Long Shadows and Gun-powder Eyes: Neko Case, Crystal Ballroom, 06/05/09

I'm hesitant to write any kind of review about Friday night's performance. I'm worried that it will quickly snowball into little more than repetitive hyperbole. But, it really was a great show. One that made me wish I had been able to score a ticket to the following night's performance as well.

Opener Jason Lytle was less than memorable.
I've never been much a Grandaddy fan, so I wasn't really interested in the frontman's new solo material. It was a bit boring and didn't do much for me. Thankfully, he didn't play for very long, maybe half an hour at most -- which was weird since he was headlining a bill at the Doug Fir the following night. Hopefully the people who actually paid money specifically to see him got their money's worth that night.

Neko, and her usual backing band, came on about 9pm (kinda early by Portland standards) and played for about 90 minutes, if not more. They touched on nearly every song from the new album, they even opened and closed the night with "Marais la Nuit" played over the housespeakers. Sadly, "The Next Time You Say Forever" and "Magpie to the Morning" were missing from the setlist, but hearing "Middle Cyclone," "Prison Girls," and "This Tornado Loves You" in a live setting more than made up for it. I also got to hear "Deep Red Bells" and a fleshed-out, full-band version of "Knock Loud," both of which were lovely. As for the rest of the set -- she pulled about half of Fox Confessor..., and the two original tracks that so far are exclusive to the live album. And that's about it. It would have been nice to hear something more from the earlier albums, but that's only a minor complaint; though, it had me curious as to what the setlist for Saturday night looked like.

But, all in all, it was a great night -- Joe and Martin are always fun company; and given the crowd response when Case repeatedly mentioned the "bear convention in town for the weekend", there could have been some even more fun company to be found within. Oh well...




"...did someone make a fool of me?
For, I can show'em how it's done."

The Past and Pending

At times, it can be frustrating not leading what one would call a "professional" life, but it's just not how I operate. I don't think in such terms. Sure, I could likely make some more money on the side with my photography or my dogsitting experience if I approached it more professionally; however, I'd much prefer to retain a very light approach to such things and keep myself open to whatever may happen because of it.
Case in point, whenever I'm asked to house/dog-sit for people, I never give them a set price. I may tell them the average per day that most people pay me, or I may not tell them at all and leave it all up for them to decide -- sometimes that means cash payment, other times it means some sort of even trade: a nice dinner out, music/iTunes vouchers, etc. In terms of last night, it brought a ticket from Andy to one of the two sold-out Shins concerts at the Crystal Ballroom, in exchange for animal-sitting a few weeks ago.

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Last night, I met up with Andy (and a small group of his co-workers from the credit union) for dinner at Ringler's before heading upstairs to the sold-out Shins concert at the Crystal Ballroom. As usual, McMenamin's fare was less than impressive, but decent enough to not complain.

We finished dinner about 15 minutes before the show was scheduled to start, but somehow we managed to get settled in pretty close to the stage before the opening band came on. Seeing as how the place was beyond sold-out and doors had been open for nearly an hour, I was quite surprised at the location we stood.
The opening band, Delta Spirit, was decent enough to keep my attention throughout but nothing too new in the way of 'bar rock.' Though, I do have to acknowledge that their percussion was fucking incredible. If they spent more time developing that aspect of their sound, rather than on cliche 'plugged-in era' Bob Dylan rips, they might actually be something to take note of. As it stands, try and check 'em out if they're openers on a bill sometime, but don't worry if you miss them.
And, after the openers, the all-new Shins 2.0 took the stage.
One thing that always surprises me about seeing the Shins live is how loud they become in person. On their records, they take a bit of a psuedo-Twee approach to their sound -- with hushed layer on top of hushed layer adding a lot of dimension but no real depth. Even with Wincing the Night Away, they produced and mixed it to within an inch of its life but there's very little "oomph!" behind it all.
Somehow, they take the complete opposite approach to their live shows. And even more so with the new band members. Everything had a new sense of urgency and angst behind it that worked well to add a lot of volume to their sound (in more ways than one). They played completely new material, completely new arrangements of old favorites, old B-sides that they'd never played live before, a Beach Boys cover, a Neil Young cover, a snippet of a James Gang cover...everything you'd expect from the band, and even a little bit more.

These days, their tours have been few and far between, so if you get the chance, definitely check them out. James Mercer is writing some of the tightest, dreamy-est pop songs around.

And he's totally hot when bearded.