ACL 2008 Day 1

Long day, great weather, some dust, and pollen or ragweed ;( My friend Dan, and I arrived early, parked near Antones and touch the shuttle.

Asleep at the Wheel

How else would you kick off an ACL Festival? This year, Ray had a younger girl (who couldn't have been more than 15 years old) on stage as the 2nd fiddle player. She's a great player now, I can only imagine where she'll be in 10 years.

Other highlights of the show included a great rendition of Hot Rod Lincoln.

What Made Milwaukee Famous

An Austin band that I had never seen before. Good, but not my cup of tea.

Jakob Dylan and the Gold Mountain Rebels

Jakob appeared on the same stage that his father had last year. I have seen him several times with the Wallflowers, and can honestly say, I liked that band better.

The first two songs of this set were played very tentatively. If I had to hazard a guess, it seemed like there was a problem with the on-stage monitors. This was quickly remedied, and they finished with the type of Singer/Songwriter set that you would expect.

The Freddy Jones Band

I caught these guys in the WaMu (wonder who the new sponsor will be next year?) pavilion. These guys were a really tight and experienced band, playing "Adult oriented" Pop/Rock. Enjoyable, but the genre is not something that would compel me to buy an album.

Patty Griffin

Patty was one of the recommended act, and was fantastic. She lives in Austin, but apparently tours quite a bit. Fantastic band, including a old friend, Mike Longoria, on drums. I'm not usually one to listen to much Americana, but I have made a mental note to catch her, the next time she plays here in Austin.

David Byrne

Holy crap, David hit it out of the park with this show. Easily the best show of the day, and could quite possibly be the best show of the Festival when it's all over.

At the beginning of the set their were 8 people on stage, David on lead guitar, keys, bass, drums, percussion and 3 backup singers, all dressed in white. They were joined on stage by 3 dancers (also in white), around the third song. The entire set was a well choreographed show, integrating music and dance throughout. As an observer, I could not help but think of Stop Making Sense.

I can't say enough good things about the Rhythm Section in this band. They were fucking awesome; the best I'd seen in a long while. Everyone in the crowd was visibly dancing or boppin' along to the backbeat. The show also consisted of a well rounded selection of Byrne's solo material and a healthy serving of reworked Talking Heads songs.

Two thumbs up for this one! I also just realized, that all of the Talking Heads albums in my collection are on vinyl. Time to refresh the collection with digital.

Evening Wrap Up

Antibalas

I caught about half of the set, from this NYC based funk band. Probably would have listened to more of their set, but they were on the way across Zilker.

Alejandro Escavedo

Supposedly Alejandro's first ACL. I listened to two numbers before proceeding back towards the AMD stage. I've seen him enough at SxSW to not feel like I was missing anything.

The Swell Season

I probably should have listened to the previews of this band. I caught two numbers from this act, and wished I had seen the whole set.

Mars Volta

I've tried to get into this band on the recommendation of other Prog fans, particularly King Crimson fans. I don't hear any similarity, and have never found them that interesting. Hearing them live, changed nothing. I'm just not in to them.

Manu Chao

Sounded fine and had a good band. Another case where I can't understand what all the fuss is about though. Seems to play a hodgepodge of World Music, but always seems to end up on the Reggae/Ska end of the genre spectrum

I have the Wristband

I picked up my ACL Wristband tonight, and took the opportunity to take a picture of the gate, with my phone.

Looking forward to a great weekend of music.

RIP: Richard Wright

Pink Floyd founder and Keyboardist, Richard Wright, passed away today in London, at age 65. I'll be listening to some Floyd tonight it seems.

Austin Jazz Fest Night 3

This was night two for me. I arrived there at 9PM and saw the following acts:

• Soul Kitchen - a Hip-hop fusion act. All competent musicians, I just wasn't into their music.
• The Landfall Quartet - the first real Jazz act, although they were apparently missing the 4th member (a guitarist). Great Wayne Shorter type of feel to the set. Everyone in this ensemble played well.
• Azul - a Salsa fusion band led an old friend from the Mid-Hudson Valley, Peter Mazzetti. Pete's bands have always been tight and played interesting stuff. It's too bad Azul is not able to play more often here in Austin.
• Burly - another quartet (?) with a member missing, playing as a trio. They played a blues influenced rock set reminiscent of Jeff Beck.

All in all, I had a good time, but I am wondering about the "state" of Jazz in Austin. I would have preferred a little more traditional trio or quartet music with Acoustic Instruments. I also have to wonder why this was held at the Dirty Dawg, as opposed to the Elephant Room.

Austin Jazz Fest Night 2

First, let me say I was lazy and didn't make it downtown Friday night. I saw the following acts perform last night:

• Bruce James Soultet - mainly a funk band. Bruce sounds at times like Dr. John, and at others like Chris Rea, great keys player.
• Brady Muckleroy - a bassist from Buda, who intermixes solo electric bass playing, with an ensemble. I had seen him perform before in San Marcos as a solo act.
• A band I believe was named Micky Ficky, but was listed as the Fair. Regardless of their name, I found the rhythm section to be a bit under rehearsed to be honest, and ended up leaving after their fourth song.

I enjoyed the first 2 bands and felt both were very tight. However, my biggest gripe about the Jazz Fest so far, not much of what I call "Jazz" was going on at all.

I did however meet Austrian Guitarist and now Austin inhabitant, Ulrich Ellison. He had played earlier and was engaging to talk to. I bought his CD based upon our conversation of our favorite musicians, and enjoyed it greatly on the drive home. It was fusion in the Jeff Beck and John McLaughlin vein.

First Ravens Post of 2008

Honestly, I'm nervous about the Ravens this season. I'm particularly nervous about our secondary and D line because of injuries;( So far, they haven't looked very good in either of the preseason games that I have watched. That said, this year is probably a gimme' for Harbaugh.

I be there a week from Sunday rooting for them against the Bungles. Hopefully, it will end better than last year's opener at Cincy. At least this one is at home.

King Crimson at the Keswick Theater

I just landed in Austin about 3 hours ago and am still digesting the show I saw last night. After well over a decade, I was finally able to see King Crimson again, at the Keswick Theater. The 6th in a 9 show tour celebrating 40 years of music. By Fripp's accounting, this is eighth lineup. We'll ignore the transitional lineups and the virtual seventh lineup.

I first became aware of the band when I was 14 years old. After discovering ELP, it was only short time later that I discovered Greg Lake's first band. Of course, a similar path following Bill Bruford's career after Yes, landed in the same place, on Robert Fripp's door stoop. As a result, I can say that I have been a fan of King Crimson for 33 years now.

My trek began Sunday, and I am thankful that despite weather problems, I was still able to arrive in Glenside (a minor inconvenience getting to the hotel at 3AM rather than 7PM). I was grateful that I had decided to fly in the day before the show, correctly foreseeing scenarios that would end up with me missing the show.

Besides finding write-ups at the obvious place, the set list can be found over at Zogworld and Tony Levin has already posted pictures from the show

The highlights of the show for me were hearing two songs from Larks Tongue in Aspic, and significant amount of material from the Discipline and Double Trio eras. Strangely, a review of Tuesday show mentioned that they did not play Sleepless, which I felt they did exceptionally well.

The lowlights for me were some problems with the sound (obvious clipping in the PA when Tony Levin's stick or the Kick Drums hit a strong note) and an interpretive dance troupe of 3, situated about 6 rows in front of me. Later joined by another spastic performance in the middle section.

Quite surprisingly, Robert Fripp seemed quite jovial despite hiding behind his rack. It was quite unusual to see him standing at stage right with a beaming smile, applauding the other members, at the end of the show and the two encores.

All I can say is that I hope they continue touring. I regret not going to the Tuesday show and hearing about the Nashville warm-up gigs, too late.

In one week

I will be sitting in the Keswick Theater watching the 40th anniversary celebration of the Beast, King Crimson.

I'm psyched! Early reviews of the 2 shows at the Belcourt in Nashville are already in. The sound clips of the rehearsal sessions are just whetting my voracious appetite for seeing the masters at work.

Startup Camp

I attended another Barcamp event, Startup Camp. This one was held at the Texas Union Building at UT. Well attended and very interesting.

Steve Hazel of bit-torrent fame, gave a very interesting talk on codepad and his application engine. Also much discussion of Co-ops, as a business structure. Much to ponder.

RIP: George Carlin

I saw this rolling by on Twitter this morning. Bummer!

Perceiving a Pattern

On two separate occasions this week, I observed buzz surfacing about things that I had experienced for the first time about a quarter ago. I am beginning to wonder whether there is something significant to this 3 month time period.

Bar Camp Austin III

I participated in this on a lark, while SxSWi was going on in force and really enjoyed the experience.

Birds of Feather (BOF) sessions have always been popular at Technical Conferences, and I've always felt that these were typically the most (and sometimes the only) valuable parts. Running an entire conference as a set of BOFs seemed to be a next logical step.

Then last year, I heard the Java Posse describe their Roundup, during their Podcast. It was the first time that I heard the words Open Space and Unconference. I was a little surprised then to see Seth Godin propose the idea a few days ago. He is usually one of the earliest adopters and has appeared as a TED speaker (which is at least in the right neighborhood). Needless to say, I think Open Space will begin to make inroads everywhere.

