Silverlake Lounge: Local Natives

A friend suggested checking out Local Natives over at Silverlake Lounge. They are the residency band for February ‘09. My friend unfortunately had to cancel, but I decided to head on over anyways. First off, however, I had to watch the new episode of ”24” at home (which admittedly seems totally off topic). I wanted to catch the second band Dusty Rhodes and the River Band, as well, but I figured since they were the 10 p.m. band it meant they wouldn’t go on stage until 10:30 p.m. and so I could watch “24” without worries. I arrived at the Silverlake Lounge at around 10:20 p.m. and Dusty Rhodes was already on stage. Interesting. It seemed that the bands were playing on schedule Monday night, which I haven’t experienced in the past at Silverlake Lounge. Anyways, the place was packed. I did attempt to slowly make my way closer to the stage during Dusty Rhodes’ set, but I never made it more than halfway up. (So no photo evidence.) They’re a band in the folk-rock vain. From what I could tell one of the lead singers bounced around a lot. I enjoyed the music, the little I heard of it -- I think I probably caught half their set.

After they finished their set, there was this crowd shift of people heading away from the stage. I knew it was crowded, but for awhile there I was wondering how many people were actually packed inside the bar. There was this organized stream of people moving away from the stage while another stream moved towards the stage. It almost felt like an orchestrated agreement between people at the front and those in the rear: we were up front for Dustry Rhodes and now we’ll move to the back so that you all in the back can now see Local Natives up close.

I headed up front.

While upfront I over-heard some conversations. After I got into Silverlake Lounge a line apparently formed outside. One young lady complained about being stuck outside for 20 minutes. Another woman was talking about how she booked bands at various locations.

Local Natives started their set at 11 p.m. on the dot. Once again, I couldn’t help but find this interesting since the last few times I’d gone to Silverlake Lounge, the bands always started 30 minutes late. Of course, the last time I was at Silverlake Lounge was back in September so maybe the world has changed in five months.

This, of course, was the first time I’d seen Local Natives. I had no clue what to expect. All I knew was that my friend suggested that we check out this band. Considering Dusty Rhodes, I was rather sure that Local Natives wasn’t a punk band or heavy metal band. They are a six piece band, though their myspace page seems to indicate a five piece band. An additional face is their violinist. Here are my thoughts on this band. Awesome folk-rock. Midway through the set I could not help but think the following: there is a transition point between jazz and rock, and Local Natives fits right at that transition point. I love how for one song two of the band members switched instruments. (I haven’t written a review of Whispertown2000, but this band also rotates instruments – actually more so than Local Natives.) There was a row of young beautiful people right in front of the band, two of them were singing along during much of the set. On occasion, this band goes wild, not wild in a crazy antics way, but wild in the sense that they suddenly get this momentary jam session feel where everyone is having the time of their lives. The band invited up a couple guest musicians. The violinist from Dusty Rhodes came up for a dueling violinist battle. They also invited up a percussionist who took up double duties on the drum set. I was standing a little too close to the side of the stage at times and was worried that the bass player was going to give me a black eye. When I had that feeling, I would back up just a bit. I am an analytical person. Towards the end of the set something dawned on me. This band was situation in a triangle shape. Three band members up front, two in the middle and the drummer in the back.

With that, I left and walked through the cold night air. It was seriously cold. I just had to mention that. Cold for Los Angeles, of course.

Over to the Key Club: The Automatic Music Explosion and The Mulhollands

The Key Club and Monday nights: based on the myspace bulletins I received from The Automatic Music Explosion it appears that the Key Club is back to a 9:30 p.m. guest list cut off for Steel Panther. The club seems to switch policies every few months. One policy is that people on a band’s guest list need to get to the club by 9:30 p.m. The other policy is that people on a band’s guest list need to get there before their band gets on stage, which means someone can show up as late as 11 p.m. and still get in for free.

