Piloting Blind On A School Night
or Friday night music club

Okay, so it seems I'm always searching for new bands to add to my arsenal of iTunes. I'm generally a lyrics lover, but sometimes a band's sound strikes me, it's feel touching a part of my psyche. Fortunately for me, Pittsburgh has one of the finest public radio stations (WYEP) whose staff are adept at finding up and coming indie acts.

Several years ago, they started playing an ethereal band out of Oregon named Blind Pilot whose melodic nature struck a chord with me. They came into some notoriety for their 2008 bicycle tour in which they literally rode bikes to their gigs from Bellingham, Washington to San Diego, California, carting their gear in special bike trailers they fashioned themselves. I was excited to see them at Mr. Small's. Their music is light and rhythmic...and, as it turns out, not very varied. In fact, outside of the handful of semi-hits, it was downright monotonous. So much so, that we actually left early.

No shit.

In hindsight, the painfully looooooong set up break should have been a tip off. The delay went on for days. I am not even kidding. Hey, I'm old now. I don't have enough years left to waste that kind of time waiting for young hipsters to get their shit together backstage only to bore me to tears for forty minutes. All I can say is someone better have been puking his guts out or had explosive diarrhea to justify that wait.

The array of instruments on stage added an element of interest (banjo, harmonium, xylophone, stand-up bass, trumpet), but aside from a couple of energetic songs, the eclectic grouping of musical gadgetry did nothing to make this school night adventure sleep-deprivation worthy.

I realize by leaving early, we probably missed their best stuff, but c'mon! You gotta throw us a bone or two at the beginning, man! They weren't awful. They were just... boring, tedious, spiritless (insert your favorite adjective here). Even their stage presence was a flat line.

Meh.

Then to top it off, their cover was of Gillian Welsh's wretched Miss Ohio. ACK!!

This is one of the better songs. At least I got the opportunity to play with my 8 MM app on Xpro setting.



The pleasant surprise of the evening was the opening act, The Barr Brothers, a side project of the band The Slip. A fact learned from the very enthusiastic fan standing next to us. I LOVE when fans evangelize for their favorite bands. The kid next to us could not wait to tell us all about them and his devotion to them. His entire face lit up when he spoke of the greatness of the "best drummer EVER". He kept insisting my concert cohort, Mary Ann (who is diminutive) stand in front of him so she wouldn't miss any of the performance.

So cute. I totally get his desire to witness. Um... hello. How many posts on here are devoted to all things Old 97's/Rhett Miller?

Besides a harp and mandolin, the drummer had an peculiar assortment of percussion instruments: metal smoker, Indonesian wood chime... But the oddest thing of the evening was the lead brother running his finger along a deliberately loose guitar string which I neglected to film, natch.

By the way, for anyone attending, The Barr Brothers will be at SXSW this year. They'd be worth an afternoon listen.

Again, got to play with my new app, this time on 70s setting.



Oh well. Not the most riveting musical evening I've ever spent, but still a welcomed night out with a good friend just the same. Plus there was liquor, so there's that. There are three more shows on the horizon: The Kooks, Rhett Miller solo and Ingrid Michaelson. I KNOW the middle one will go way beyond expectation. I have high hopes for the other two. Now if we could schedule a Francis fix, life would be golden.

I Love Sundays...

Okay, so my job is in a 24/7 business and I work weekends. The beauty is by the time things get cranked up at the end of the M-F week, I'm out of the madness being that my off days are Thursday and Friday. A beautiful thing indeed.

The thing about working the weekends is I work the daylight shift so am out of the bat cave with plenty of daylight and evening left to partake in any number of social activities. Naturally I tend to burn my candle at both ends (ouch!) and have performed my duties with clouded-head-syndrome on numerous Sunday mornings. Generally, the pain in the AM has been worth the fun had the night before.

Usually on Sundays, my good bud, Suzette and I indulge in a four course, mircowave-cooked, breakfast of champions--noshing whilst watching the CBS Sunday Morning show. Suzette's been MIA for a while now, so breakfast consists of me foraging for something semi-edible at home like cereal, yogurt or hard-boiled eggs. Honestly, it ain't much fun whipping up grub for yourself and some random casual worker. I miss her.

Anywho...

The best thing about working Sundays is it's a chance to catch up on the important stuff...emails, blog postings I haven't got around to reading over the week, blog posts I haven't got around to writing, reading the newspaper, reading Entertainment Weekly, and phoning folks.

Okay, I don't really do all that stuff at work. That would be wrong. However, some Sundays the programming is just one infomercial after another which leaves a bit of free time. It's those mornings that afford me the opportunity to listen to new musicians on...wait for it... MySpace. (See, I told you MySpace was still useful.)

Today I've been streaming the indie band, Blind Pilot from Oregon and the powerpop Fastball from all-things-music Austin, Tx. I've heard them mentioned on several occasions and decided to give them a listen. They are both EXCELLENT! Blind Pilot has a quieter, ethereal sound where Fastball is a slicker, much more polished, fuller pop sound. I would highly recommend both.

I better brush my hair and get all purtied up. I have a date with iTunes to buy me some of these finds when I get home.