Branded or Artist Specific TV Stations

In an equally odd and coincidental fashion, I started seeing tweets and blurbs on Bob Lefsetz's site talking about Live from Daryl's House. This show was heavily marketed at SxSW Music this year, and I agree that it is amazing. I've been watching it regularly since first hearing about it. I am somewhat amused by the fact that I would have never considered my self a big Daryl Hall fan in the past.

The timing of this seems to indicate a pattern. BTW, check out the recent episode with Nick Lowe and Daryl!

Conclusion

I think the confluence of people and ideas here in Austin during SxSW, is a major catalyst. I don't believe that it's the breeding ground, but it is certainly a place where you can first observe the early adopters using new things in the wild. Of course, there's a jaded part of me that has tended to scoff at the value of SxSW, because some parts of it seem so commercialized (and political). The impact of the event seems obvious now.

This has led me to the conclusion that I should continue to keep my eye on certain new things in the Tech Industry. Right now, I am fascinated with the Ruby community and what is being done with cloud computing, github, and heroku. I'm sure they will be very prominent at Bar Camp Austin IV.

A Thursday Night at Emos

I received an email from Graham Reynolds early last week, about his Golden Arm Trio show at Emos, on thursday night. Since I happened to be attending the Live Music Task Force meeting at City Hall, I decided to stay downtown and catch some music. After grabbing some food at Best Wurst, I headed over to Emos, for the first show I've seen there in probably 7 or 8 years. I arrived at around 10:15 and the first band was already playing:

Mr. Lewis and the Funeral Five ...

were already on stage. The Tom Waits influence was obvious. They were all good musicians, but this type of music just doesn't work for me for longer than about a set.

Golden Arm Trio

This is about 4th time I've seen Graham play this year, and this time he was using essentially the same lineup that he did at SxSW, and included an AMF friend, Wayne Myers on trombone. For this smaller show, Graham brought along his own console piano. He also opted not to play drums, and had a very exceptional drummer instead. Great job, Graham is quite demonic sometimes when he plays. The crowd was surprisingly into them, and expressed their enjoyment freely.

Firewater

Firewater finished up the night. I had missed them at SxSW, and it was obvious that this show was a result of their trip here in March, and they had a minor buzz. Their base sound is an offshoot of Ska and Dub with an injection of some other world music. I enjoyed the show, as did everyone present. The band played superbly.

Two individuals stood out in the band in addition to leader Tod A, Reut Regev on Trombone and Flugelhorn, and Dhol percussionist, Johnny Kalsi.

I had originally planned on cutting out early during their set, but decided to stay until closing time after I had heard them play. I'll be keeping an eye for them in the future.

Airto Moreira at the One World

I attended a Master Class given by famed Brazilian drummer and percussionist, Airto Moreira, last Sunday (6/8/2008) at the One World Theater. Airto is famous because he played with Miles Davis on Bitches Brew, and was involved in the seminal beginnings of both Weather Report and Return to Forever. It's too bad that Chick Corea couldn't have had him sit on some dates with that tour.

The Master Class was free and afforded all present an opportunity to peak inside the mind of the artist. It consisted mainly of him talking, with a little bit of singing and playing intermixed. It was a little bit different than the other Master Class I had attended there with Terry Bozzio and Pat Mastelotto, which consisted entirely of a performance and very little talking

I was unfortunately unable to attend the show later that night, but my friend Fito did. He enjoyed the show but mentioned that Flora Purim was not present (even though advertised) and they did not have guitarist.

RIP: Bo Diddley

Bo Diddley passed away today. What can you say? He's an icon and a member of the Rock n' Roll Hall of Fame.

Just think about the number of songs that use the Bo Diddley beat. Too many to count, it's part of Rock n' Roll's ancestral DNA.

Additional information here.

Return to Forever Returns

I attended the kick-off show of the Return to Forever Returns tour, at the Paramount Theater. I was quite surprised that it happened in fact, given some of DiMeola's and White's previous comments that the obstacle to a reunion was Chick's religion.

The evening started at the New Amsterdam bar with friends who are mostly musicians and heavy Prog/Fusion fans. We had also gotten together at a Memorial Day BBQ and watched DVDs of RTF (and other fusion bands), as a pregame. After speculating on what the show would entail, we trekked over to the Paramount which was almost sold out.

You could feel a general sense of excitement within the crowd, as they anticipated the show to come. As I took my seat, I noticed that the soundman was playing Tony Williams' album, Believe It (nice choice). I was probably right at the mean age of the crowd, so there were lots of gray ponytails in the audience ;)

I was sitting 6 rows back and 3 seats in from the aisle, on the left with DiMeola and Lenny White directly in front of me. The show began fairly promptly at about 8:10PM with an unusual touch, the band received a standing ovation before they had even started playing. I think this helped them immeasurably, and they appeared to all be in good spirits, as a result. At times, they even seemed quite emotional about it.

All in all, the show consisted of 2 sets lasting 65-75 mins, with an intermission and a 2 song encore. I think the whole thing came in about 2 hours and 40 minutes. Understandably, the first 3 or 4 songs were a little rough around the edges, before they settled into a good groove. I estimate that the house sound wasn't properly tweaked until later in the first set.

I should mention at this time, that I had seen every member of this band except Lenny White, as solo acts. The last time I had seen DiMeola, I didn't really enjoy it that much. I knew Lenny White was a bad-ass though, you don't replace Tony Williams in Miles Davis' band if you aren't. I am not familiar with the RTF catalog with this lineup, since all of my RTF albums have Bill Connors, not Al DiMeola. This didn't detract from my enjoyment of the show, in this context everyone shined.

The songs were all arranged, but there was a good deal of improvisation, even with DiMeola and Clarke using charts. There was enough nervousness on the part of the band, to make the solos interesting and feel honest. I am convinced that if I had in fact returned to see the Friday show, it would not feel like a replay of the night before.

For the second set, they went all acoustic with DiMeola on a nylon string, Clarke on upright bass, and Chick on a Yamaha grand. This was really special. DiMeola's and Chick's playing is almost frightening at times.

Surprisingly, a full account of the show was posted on the website before noon Friday. It includes a Set List and photos. I took a few additional photos with my iPhone.

Return to Forever

If possible, I was thinking I would like to catch this group after they had been touring for a few months, just to see what they sound like. Other than that, I enjoyed this night of music immensely. I have also reconsidered some of the things I said previously about DiMeola.

Miscellaneous thoughts

Last night, I had the misfortune of watching the Spurs lose and drop into a 3-1 hole, in the Western Conference Finals. It would have been more palatable if it weren't for the ending of the game. Brent Barry was obviously fouled, and should have went to the foul line.

On a positive note, 24 hours from now I will be sitting in the Paramount Theater watching Return to Forever. I can't wait!

A strange coincidence

As some of you may know, I'm half Lithuanian, originally from Baltimore, and a big Frank Zappa fan. As a result, it isn't too hard to imagine why that this article caught my eye, in google reader.

Two questions arise:

• Should Montana get a bust of Zappa too?
• Will there be statutes of John Waters, Divine and David Byrne?

I wonder if my Zappa predilection is genetic? It seems that I will have to plan a celebration on August 9th!

Graham Reynolds and Brannen Temple

I trekked down to the Long Center to catch Graham Reynolds and Brannen Temple perform as a duet. Unfortunately, I arrived about 15 minutes late to see them already at work. I estimate there were about 70 people in the audience.

The stage had an interesting layout with a Steinway Grand, 2 drum sets, a vibraphone, and assorted make shift percussion strewn in front of Brannen's kit. Both musicians moved very fluidly between the various "stations" during the show, which lasted approximately 75 minutes.

Some of the highlights ...

• They began with a group of improvisations. Graham played a Steinway Grand, accompanied by Brannen on the traps. The songs all had great interplay between the piano and drums. One piece had a mutated "Trading eights" feel, without being cliche. Graham was playing in his very orchestral, Bartok-ish style with heavy use of left hand octaves and ostinatos.
• They then switched positions on stage, so that Brannen was on Vibes and Graham was on his drum kit to perform one of Brannen's compositions. This was as an interesting change of pace, and the song presented had a completely different feel and texture.
• Changing places again, Brannen performed a percussion solo on a collection of make shift instruments. The instruments consisted of things like barrels, propane tanks, and buckets. I distinctly remember the title of one piece being Boogie's Boogie, a dedication to his infant son.
• The show finished up with Brannen on the percussion and Graham returning to the piano and ending with a variation on a theme by Lionel Ritchie, that would have fit right in with the rest of the Scanner Darkly soundtrack.

I really enjoyed this show, as well as my first venture inside of the Long Center. The music was great and the acoustics were fantastic.

My only criticism: the show was too short!

Austin Art Alliance Party

I was invited to a Thank You party as a result of participating in Art City Austin a few weeks ago. It was held on the grounds of the Art Museum of Austin (AMOA) at Laguna Gloria.

The main reason I'm posting though is to get one up on Mikael Behrens! I see his Pelicans, and raise him some Peacocks!