Nancy Fullforce. This band puts on an interesting show. I walked into the Key Club and on the main floor there was a small platform. I looked at it and wondered, “What that’s for?” I found out at 9:15 p.m. A young lady got on it and started to tap dance. Now that is an opening. There were also two guys on either side of the floor holding signs that said “Rock” and “Roll.” The O’s were cut out so that the guys could stick their heads through the alphabet. The two guys later came back as weight lifters. During one song that had the word “vulture” in it, there was a scene from (I believe) The Birds projected on the stage screen. So what about the band itself? It is hard to say. This was the first time I’ve seen this band. One cool thing about this band is that they incorporate a saxophone and trumpet. I always appreciate a band that uses musical instruments other than the standard drums, guitar and bass. Interesting note: I wonder if this was the first time they’ve played at the Key Club. The trumpeter occasionally would put his trumpet down and pull out the digital camera.

The Automatic Music Explosion and The Mulhollands. Okay, so if you read this blog, you’ve figured out by now that I’m a sucker for these two bands. The AME had the 10 p.m. slot. Their new song is titled “Rock Me Like This.” I mentioned this song in a previous blog, but wasn’t able to nail down the song title. This song won’t allow you to relax. This song is the equivalent of a high octane action movie squeezed into 3 or 4 minutes. I learned that this song is from producer Mike Chapman. He produced albums for Blondie and The Knack. The AME needs to get this song recorded, because it deserves some radio airplay. During the set, an occasional voice would come booming out at just the right moments during song breaks. The first time I heard it I looked around the Key Club. Was a Key Club DJ getting into the music and making shot-outs? Actually, it was the drummer, Max. The Mulhollands came up next. Murray, their guitar player, was back on stage. Previously, Eric from The New Hotness had taken the guitar duties. Murray had a broken arm at that time so it was good to see him back. The Mulhollands are a band that focuses in on Sarah J’s vocals. Her vocals were going Monday night. Unlike at the The Roxy, there were no sound difficulties. Jeff, on bass, who usually plays in the background without drawing too much attention was getting on his knees and rocking it during a song or two. Matt Fuller was playing to the crowd so much so that a couple guys came towards the stage at one point and started to give him the band worship gyrations. It all ended with Sarah J taking out the megaphone for the last two songs. One must love the megaphone.

This was an interesting night in terms of who showed up. There were a variety of friends that showed up, many of whom seldom interact with each other. I always find it interesting how certain bands (in this case The AME and The Mulhollands) can bring so many varied groups together.

For some reason I focused in on opening this Monday night. Nancy Fullforce started it off with the tap dancer. The Automatic Music Explosion came out from behind the curtain, walking in a line to their spots. The Mulhollands settled in on stage, checking their gear, and when the time came went for it full force.

Movie Review: Gran Torino

Gran Torino. This is an excellent movie. A friend who also saw the movie gave it rave reviews, but discounted the acting skills of the Asian actors. I thought they were just fine. (The issue here is that many of the Asians in the movie aren’t professional actors.) The story starts out at a funeral. Walt Kowalski’s wife has just died. They live in a neighborhood that has culturally transitioned from European to Hmong. Kowalski is a bit of a racist and doesn’t get along with his neighbors. A youth living next door to Kowalski by the name of Tao has a cousin in a gang. The cousin pressures him into trying to steal Kowalski’s Gran Torino. Kowalski becomes aware of the theft-in-progress and confronts the kid. Over the next few days or weeks, Kowalski slowly becomes more involved with Tao and his family and then in the neighborhood at large as he sees the need to stand up to the local gangs.

I found myself wrapped up in storytelling. You see a racist who slowly softens his stance to his Asian neighbors. He sees his neighborhood as being run down and despises the fact that the Hmong don’t keep their properties up, but learns that one reason is the fact that they are too poor to do the necessary upkeep. You see a person who was likely involved in his community at one point, but then withdrew as he saw the cultural shift occur, but then finds a reason to get re-involved. Even though the film is seen as an anti-PC movie, it also has certain qualities that affirm the need to stay involved in your neighborhood. You also see how he has issues with his own family members. His children don’t like to be around him. His daughter-in-laws are greedy. One grandchild is a spoiled brat. This is partially his fault and he realized this as time passes.

Kowalski gets involved with his neighborhood to the extent that he feels he must do something about the local gang harassing his next door neighbors. His actions cause a violent reaction. This leads to the powerful finale.

