The King Can Drink The Harbor Dry.
At first glance The Rickshaw Stop turned out to be no more than a hole-in-the-wall. Quite literally, just a small dark door in what would have otherwise been a small dark wall of a much larger building. Once past the gruff Doorman who did this to my hands--
(Still prominent after 4 days of showering and hand-washing, might I add)
--you find a dark living room. (I suppose it could be the size of two or three living rooms) Complete with a full bar, lit only by various strings of christmas lights the atmosphere is dark and warm and sweet (With Rickshaw's adorning the walls, hence the name). It by all means, was like attending a concert in a darkened Mrs. Hartman's classroom (With...uh...with a full bar). The stage was about as high off the ground and roughly the same size with plenty of track lighting bathing the singers in swaths of red and blue. Myself and David Wood (and his dad Eric) met up with Carl Schlachte inside. Carl had been loitering around since they opened doors at 7, and was the only person (besides the gruff Doorman) for a good hour before we arrived. (I like to think they passed the time bonding) He informed* us, to our chagrin, that he'd already met the man we came to see, Andrew Kenny.
Once inside we stood through two great opening bands. An asian guy with a sugary voice playing Beatles White Album era distorted acoustic rock, and a 7-piece band (who's [also] asian lead singer sounded exactly like They Might Be Giants) that played nerdy rock with slight folk/country twists with the inclusion of a gorgeous fiddle player named McVane. Also, their bass player was a splitting image of Mina except taller and in converse.
By 11, Andrew Kenny and the Hometown Fantasy Band took the stage. They comprise the band The Wooden Birds: Andrew Kenny's new musical project since The American Analog Set parted ways a few years back. Having only one album, the concert was rather short (But by no means not fantastic) And he played two AmAnSet covers from their best album as a closer. With only 100-150 people packed into this tiny black box theatre, I was able to stand at the front of the stage, and would have been physically able to touch the man at any time during the show if I so wished**.
After they finished their set, and the band (complete with two drummers, and a beautiful female lead guitarist) began to leave the stage, we voiced our approval of the show to Andrew Kenny himself who was only several feet away. He said he'd love to talk, but had to go sign some records first.
Feebly, we each produced a CD from our pockets, and offered it to him.
"Oh...yeah, [smiles] I guess I can sign these first for you"
Carl hadn't thought to bring a CD, and quickly stole one of the bands set-lists taped to the stage floor, and got him to sign that. Though pressed for time to catch the last BART out of the city, we hung around the front of the theatre. I purchased a vinyl record of The Wooden Birds album (Vinyl is coming back!) and surprisingly, Andrew Kenny really did want to talk with us. He seemed genuinely happy to talk with fans, and even came up to us in the crowd to say hello.
I don't think he gets many fans that are both interested in his work and aren't some sort of bat-shit crazy. Most of the other people hanging around had that dead look in their eyes, you know, the one that suggests they aren't sure how social situations are supposed to work, and spend a lot of time not going outside.
We felt asking for a picture with him was too much. Upon telling him if we didn't sprint for the last train I'm quite sure I saw tangible disappointment on his face. (Call me conceded, but I'm positive he liked us) We departed the theatre with a gruff "Bye Carl" from the Gruff Doorman.
We then sprinted, and I mean sprinted, twelve blocks to the Civic Center BART station at 12:30A.M. in the not nice part of San Francisco. And we did indeed miss the final train. Accepting that we might have to sit around in a BART station for a better part of the night until the trains started rolling again at 5A.M, we were happy to learn that since there's a BART Barn at the Dublin/Pleasanton stop, there was a transfer train we could take.
We had to change trains 4 times, but eventually made it back to Pleasanton hours later, the four of us the sole riders on a big 9 car train. The ride home was fun, I finally talked with Carl for the first time. I think I met him once in real life at Cathy Kirch's house in high school, but few words were exchanged. Other than that, we've spoken online a few times, video chatted once, and most of my knowledge of him comes from stories told by Sam Tillis and Wood, who made Carl's acquaintance (based on a mutual love of Andrew Kenny) at Chapman University. He reminded me of Tristan quite a bit with his mannerisms, and I found him quite entertaining. Exchanging stories of mutual friends we both know well with more or less a stranger is always fun.