The 2008 Baltimore Orioles

Well my Orioles are presently sitting in 2nd place, but for how long? This is the first year in a long time, that I have not purchased MLBTV. I'm treading around this softly, like there's an open container of Nitro nearby. Shhhh ... don't jinx it!

In other news, the Spurs are up 1-0 over the Suns in the first round of the NBA Western Conference playoffs. Damn the 2:00PM start time to hell, it sounds like I missed one of the best playoff games ever. (At least for Spurs fans).

RIP: Brian "Blinky" Davison

Brian Davison, drummer for Keith Emerson's first band, the Nice, passed away on 4/15/2008. He also played with the band Refugee, with another keyboard wiz, Patrick Moraz.

Like many prog fans my age, it didn't take too long to discover the Nice, after learning about ELP. If you have never heard the Nice before, then let me suggest the albums Five Bridges and Elegy (the two of which has been re-released in a single package, as Keith Emerson with the Nice).

Art City Austin - Art After Dark

As a result of volunteering to help the Austin Music Foundation man their booth, I obtained an all access pass to the Art City Austin and Art After Dark events, downtown on South 1st Street around City Hall. It's events like this that make living in Austin great.

Arriving late Saturday afternoon, I crossed the First Street bridge which had been closed to traffic. Over the last 50 yards or so, the bridge was sparsely populated with shrub/sculptures that looked like humans. (Way cool!) The weather was outstanding!

I arrived at the booth around 5PM and discovered that I had missed the Octopus Project again (Doh!). I was however, able to watch Del Castillo do their sound check. They played a very solid set that I estimate ran about 90 minutes. I agreed with several friends that this art oriented crowd seemed more concerned with the party inside City Hall and the after hours viewings. This was too bad, these people missed a very good show.

On Sunday, I arrived early to catch part of Guy Forsyth, walk some of the exhibit tents and booths to view the sculptures and paintings, and then move further down to the other stage to catch Opposite Day and my friend Ric Furley's band, Mundi. Both bands were great, Opposite Day was a great Power Trio, who were probably a little too loud for the mixed age crowd.

I would hazard a guess that almost everyone enjoyed Mundi, a 5 piece with Ric on Drums and Percussion, bass, cello, violin, and acoustic guitar. I will have to it point to see Ric's other project, Sabbath Crow.

The day wound down with a Conjunto type of band from Denton, Brave Combo. Good musicians, but not really my cup of tea. On the way out, I was surprised to see that someone had erected a temporary hedge sculpture on the 1st Street Bridge.

Les Claypool (with Tim Fite opening) at Stubbs

Tim Fite

This is the third time I've seen Tim Fite and side-kick, Dr. Leisure, perform. Since he evokes memories of Andy Kaufman, I really enjoy his act. It took about 15 minutes for him to win the crowd over with his zaniness. (A little longer than the other times that I've seen him).

If you've never seen him and get the chance, do it!

Les Claypool

I was tentative about going to this show, because in the past I have found some of Claypool's music to be repetitive and annoying. His band looked interesting enough with 4 players on sax, marimba/vibraphone/percussion, drums, and bass. Unfortunately, my worst fears were realized, and were combined with bad lighting, bad sound (the sax player may as well have not been there), and inaudible vocals.

I estimate that he played about 2 hours, but I found myself wanting to leave halfway through the show. A large part of my irritation was Claypool's sound selection. I don't think I will be going to another Claypool show for a good long time.

U2 3D

Over the past few months, I have tried to talk several friends into going to see the U2 3D movie at the TX History Museum IMax Theater. With this being the final week of showing, I said screw it and went by myself. All of the reviews I have read said this was not to be missed.

I enjoyed it immensely but it wasn't quite what I expected. They still use stereoscopic technology, so the glasses were required. Unfortunately, a calibration problem at this facility resulted in some images appearing with pink shadows or halos rather than a sharp 3D image. Perhaps it was better in other parts of the theater, although I'm not 100% convinced of that.

In general, U2 is a great live band. They are always tight, have an excellent song selection, and look like they truly enjoy being on stage. This was captured on the movie which from the credits appeared to have been derived from two shows, one in Argentina, and one in Australia.

The biggest disappointment for me was the camera angles. In some cases, like the shots of drummer Adam Clayton, they did a fantastic job. In other cases, however the 3D effect didn't work that well. U2 is very fond of using large light displays behind their stage. In many cases, this seemed to distract from the 3D effect.

Bottom line: If you haven't already seen it, I would still recommend that you go. This is obviously the future of entertainment. There is more to follow ...

Albino Squirrel Sighting

Well, I saw an albino squirrel today, and took these 2 pictures as proof. I tried to get closer, but the little critter was pretty cagey, and suspicious.

SxSW Music - Day 4

The final day, and the weather is still holding up. In fact, I'm wearing shorts

Panels

• I started the morning with the Daryl Hall interview. It was great to see that Daryl is still an Indie musician at heart, and is one of us in spirit. Lots of questions from the Interviewer and the Audience about the whole Sacred Songs and Exposure debacle. Daryl is quite an interesting guy, and I give him major kudos for the Live From Daryl's House webcast site. Here is a major artist that gets the Internet, and wants to bring back shows like Don Kirchner and the Midnight Special.

I would have liked to have stayed for the Alan Parsons panel at 3PM, but was on the hook to go watch my friends in Proteus and Coalition play at the Hi-Lo.

Music

• I started out the afternoon, to watch Ed Martinez, Dave Johnson and their bands, Proteus and Coalition. Both bands are tight and play great fusion/prog music. Like One2One, Hi-Lo is a bar where the windows can be completely opened, so that people can see and hear the band from the sidewalk. People were stopping and then jammin' along to both bands. What a great afternoon.
  
  

  Here are 2 pictures of Proteus in action:
  

• Ran into my good friend, Ted from Thirteen of Everything, and went to see the experimental group, Jandek. I like some pretty strange Avant-garde music, but this was beyond me.
• I then trekked down to Stubbs to catch another friend Scott Brackett and his band, Okkervil River. They're a high energy, folk influenced pop rock act and won the best Indie Band, in this year's Austin Music Awards. They were followed by Austin legend, Roky Erickson, who sounded much better than any previous videos I had seen.
• I managed to catch one song of the Pedro Menedez Ensemble at the Elephant Room. I probably could have caught more, but they seemed to be on Jazz Time while setting up.
• For the final show of SxSW, I went to the Hideout and caught AMF friend, Josh Robbins and his band the Invincible Czars. Very Zappa-esque, crazy and fun. Josh you're a madman and great guitarist.

SxSW Music - Day 3

A third straight day of fantastic weather, what could be better.

Panels

I attended 2 panels.

• What is the Future of Record Companies and Artists Deals - actually a CLE for the lawyers. I just found out from my friend Alissa, that this was the first year they were open to non-lawyers. Kind of funny, I never realized that in previous years, and attended anyway.
• Mobility, Ubiquity and Monetizing Music - great talk. Only Pearlman really got it. Had interesting stats from Ed Felton out of Princeton and China. 30 Million classic music hobbyists and aficionados.
  

  I was very annoyed at the typical rhetoric against the Free Market, from some of the pundits on this panel. If I hear another lawyer arguing about how government saves us, I'm going to puke.

Music

• First act I saw was Paddy Casey, on the DirecTV stage. I'm not normally a fan of singer songwriters, but this guy is just Incredible. He sang and played acoustic guitar, with a background singer/pianist. I would buy this guy's CD in a heartbeat.
• I went to the Brush park party, hosted by the Australians. Can't remember much other than some free Vodka samples and food.
• To begin the evening, I went to the Tim Fite Hosts show at Antones. Bear In Heaven was the first act, after a humorous intro monologue by Tim. Finding no honey with these bears, I left.
• I stopped by Cedar Street, and caught part of Fastball. They are an Austin band that had a Top 40 hit in 1999. Pop rock, that is very well done. Cedar Street was even more crowded than the night before with Tim Fite. At least 3 rows of people on the 4th Street sidewalk.
• I then went to the Tiniest Bar in Texas to catch deSoL. Apparently, I screwed up and they had played the night before. I stayed a bit and watched the White Ghost Shivers, instead.

St. David's

I finished the night catching 3 fantastic shows at St. David's Church. This is officially my favorite venue.

• First up was Sxip Shirey. Holy f*cking crap, was this guy amazing. He basically has some pedal effects, a microphone, harmonica, and table of toys. A former guitarist who came up with career ending tendinitis, he turned to making music in non-traditional ways. I would fail miserably to describe what he does in words. (He does for Music, what Tim Burton does for film). He was joined by an equally amazing Human beatbox performer for several songs. This show totally blew away some of my previous conceptions about live musical performance and instruments. A must see, if you ever get the chance. He lives in Brooklyn.
• Graham Reynolds and the Golden Arm Trio were next. Another amazing Austin musician who I have gotten meet through AMF. The Trio was actually a quartet, with a Cellist, Trombone Player (Wayne Myers another AMF acquaintance), Saxophonist, and Electric Bassist. Graham plays Piano and Drums and is an unbelievable talent. He is always entertaining.
• The Brannen Temple Trio with D Madness on bass. An Austin Jazz Trio with Drums, Steel Drums and Electric Bass. My friend Brian over at Mixtank has been ranting about D Madness for a while. Now I know why.