Criticism: There are always issues in any movie that you can question and complain about. My one complaint is in regards to the priest. When the gang reacts to Kowalski’s actions, the priest comes over to discuss matters with Kowalski. It seems to me that he advocates aggressive measures against the gang during the meeting, but then later on reverses himself. If I interpreted the priest’s initial reaction, an appropriate explanation to this reversal isn’t provided in the movie.

Of the Oscar potential movies I’ve seen, I’d have to say that this movie deserves a nod for Best Picture. Unfortunately, it got no Oscar nods at all.

Movie Review: The Wrestler

The Wrestler. Yahoo.com has this description of the movie, “ . . . In an effort to build a new life, Robinson takes a job at a deli, moves in with an aging stripper and tries to build a relationship with her son.” I wonder if I saw the same movie, because I don’t remember Randy Robinson every meeting the stripper’s son. And they didn’t move in together. I wonder if there is another version of the movie out there somewhere.

I enjoyed this movie. It shows a life of a guy who was once a big time wrestler, but is now way past his prime. He wrestles at small time gigs, which pay in twenty dollar bills. He must work at a grocery store during the week to make ends meet. He makes so little money that he can’t even pay his monthly rent at a trailer park. He was married at one point in time, but that ended a long time ago. His only current relationship is with a stripper, who is also way past her prime. And then comes a heart attack right after a wrestling match (which I have to say this, I don’t watch wrestling so I don’t know how violent and bloody these wrestling matches are, but this was one bloody match with barbed wire and staple guns, not for the weak of heart). This puts a halt to the life he loves, because he is told he can no longer wrestle. It causes him to re-assess his life. He attempts to reach out to the stripper, trying to create a true relationship. She resists, but eventually agrees to meet him outside the club. He tries to reconnect with a daughter we learn about midway through the movie. Initially she resists, but then decides to give their relationship another chance. He also starts putting in longer hours at the grocery store. But things start to fall apart. The stripper does hang out with him for a day, but then withdraws. He has another falling out with his daughter. His duties at the grocery store begin to wear on him. And so he has a chance at a final rematch with a wrestler from his past glory, the Ayatollah, and he takes it.

For me, this movie was about emotional connections and inabilities to deal with what life throws at you (or what time takes away from you). The wrestler and the stripper had an emotional connection even if those moments were spent at a strip club. I felt that she wanted to start a relationship, as well, but also felt concern that what they had wasn’t real. Much of her life was built around creating sexual illusions with her customers so that when a real connection occurred she wasn’t able to recognize it. The wrestler and his daughter had a damaged relationship. There is only brief mention of the background story, but you do learn that the wrestler ran away from his responsibilities. His daughter hated him for it, but gave him a second chance, which he ruined by making some very poor choices – putting certain priorities above his daughter. These frustrations of having to deal with a transition in life caused him to make a potentially serious miscalculation by getting back into the ring with the Ayatollah.

Oscar question: Does Mickey Rourke deserve an Oscar nod for Best Actor? I’d have to say yes. In a previous review, I came down negatively on The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. So if Brad Pitt can get a nod for the picture, Mickey Rourke surely deserves one for The Wrestler. Does he deserve to win? Perhaps, but I haven’t seen all the movies that have Best Actor nods, so I can’t really form an opinion yet.

Echoplex: IO Echo and ZaZa

I was out at the Echoplex Tuesday night for Indie 103.1’s Check One Two. (I wonder what will happen to this night with the radio station no longer around.)

I arrived during the middle (perhaps closer to the beginning) of ZaZa’s set. ZaZa is an ethereal rock band. I actually wanted to come and see their whole set, but got held up. I checked out their website beforehand and was stunned by their music. Their vocals just allow you to float out there in space. A number of times, when you see a band live you hardly recognize them because your impression of them was made via manipulated music recordings. As soon as I walked into the Echoplex, I knew that ZaZa was on stage. The only difference between their website recordings and their live show was that perhaps the drums played a more driving force during their live set. Based on my brief read of their website, I guess they’re originally from the West Coast (I don’t know if this means Los Angeles), but are now based out in New York City.

