits with two people playing drums and that was a cool sound...and then, oh yes, and then, yes! its lou reed himself, the man behind the music and the name of the festival and he opens with....ALL TOMORROW'S PARTIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and im right there and oh wow! he definitely is still as amazing as ever, its incredible just how good he is, he makes everyone else that played before him look like complete amateurs (except for jm of course!) and he has this amazing cellist with him who just rocks out on the cello like no one ive ever seen before and this amazing singer/guitarist/this crazy instrument i dont know the name of, and he has this amazing high voice that harmonizes perfectly with lou's deep baritone/speaking voice and the drummer is also amazing and lou reed is just fabulous and i cant beleive that i am actually seeing my childhood hero mere feet away from me, i can see all his facial expressions wow oh wow and my heart burst again! and at the end i managed to get the setlist and here it is b/c i know you care: all tomorrow's parties, modern dance, dirty blvd, ecstacy(a new song), why do you talk, jesus (thats right - the beautiful vu song from their self titled cd and he makes it a little more rockish, almost country sounding but its just as pure and gorgeous), satellite of love, venus in furs, wild being-valley, vanishing act (two spoken word pieces that are just kinda songs from his albulm THE RAVEN, the edgar allen poe one), guardian angle, wild side, magic and loss, and the blue mask!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! as an encore he meant to play perfect day but the place its at has a curfew so he cant go on but wow am i totally and completely smitten and my parents were really jealous b/c its lou reed! and then as we're leaving we stop to by tshirts and im buying a dinosaur jr. shirt and talking to the guy and hes like are you a huge fan, and of course i say yes, and he tells me that j mascis himself is walking out behind me so i walk over and say hi, and really lamely say thank you for your music and he kinda mumbles ok, thanks, jm being a reclusive shy kinda guy and I MET J MASCIS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
incredible, incredible and then we go back to our hotel and everyones watching tv but im too ancy so me and michelle take a walk and discover a Chicken and Waffle House and go inside to eat, not having eaten all day long really and its great to just sit in a diner and drink coffee, something ive really missed perfect end to the night
sunday i dont expect anything to beat what ive just seen, but i am pleasantly surprised! i see those peabodys, who are good...next i opt to skip the constantines to see this band white magic who are supposed to be very good, but it turns out theres a misprint on the schedule and i see magic magicians instead who are just alright...so i walk around where theres all these stalls with people selling stuff for the concert in the ship and i find this guy selling these cool looking posters and i realize its the same guy whose allman brother's band poster i bought at coachella so i talk to the artist and he is a very cool guy and i buy another poster and he signs it for me so thats really really exciting but next is the radar brothers, very pretty stuff and i really enjoy their set! i then head over to the mainstage and meet up with the rest of the people we came with just in time to see the shins who are very very good, at first they only play newish stuff and i worry but they played a good amount of stuff from their older albums and the keyboardist is really funny and keeps making bad jokes about them being all gansta like snoop dogg and how their songs are going to lay out some mad beats and other such rap nonsense and his bandmates all laugh at him and we all laugh at him and their set is great! at this point i mean to go walk around and get out of the crowd, having had enough of the up front experience yesterday but people leave after the shins set and we all sit down and when we stand up we are much much closer to the stage, and then its time for built to spill and people everywhere are smoking by this time so i figure why not when this guy nest to me passes me a joint and i smoke with these three very cool people for a while and built to spill is just so atmosperic and it builds up and down and its like i can really feel the music inside me and then somehow without even noticing i am even closer, two people between me and the front and then theyre done and it starts to rain and everyone freaks out b/c its california and all my friends except one leave to go see the peaches, who i really want to see, but decide to stay to see the cramps and everyone in general is leaving to the ships stage which is indoors and all thats left are the really big fans of the cramps and the flaming lips, and the cramps are next and wow what a show! they all have their personas and you can tell how they became such huge cult legends, ask me about it some other time but it was wonderful and everyone is going so crazy that i somehow manage to get shoved onto the barrier, without even trying so there i am right in front again just in time to see the flaming lips and i just know that theyre going to the bubble again like at coachella b/c i saw them testing it early in the day before the festival started, and everyone is all upset b/c they want to actually hear them play a set and not waste all their time with the bubble b/c theres a curfew here and at coachella they only had time for 4 songs, but they start not too late even with their huge screen set up and wayne's facecamera and of course many people dressed up in animal costumes and a bag of confetti for wayne to throw out to crowd and fog everywhere from a smoke machine they actually play a real set, and even play she don't use jelly and then they send out all these balloons, literally thousands of them bigger than my head and some four or twenty times larger and then he asks us who was at coachella and the crowd screams and luckily most other people are excited for the bubble and he steps inside and walks out into the crowd, same stunts as coachella, but wow what an experience! and when its finally over theyre giving out free icecream, and it seems like a never ending supply and its the perfect end to another perfect day and then we go back to the Chicken and Waffle diner and drink coffee and my life is wonderful