Screw ups of the day

Not putting the deSoL show on the right day in my calendar.

SxSW Music - Day 2

A second awesome day of weather. This makes up for a SxSW I went to 10 years ago, where it rained every day

Panels

• I caught the tail end of Lou Reed Keynote, no need to book the Hilton Ballroom, this year! LOL ;)
• The first panel was the Performance Royalty Debate, led by AMF Board Member, Chris Castle. Very interesting talk with reps from SoundExchange, A2IM, AFTRA, and others. Chris Castle did a great job as host and antagonist, keeping the whole panel on their toes. Each group was still protecting their own interests first, exactly as you would expect.
• I then attended the Steve Reich Interview. (This is how I discovered that I had missed the night he had hosted at St. David's. Doh!) Fantastic interview, I took some notes, but hope that a Video Podcast will eventually appear on the SxSW site. He had lots of interesting things to say about the Beatnik generation that he grew up in, and particularly Jazz great, John Coltrane. I stand in awe of the great Composer, and Musicologist!

Music

After the morning lightning round of panels, I went to go see more music.

• It started with the Austin Music Foundation Party at the Music Gym. Austin music diva and Rockstar SuperNova contestant, Patrice Pike. Great day outside, and great music.
• After the party wound down at 4PM, I went back to the Convention Center and caught, Martha Wainwright on the DirecTV soundstage, the Long Star Lounge. I had seen her last year at La Zona Rosa show with Rachel Fuller. She was fantastic and her band was awesome.
• I went upstairs to look over the Trade Show. It has gotten worse each year. Lots of booths with irrelevant vendors. Most hawking nameless digital music services, that I had never heard of before entering the room.
• I started the evening at Stubbs for the Body of War show. This is part of the promotion for a documentary film with the same name, produced by Phil Donahue. (Who was in the audience). The music consisted of Tom Morella (Rage Against the Machine, Audio Slave), Serj Tankian (System of a Down), Ben Harper, Billy Brag, and others. Interesting Serj played piano, Tom played the blues and sang, Billy Brag was awesome. A group encore completed a very enjoyable show.
• I managed to walk across town to Cedar Street and caught the end of Tim Fite. I was blown away by Tim, 2 years ago at Antones. Word has gotten around, and the house was packed. He was entertaining as always, but Cedar Street is probably not the best venue for his multimedia fun.
• On the way back, I happened by One2one (non-SxSW venue) with the windows open, and the house a rockin' with the Everyday People. Outside, I ran into the drummer from Cellus and Loose Grip, Mike Burnall, whom I had met at the Ron Paul fundraiser in SA. They were on a split bill at the same bar. Mike introduced me to del Castillo bassist, Bert Besteiro. Both bands were interesting enough to make me stay for a parts of both sets.
• I finished the night with the Abigail Washburn and Bela Fleck show, at St. Davids Episcopal Church. There was a bit of a line, that included Jackie the Jokeman Martling. This room, a chapel, had incredible acoustics and the show was unreal. A very memorable experience. (Driving home the realization about what I probably missed at this venue the night before with Steve Reich).

SxSW Music - Day 1

Today was the first day of SxSW. It started out slightly overcast, but cleared up nicely as the day moved on.

Panels

• I started off the day, with the Tour Smart panel hosted by ex-PiL drummer, Martin Atkins, Eddie Spaghetti from the Super Suckers, and some nameless manager from Live Nation. All I can say is Wow, Martin is the bomb. He basically monopolized the time, but thank god he did. He had a very engaging set of slides, had a great humorous delivery, and showed real creativity. This was the best panel I've ever attended in 4 years of attending the Conference.

  I had no problem forking over $20.00 for a copy of Martin's book and DVD afterward, because what he said was so valuable. He is continuing the Punk, DIY attitude that I love.

• For the second session, I attended a talk by three lawyers on Red Flags in Contracts. Honestly, even though they had huddled beforehand and had handouts, they didn't really make the subject accessible to those in the audience, who weren't members of the Bar. They needed someone like Martin Atkins on their panel. Too bad, I think it is important for artists to understand this stuff.
• The last session I attended was Accounting in Record Deals. It was another case of being dry, but important. Fortunately, the presenter actually had examples of real deals, with a brief explanation. I have a set of the slides hopefully coming via email. Of course, maybe the whole subject is moot, because the whole concept has changed in the Digital Age.

Music

The panels are interesting, but the music is king.

• I started out the night going to see Van Morrison at La Zona Rosa, with some friends. Apparently the show was under Martial Law. The bar was closed during the entire show, by edict from King Van. There was also some heavy handed enforcement of the no photographing policy via cell phones. While I understand the objection, this was a little over the top.

  I guess I would of overlooked this, if I felt like I attended an exceptional show. Frankly it was boring, and lacked passion. Talking to some other people, it sounds like this is par for the course. (Next)

• The refurbished Austin Music Hall, was next on the list with the Austin Music Awards. It was crowded and I was able to see Lyle Lovett and Pinetop Perkins, as well as several other acts. Not stellar, the acoustics weren't that great. This is the first time I went to check out the awards, and it will probably be the last.
• During the walk back towards Red River, I happened across The Photo Atlas at the Cedar Door. They weren't bad, just not my cup of tea.
• I also randomly walked into Buffalo Billiards, and saw Goldspot, a band from LA. A very well done light rock/pop show. Austin beatbox artist, John Pointer joined them on stage for one number. I enjoyed it, but can't say I would buy their CD.
• Hopewell and Earthless at Bourbon Rocks. Both of these bands were interesting, but loud. This was the show that made me regret forgetting my earplugs.
• I attempted to get in line for REM at Stubbs, and after seeing the futility there, ended up seeing The Acorn from Ottowa, CA at Habana Patio. These guys were great. Easily the best act of the night on my itinerary.

Screw ups of the day

• Forgetting the earplugs!
• Going to see Van Morrison
• Not seeing Daryl Hall
• Not noticing the Steve Reich show at St. David's Church

Brain Science

Brain science seems to be a popular topic in the Blog/Podcast Sphere. I recently ran across the following:

• A two part episode of Geoffrey Grosenbach's Rails Podcast featuring Brain Rules author, John Medina.
• A very cool blog post pointing to a research paper about how the brains of improvising Jazz musicians work.

I found both of these to be very interesting. Much to ponder.

In other news, my mood is both excited and happy, with SxSW Music commencing tomorrow morning!

Barcamp Austin III

Having attended the SxSW Music Conference for the last 4 years, I have often considered also attending SxSW Interactive. Being a contractor however, I couldn't justify taking over a week off from work, since the 3 days off for the Music Fest are bad enough. After hearing about the Austin Barcamp, I was immediately interested.

Barcamp is an Open Space Conference (or unconference if you like). It is chaotic, anarchistic, emergent, and free (although attendees are encouraged to leave tips via PayPal, if they find it useful). I liked the concept, as soon as I read about it. Since I enjoyed the experience, I plan on leaving a donation.

This installment was held in the GDS&M offices on West 6th Street in Austin. I arrived around 1:30PM and ran into many old friends from the Austin Tech Community. In addition, I was also able to meet Michael Cote from the Drunk and Retired podcast, and rub elbows with other Internet Celebrities.

After attending 3 adhoc presentations, and engaging in multiple chats around the water cooler, the evening was topped off by the Karaoke Apocalypse, where a few lucky attendees got to sing, backed by a four piece band. A good time was had by, and I plan on attending future Barcamps, and other Open Space events.

RIP: Led Zeppelin Reunion Tour

First Roger Waters said no to a Pink Floyd reunion, now Robert Plant has said no to THE reunion tour. The people that saw the London show should consider themselves lucky.

RIP: Jeff Healy

I heard about this first from a Facebook post by Paul Garay, from Inside Home Recording. Last night, guitarist Jeff Healy, passed away. It was always inspiring to watch Jeff perform, given his challenges.

Another great one that will be missed. It is truly sad because he was still so young.

RIP: George Allen Buddy Miles

Good thing I listen to podcasts or I would have missed this news. Former Band of Gypsys drummer, Buddy Miles passed away this past Tuesday. When I hear his name, I will always associate it with Jimi Hendrix and the song Them Changes, which I played on many occasions with Tom Limbaugh.

The biggest surprise for me however, was finding out that he was an Austin resident. I was totally unaware of that fact.

A new type of Flash Mob

I participated in a very interesting experiment today, and am still pondering what to make of it.

I really enjoy new media, and love Podcasts. I listen to Adam Curry's Daily Source Code (for over 2.5 years now) and No Agenda podcasts. I was at my computer, and actually listening to the DSC 724 and was also following twitter.

Strangely enough, Adam tweats about working on a new studio setup and I responded about how funny it was that I was listening to his show. He then tweats again a few minutes later that he is testing a Live Podcast on Talk Shoe and posts a tinyurl. I was one of the first people to jump in the room, but was amazed to see that there were already 3 others joining me. Within about 3 minutes there was easily 30 people in the room, from all over the US and Europe, and I'm in a live conversation with 4 other people and Adam on my cell phone, while the whole things is being streamed out to the Internet. I estimate that the crowd grew to 70 or so people.

