I Came Upon A Child Of God (upcoming concerts)

[elpollodiablo]

WWWWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO BLACK DICE YAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH




WOOOOOOooooo . . . woo.

[Greg Nog]

I like how on either side of the pink shirt girl, it looks like someone just unloaded a couple of tranq darts into the crowd.

[elpollodiablo]

I like the guy sitting, hugging his knees, staring despondently at the floor.

[Greg Nog]

Whoa!  I didn't even notice him!  He's got a bit of a Solomon Grundy thing going on.

[elpollodiablo]

I want to hug him and tell him it'll all be over soon.

[elpollodiablo]

Buried in a press release for an upcoming May 6 benefit show in NYC for New Zealand musician Chris Knox (who suffered a series of strokes last year) is the news that indie-rock messiah Jeff Mangum, the famously austere lead singer of Neutral Milk Hotel, will be performing:
"In addition, we are pleased to announce the night will include a very short acoustic set by Jeff Mangum of Neutral Milk Hotel, his first public performance in over a decade."
While not quite true (Mangum performed at several stops on the Elephant Six Holiday Surprise Tour in 2008, for example), it's still extremely rare and exciting for indie rock's J.D. Salinger to come out of hiding.
Mangum also contributed a track to the Chris Knox benefit album, Stroke. As for the show, it will take place at Le Poisson Rouge, with tickets going on sale at Kickstarter.com next Tuesday, March 30, and the promoter warns that they "won't be cheap."
Since the show will certainly sell out quickly no matter what, we'll be honest and say that while there is no artist we'd rather see perform than Mangum (in the world), the fact that every single person there will be holding up a Flip Cam or iPhone to record it, ruining the moment and breaking our hearts, means we will be skipping the show and waiting for the YouTube footage to be uploaded that night. (And no, the irony of that isn't lost on us.) We'd rather remember Jeff as he was in 1998, when human beings could and did rapturously enjoy a musician's work in the moment without the need to distract from it by holding up devices so they could prove they were there. (And if taking these measures to protect our memories/hearts makes us old Luddites, sign us up. We're pretty sure Jeff himself would be on our side.)

And really, that's all that matters.

http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/03/neutral_milk_hotels_reclusive.html

[YojimboMonkey]

ah crap.  The Protomen are playing Beat Kitchen tomorrow, why'd it have to be tomorrow?  I can't make that.  Crap.

[davy]

Man, I can't wait for Ryan Bingham.

[edison]

Tonight: Mount Eerie, No Kids and Pterodactyl in Colmar. I hope I'm awake enough to enjoy all that (didn't sleep well last night).

Other potentially cool stuff in Strasbourg or Colmar in the next two months or so: Nadja + Thrones + oVo, Deerhoof (!), Meursault, Jimi Tenor with Kabu Kabu and Tony Allen, Chain and the Gang, Mulatu Astatke.

[alex]

I was hesitating about going to the Randy Newman concert in May, because it's on a Wednesday, and I have music lessons on Wednesday and have already missed too many of them this year. Last week, our teaching announced that one of our May lessons would be cancelled, and it just occurred to me that that might be the very date of the Newman concert. Just double-checked, and was overjoyed to find that this was indeed the case. So I looked into getting tickets and...the cheapest tickets are 50 Euro. (Plus it would cost me another 15 in train tickets to get there.) That's too much.

[davy]

Jimi Tenor with Kabu Kabu and Tony Allen

Sweet!

[ellaguru]

I was hesitating about going to the Randy Newman concert in May, because it's on a Wednesday, and I have music lessons on Wednesday and have already missed too many of them this year. Last week, our teaching announced that one of our May lessons would be cancelled, and it just occurred to me that that might be the very date of the Newman concert. Just double-checked, and was overjoyed to find that this was indeed the case. So I looked into getting tickets and...the cheapest tickets are 50 Euro. (Plus it would cost me another 15 in train tickets to get there.) That's too much.

That's too bad, he does a good, and long, show. I think I paid about $50 or so here, but that's less than 50 Euro, even without the train fare.

I was listening to Randy Newman Live this morning, and he still sounds pretty much the same - maybe just put that on instead?