as for the bad, its really not as important b/c this weekend was just so goddamn good and now its 10:40 and i have an essay to write and have not done any hw today! also this entry is ridiculously long as it is....but i have a ton of pictures, when i get them back im going to try and figure out how to put them online for all of yous i love me my music, i think its what gets me through life these days
I went to this festival called all tomorrow's parties and it was fabulous, fabulous, fabulous i went with 6 other people and as none of us had a car we had to rent a limo (which turned out to be a shuttle) to get us there and we stayed in a hotel, all 7 of us, saturday night! atp was a relatively small, all music kinda thing with hip music but not too many hipsters, supposedely affordable but still $90 for two days, but absolutely worth it! this year it was at the queen mary, this permanently docked cruise ship and there are two stages, one actually on the ship and the main stage at a 5-minue-walk away park its curated by a musician every year, this year it was isaac from modest mouse and as much as i dislike their new albulm i have to give it to him, he still knows good music it was a two day thing and on saturday after having a frustrating experience actually getting to the place, me and my friend michelle get there just in time for the first band and plant ourselves at the main stage at the barrier, right at the front, yes!, and remain there for the rest of the day, feel free to skip over my lengthy description of whats to come
the first band is wolf parade, and let me tell, watch out for them! they're so underground they're not even on allmusic.com yet but wow! they have a very stills/interpol-ish kinda sound but definitely claim it for their own anyways they put on a great show and you could just tell how excited they were to be there! next is explosions in the sky who play only one song, but its a good one, also fabulous! then comes the black heart procession who are good, but nothing special they just kinda stand there and play and the music is good but nothing special because it has no real feeling to it....next is j. mascis (ex-lead singer of dinosaur jr.) and wow oh wow oh wow he might be old and fading but he definitely still has it, he has one of my favorite voices and seeing him play right in front of me my heart almost exploded i used to sit in my room in jr. high and listen to him sing and write bad angry poetry and it was beautiful and it was so amazing to see him and he played the doorbell in my mind song (actual title unknown by me) which is one of my absolute favorite all time songs and it was just such a moment....next is the lungfish whose music isnt actually that wonderful, but they are fronted by this crazy old guy with a huge beard and he is insane too watch and really nimble for his age and he jumps all over and has this really interesting voice and plays with the microphone and the stand and uses it to knock photographers away - definitely fun too watch, and then come the walkmen! i was really excited to see them and they played a great set but nothing ultra-noteworthy in my mind...next come modest mouse themselves, which is funny b/c isaac put himself on the lineup and they play a very bad set for them - very disjointed, no continuum between their songs and isaac's guitar is very out of tune which he mentions but declines to fix, they dont have time for all their songs b/c of set up delays and all their songs are from their new cd except wild pack of family dogs, and granted i did like their new songs much better live but they didnt seem very happy to be up on stage for some reason but they did have two drum kits with two people playing drums and that was a cool sound...and then, oh yes, and then, yes! its lou reed himself, the man behind the music and the name of the festival and he opens with....ALL TOMORROW'S PARTIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and im right there and oh wow! he definitely is still as amazing as ever, its incredible just how good he is, he makes everyone else that played before him look like complete amateurs (except for jm of course!) and he has this amazing cellist with him who just rocks out on the cello like no one ive ever seen before and this amazing singer/guitarist/this crazy instrument i dont know the name of, and he has this amazing high voice that harmonizes perfectly with lou's deep baritone/speaking voice and the drummer is also amazing and lou reed is just fabulous and i cant beleive that i am actually seeing my childhood hero mere feet away from me, i can see all his facial expressions wow oh wow and my heart burst again! and at the end i managed to get the setlist and here it is b/c i know you care: all tomorrow's parties, modern dance, dirty blvd, ecstacy(a new song), why do you talk, jesus (thats right - the beautiful vu song from their self titled cd and he makes it a little more rockish, almost country sounding but its just as pure and gorgeous), satellite of love, venus in furs, wild being-valley, vanishing act (two spoken word pieces that are just kinda songs from his albulm THE RAVEN, the edgar allen poe one), guardian angle, wild side, magic and loss, and the blue mask!