I was simply flabbergasted at how quickly a virtual flash mob was spawned by one random tweat. The implications of this are staggering to me.

Off Season Thoughts

Well the SuperBowl is over (good game, but I found it hard to care about the outcome), and the Ravens have their new coaching staff in place. So far, things look good. I like what I've heard about John Harbaugh, our new OC, Cam Cameron, and am happy that we retained Rex Ryan. I like all of the moves we made on the offensive side of the ball with the Quarterback, Running Backs, and Receivers coaches. If we're healthy, we could easily be the number 1 Defense again.

The big question for Raven's Nation will be, "Will we finally have an NFL caliber offense?"

Stomach Virus thwarts VH Plans

I came down with this nasty Stomach Virus after seeing Ari Hoenig. Despite having tickets, I was unable to see Van Halen at the AT&T Center, in San Antonio. C'est la vie!

Snarky Puppy and Ari Hoenig at the Flamingo Cantina

A least minute email from a friend tipped me off to this show, this past Monday night. I arrived at 9PM and the opening act, Snarky Puppy had already begun. They're a groove oriented, Jazz outfit which normally has 9 members. They were supposed to have 7 people at the gig that night, but the Percussionist was ill. (Strangely enough, I came down with a brutal stomach virus the next day that put me out of commission for 2 days).

The lineup I saw, had Keys, Guitar, Sax, Trumpet, Bass and Drums (and guest Trombonist, who came up for one song). The music was very creative and I would go see them again. The Rhythm Section, Saxophonist and Keyboardist really stood out. I enjoyed the textures and the polyrhythmic chops of the drummer.

The headliner was Ari Hoenig, who appeared with his trio, Punk Bop. I really enjoyed his show and his playing. He was accompanied by an Electric Guitarist, Gilad Hekselman, and Bassist, Orlando LeFleming. They performed for about 90 minutes with some originals as well as classics from Coltrane and Monk. All 3 were exceptional musicians, but I was really impressed with Gilad. He was a master of playing in an understated way, no pyrotechnics, but everything spot on.

I would go see both of these acts again. Very well done.

Billick Era Over

You may have noticed that I stopped blogging about my Ravens, when their 9 game losing streak was in full force. It was quite depressing to see a team go from 13-3 last year, to 5-11 this year. Since I refuse to be a bandwagon fan, I still watched every game. Having to "take it like a man" just like the DirecTV commercial guy, says.

To make matters worse, this is the first time in 8 seasons that I was unable to get back to Baltimore to see at least 1 game. Strangely enough, fate intervened when I was supposed to see them play the Rams, which ended up being the last win before the losing streak.

Anyway, Steve Biscotti pulled the trigger and fired Brian Billick and all of his assistants, with the exception of Rex Ryan. I have mixed feelings about this, since Billick had a winning record, a Super Bowl, two Wildcards and two Division titles. But, our offense has never been more than putrid since his arrival. Rumor has it that he had lost the team.

Now the speculation begins ... Rex Ryan? Cowher? Marty Schottenheimer? Marv Levy?

RIP: Oscar Peterson

Being on Christmas vacation with my family, it took me a few days to get near a computer to post. Another Jazz great, Oscar Peterson, passed away on 12/23.

I'm still kicking myself. Although given ample opportunity to try and catch Oscar, I never saw him live. I have seen multiple videos, he was truly a frightening player. I wonder if there is really is anyone else who will be able to carry the torch of Art Tatum, like Oscar did.

MPTU at the Saxon Pub

I trekked over to the Saxon Pub last night (actually this morning) for a midnight show of the latest Austin supergroup, MPTU. The lineup is Pat Mastelotto (from King Crimson, XTC, Mr. Mister), Malford Milligan (Storyville), Phil Brown (Little Feat), Mark Andes (Canned Heat, Heart and others). I joined a small crowd of approximately 25 people, to listen to the 75 minute show.

They opened the set with instrumentals, a rendition of Jeff Beck's Pump. Phil is mainly a Strat player and is obviously into Beck, Clapton, and Allan Holdsworth, and is also a great singer. I'm going to have to go back and see if he's on any of the Little Feat albums that I own. He was surprised that I recognized his quoting of Holdsworth's song, Fred, when I spoke to him after the show.

Malford's singing as always, was amazing. He did manage to fit some Storyville songs like Bitter Rain, into the set. For the remainder, I have to admit that I didn't recognize too many of their songs, yet. So I guess I will have to buy the MPTU CD when it's released, but I believe they played everything up on the myspace page. They sounded great, and delivered the goods despite the crowd size.

P@ surprised me with his versatility. I have seen him with KC, ProjeKct 3, Terry Bozzio and KTu. All progressive or "art" rock type of setups. In MPTU, it's straight forward rock, blues and soul. As always, his drumming is powerful, but tasteful.

One thing is for sure, I will try and catch them again, next Tuesday, and at Momo's and/or Antones this month. I'm hoping that perhaps I will be allowed to take a Picture or two, at a future show.

Wow, this jogged my memory

I followed a link over at the DGM site to Trey Gunn's site and stumbled across this entry about the formation of KTU:

Seeds for KTU took root at SXSW in Austin Texas in March 1999 when Kimmo Pohjonen shared a billing with Mastelotto/Gunn/Fripp's Project Three at the Electric Lounge.

I then had my holy-crap moment, since I was there. I clearly remembered seeing ProjeKct 3, but had forgotten about the opener, Kimmo, until just now. Everyone in the crowd was raving about him. I guess he made an impression on Trey and Pat too! (or is that tu?)

To complete the circle, I was able to catch KTu last year at SxSW.

Fripp announced ...

that Gavin Harrison (presently the drummer of Porcupine Tree) will be the newest member of King Crimson. I can't wait to see this show.

Tool at the Frank Erwin Center

I saw Tool live for the first time live, last night. Rumor has it, that this tour may be their swan song.

In general, I have a great distaste for large Arena shows ever since seeing the Police at Shea Stadium in 1984, and this concert did nothing to change that outlook. My seats were up on the upper level, stage left, pretty much even with the front of the stage. As a result, the sound was so-so, but not particularly loud. It also allowed me to see the stage floor, which was a white surface and used throughout the show as a projection screen. This was used throughout for displaying arcane Sacred Geometry figures.

The light and video portion of the show was pretty awesome, although my view of the screens behind the stage was somewhat hindered. The band is tight, and Maynard seemed to be on. However, after the Zappa Plays Zappa show the night before, this show was a bit of a let-down. The 2 hour duration almost seemed like a rip-off, after Dweezil's 3 1/2 hour marathon.

One of the strangest things about this show was that they brought out Terry Bozzio to jam with the band on a song. He played percussion, a couple of Timbales, a Dumbec and a Cymbal. I guess I was surprised, because I had thoroughly scanned the house the night before at the Zappa Plays Zappa show, and did not spot Terry anywhere. Perhaps he was back stage at the Hogg, I had assumed that he wasn't in town.

Tool play a mix of material from their 5 albums. I specifically remember Schism, 46 and 2, and Prison Sex. I was disappointed that they didn't do Aenema. Good show, but not great.

Zappa Plays Zappa - Part Deaux at the UT Hogg Auditorium

For the second time in less than a year, I saw the Zappa Plays Zappa show at the UT Hogg Auditorium. This time, the special guest was Ray White.

There were several surprising things about this show:

• At various times, including the opening number, the Mystery Man, the band accompanied a video clip of Frank. They also accompanied his vocals on Dumb All Over, and one other song that I can not remember now.
• The set lasted approximately 3 1/2 hours again, but there was no intermission this time around. Dweezil did not leave the stage at all.
• There was virtually no overlap in the set list, with the show I saw last year. This time around there was new material from Zappa in New York, You Are What You Is, and Joe's Garage.
• There was a song improvised from phrases submitted by the audience. This worked very well.
• Terry Bozzio was surprisingly not visible. (Perhaps he was backstage?)

I can't say much else other than Ray White is fucking amazing, and this show is one of the best things going right now. I'm still kicking myself for not noticing the DVDs from the 2006 ZplaysZ show on the Merch table. Hopefully, I can snag one via another method.

The biggest chuckle I had this night was a young couple. The woman was wearing a Titties and Beer T-shirt and her SO had one that said Pussy and Coffee. Unfortunately, Dweezil resisted the urge to play Frank's most requested song immortalized on her shirt.

Porcupine Tree at the Meridian in Houston, TX

Two nights ago, I was able to see Porcupine Tree perform for the second time on the Fear of A Blank Planet tour. With all the turmoil from the move, I contemplated not going to this show, but then decided otherwise. So, I made the 3 hour drive, with my friend Biggie, following some other friends Alissa and Ron from AMF.

As before, the opening band was 3 from Woodstock, NY. Three has progressed quite a big, and sounded much tighter than the last time I saw them. In addition, I was able to talk the Joey and Joe from the band and do some reminiscing about my days in the MHV playing Woodstock.

