http://i123.photobucket.com/albums/o...ete/odeath.jpg

O'Death with On the Water and The Wallace Brothers Band
Saw these guys tonight at a shockingly small venue. The opening acts were okay, but O'Death put on an incredible show. All five of them have amazing stage presence. The rhythm section both play like they're in a metal band, the banjo player and singer/guitarist have a rapport like a pair of comedians, and the fiddle playing is amazingly intense. They're also apparently psychic since they started with my three favorite songs by them ("Low Tide", "Ghost Head" and "Bugs", in that order). They played a couple new unrecorded songs, which sounded great, and a whole bunch of high-intensity previously released songs. I was definitely impressed. It's a crime that they were playing in a venue as small as the one I just saw them in.

(Picture above taken by me at the show.)

Lucky bastard. They were suppose to play here 2 years ago but cancelled because of weather. Sucked to because they were supporting their newest album Outside which I've just recently rediscovered. Luckily I did see them in 2008 when they were touring their sophomore album. It was a Monday night show at some dive that went on an hour later because of some mix up. I was determined to see them and I was absolutely enthralled with their banjo player, and I feel safe to say that was when I decided the banjo was a legitimate instrument that I wanted to play.

Anyways I just found out Munly & the Lupercalians will be playing at some countryfest in September so I can check off seeing Jay Munly live, off the bucket list. I was actually listening to a Slim Censsas Auto Club live album today and that's a show that's definitely on my live list. Still I'll settle for a Munly show and I'm quite willing to pay the price and make the drive.

In more recent shows I'm going to Built to Spill on this coming Thursday, not a bucket list show, but certainly a show to see.

Saw Green Day a few weeks ago (AKA father and son bonding festival) and last week Bob Seger (AKA middle age - I saw this crowd at Springsteen last year - festival). Both were excellent.

Can I drag this up to brag about two shows I've been to lately? Mike Keneally and Wende :yeah: First of all the show by Wende. Wende is a Dutch singer and she sings whatever the **** she wants basically. She started out by singing French chansons and has a new, more poppy album out now. Now this concert was one in a series of concerts with a different concept than usual. The concerts are held in a church and part of the show is that the artist talks about his or her inspiration for the songs too.

Wende decided to experiment while at this concert, by not styling her show. :D There were no lights, except for the regular church lights. She wore her favourite shirt that she wears at home all the time. And instead of, as she calls it, 'getting in a bubble' -meaning that she gets in a sort of focussed mood and gets completely absorbed in her songs until the moment she's finished- she decided to snap out of it after a song, and just improvise the talking. So we really got to see the real Wende. Which was amazing. I loved it.:love: She asked the public questions like: "what part of the lyrics of this song do you like most? Or do you dance to this song at home? No? You should, that would make me happy."

Everything she said and the way she sang her songs totally captivated me. :bowdown: The only downside was that for her this experiment wasn't that great. While she was playing her last song she completely forgot what she was doing. She just stopped playing the piano and stopped singing mid-sentence and proclaimed: 'I'm out of it. I'm sorry.' and then she asked: 'What do you want me to do now? Should I continue with this song? Or play another one?' She ended up playing the same song again and it was wonderful. For her, this concept and experiment were not a success. For me, it was. It was so honest. You felt so much closer to the person behind the music. It somehow felt more real.

And then the other show I saw. My boyfriend and I wanted to go to the Mattheus Passion. But not very surprisingly this was completely sold out on the day we wanted to go. So we had to make a change of plans. I decided to take a look at the other venues in town and discovered that in a venue way too small was playing: the Mike Keneally Band. When we got there I think there were about 40 or 50 people and I think our presence lowered the average by quite a bit, lol. :D

Now if you're unfamiliar with Mike Keneally, don't be ashamed. I was too. Until I did some research and found out that he was a stunt guitarist for Frank Zappa! He used to play the most difficult guitar parts Frank Zappa composed. So at that moment I decided I had to go to this show. Well not exactly at that moment, I listened to some songs too. Anyway, Mike Keneally doesn't just play the guitar, he can play the piano too. Heck, he can even play the piano and play the guitar and sing in one song. Needless to say: this show was great. It was ****ing brilliant. Now I had wanted to write that the thing that I found best about this show was that the band seemed to have so much fun on stage, they improvised, they laughed, they were so much at ease. And yet they rocked!

