Tuesday Tunes: Japandroids

Guys, I cannot stop listening to this band. 

This is one of those weird cases where I've known about Japandroids for ages, and in fact, they'd been recommend to me over and over.  I had heard them a few times, and there was no real reason that I didn't listen to them, except that I didn't.  That sometimes happens.

Then Celebration Rock came out and, seriously, I have been listening to almost nothing else (except books on tape in the car because of reasons).  "The House that Heaven Built" is the single, and it's so damn good that I feared that it would be the best songs that the rest of the album couldn't live up to it (I'm looking at you, Walk the Moon).  But I needn't have worried – the album starts of with "The Nights of Wine and Roses" and never lets up.  In fact, the only song that didn't blow me away was a cover of "For the Love and Ivy" originally by The Gun Club.

Japandroids will be in at the Fillmore in November, and I'll be there and I'll yell like hell to the heavens!

Awesome August : Day 7

There are a lot of things I've picked up from my parents: calling elementary school grammar school; eating peanut butter straight out of the jar with a spoon; using phrases like "put them in the Bizbag;" my love for Mel Brooks; and, of course, my love for The Beach Boys.

One of my earliest memories of me and my Dad involves him cleaning this old hot tub we had while I was in some sort of floaty, and we were listening to the Beach Boys.  I had to have been about 2.  (Strangely, I have another similar memory, only we were listening to "Gimme Shelter," but since that I has nothing to do with this story, I digress.)  And I swear, I knew the lyrics to all their greatest hits before I could speak in complete sentences.  My first CD was their anthology Born in the U.S.A. and it wasn't until Junior High, that I started listening to "my own music," so to speak.

The questions is always The Beatles or The Rolling Stones.  For me, the answer has always been The Beach Boys.

So, when Boyfriend got us tickets to see The Beach Boys as the Mountain Winery, I was beyond stoked.  I don't care if there are only two original members left touring – they're one of my only favourite artists that I've never seen (or if I did when I was younger, which is a possibility, I don't remember them).  And when we got there, we discovered how great our seats were.

Of course, I'll never really know what it was like to see them in the height of their musical careers, but damn, if they were anywhere as tight and impeccable as they were tonight, it's easy to see how they've stayed a touring band for so long.  They played from 7:30 to 10:00, with a brief intermission, and in that time they played every thing I wanted to hear (with the exception of "Heroes & Villains," but I wasn't really expecting that) and stuff I wasn't expecting at all ("Sail On, Sailor," anyone?).  Mike Love and Bruce Johnston are still amazing and their support band is fabulous.

It's strange watching a band that had it's rise and fall before I was even born.  With the exception of "Kokomo" they haven't done much that's noteworthy since the 1970s.  They even made jokes that they must be so popular due to Full House re-runs.  But at the same time, everyone in the audience was singing along and dancing and enjoying it all.  They transcend time and genre.

And that got me thinking, too.  Are there any bands around today, that got their start in the past 10 - 20 years, that could someday be touring for their 50th anniversary?  It seems to me that the longevity just isn't there anymore.  Not with such a large catalog and such a universal love like The Beach Boys have...

What band from today would you see 20 or 30 years from now?  What band that was a favourite of your parents' would you go see today? 

My Favourite Band: The Hold Steady

Live at the Catalyst Club, Santa Cruz, Ca 9.24.10

This is The Hold Steady. They are my desert-island favourite band. It's stupid how much I love them. I don't expect you to love them, too. I just expect you to indulge my worship.

The Hold Steady was introduced to me about four years ago, when I picked up my sister's then-boyfriend at the San Jose airport and had to dive him the hour back to Monterey with me. He put in a CD.

"I just saw this band live in Chicago, you'll love them," he said. The first track was amazing. I listened intently. Track two was called 'Chips Ahoy': "This song is about a race-horse, not cookies." It turns out it didn't matter what the song was about, really. I was already in love.

I immediately went and bought the album, Boys and Girls in America, and listened to it non-stop. Then I bought their first two albums: Separation Sunday and Almost Killed Me. They sang about sex, drugs, rock-n-roll, and religion. They had reoccurring characters. It was like a Bret Easton Ellis novel come to life in songs. The band itself was like a drug and I couldn't stop listening.

In the past 4 years they've released 2 more studio albums and a live album. I've seen them live 5 times (it would have been 6 but a venue change caused a show to be 21+ much to the dismay of the aforementioned then-boyfiend of my sister) and 3 of those times in the past year and half. I even took my first trip to Vegas to see them play for $15 in a bar.

They are a modern band who sound like a bar band from the '70s. The first time I heard their song "South Town Girls," I immediately thought of The Band (thus it was kinda cool to see them play at The Fillmore - the famous venue featured in The Last Waltz). They are one of the best bands I've ever seen live (up there with Sleater-Kinney and Broken Social Scene) and definitely one of the bands that seems to have the most fun playing. When you watch Craig, their vocalist, you know that there is no where in the world he would rather be than playing this show, right now.

When I saw them this past week in Santa Cruz, it was very surreal. In spring, I saw them for the second time at the Fillmore and it was a packed house. Each time I've seen them, recently, the audience seemed to get larger and larger. But not the other night. It was both awesome and sad.

We wondered into The Catalyst Club around 9:00pm, right before they went on, and the club had about 40 people wandering around inside! By the time The Hold Steady came on, the crowd was maybe 5 deep, but with a ton of space around everyone. I wandered up to the front row.

If you think that a small crowd would lead to a mediocre show, you are much mistaken. They played a full 90-min set and it was just as good as any of their other live appearances (and better for me since last time I was so sick, I had to be propped up just to watch them - now that's commitment!). I bounced and sang until my throat made no more sounds.

Also, I bought this shirt:

The merch guy looked at me like I was mad when I said, "It's like The Hold Steady meets Harry Potter! I have to have one!" I mean, clearly that's what this shirt is, right?!

Check them out. You can thank me later. The Hold Steady

Certain songs they get so scratched into our souls.