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! as an encore he meant to play perfect day but the place its at has a curfew so he cant go on but wow am i totally and completely smitten and my parents were really jealous b/c its lou reed! and then as we're leaving we stop to by tshirts and im buying a dinosaur jr. shirt and talking to the guy and hes like are you a huge fan, and of course i say yes, and he tells me that j mascis himself is walking out behind me so i walk over and say hi, and really lamely say thank you for your music and he kinda mumbles ok, thanks, jm being a reclusive shy kinda guy and I MET J MASCIS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
incredible, incredible and then we go back to our hotel and everyones watching tv but im too ancy so me and michelle take a walk and discover a Chicken and Waffle House and go inside to eat, not having eaten all day long really and its great to just sit in a diner and drink coffee, something ive really missed perfect end to the night
sunday i dont expect anything to beat what ive just seen, but i am pleasantly surprised! i see those peabodys, who are good...next i opt to skip the constantines to see this band white magic who are supposed to be very good, but it turns out theres a misprint on the schedule and i see magic magicians instead who are just alright...so i walk around where theres all these stalls with people selling stuff for the concert in the ship and i find this guy selling these cool looking posters and i realize its the same guy whose allman brother's band poster i bought at coachella so i talk to the artist and he is a very cool guy and i buy another poster and he signs it for me so thats really really exciting but next is the radar brothers, very pretty stuff and i really enjoy their set! i then head over to the mainstage and meet up with the rest of the people we came with just in time to see the shins who are very very good, at first they only play newish stuff and i worry but they played a good amount of stuff from their older albums and the keyboardist is really funny and keeps making bad jokes about them being all gansta like snoop dogg and how their songs are going to lay out some mad beats and other such rap nonsense and his bandmates all laugh at him and we all laugh at him and their set is great! at this point i mean to go walk around and get out of the crowd, having had enough of the up front experience yesterday but people leave after the shins set and we all sit down and when we stand up we are much much closer to the stage, and then its time for built to spill and people everywhere are smoking by this time so i figure why not when this guy nest to me passes me a joint and i smoke with these three very cool people for a while and built to spill is just so atmosperic and it builds up and down and its like i can really feel the music inside me and then somehow without even noticing i am even closer, two people between me and the front and then theyre done and it starts to rain and everyone freaks out b/c its california and all my friends except one leave to go see the peaches, who i really want to see, but decide to stay to see the cramps and everyone in general is leaving to the ships stage which is indoors and all thats left are the really big fans of the cramps and the flaming lips, and the cramps are next and wow what a show! they all have their personas and you can tell how they became such huge cult legends, ask me about it some other time but it was wonderful and everyone is going so crazy that i somehow manage to get shoved onto the barrier, without even trying so there i am right in front again just in time to see the flaming lips and i just know that theyre going to the bubble again like at coachella b/c i saw them testing it early in the day before the festival started, and everyone is all upset b/c they want to actually hear them play a set and not waste all their time with the bubble b/c theres a curfew here and at coachella they only had time for 4 songs, but they start not too late even with their huge screen set up and wayne's facecamera and of course many people dressed up in animal costumes and a bag of confetti for wayne to throw out to crowd and fog everywhere from a smoke machine they actually play a real set, and even play she don't use jelly and then they send out all these balloons, literally thousands of them bigger than my head and some four or twenty times larger and then he asks us who was at coachella and the crowd screams and luckily most other people are excited for the bubble and he steps inside and walks out into the crowd, same stunts as coachella, but wow what an experience! and when its finally over theyre giving out free icecream, and it seems like a never ending supply and its the perfect end to another perfect day and then we go back to the Chicken and Waffle diner and drink coffee and my life is wonderful
as for the bad, its really not as important b/c this weekend was just so goddamn good and now its 10:40 and i have an essay to write and have not done any hw today! also this entry is ridiculously long as it is....but i have a ton of pictures, when i get them back im going to try and figure out how to put them online for all of yous i love me my music, i think its what gets me through life these days