But then I thought: no, people will probably want to hear about how complicated the songs were, how difficult the bass lines, about the climaxes and the stylistic diversity. But I don't know ape**** about that. So I decided to look up what a reviewer said about this concert. He probably knows what they do better than I know, right? Guess what? The guy mentioned in his review how the band seemed very relaxed...XD

I saw Loretta Lynn not that long ago. She was great. :)

Saw Los Lobos a few weeks ago
Saw Medeski, Martin, and Wood back in April

Those were both awesome shows with great talented musicians.

http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/...1_2451130b.jpg

New Order with Holy Ghost
Went to this show this past Friday. It was at one of those stadiums-with-lawn-seats that I usually hate, but the show was far from sold out so it was actually pretty nice. They even offered us a free upgrade on seats. New Order were great. It was more of a greatest hits type of show than I expected but very well done, and the encore was a trio of Joy Division songs. Holy Ghost basically sound exactly like New Order so they were either the perfect opening act or completely redundant depending how you look at it.

I've never seen New Order. I imagine that would be a fun and worthwhile show to go and see.

I'm not even a huge fan, although I do like them, but I would definitely go and see them.

I'm the same way. I like them but am not super into them. The only things I own by them are one of their singles collections and their Peel sessions album. Seeing them live definitely made me want to get more though.

So The National and Daughter are playing this Sunday in Indianapolis (about an hour from where I live).

And I can't go.

My favorite band...and my favorite new artist of 2013.

And I can't go.

Sigh.

Saw New Order and Holy Ghost! last week in Williamsburg Brooklyn. Tomorrow Tom Tom Club and the Go-Gos in Coney Island.

I saw Karnivool last night, for what I think was the tenth time (I was trying to count but it's been so long and so many shows...)

Gig review here.

Saw The Boss at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff the other day. 3 and a half hours of non-stop ROCK AND/OR ROLL. legendary. Couldn't fault him. Great showman, great singer, great band behind him. His acoustic playing of "Thunder Road" at the end was truly a treat.

http://i123.photobucket.com/albums/o...b7da57e7ff.jpg

Dosh
I went to this show this last last Friday, the sixth. It was a frigid, rainy night, and as a result the place was dead. That kind of sucks for the people playing but it was nice as an audience member. The photo above was taken by me at the show and really demonstrates how close I, and much of the audience, were standing to Dosh throughout his entire set. He played on the floor right in front of the sound booth, which was interesting, and handled his own levels. The sound guy covered up his board and was just watching Dosh in awe, as we all were. He was amazing—playing drums and keyboard at the same time, looping, mixing, creating gorgeous layered vocals, playing the exposed circuitry of his electric piano with drumsticks like it was a xylophone. After his set, he ended up standing next to me at the bar and I talked to him for a bit. Guy turned out to be just a friendly as he is talented.

For anyone unfamiliar, here's Dosh at work:




I should also add that Dosh wasn't even the headliner for this show, Matthew E. White was. He was decent and played a kind of indie version of 60s rock/soul. I wasn't overly excited by the music but his band was very tight. They also served as the backing band for the first opener, Howard Ivans, who frankly was a little on the dull side, but again had a nice tight backing band.

http://i123.photobucket.com/albums/o...phillyorch.jpg

West Philadelphia Orchestra
The weekend before last I went to see my old neighbors' band, though as I discovered at the show, my old neighbors are no longer in the band. Nevertheless, they still play some badass Balkan brass dance music with a touch of jazz. The singer was a new addition (though they still played a lot of instrumental stuff as well) and I thought she was great. An excellent show. If you're ever in Philly or anywhere else these people happen to play, I highly recommend going to see them.

Check it out (song fully kicks in at 1:30):

Black Sabbath a few days ago. I don't give 2 ****s how old they are or if they don't run around like loons on stage, they were one of the tightest and heaviest bands I have ever seen and I have seen a few bands in my time.