I hung out with a couple friends for awhile and then IO Echo came on stage. I’ll have to admit that I found it hard to get into the set during the first couple songs. I had this slight level of anxiety. I’d convinced my two friends that this was a local band to check out. Also, this was only the second time I’d seen them so honestly I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. I’d built up this band based off of seeing only one previous gig. Sometimes you see a band for the first time and think they’re great, and then the next time you scratch your head and wonder what you were thinking previously. After awhile I stopped thinking about my friends’ potential negative opinions about the band and started getting into the music. It was hard not to get into the music when towards the center of the floor the crowd was jumping to the music. The band ended with a couple songs that they just hit out of the ballpark. And then it was over. Hmm, how long was that set? Where was the encore? Hey, I wanted more.

IO Echo isn’t just a band. To me, it is a mixture of music and performance art. The band is creepy good fun – a horror flick movie with magical vibes. This was a night we all went down the rabbit hole with IO Echo.

Note: A longer version of this may soon appear elsewhere on the web. When it does, I'll link to it in a blog update.

A weekend filled with music of various Los Angeles bands

Quick round-up of music as I just recently blogged about many of the bands I saw over the weekend.

The New Fidelity and The Automatic Music Explosion played Club Dynamite Saturday night. AME Jeff got some vocal time. Is that a first? AME has this great new song built around high speed adrenaline that doesn’t allow you to breath – sorry, can’t remember the name of the song for the life of me, so you’ll just need to go see them to experience it. The New Fidelity went searching for a tambourine. At one point, the lead singer from The New Fidelity was right in front of me and then he suddenly disappeared. I re-located him lying on the floor with his guitar. The hot sister dj team S.I.S provided the dance atmosphere between sets. There aren’t any pictures from the night. If you’ve ever gone to Club Dynamite at Fox and Hounds, you’ll understand.

Get Set Go, Underwater City People and Silver Needle on Sunday night. Yes, it was just two weeks ago that I saw Get Set Go and Underwater City People at Old Towne Pub. The last time was a farewell party, this time around it was for a birthday party. It was Celeste’s (UCP) birthday. One of the guys from Get Set Go was wearing a Bang Sugar Bang t-shirt during the set. It brought back memories of a favorite band that no longer exists. Get Set Go’s bass player for the night was Andre from Silver Needle – a pink glitter bass at that. Jon (guitar) from Underwater City People seemed particularly excited about the night, knock down his microphone stand more than a couple of times. I think he was more excited about the birthday party than Celeste herself. They had a really good set. Silver Needle took the stage next. I haven’t written about them before. Andre did double duty for the night, bass for Get Set Go (as mentioned) and guitar for Silver Needle. There was a moment towards the end where their lead singer, Daniel, was searching his pockets for some time. Johnny 99 figure out what he needed. A guitar pick was quickly delivered. Talk about communication skills. The three bands playing that night at Old Towne Pub have a long history together. It was highlighted by the fact that all three bands used Get Set Go’s bass drum, just a sharing of equipment night.


Below photos are of UCP and Silver Needle.

Stab City, Toys that Kill and Pu$$y Cow at Juanita's in Highland Park, a January Tuesday night

Stab City. This band plays one crazy set. The lead guitarist just wouldn’t stop moving around. He was constantly in motion, either swinging away at the lights above or seeing what strange sounds might result from pressing his guitar against the corner of the wall. In regards to the drummer, I’m not sure if he’s playing the drums or dancing around the drums. He spent time standing atop his drum set, slamming away at it and then taking part of his set with him while jumping to the stage front. When he decided to go back to his seat, he left what he took behind. A couple friends decided to help him by bringing the missing piece back onto the stage. I noticed the drummer yelling, “Leave it there.” They didn’t hear him saying that so I just have to leave it up to my imagination in regards to what might have come next.

Pu$$y Cow. Someone spilled some beer on the stage. I think it was the lead singer, Joe. Joe had to come off the stage while the Juanita staff went looking for a mop. The Juanita staff came back with the mop and began mopping up in the middle of a song. Flaco the bass player helped out a little, taking the mop for a brief while. With one hand on the bass and the other on the mop, his skills at mopping didn’t come through properly. They ended their set with a loose cover of “Na Na Hey Hey (Kiss Him Goodbye).” They had some CDs for sale. They had sticker prices at $0.25 and upwards. Random prices. I don’t think anyone paid the sticker price. FYI: This is the band that wears the hats, slightly beaten from mosh pit encounters.

