I keep thinking about getting a record player again. I have a small collection of vinyl records, many of which you can’t find in other formats. There’s an aesthetic to vinyl that can’t be captured by downloading a bunch of music. Now that I own a house I feel like I should have a proper hifi audio system to listen to music on. It’ll give me far more joy than any television ever could. Buying vinyl will make me feel like I’m properly purchasing music again too.
Anyway, there’s a bunch of money between me and an awesome stereo with a Technics 1200 turntable, phono preamp, and fancy speakers. So in the meantime I think I’m slowly going to start picking up records in anticipation of the day when I get a shiny new turntable.
So what does this have to do with the Yeah Yeah Yeahs? Nothing, except I just discovered their first EP can be purchased on vinyl for $9.95 USD. I’ve queued it up on the computer and it’s bringing back memories of the first time I saw them.
They were opening for the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion (one of my all time favorite bands) at the Commodore Ballroom in Sept of 2002 and I’d heard they were the new buzz band so I got in early to check them out. Needless to say the Yeah Yeah Yeahs were pretty wild, especially Karen O. She’s a little unglued on stage and the most fun part was when some girl from the audience jumped up and did a dance routine for an entire song. Karen was all, “that chick was hawt!” when the girl hopped back into the crowd at the end of the song. I’ve been a big fan of the band ever since, especially their live show, which is always awesome.
The Jon Spencer show that night was the best I’ve seen him too. In fact it’s one of my all-time show highlights. I was talking to some random people before the Yeah Yeah Yeahs came on and they had decided to come up from Seattle after seeing Jon Spencer the previous night at the Showbox. They were also huge fans of the band and said that the Showbox show was the best JSBX show they’d ever seen and they had to make it up to Vancouver to see him again. They weren’t kidding – Jon Spencer owned the Commodore that night. I’ve seen him three times in total and that was by far the best show of the lot.
Also of note was this being my last show I attended without earplugs. I stood right up front the whole time with Judah Bauer’s amp facing me and the ringing in my ears went on for a couple of days. I wouldn’t be surprised if I suffered some hearing damage from that concert and I’ve been religious about earplugs ever since, especially since it hasn’t been uncommon for me to see 20+ shows a year.
Check out the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion doing some French TV thing. It starts out pretty mellow but halfway through it gets out of control. Well worth watching!