Saw Fields of the Nephilim 5 days earlier and they were incredible too, The Mission followed and they were quite frankly ****.

I missed out on the Alex'a Bar one and now missing out on the Club Nokia in L.A. :mad: Shame on me for being a fan and not going to go see my band live. The next time in 2014.

I saw Sabbath in '05 and they were great then too. Surprisingly brilliant. Good to know thats still the case. Its a shame its not quite the original line-up this time though but I still really fancied going. Just couldnt swing it.

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Whores.
Thanks to bob for telling me this show was even happening. It happened to be at one of my favorite local venues which was nice, and we began the evening by hitting Whore's singer/guitarist Christian Lembach with the door on our way into the club which was kind of hilarious. The show was fantastic! The songs from Ruiner were as amazing live as I expected them to be and the songs from Clean were much better live than on the EP—much more of sludge/doom sound to them than the way the recorded versions sound. My only complaint was that, with them being one of the opening acts, their set was pretty short. But they ended with a kickass version of "Tell Me Something Scientific" and that made me happy.

you lucky bastard!

i already sent them an email telling them what dicks they are for going to Philly before coming out west!

seriously though....glad you enjoyed it man :)

I saw a local band called The Amazing Snakeheads recently although they are getting quite big. The Guardian (so rock'n'roll) said they were the best live band in the UK. They were very intense but in a good way. The guy was wiping tears from his eyesat one point and eye****ed the bassist for a while which was a little uncomfortable.

I also saw Metronomy which was enjoyable pop fan but not much else. They had neat stage presence and I just stared at the drummer most of the time because she is beautiful and talented.

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Rocket from the Crypt
I just got back from this show about an hour or so ago. It was glorious! They were every bit as wild and fun as I always hoped they'd be and John Reis is one hell of a showman. They opened with one of my favorite songs of theirs, "Light Me", and roared through a lengthy set and encore of virtually all the tracks I hoped they'd play, finally bringing down the house with a great version of "Glazed". And yes they all were wearing those shirts from the picture above.

The opening act, Dan Sartain, was very good too, and his brand of punky throwback rock 'n roll fit well with RFTC.

I saw Kraftwerk "3D" this past Tuesday in New York City. What a great show it was. It was the standard show where they played all the standard Kraftwerk songs (Man Machine, The Model, Autobahn, Tour de France, Trans Europe Express, etc.) but with 3D visuals projected from behind. The 3D visuals added a new dimension to the Kraftwerk soundscape which I found found very appealing. I remember my first concert at the Fillmore East back in 1970 where the visuals were provided by the Joshua Light Show. The light show consisted of a guy behind a screen with an overhead projector and a bowl of water into which he'd drop colored oil and at times spin the bowl.

http://www.billrolikenterprises.com/...AllmanBros.jpg

Fast forward to 2014 to the Kraftwerk projections, not some overly produced Hollywood production but a well balanced, simple 3D animated projection that worked well with the music. I can only say that a Kraftwerk concert should be on everybody's "must see" concert list.

http://liveforlivemusic.com/image.ph...raftwerk-3.jpg

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The Magic Band

Holy fuck, that was incredible. The Magic Band still has three original members as well as two younger musicians who joined in and did a great job. Man they nailed every track to a tee. They opened with "My Human Gets Me Blues" and moved all through Captain Beefheart's discography. You would think that it wouldn't be as good without the Beef but they did so well, it was fantastic. I'll have to say that the Youtube videos that I watched didn't really do them the justice that seeing them live does. They came out for the first encore as the whole band and did "Electricity," then as the crowd clapped for more, John French came out alone and did "Orange Claw Hammer". Definitely the best show I've ever attended.

http://www.metal-archives.com/images...photo.jpg?1220

Godflesh
I had been waiting 22 years to see these guys and finally got my wish this past Friday. They opened with "Like Rats", which was exactly what I hoped they'd open with, and were unrelentingly heavy throughout. It was great to see them though I have to admit I wasn't quite as blown away as I was hoping. I was feeling sick and dragged myself out to this because I wanted to go so badly, so take any gripes I have with a grain of salt. But I felt like, in streamlining the music for a live setting, it kind of lost something. It made me realize how much of what I enjoy about Godflesh are textural elements that are hard to replicate outside of the studio. At any rate, still a good show that I'm glad I got to go to.

