Month: November 2011

Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears were outrageously good at the Rickshaw tonight. He’s like Eddie Murphy and James Brown rolled into one dude. 7 piece band with a horn section and everyone tight and high energy. Old blacksploitation films projected behind the band, bassist pulling off ridiculous dance moves.

Sheepdogs (from Saskatoon!) opened. Like a bunch of shaggy bears led by a viking doing authentic 70’s rock music. Glad to have seen them finally. Bought their album on vinyl too. One day I’ll have to pick up an amp to plug the record player into so I can play all this stuff.

Cold’s nearly gone and I made it back into swimming tonight too. Our swimming class is shrinking which is kinda nice when it’s smaller. Still learning lots and am excited about making swimming a part of my regular routine soon.

Now sleep.

When news broke out that Carrie Brownstein and Janet Weiss of Sleater Kinney were in a new band with Mary Timony of Helium, you couldn’t look at an indie-rock website without a headline about Wild Flag splashed across it. That was over a year ago and I’ve been waiting to see this band play ever since.

Their new album is good. Really good in fact. The kind of album that doesn’t grab you at first with a catchy, but quickly tiresome song, rather the kind off music that rewards repeated listens. You start to dig into one song and then another song opens up for you and then you discover that gem at the end of the album and wonder how you ever overlooked it in the first place.

I finally got to see the band at the Biltmore on Saturday night. I was still reeling from a cold that kicked in during the week but was determined not to miss Wild Flag. And what a show it was! Easily one of the best shows this year, if not in my lifetime. Musically it’s like a rollercoaster, it builds up and then roars ahead before slowing into a feedback-soaked jam.

Carrie really let go with the vocals and was much less restrained than she was on the album. There were a couple of new songs and some extended jams in the album tracks.

I’m glad I got to see them. The music is fantastic and seeing new songs makes me hopeful they’ll be back in a year or two after dropping a new album.

I’ve been looking forward to the Rum Diary film which is based of the book by Hunter S. Thompson. It was well done and I won’t say anything to spoil it other than to say I enjoyed it immensely.

After the show we wandered into the Legion on Commercial since it was just down the road from the Rio Theater. Interesting place with a spectrum of characters starting at young hipsters through to old veterans. Tall cans of Pilsner were on for $4.50, a hell of a deal these days, and we got an entry into a draw for a Pilsner longboard (skateboard) with every can we bought.

On the way home I got into a bit of a confrontation with some metalhead who was being arrogant about his taste in music. Apparently those guys don’t take it too well when you tell them that Gordon Lightfoot’s lyrics were heavier than any metal they could dish out. I also said something about Nickleback being a superior band which didn’t help things.

Looks like there’s a breakfast plan being put together. Haven’t done breakfast out in a long long time. My Mom flies into town this afternoon too so I’ll be hanging out with her when she arrives.