Posts Tagged ‘concerts’

Ode to Earplugs


15 Mar

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I know that concerts are supposed to be loud. I know that it makes me “old” when I want to have earplugs for concerts, but you know what, I don’t care, because besides saving my hearing (if it can be saved) earplugs actually make the concert a more enjoyable experience.

They cut out the majority of the background crowd noise so that I hear the band but not a hundred people talking. They also cut down on speaker feedback and help me hear the singer and lyrics much more clearly. But I can still feel the bass pumping through me.

Breaking Up the Band


05 Dec

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We bonded over music. The first CD my husband ever loaned me was Mental Jewelry, the debut album from LIVE. They became “our band”. Why settle for a song, when you can have a band? “Dance With You” from Distance to Here, was our wedding song. We travelled out of state and out of country (twice) to see them perform live.

So its hard to see the band break up, to realize that everything turned sour. This was our band. I’m excited to hear what the former members are doing now, but I can’t help but be a little sad.

A Youth that Never Was


04 Dec

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Midnight, on a Wednesday, the lead singer says stick around and have some drinks with us after the show. And I think, why couldn’t I have lived in Seattle when I was young? (I did; I couldn’t afford concert tickets.) This was the kind of concert I dreamed about attending- a new band, a small venue. I could have been right up against the stage from the beginning, shaking hands with the lead singer as he reached out, looking enviously at the old friends he kept pointing out in the crowd. And I definitely would have stayed for a drink.

Great live performances – The Gracious Few


03 Dec

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“It’s called rock and roll, look it up.” This slogan was repeated a couple times during the Gracious Few concert, and rock and roll it definitely was, with a bit of blues thrown in. To quote Huey Lewis and the News, “They say the heart of rock and roll is the beating” and that was definitely true here. The beat and baseline drove the music, while the guitar solos added some flash.

Toward the end, they sat down for their “untamed” section- a little swamp bluegrass, they called it. It was intimate and added a new dimension to the performance.

Great live performances – Concrete Blonde


29 Jun

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Most of the time at a concert, you expect things to sound a little off from what you are used to on the albums. It’s the vagaries of being on tour, bad acoustics, and the fact that recordings can be touched up, at least a little bit.

Not so with Johnette Napoltiano. Twenty years after their Bloodletting album came out, the lead singer of Concrete Blonde sounds exactly the same live as she does on CD, and trust me, there was no lip synching involved.

They rocked the Showbox, and I was even inclined to forgive the 10:30pm start time.

Great live performances – Flogging Molly


29 Jun

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I got us tickets to see Flogging Molly last summer more for Charles than anything else. I knew he liked them, and I didn’t hate their music, but I could not have told you for sure what their music was. We had an amazing time.

Marymoor Park is an amazing venue. They left the area that is sometimes reserved seating open as “dance” floor so that people could get close to the stage. The band had amazing energy that rivaled that of the dancers (or beat it) from beginning to end. I can’t wait until they come this way again.

Great live performances – LIVE


29 Jun

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LIVE is our favorite band. We have seen them perform live four times. The first time was in Oakland at an outdoor amphitheater. The second was when they were opening for Nickelback in Vancouver. The best part was leaving before Nickelback came on and the look on the bouncer’s face when we left. We also saw them at a casino just outside Vancouver, that turned out to be a great venue, and finally, just two summers ago, at Marymoor park.

They have all been great performances, and I am sad that it looks like their current break might become permanent.

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