pennywhistle

Wednesday night I trekked to Columbus to see THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS for the second night in a row.

I lucked out and got a superclose parking spot AND my car didn't get towed! (The venue is near OSU's campus, where they tow you pretty much just for looking at them funny)

I managed to stake out a place three rows back left of center; Flans' side -- no, I don't know why I went Flans-side instead of Linnell-side like I usually do. Change of pace.

I made a friend while we were waiting for the opening act to start, because that's what I do. The guy next to me started asking me questions about how many times I'd seen them, what other concerts I'd seen, what I liked about them, and we branched off into other topics and it turns out he's doing Nanowrimo too, and he was recently in Paris, so we were gushing about that. Made the waiting time go faster.

The opening act was Oppenheimer, and they surprisingly did not suck. I have seen a lot of opening acts in my time, and let me tell you: the vast majority of them suck. The last time I saw a non-sucky TMBG opener I think was when Cub opened for them on the Factory Showroom tour.

Then They Might Be Giants came on!! YAY!! Ok, I love them to death, and the concert was absolutely, positively, without-a-doubt awesome. BUT. They played the exact same setlist as the night before. Like, a carbon copy. I mean, so YAY! I got to hear "She's an Angel!" And I loved every minute of it! But dude....I got Marty's set list after the show, and it is literally a copy, they just wrote in "Columbus" instead of "Newport, KY." So, the exact same songs as the night before.

Racer X was the caller on "Phone Calls from the Dead," though. Didn't go over as well as Jerry Orbach, but then, who does? Linell later did a shorter improv in the middle of Particle Man about how Racer X would try fighting Triangle Man, but it was nowhere near as awesome as the improv about Jerry Orbach's donated eyes.

Still, all in all, amazing show. I danced my ass off, I screamed my heart out, I want Linnell to have my babies.

( Pictures! )

Videos - Sound quality pretty much sucks. I still watch them.

Alphabet of Nations



Mr. Me

So, TORI AMOS!!

Julie and I first saw Tori, as Julie reminded me this weekend, 13 years ago on October 3, 1994. She played at the Taft Theatre in Cincinnati. She had only released Little Earthquakes and Under the Pink at this point. Since that show, we have seen Tori together at least six other times, and I've seen her on my own at least four additional times.

So while we were driving around Saturday morning, we were listening to an all-Tori mix on Julie's iPod. It was mixing up a lot of Little Earthquakes songs, and I mentioned that according to the set lists on Undented she hadn't playing a lot of LE songs on this tour, maybe just one or two per show.

Our seats were fantastic, row H and right dead left center. Before the show started, Julie asked me what songs I really wanted to hear, and I said I'd really like to hear "Pancake" because I don't care for it much on the CD but live it's soooo much better, I wanted to hear "Strange," "Girl Disappearing," and I was looking forward to hearing "Hey Jupiter" because she'd been closing almost every show with it, and it had a lot of importance for me this year. We agreed that "Pancake" and "Strange" were probably pipe dreams, just like songs from LE.

The show finally starts, and Tori comes out looking adorable. She's supposedly one of the dolls from American Doll Posse in the opening set, but I had no idea which doll was which. I'd been hoping for the Isabel doll because I liked the songs she sings best. It turns out we got the Clyde doll, which was also fine with me ^_^

( Set list )

If you don't know Tori, let me explain to you what's amazing about this list. We got FIVE songs from LE!! Each time she started a new song from LE, Julie and I looked at each other like, "Are you kidding me?"

She started "Strange" with a slow intro that made it hard to tell what it was until she started singing. As soon as I heard her sing it, I was so shocked. It's the only time she's played it on this tour. I started crying; me + my failed relationships = the lyrics to "Strange." But she only made it to the first chorus and then she stopped abruptly and exclaimed "I fucked this up so bad!!" And watching the video of it, I can see, yeah, she did mess it up in a few places ^_^ I was too into it at the time to even notice. So she went into a little "I fucked this song up" improv that basically went "If you want to hear this song you're gonna have to put the record on, because I can't play it again now without laughing." ARGH!! SO CLOSE!! And then she went into "Carbon." Also okay with me, because I am all about songs about bipolar girls.

"Pancake" was just as fantastic live as I was hoping it would be...and "Siren!" I love that song ^_^ I kept waiting...waiting...for "Hey Jupiter" but then they just brought up the house lights! WAIT! GET BACK HERE AND SING "HEY JUPITER!!" I need to hear it ;_;

Oh well, it was still an AMAZING concert. I hope she does another leg next year and comes to Cincinnati or Columbus so I can see her again ^_^

( Pictures )

"Big Wheel"


"Winter"


"Little Earthquakes"


"Crucify"


"Strange" and improv (filmed by ribbonsoflithium)

OH I AM GOING TO PITTSBURGH ON SATURDAY OCTOBER 6 TO SEE LIBBIE SCHRADER.


I don't think you understand. LIBBIE SCHRADER.

Yeah, I know. Who? You say.