Toys that Kill. I couldn’t even really get any solid photos of this band – to the side is a photo, which I just don’t feel captures the band’s stage presence. There was a crush of fans right up against the stage the whole time. I saw one photographer squeeze in for a brief while. I personally found myself immediately slammed to the side as a mini-mosh pit formed. This is an interesting band where two of the guys look like they’re just over the age of twenty-one while the other two look like they might be in their early thirties. This is just an observation, because it shouldn’t matter. This band had the crowd going. They let the drummer have the small stage to himself while the two guitarist and one bassist played in front of the stage. This made for an intimate mosh pit setting – that sounds a bit awkward.

Juanita’s. So this was my first time at Juanita’s – as well as a number of other friends. Cheers to Pu$$y Cow for getting us out there. This show was initially supposed to be at Mr. T’s, but was shifted due to the fact that Mr. T’s is closed for a couple weeks or so. I’ve driven by Juanita’s a few times and often noticed people hanging outside of it. It has a nice area with a patio in the back. One thing to remember if you plan to live in Highland Park, don’t live next door to Juanita’s unless you’re a type that stays up till 2 a.m. – on a work night. As I was walking to my car, one of the bands was playing and I could hear the music loud and clear.

Movie Review: Yes Man

Yes Man. This movie is just stupid fun. For example, who in the United States would believe that a curse would fall upon you if you broke a convenient? And who actually would say yes to everything? But who cares, this movie was just fun to watch, from the stupid face tape wrapping scene to the running photography artwork. What is precious about this film for someone who knows the East Los Angeles area is that one can consider this a love story to the eastside. There are scenes from Elysian Park, Griffith Park, and Spaceland. I believe there is even a scene set at a restaurant called Home (just speculation, but this is the scene where he is having lunch with a friend and his Persian date) in Los Feliz. Maybe this biased my opinion of this movie, but who cares. It is a comedy worth spending time laughing along with during these dire economic times.

Hanging at The Roxy with The Mulhollands and The Automatic Music Explosion

I was out at The Roxy Monday night to catch two of my favorite bands: The Mulhollands and The Automatic Music Explosion. It was the Hollywood Roxxx night with Switchblade Kitty. I guess this night is meant as competition to The Key Club’s Steel Panther (Metal Skool.) It must be working, because Hollywood Roxxx used to be over at The Viper Room. The Mulhollands started the night out at 8:45 p.m., an early start. Erik from The New Hotness was the replacement guitar player for the night. Mofo Daniels (Murray) has a broken left arm. There were some technical difficulties that Sarah Jeanette needed to power through. One of the microphones that she was planning to use wasn’t working. And the main microphone she was using was going on the blink early on. Erik worked out just great for The Mulhollands. Hey, will they turn themselves into a five piece band? Sarah Jeanette was being offered drinks left and right during her set and finally refused one, saying, “I’ll end the set drunk with all these drinks.” Even though the old-school microphone was giving Sarah Jeanette some problems, I think it is a great little addition to their set. Sarah Jeanette has great vocals and the microphone just seems to highlight the fact that one should focus in on her vocals during the set.

The Automatic Music Explosion was up next. This was their first set of 2009. They also play Saturday night at their home base Fox and Hounds. They are giving Max (drums) some love. Jodie headed over to the drum set. There was some drum directed moves made by the rest of the group. Bands often leave the drummer alone in the back. The AME is showing the best dressed drummer some love now. A friend of mine came along with me for her introduction to The AME. I turned to her towards the end of the set and said, “It just gets better.” It did. The AME is just one of those bands that continues to turn the volume and excitement up until the very end. The set was turned up so much that The AME brought down the Roxy’s curtains. As they were concluding the night, the curtain came on down and the last ten seconds or so of their set was done hidden behind the curtains. An interesting end of their set – a mistake or planned who knows, but it made for a distinctive AME night.