[edison]

I was hesitating about going to the Randy Newman concert in May, because it's on a Wednesday, and I have music lessons on Wednesday and have already missed too many of them this year. Last week, our teaching announced that one of our May lessons would be cancelled, and it just occurred to me that that might be the very date of the Newman concert. Just double-checked, and was overjoyed to find that this was indeed the case. So I looked into getting tickets and...the cheapest tickets are 50 Euro. (Plus it would cost me another 15 in train tickets to get there.) That's too much.

Shame! I was slowly moving beyond seething jealousy towards the possibility of vicarious enjoyment!

(Also, with maybe a few very occasional exceptions, you can't really expect to pay any less for shows like this these days - i.e. with a high-profile artist in a presumably relatively fancy venue)

[alex]

I've kind of noticed, but find it an unacceptable state of affair pretty much regardless of whether I can afford it (I can). Which itself can be an argument against going - matter of principle, etc. etc., but also simply: It'd be setting bad precedents.

[edison]

You're a stronger person than I am! I completely agree with you on principle, but am (as you know) far less successful at sticking to that kind of principle.
Actually, in many cases I am completely unable to even think about sticking to the principle; I'll pretty much go and see Bob Dylan, and possibly a couple of other people, for just about any amount of money he wants to squeeze out of me (as long as I've got a stable income, obviously, otherwise it's another story). Sort of proud about having managed to giving a pass to Leonard Cohen in Strasbourg for ticket price reasons, although I will still be feeling strange sitting home or doing whatever I'll be doing that night knowing that Leonard fucking Cohen is performing a couple of kilometers away from me, but it's an admittedly very small victory. Dammit, I am cheap.

[Good Intentions]

I regret not paying the exorbitant fee and going to see Leonard Cohen.

[edison]

I was lucky enough to see him for a relatively reasonable price (i.e., a bit less than 50 euros with free placing) in a German suburb of Basel, which, along with the fact that the price is twice as high now, certainly informed my decision not to go for a second time, I have to admit.

[Good Intentions]

You can't win them all: I regret paying the exorbitant fee and going to see the Twilight Singers. The fee wasn't nearly as exorbitant, but I regret it nonetheless.

[narlus]

I regret not paying the exorbitant fee and going to see Leonard Cohen.

that's the rub.


for some (most?) of these types of performers/performances, you are not going to get a cheap ticket unless you are lucky.  obviously you've got to pick and choose who is worth it, but you aren't gonna be seeing Neil Young play in a theater for $25.

[edison]

Well, for me, whereas, there have been shows where 15 or 20 euros retrospectively felt like an exorbitant fee, thank god, all the artists who I paid 50 euros+ to see (not that many, anyway, I think) put on a pretty amazing show.

[davy]

You can't win them all: I regret paying the exorbitant fee and going to see the Twilight Singers. The fee wasn't nearly as exorbitant, but I regret it nonetheless.

Yeah, I passed up on a Twilight Singers show back during the Twilight days. They haven't been back since.

What the hell was I thinking passing on a chance to see Greg Dulli live?! Dude is only one of my all-time favorite musicians.

[Good Intentions]

That's what everybody thought going into the plainly disappointing show.

[elpollodiablo]

It's a rare show I'll go to where I feel I've gotten my money's worth. Less so these days, when even regionally successful indie acts seem to think twenty five bones is an acceptable ticket price.

[Robert]

Loretta Lynn is playing in May, and they just announced Merle Haggard in September. It's Country Gold in Athens, apparently.

[davy]

It's a rare show I'll go to where I feel I've gotten my money's worth. Less so these days, when even regionally successful indie acts seem to think twenty five bones is an acceptable ticket price.

That's a good point. The shows I remember really fondly these days are the $5 shows I see on a whim that surprise the shit out of me. The $15 shows are all about as good as I figured they'd be, which in itself is something of a let-down.

Or the shows that somebody has to drag me to--Seeing Simon Joyner play in a tiny indie theatre a few weeks ago was a fucking righteous and powerful experience. Best show I've seen in a long time, and I was damn close to not going.