I estimate PT played about 2 hours this time around, with a set list very similar to what I heard in Boulder back in May. The sound was good, but not as good as the Fox Theater. Sight lines however, were excellent since I was able to spend the first half of the show about 4 rows from the stage.

Afterwards, it was interesting to see that Steven Wilson was outside signing posters, and taking pictures with a group of about 30 fans. Other interesting tidbits were a verification (I won't say how I found out) that Gavin Harrison is the fifth member of the new King Crimson lineup. All in all, a great show.

Well, this floored me

With all the hassles of moving, I have been more than a little frazzled. Reading this entry by Adrian Belew really put things back into perspective.

Happy Bday?

Well I celebrated the week leading up to my birthday, finding out that I may have to move unexpectedly. It seems my Apt was actually a Condo, and it is alleged to have been foreclosed. So rather than going back to MD, I ended up starting to preemptively pack. ;(

Fortunately, the Ravens helped me today by winning. The offense was effective but not impressive, the defense was punishing. Samari Rolle was finally back! One more week until our bye, and then Trevor Pryce is hopefully back. Watch out NFL, you haven't seen the full strength Raven's defense.

Frank Marino and Mahogany Rush at Antones

Well I had made a mental note to try and catch Umphrey's McGhee at Stubbs, but didn't realize it conflicted with the Frank Marino show. Frank won because I already had the tickets.

I estimate that Antones was filled to 80% of the capacity last night, and started thinning out about 2 hours into the show. The average age of the crowd was about 44 years old. Nothing unexpected here.

Frank's band consisted of a rhythm guitarist (who played a Strat and also played Electric Violin), bassist and drummer. The show lasted a little over 3 hours, but I can honestly say that I would have been happy if he had stopped at the 2 hour mark.

There was nothing wrong with Frank's playing, he's very accomplished. He's an encyclopedia of 70's and 80's rock guitar technique. Basically, extended guitar soloing, over grooves. Honestly though, I found him repetitive after a while. Robert Fripp deliberately moves his students to NST, to avoid pattern playing (among other reasons), Marino's playing reminded me why this is.

For most of the night, he played a Gibson SG and I estimate he sang on only 4 songs. He needed to sing more. He performs a lot of covers, of which I specifically remember Voodoo Child and Red House. He also did a somewhat interesting version of Amazing Grace (making the guitar actually sound like Bagpipes in spots). Surprisingly, he did not play Strange Dreams, which might have been interesting without a keyboard player.

All in all, a good show, but not great.

Interesting KC news

Well I'm still stinging from the Raven's loss to the Poop Stains yesterday, but Monday is a new day and I was excited to hear about line-up 8, of King Crimson. I followed a link from the DGMLive Site, where Pat Mastellotto has given away the fact that this line-up will be a 5 piece.

The quote: We will be a 5 piece and i think you know 4 of us. In fact I'm sure you know the 5th man too (an incredible drummer that i will be delighted to work with). I think you'll have to tune in to Robert's diary over at the DGM site and await the official announcement.

My first guess and hope is Terry Bozzio, based upon the comment about the tour being restricted to the US. However, these other possibilities come to mind:

• Danny Carey - particularly if I were betting on this
• Jerry Marotta
• Eric Slick
• Bruford? - maybe the hatchet has been buried again

I was tempted to add Gavin Harrison, but I think he has way too much going on with Porcupine Tree and 05Ric. It also occurred to me that this might be a trick, where the 5th member is not the drummer, Belew is the drummer, and it's someone like David Cross or David Sylvian.

Alien Time Ensemble

I ventured out last night to see an Austin Music Foundation (AMF) friend, David DeMaris, play with Alien Time Ensemble. The gig was at the Salvage Vanguard Theater off of Manor Rd. I unfortunately caught only the last 4 songs of the show, primarily because of my late start, and inability to find the place.

None the less, it was enjoyable despite not being able to listen to the whole set, and missing Carlos Villareal/One Umbrella, the opening act. It was nice change of pace from the Elephant Room crowd, with a heavy dose of post-bop improvisation. A little reminescient of the 2nd Coltrane Quartet (when Alice Coltrane was playing piano). It was somewhat interesting as well, since the Acoustic Bass was all done on keyboard.

Will have to go see more acts like this and I am encouraged that I discovered a new venue/scene that focuses on genres other than Texas Blues or Americana. I think the time is ripe for trying to jumpstart a Knitting Factory scene here in Austin.

Fripp Skipping TX again ;(

Hoping to be an audient, once again, I was somewhat happy to see that the League of Crafty Guitarists had announced a tour of the US. Once the realization set in that there would be no TX dates, I was disappointed. Given the turn out for the CGT (with Austin supposedly being one of their favorite places) and with PM living here, you would figure that Austin would be a no-brainer.

Damn, I was anxious to see LCG again, since close to 20 years have passed since I last saw them at the Chance, in Poughkeepsie. Over 10 years have passed since the ProjeKct 3 shows here in Austin, making me regret not trying to fly and catch KC, on their last 2 tours. It's been quite a while since I've been able to catch Fripp live.

Let's hope that more US dates are announced for early next year.

Ravens vs. the Cards

Well, we had another ugly win today, blowing a 23-6 lead, but winning with a walk-off Stover Field Goal. I found myself asking during the 4th quarter, Who is this team on the field and what did they do with the Ravens' defense? The drop-off in our pass rush, with Trevor Pryce out, is big ;( Worse, with Samari Rolle out, our mutated 46 defense is not all that effective. Having our Nickle or Dime back cover a #2 receiver is dangerous.

That said, Kyle Boller, in relief of McNair, saved the day, with a good drive to put us in FG position. In the last 3 games, he is starting to look like a legit NFL starter. I'm actually happy for him, since he has been generally vilified in the past.

Henry Rollins: Provoked - Spoken Word Show at La Zona Rosa

Last night I went with a friend to see famed musician, Henry Rollins, do his one man, spoken word show at La Zona Rosa, Provoked. I had seen Henry perform live on TV, caught a few of his shows on the Independent Film Channel, and watched a Punk Rock documentary, that he had hosted. I can't really say I was a big fan of his music, but he always left me with the impression that he was an articulate and a deep thinker. His viewpoints were often anti-authoritarian and contrarian.

We arrived around 7:15 or so and there was already a respectable crowd of approximately 200 people. It was surprising to see a merch-table with multiple books for sale, rather than just the normal fare of T-shirts and CDs. I picked up one of his books and realized that we were exactly the same age, both from the Baltimore/Washington area, and listened to a lot of the same music in the late 70's (such as Devo). My expectations for the night had been elevated.

Henry walked out promptly near the advertised 8PM start time, and launched into his monologue which lasted close to 3 hours. He spent the first few of minutes talking to the crowd like his friends, and about his great love of Austin with its unique quirkiness and the number of kindred spirits. This praise seemed very genuine, and he claimed that he didn't hand this type praise out very often or lightly.

He covered a lot of politics and the action in Iraq, his invitation to fill-in as leader singer for a reunion of the Ruts in London, his USO tours, and travels in the Middle East to Iran, Syria, and Lebanon (He seems to target places he's not supposed to go to). In all the 3 hours went by way too fast, and nobody left early. He is very engaging, sometimes self deprecating, and extremely humorous.

Great show. I will gladly go see him perform Music or Spoken Word again, when the opportunity presents itself. Will also have to look and see if his IFC show is available on DVD, from Netflix.

Ravens vs. Jets

My Ravens beat the Jets in their home opener, yesterday, but it looks as though there's much to worry about. Two more injuries, Trevor Pryce and Demetrius Williams. Ouch!

In addition, the Defense gave up 177 yards passing in the fourth quarter and almost blew the game. Our ability to hold on to a victory was in doubt, up until the last minute. On the plus side, the much derided, Kyle Boller had a respectable outing and Figurs looked good returning kicks.

ACL for the 3rd and Final Time

I decided today to catch the Ravens game in its entirety, before trekking down to Zilker Park today. As a result, I was only able to catch 2 acts since I arrived at 6PM, and unable to catch a third.

As I entered the grounds, Austin native, Guy Forsyth was playing the BMI stage near the front gate. He was already halfway through his set. He always sounds good, and did last night, as well. I have heard him enough locally, that I decided to attempt to get near Ziggy Marley's show.

After seeing the crowd about 100 rows deep outside of the WaMu pavilion, I gave up. So, rather than fret, I went to go find a decent position for Bob Dylan. Not having a chair, I managed to get about 150-200 ft from the stage. I could have gotten closer, but I don't enjoy standing shoulder to shoulder.

Dylan played for over 90 minutes. He started the set with Rainy Day Woman #12 and 35 (aka. Everybody Must Get Stoned). Other recognizable songs for me were Tangled Up In Blue, and Like A Rolling Stone. His voice was even more gravelly than even I remember, and he spent the bulk of the set playing an Organ. His band was absolutely phenomenal, and I would have liked to have found out who was in it. I unfortunately opted to start heading out of the park 9:50, and heard the last 2 songs headed towards the shuttles back to republic square.

All in all, ACL was good this year. Other than the heat, the weather mostly cooperated.