Interesting note: I would say that three-quarters of those there during The Mulhollands’ and The Automatic Music Explosion’s sets were fans of those two bands. I stuck around for the next couple of bands (I skipped out on Switchblade Kitty – maybe another time I’ll catch them) and the audience appeared to change. It was like a significant number of folks came out just for The Mulhollands and The Automatic Music Explosion, and then went home for the night.

Jessie Deluxe was up next. She’s in a two piece band. She plays guitar and has a drummer. She’s just pure rock. This was the first time I’ve seen her though I have seen her name up and around before. On the Roxy’s large stage, her two piece band provided an interesting contrast. After the set, I saw her mingle on the floor a bit. There is always the chance of false first impressions, but she seems like a person you’d want as a friend. Perhaps that’s not cool to say about a rock singer, oh well.

A night at Old Towne Pub Pasadena with UCP, Power Cords, Get Set Go

I headed off to catch Underwater City People, Power Cords and Get Set Go at Old Towne Pub Sunday night, 11 January. I’ve followed two of the bands (Underwater City People and Get Set Go) for awhile. It was a last second show. It was a farewell for Sarah, who is Mike TV’s girlfriend. I’m not friends with Sarah (though I do know who she is), but I was happy to show up and catch the show. What was cool about the night was that there were only three bands – what is so cool about that? Well, the night started off at 9:15 p.m. and ended at around 12:15 a.m., which meant that each band had an approximate 45 minute set. That is what was so cool about the night. Underwater City People started it off. It being a last minute gig, per them, they hadn’t practiced. None the less, it was a great set. (Amusing moment: for one song they had to talk things over for a moment to figure out exactly how to get the song going.) For Underwater City People, I believe they played a set list that was requested by Sarah. The Power Cords were up next. This is a band that I’ve heard of, but never seen. For some reason, they reminded me of another local band called New Fidelity. They are a four piece band. Their sound is semi-similar to New Fidelity. They call themselves avant garde post-post rock. I have no clue what that means. I will mention that on their myspace page, New Fidelity is one of their top friends so perhaps it isn’t just my imagination thinking that the two bands sound similar. Like New Fidelity most of the band members share vocals though perhaps for Power Cords it is more of a shared responsibility versus New Fidelity where there is more of a lead vocalist with the other guys doing backup vocals. As for Get Set Go, they started their set with a cover song from The Cure. I have to say that Mike TV is one of the coolest musicians in the Los Angeles area. During both UCP and Power Cords, he was out in front pogo dancing to the music. I was at another Get Set Go show where he was the only person standing near the stage for the first band of the night. Get Set Go also mainly played a set list requested by Sarah. Towards the end, Sarah tossed out a couple other requests and after that the night ended.

Off to Spaceland: Ida Maria, Rocco Deluca, HoneyHoney

Spaceland on Monday night, January 12, was apparently the place to be among my various friends. I met up with a handful of friends and then ran into other friends who had also made the trek out. “I heard there were a number of good bands playing tonight,” was the common theme among us all.

Ida Maria. She rocked Spaceland. She’s an artist from Norway. I’d never heard of her until reading about her in the LA Weekly. The LA Weekly describes her as “packed with bare-bones garage-punk jams longer on attitude than ornamentation . . . larger-than-life reputation for onstage antics.” She’s definitely a woman filled with attitude. At the end of her set, she’d destroyed the stage, but she still had vocals to finish up so she grabbed two microphone stands and rushed towards one end of the stage with finality on her mind. Her onstage antics included a self-only wet t-shirt contest which resulted in everyone noticing she wasn’t wearing a bra. She does have the onstage antics down, but I can’t say they’re larger-than-life. Maybe people who love Ida Maria haven’t seen Shayne from Spider Problem – now that’s a person with onstage antics. I loved the set – and the pink high top shoes she wore. Perhaps my thirty minutes of enjoyment had something to do with the fact that just before the set began a friend of mine began jumping around chanting, “Ida Maria. Ida Maria. Ida Maria.” It sort of got me going and I will say that from her very first song, I had a smile on my face.