Cut Hands (Whitehouse's William Bennett) opened. His stage presence may have left a little to be desired—hitting buttons and occasionally doing silly dances—but the music was really good—harsh, danceable meld of tribal and industrial aesthetics.

just got back from Cut Hands and Godflesh

i agree 100% about Cut Hands....the music was surprisingly good and his projection show went well with it....having seen him live before i was expecting his theatrics and arrogance

Godflesh was amazing live except several problems with equipment....it almost seemed like Broadrick tuned more than played :) and Vitriol really did not seem into it at all....literally throwing his bass on the ground and walking off at the end....still very much worth it

Yeah, GC Green was the same way at my show. I don't know if he legitimately didn't want to be there or if that's just his stage persona, but he was out of there like shot a second after playing his last note. Zero interaction with Broadrick and zero interaction with the audience.

Also, Cut Hands had projections at your show? He had nothing at mine. :(

both Cut Hands and Godflesh had projections

i have to say that he seemed generally annoyed with the whole thing....still when they were playing it was seriously good....and the audience was really into it so overall a great time....plus i feel like they really did a wide set list which was nice

I saw the Chris Speed Trio last night with Dave King on drums and Chris Tordini on bass. It was really good free jazz, the drummer was especially superb. Unfortunately I missed the first ten minutes of the show trying to find the place, but what I did see ended up being pretty awesome.

I'm seeing Godflesh this Thursday (not sure who's opening). Will report my experience.

Don't know if this is helpful, but it lists Rusted Shut, Burnt Skull, and Pushmen playing the same night at the venue according to this.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j...,d.aWw&cad=rja

Kind of a crappy list you have to scroll by day, but its got the three other bands listed that evening.

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CLUTCH

I'd waited a good few years for this. I'd seen Clutch at a festival but never been to a gig of theirs, so I was very pumped up for this. It was pretty standard Clutch, which is not a negative. Loud, boozey, bluesy metal with some heavy grooves and a very nice setlist for which I feel very lucky. Their sets are sometimes extremely light on Blast Tyrant, which would have disappointed me. Excellent show.

Just saw The Ex - wow!
Outstanding show, one of the best this year.
Played mostly material from Catch My Shoe, which is one of my favourite Ex records, so no complaints. Still going strong after 30+ years - an inspiration.

Went to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Concert in Brooklyn which was awesome.Saw Local H Monday night at Mercury Lounge and tomorrow I'm seeing David Johansen and David Bromberg at Town Hall in NYC.

I'm seeing The Ex at a festival later this year so glad to hear this, so excited!

Sincere thanks for the research Fred but all 3 of those bands played in the indoor part of the venue on the same night. I did not see them.

The lineup was Regis/Godlfesh on the outdoor main stage. Regis is an electronic musician who, according to wikipedia is "one of the originators of the Birmingham sound, forging a sound that blended Chicago house with darker European electronics" Regis was not bad but also not interesting.

Godflesh were great though. Very glad I went because the music reminded of times and places I loved so long ago. I even got caught in a mosh for the first time in about 15 years. And I didn't get a broken nose or a twisted ankle. I was happy to see that I can still withstand that kind of thing. The audience was mostly late-20s to early-40s fans so I assume that many appointments with chiropractors and massage therapists were made today.

All around a great experience, the band seemed really into it the entire time and it was just super fun. I bought the last official US tour shirt in size L. White T with gold logo / the Everything I Build I Destroy graphic on front. Tour dates on back. I didn't know they only played 10 shows here. Extremely satisfied

Nice one - don't miss 'em man

What festival is it?

Awesome.....so they didn't seem to hate each other?

I was worried they might be a bit old but after hearing they've still got it I'll for sure lock them in as a 'must see'. Jabberwocky festival in August, from ATP.