The Front Gate

The ATT Stage 2 Hours Before Bob

Bob Dylan Closing ACL 2007

It's pretty difficult to get a good shot at night, I see

ACL Day 2

I stayed for a much shorter time today, because the heat was stifling. I saw the following acts today:

• Sylvia St. James
• Dax Riggs
• Back Door Slam
• Railroad Earth
• Stephen Marley
• BeauSoliel
• and a smidgen of Artic Monkeys

The highlights of the day were Back Door Slam, Railroad Earth and Stephen Marley. The only thumbs down went to Dax Riggs. (I'm mystified how he was booked for the festival to be bluntly honest).

Stephen Marley sounds eerily like his father, Bob. He did a full hour of Reggae with his own music, as well as three of his father's songs, Buffalo Soldier, No Woman No Cry, and Could You Be Loved. The band was tight, and the very large crowd was into it.

I don't hate Bluegrass, but I don't listen to a lot of it either. If all Bluegrass Bands sounded like Railroad, I would listen to a lot more. There was some shredding going on with between the mandolin, banjo, and violin players. They were trading 8's like it was going out of style.

Back Door Slam was an English Blues Rock Trio, reminiscent of Cream. The leader of the band, sings like Jack Bruce and plays like Clapton. I'd go see them in a heartbeat again, too!

Railroad Earth

Stephen Marley's Band

ACL Day 1

Well I just returned from my first grueling day at the Austin City Limits Festival. I'm covered with sweat, tired and have blisters on my feet. I saw the following bands:

• One Mississippi
• The Greyhounds
• Asleep at the Wheel with Austin Celebrity, Ray Benson
• Jesse Malin
• Heartless Bastards
• Bela Fleck and the Flecktones
• Blonde Redhead
• Big Sam's Funky Nation
• Joss Stone
• Spoon
• Andy Palacio and the Garfina Collective
• Queens of the Stone Age
• Gotan Project
• The Killers

For me the highlights of the day were Bela Fleck, Gotan, Big Sam's, and Andy Palacio. Bela and company are still amazing, with Future Man appearing to have some new tricks. At times during their set, he now plays a traditional drum kit with his right arm and foot, while keeping his left hand on the Drumitar. All I can say is wow!

Gotan was another surprise. They're a unique fusion of Tango, Nu Jazz, and Electronica. They drew a big crowd and with good reason. The other two bands were Funk/Gospel groups that just kicked ass, and took no prisoners. Everyone was bopping along.

I enjoyed the rest of the day. Although I would be hard pressed to say what I liked about Hearrtless Bastard and One Mississippi. The Killers were good, but had a larger buzz than I thought they deserved. I'm not sure what the fuss is all about.

I had wanted to see Bjork, but found myself too tired to last it out for the end of the night show. I know now that I will be exhausted when ACL ends in two nights.

The Calm Before the Storm

Asleep at the Wheel

Bela Fleck and the Flecktones setting up

T-minus 5 hours

I have my wristband, and ACL starts in approximately 5 hours. Will hopefully be able to report on things daily. My main objective today is to catch Bela Fleck.

More to follow ...

MNF Follow Up

The NFL acknowledged that the ref made a bad call in Monday's game. To add to the week1 strangeness, the Patriots were busted this week trying to intercept the Jets' defensive signals and were fined heavily by the league and docked a draft pick.

In both cases however, the L stays put for both the Ravens and the Jets. Gee, thanks NFL, I know fans in Baltimore and NY are much happier now!

RIP: Joe Zawinul

Another of my Jazz heros passed away on this past Tuesday (9/11), Joe Zawinul. Once again, the hustle and bustle of normal life resulted in my missing the news, two days ago. Thanks to the Sonic Talk Podcast for mentioning this.

Fortunately, I was able to see the Zawinul Syndicate once. I would have loved to have seen him with Weather Report and Cannonball Adderley, however! I'll have to listen to Birdland and Mercy, Mercy, Mercy sometime this weekend.

NPR did a wonderful job looking at his life and art.

Ravens vs. the Bengals on MNF

Well my Ravens opened their season with a Prime Time game this past Monday, against the Bengals. In keeping with their recent tradition of playing shitty on MNF and in the rain, they managed to turn the ball over 6 times and amass a ton of injuries. B.J. Sams our ProBowl caliber kick returner, has had a season ending injury at Paul Brown stadium for the last 2 years. (Talk about Bad Kharma!) Unfortunately, the special teams drop-off will hurt us.

Despite all of this, our D played fantastically in the 2nd half, and the Ravens took the lead in the 4th quarter, only to blow it on a stupid interception. Then, they almost tied the game with less than 90 seconds with a TD Pass from Kyle Boller to Todd Heap. Unfortunately, in what will go down as the worst fucking call I have ever seen in an NFL game, Heap was called for Offensive PI. The referee responsible needs to go back to officiating Pop Warner games. Of course, Billick sealed the deal, snatching defeat from the jaws of a tie, with some very questionable play calling.

For now, I'm telling myself it's only the first game of the season. The Jets are next, and are one of the few teams in the NFL worse off than the Ravens, injury wise. (Actually, both NY teams are in trouble already).

On the positive side, Willis McGahee looks like an upgrade from Jamal. And, the Austin City Limits Festival is less than 2 days away now!

30 years ago or Damn, I feel old

I certainly felt old when I saw this story today. I was a sophomore in high school when the Pistols launched their infamous tour of North America. In those days, your choices were Punk or Disco. My friends and I (almost of all of whom were musicians) chose Punk.

Since the Pistols came and burnt out quickly, a lot of my attention was focused on the likes of the Clash, the Ramones, Elvis Costello and Devo. I am proud to say, that my 4 nephews ages 6-12 all enjoy Blitzkrieg Bop as much as I did back in the day. Of course, hearing Devo's Freedom of Choice in a Miller Beer commercial sealed the deal.

It's amazing to think how mainstream Punk became. As they say in Texas, Gabba-gabba-hey, Y'all!

RIP: Max Roach

I guess in the process of going to all the recent shows and events, I missed the news of Max Roach's death on 8/16. He was one of the greats of the Bebop era, and arguably brings it to a close following Dizzy, Miles, Bird, and Bud into the great beyond.

RIP Max, you will be missed.

Deep Purple at the Majestic, in San Antonio

After noting this date well over 6 weeks ago, I had resigned myself to not going, because several of my friends were on vacation. I have been a fan of both Deep Purple and Steve Morse for over 30 years and have seen both live, but I have never seen them together. Somehow, fate intervened Wednesday and I was offered a ticket that some other friends (who were already going) had won in a radio, call-in contest.

My seat was great last night, unlike the last time I attended a show there and sat in the balcony. The sight lines were great since I was only 20 rows back from the stage, and the sound is very good down there also. I was about 3 chairs to the right of the line from the house soundboard to center stage.

I estimate Deep Purple played somewhere between 90 - 120 minutes. Since they were not promoting a new album (see their website as to why), they stuck to playing their hits. The night included a lot of material from Machine Head (Smoke on the Water, Lazy, Highway Star), along with Hush, and Woman from Tokyo.

The core of the band, Roger Glover and the Ians (Gillian and Paice) are still on top of their game, and can deliver the goods. The crowd and the band fed off of each other, and everyone in the house seemed to enjoy the show. Steve Morse seems to never age, and still plays in his blazing, rock-solid style. The only disappointment I had was that Jon Lord had retired due to health reasons, but Don Airey did an excellent as his permanent replacement.

A great show all around.

More Orioles

Every year for as long as it's been offered, I have subscribed to MLBTV.

Unfortunately, it's the same story over and over again.... I've usually given up on them by the All-Star Break (because they make me).

Where is Davey Johnson when you need him?

RIP: 'Wild Bill' Hagy

I spent a significant portion of the my summers during high school and home from college ('76 to '83) at Memorial Stadium, going to Orioles games. Actually, I was a Jr Oriole starting in 1968 but was obviously not able to drive myself to Memorial Stadium until years later. The O's were a force to be reckoned from 1966 until 1985, with a small resurgence in 1996 and 1997. They were one of the elite teams, and notorious Yankee killers.

On many a summer evening, my friend Porkface (aka. Fran) and I would go purchase $3.00 GA tickets, fill a Coleman Jug with the contents of a case of Busch Beer, and drag our little brothers, and/or his cousin "Sweaty" Freddy to the stadium. There was only one place to sit, Section 34!

For years, a drunken fan named 'the Big Wheel' had been spelling out C-O-L-T-S with his body, during football games at the stadium. Somewhere in the late 70's this bled over into the Baseball games, when a cab driver named 'Wild Bill' Hagy started doing the same thing by spelling out O-R-I-O-L-E-S. Wild Bill was the King of Section 34 and led us all with his battle cries. He would usually make a good show of winding up for a cheer with exaggerated arm movements, waving his Cowboy Hat, demanding that we get our asses off the seats, and followed by a quick call of Let's hear it for the Ball-team, before launching into his dance. He was usually egged on by the other denizens of the Section.