Rocco Deluca. He’s doing the residency at Spaceland this month of January. This guy can rock it. The first half of his set was a thrill of rock and roll. He uses a resonator guitar, which in my mind gave the music a southern rock feel. He had folks bouncing with the music. He slowed it down during the second half of his set. There were a couple cool duets with a female singer. There were also a couple other guest musicians. My nitpicking, I got really into the first half and wished he’d continued in that vein, but I can’t complain too much because as mentioned I did enjoy the two duet songs. I read online that Kiefer Sutherland of “24” fame has taken an interest in Rocco Deluca’s music and that a Rocco Deluca music video is on the “24 – Redemption” DVD. I couldn’t help but think that his music would be great for that Louisiana-based TV show “True Blood.” (Anna Paquin just won the Golden Globe for “Best Performance by an Actress in a TV Series – Drama.)

HoneyHoney. This band is the main reason I headed out to Spaceland Monday night. For some reason, reading the LA Weekly, the band name just caught my attention and I figured I had to give this band a listen. I wasn’t disappointed. As the LA Weekly puts it, HoneyHoney is “an appealing uptempo brand of melodic folk-rock.” Hey, when Suzanne Santo is jamming on the violin, you can’t deny that this is uptempo music. She also plays that banjo, but she had problems tuning it so she didn’t really use it during the night. HoneyHoney is a two piece band (I think) with Ben Jaffe on guitar. He helps out on vocals, as well, but Suzanne is the main vocalist for the band. They also had two other musicians playing guitar and drums. What was endearing (at least to me) was the fact that midway through their set (which started a bit after midnight) Suzanne said something like, “I’m going to sleep in tomorrow morning. I’m so used to going to bed early that by 9:30 p.m. I was wondering how I was going to make it through the night.” It is nice to know that not all musicians get an extra boast of energy starting around 1 a.m. It was unfortunate that Spaceland partially cleared out soon after Rocco Deluca, because people missed a great set. (I suspect that Suzanne isn’t the only one who needs her sleep. Tuesday is a workday and I think even in Silver Lake people need to head to bed for the next day’s grind.)

Other than music, something to remember the night by: there was a guy who was trying to hit on every woman in his near vicinity. Most of the women shifted just out of conversation distance soon after initial contact.

Over-heard comment from Suzanne regarding the audience, “Hey, everyone, why don’t you . . . oh thanks, I thought you were all going to stand away from the stage during our set.”

Notes from Vivace

Movie Review: Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Straight out: sorry about this review.

Based on looking at Yahoo, I know this is a well liked movie by audiences. Currently, it has an A-. As for me, I was bored stiff. (Last year, I had the same reaction to Sweeney Todd. People loved the movie, but I walked out of the movie bored.) After an hour, I was looking at the time. This is a rather bad sign when the movie is nearly 3 hours long.

To me, the movie was going through the motions between the various stages of the Benjamin/Daisy relationship. The relationship moments I loved -- except for the last scenes, which to me just made the movie look silly. The whole tug boat, World War II portion of the movie felt like some useless side story. I will attack one part of the Benjamin/Daisy storyline. The part where Benjamin re-creates the moments before Daisy's accident in Paris. Oh mercy. Was this five minutes long? It felt like an hour. (Note: it is interesting how a drawn out moment like this bored me, but there were scenes in another movie called Rachel Getting Married that were probably even more drawn out that I simply loved.)

And is it me or did this movie seem to have an anti-George Bush feel. Was the whole Hurricane Katrina moment meant as a dig at George Bush? If so, another attack on this movie for having a useless political bent. Or perhaps Katrina had some over-arching meaning to the movie that I totally missed.

Anyways, I can't say this is an awful movie due to the fact that it felt like such a well made movie. I will say I don't consider it Oscar worthy and rate it as an average movie -- not the best movie of the year, but also not ranking with the worst.

Movie Review: Doubt

This is the second movie I've watched recently where ambiguity rules the day. In Doubt, one isn't sure if Sister Aloysius Beauvier (Meryl Streep) is correct in her child molestation accusations against Father Brendan Flynn (Philip Seymour Hoffman). My guess is that she is not correct in her accusations that Father Flynn is molesting the first black student, Donald Miller, in school history; however, I do believe she might be on the right track. There is one child who appears to withdraw from Father Flynn, but then even there just because a child withdraws whenever a figure of authority passes by doesn't mean there is child molestation going on.

I consider this a well done movie -- great acting, great storyline, great everything.