I love going to shows.
*=see gloated
**=see me trying to control myself
(Still prominent after 4 days of showering and hand-washing, might I add)
--you find a dark living room. (I suppose it could be the size of two or three living rooms) Complete with a full bar, lit only by various strings of christmas lights the atmosphere is dark and warm and sweet (With Rickshaw's adorning the walls, hence the name). It by all means, was like attending a concert in a darkened Mrs. Hartman's classroom (With...uh...with a full bar). The stage was about as high off the ground and roughly the same size with plenty of track lighting bathing the singers in swaths of red and blue. Myself and David Wood (and his dad Eric) met up with Carl Schlachte inside. Carl had been loitering around since they opened doors at 7, and was the only person (besides the gruff Doorman) for a good hour before we arrived. (I like to think they passed the time bonding) He informed* us, to our chagrin, that he'd already met the man we came to see, Andrew Kenny.
Once inside we stood through two great opening bands. An asian guy with a sugary voice playing Beatles White Album era distorted acoustic rock, and a 7-piece band (who's [also] asian lead singer sounded exactly like They Might Be Giants) that played nerdy rock with slight folk/country twists with the inclusion of a gorgeous fiddle player named McVane. Also, their bass player was a splitting image of Mina except taller and in converse.
By 11, Andrew Kenny and the Hometown Fantasy Band took the stage. They comprise the band The Wooden Birds: Andrew Kenny's new musical project since The American Analog Set parted ways a few years back. Having only one album, the concert was rather short (But by no means not fantastic) And he played two AmAnSet covers from their best album as a closer. With only 100-150 people packed into this tiny black box theatre, I was able to stand at the front of the stage, and would have been physically able to touch the man at any time during the show if I so wished**.
After they finished their set, and the band (complete with two drummers, and a beautiful female lead guitarist) began to leave the stage, we voiced our approval of the show to Andrew Kenny himself who was only several feet away. He said he'd love to talk, but had to go sign some records first.
Feebly, we each produced a CD from our pockets, and offered it to him.
"Oh...yeah, [smiles] I guess I can sign these first for you"
Carl hadn't thought to bring a CD, and quickly stole one of the bands set-lists taped to the stage floor, and got him to sign that. Though pressed for time to catch the last BART out of the city, we hung around the front of the theatre. I purchased a vinyl record of The Wooden Birds album (Vinyl is coming back!) and surprisingly, Andrew Kenny really did want to talk with us. He seemed genuinely happy to talk with fans, and even came up to us in the crowd to say hello.
I don't think he gets many fans that are both interested in his work and aren't some sort of bat-shit crazy. Most of the other people hanging around had that dead look in their eyes, you know, the one that suggests they aren't sure how social situations are supposed to work, and spend a lot of time not going outside.
We felt asking for a picture with him was too much. Upon telling him if we didn't sprint for the last train I'm quite sure I saw tangible disappointment on his face. (Call me conceded, but I'm positive he liked us) We departed the theatre with a gruff "Bye Carl" from the Gruff Doorman.
We then sprinted, and I mean sprinted, twelve blocks to the Civic Center BART station at 12:30A.M. in the not nice part of San Francisco. And we did indeed miss the final train. Accepting that we might have to sit around in a BART station for a better part of the night until the trains started rolling again at 5A.M, we were happy to learn that since there's a BART Barn at the Dublin/Pleasanton stop, there was a transfer train we could take.
We had to change trains 4 times, but eventually made it back to Pleasanton hours later, the four of us the sole riders on a big 9 car train. The ride home was fun, I finally talked with Carl for the first time. I think I met him once in real life at Cathy Kirch's house in high school, but few words were exchanged. Other than that, we've spoken online a few times, video chatted once, and most of my knowledge of him comes from stories told by Sam Tillis and Wood, who made Carl's acquaintance (based on a mutual love of Andrew Kenny) at Chapman University. He reminded me of Tristan quite a bit with his mannerisms, and I found him quite entertaining. Exchanging stories of mutual friends we both know well with more or less a stranger is always fun.
I love going to shows.
*=see gloated
**=see me trying to control myself