By 1979, it had become the "in-thing" to go to an "O's" game. For about a decade, it seemed that baseball had unthinkably reached an equal footing with football, in Baltimore. To this day, a Baltimore crowd can not listen to the National Anthem w/o embellishing the "O" ala Wild Bill.

Those were the days. The Skankees, Red Sox, Brewers, Indians, Tigers, and Blue Jays were all in our division. (There were only 2 divisions per league back then and Milwaukee was still in the AL!) Names like Earl Weaver, Jim Palmer, Scott McGregor, Steve Stone, Sammy Stewart, Rick Dempsey, Elrod, Disco Dan Ford, Brother Low-low, Rhino, DeCinces, Ed=E Murray, Marc Belanger, Cal Ripken, Benny Ayala, Rich Dauer, Tippy, Dennis Martinez, come to mind. Rex Barney on the PA, play by play with Chuck Thompson, and the recap the next morning with Charlie Eckman.

Unfortunately, there has not been much to cheer about since Game 5 of the 1983 World Series. And of course, OPACY (Oriole Park at Camden Yards) never had the right feel for me. 'Wild Bill' was one of the common, blue-collar people of Bawldy-more. He seemed like he had stepped out of one of Barry Levinson's or John Waters' movies. He (and I) belonged in Memorial Stadium. If only something would convince Angelos to sell the team now, maybe the Orioles could climb out of the grave they fell into.

RIP: Wild Bill. I'm going to see if I can find a 6 Pack of Natty Boh tonight, and drink in your honor.

Ravens vs. Giants - Primetime Preseason

I was somewhat pleased because I didn't have to make special arrangements to watch the Ravens tonight. They were the Primetime game. Most likely because there's a Manning involved.

I was going to comment more on this, but it looks like both the Offense and Defense went a little backward this week. We came out on the short end, 13-12. Troy Smith looked good, Boller looks like he's done. I'm slightly worried about McNair. He doesn't do too well in the rain or the snow.

The Countdown Continues

Some great music happening this fall. I have tickets to:

• All 3 days of ACL - Bob Dylan
• 2nd leg of the Porcupine Tree tour
• Zappa plays Zappa - this time with Ray White as Special Guest.

My mood: Psyched with anticipation.

Ravens open their preseason vs. the Iggles

Watched the Ravens first preseason game against Filthadelphia. The Ravens controlled all aspects of the game throughout. McNair and Drew Olsen looked great. (Olsen probably won't make the team). The season is less than a month away, can't wait. I expect big things and a number 1 defense again.

The only downer so far, they have away games during Thanksgiving and Christmas. Most likely, I will only get to see one game at M&T Bank Stadium this year, against the Rams, in October.

Rush at the Verizon Amphitheater, in San Antonio, TX

Over 15 years have passed since I last saw Rush on tour to support Roll the Bones. I had seen them multiple times in the late 70's and early 80's, with an outstanding show at Radio City Music Hall during the Signals tour, being the most memorable.

I will admit to losing interest in the band, because of the direction they had taken during the 90's. Until two days ago, I was also unaware of the tragedy that had befallen Neil Peart and thought they had just gone inactive. I was somewhat surprised when I watched and heard Far Cry on Youtube 6 months ago, and really liked this return to their old sound.

While I will admit to being a fan of the band, I was never a fan-boy. I've noticed in the past that fan-boyism seems to be rampant amongst Rush (and Dream Theater) fans, and have always been curious (and somewhat annoyed) about this phenomenon. At the conclusion of this show, I discovered that nothing has changed in this respect (and I still don't understand it).

The show was listed as starting at 7:30PM, and probably started no later than 7:45. With one 20 minute intermission at the 2 hour mark, the show went all the way up to 10:52PM. The sight-lines were good once again, since my seats were about 30 rows back from the stage, dead center. Despite the great view, the heat and humidity made things uncomfortable.

The biggest downer for the show, was the sound. It sucked. The floor is a sloped, concrete slab. Ear plugs were an absolutely necessity. A real downer for me after the One World show two nights prior! I really despise large arena shows, and this did nothing to change my opinion.

Countering this, one of the cool features of the show were 3 large screens at the rear of the stage. There were live cameras in front, at the side and above the stage, that were used to focus in on the individual band members, and supply a "bird's eye" views of Neil. They also used the screens for CGI artwork and had two funny segues to introduce songs:

• The first involved the MacKenzie Brothers from the SCTV skit the Great White North.
• The South Park crew prepared a special cartoon, with Cartman, Kyle, and Kenny as Lil' Rush playing Tom Sawyer. There are several screeners posted to Youtube right now.

The show included a mix of material, obviously including Snakes and Arrows. It was a good cross-section of their discography, including cuts from Hemispheres, Signals, Moving Pictures, Power Windows, Vapor Trails, R30, and others. Noticeably absent however, were songs from 2112 and Farewell to Kings, other than Passage to Bangkok. The most glaring omission however, was that this was the first time I had ever seen them play where they did not play Closer to the Heart.

From what I could discern in the horrible mix the playing was tight. I did notice a reliance on prerecorded tracks at various points, and am pretty certain that some backing vocal tracks were also added at various points in the show. I'm not sure how I feel about this, and was a little disappointed.

Final Verdict: Good show, not great. I'll probably go see them again in the next few years, before they get so old that it's embarrassing.

California Guitar Trio at the One World Theater

Friday night, I attended another great show, featuring Guitar Craft alumni, the California Guitar Trio at the One World Theater. Without a doubt, the One World is probably the best venue in Austin to see a show. The room holds 300 people tops and has great acoustics. My seats were in 2nd row, right on center aisle. I was within spitting distance of all three members of the band, and it was amazing to see how relaxed and precise their technique was from that vantage point.

CGT played a solid 90 minutes. They played older (Melrose Avenue) and new material (Andromeda), and were joined on stage by several guests (their soundman playing a melodica and a woman playing mandolin). During one phase of the show they got the audience singing along to Bohemian Rhapsody, and of course played an encore with the most requested live song of all time, Freebird.

The highlight of the night for me was seeing them play a Bach Prelude in Circulation, a training technique used by Robert Fripp, in the Guitar Craft courses. Of course, I am now hoping that the League of Crafty Guitarists will make it to Texas.

After the show, the Trio was available for autographs and I was able to purchase a CD of the show I had just attended. They are actually touring with a CD duplicator and were able to burn 7 disks at a time. Very cool idea.

Dream Theater at the Backyard

This past Saturday, I endured the early evening heat and opening bands Into Eternity and Redemption to see Dream Theater at the outdoor venue, the Backyard. In general, it was an enjoyable show, but as usual, I left a DT show once again unable to call myself a true fan of DT's music.

First the opening acts. Into Eternity was a Progressive Death Metal band from Canada. I found them to be cliche and boring. The speed metal licks, one singer growling, the other sounding like Iron Maiden, argh!!! I made sure my earplugs were firmly in. Sorry guys, you're weren't worth a case of tinnitus.

The second opener, Redemption from L.A., was much better. They displayed a little more creativity. The biggest problem with them was that they were basically DT Lite.

I estimated DT's show lasted 2 hours tops, but didn't really watch the clock. They played a lot of their most recent material from Octavarium and Systematic Chaos. They didn't play Metropolis, which I found surprising. I will admit that I have a hard time distinguishing a lot of their material and albums, since Jordan Rudess has joined the band. Nothing was bad, technique abounded, but there was not a single moment during the show where I would call the music soulful. I do give some props to Jordan however, who actually succeeded in looking cool playing a Keytar.

Ron Paul San Antonio Fund Raiser

I spent a grueling 22 hour day in San Antonio, Saturday, helping with a Rally and Fund Raiser for Presidential Candidate Ron Paul. Despite being understaffed from a volunteer standpoint, the event went off with very few hitches.

Coverage of the event can be found at the Ron Paul SA and Ron Paul Austin sites. All told there were between 500-600 people in attendance at the Buckhorn Museum. During the day, there crowd was sparse, but swelled to large proportions around 5PM for the rally.

For me, the highlight of the day was getting to meet Michael Badnarik and getting a picture with Ron and his wife.

Storyville at Antones

Last night at Antones, I was able to see another Austin super-group, Storyville, for the first time. Prior to this, I had seen every member of the band either individually or with other people, but never together as Storyville.

The club was moderately packed when I arrived, but nowhere near as crowded as the Arc Angels show 2 weeks ago. Since this was their 2nd straight night at Antones, it's hard to say whether a larger crowd was present on Friday. (I would expect there was).

The opener was Kathy Valentine (one of the original members of the Go-Go's) and her band, the Bluebonnets. They had a very solid set of post-punk, pop material and won over the crowd. They were one of the better openers that I've seen there in a while.

For the main Storyville show, there was not much in the way of new material (very reminiscent of the Arc Angels show a few weeks back). Their only release since the 2nd Studio album has been a "live" album. This band did however, seem a little better rehearsed than the Arc Angels. As always, Malford was just awesome. Great singer and showman. The Davids (Grissom and Holt) did a great job with their dual guitar parts. And of course, Double Trouble is always great.

No big surprises or anything out of the usual, other than Malford performing A Capella for the first song in the encore. As with the Arc Angels show, I left hoping that they would see the wisdom in recording some new material.