She's an independent artist. But I love her. Her lyrics mean so much to me. Those are her lyrics in my default icon. Her words...I just can't express myself right now. I'M GOING TO SEE LIBBIE SCHRADER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

Saturday Carlette and I drove to Cleveland on Saturday to see They Might Be Giants!

On the first leg of the trip I was sooo tired. I was closing my eyes extra long, thinking "Just a few seconds...just a few more seconds." Bad sign for the start of a three and a half hour trip. Fortunately we stoped in Columbus for caffeine and chocolate, and I felt much better!

Carlette's boyfriend Nick loaned us his GPS unit, named Janine, and we used her to find dinner. First we found Grandpa's Cheesebarn...




But sadly, it was closed.




...which was disappointing because we really wanted some barn cheese.


( Cut for copious amounts of pictures of Linnell and embedded videos )

Called the Pub up. Enter the Haggis will be playing from 8pm-10:30pm, so I'm heading straight there when I get off work at 9pm!! (It's only a few blocks from work)

Last night was MADE OF WOE.

Well, there was some good to it. But that's for another entry.

THIS IS AN ENTRY OF WOE.

I hate cars. Tomorrow I am getting my bike fixed and I am fucking biking everywhere for the next five months.

ladyoceanstar and I went to Indianapolis last night to see Rachael Sage. More on that in another entry.

On my way home from school earlier that day, I had noticed that the car was driving a little funny, so when I stopped to get gas, I checked the tire pressure. Alas, I had no idea how to actually read the tire gauge, and the car's manual was not in the car. I know where to put the gauge to get a read-out, but I didn't know what the read-out meant.

I tested the left-front tire. 15psi. I have no idea if that's good or bad. I test the right-front tire. 27psi. Again, those numbers mean nothing to me. I know from previous history that I always run down and then flatten the right-front tire, so I test the back two tires. 15psi. I deduce that 15psi is somewhere in the good range and, based on my history, 27psi is low on air. I fill the right-front tire.

Toby and I go to Indianapolis and enjoy the concert. There was a moment of panic when the exit mapquest directed me to was closed for construction, but thanks to my direction-fu, I was able to get us right back on track.

We left the concert venue at 10pm. We didn't reach the highway until 10:44pm, because of the aforementioned construction crap; all the highway entrances were closed. Using my direction-fu again, I found us a highway entrance.

I was worried, though, because I had my window rolled down, and I was hearing a click-clack, click-clack coming from a tire. We stopped at a gas station and looked at them, and they seemed fine. As soon as we got on the highway and got up to speed, the right-front tire gave out.

*sigh*

There was no really good place to pull over; I pulled over onto the shoulder as far as I could, but we were still thisclose to the highway. Indiana's speed limit is 70mph, and trucks were not moving over into the left lane for us.

I called AAA and explained the situation, and they just said "Well, we'll put a priority on it, but it's probably going to be about 90 minutes." WTF?! 90 minutes on the side of a busy highway of DEATH!?

We sat there for awhile, watching our life flash before our eyes everytime a track scraped past us at 70+. Finally a cop car showed up, and they started directing traffic to go around in the left lane.

The cop was very nice, and he offered to change the tire for us. He got the lug nuts off and started to jack the car up, but it turns out the jack that came with the car will not jack it up high enough when the car is sunken with a flat tire :-\ He offered to call us a tow truck. Seeing as it had been over an hour and AAA still wasn't there, we accepted. The tow truck had it changed in 10 minutes. I had to pay out of pocket and try and get it reimbursed by AAA. :-\

As we were leaving, we found out the cop's car had overheated from sitting for so long! ^^;;

Then came the sad part. We had to drive all the way home to Dayton on the donut at 50mph. It took for-freakin'-ever. Toby helped me stay awake, and we made a few humurous voice posts on her journal. Go listen to them, they're a riot. Or maybe you had to be there.

Anyway, we finally get back to my apartment around 2:30. Toby sees her car and says, "Those lights aren't on, are they?" I'm like, no, it's just the glare. I get in the house and am about to take my clothes off when she calls me. Her battery had died, and her car alarm was protesting loudly about it. It was kind of funny at that point.

Fortunately, dad had insisted on putting jumper cables in my car, so I moved it over next to hers, and after several sparks we got them hooked up and her battery juiced.

I got to bed at 3am, to sleep around 3:30, and awake for work bright and early at 7:15am. KILL ME PLZ.

Dad is about to return my car to the library now with two fresh, shiny new tires. I love my dad. I hate my car.

TMBG IN CLEVELAND AND DETROIT IN JULY.

DAY HAS BEEN REDEEMED.

Yesterday Carlette and I drove down to Lexington, KY to see Vienna Teng perform on the "Woodsongs Old Time Radio Hour."

We got to be the audience for an NPR/PBS show! There was an applause sign and everything.

The host of the show was really creepy.

Vienna was fantastic. I hadn't seen her with a band since the first time I saw her live back in April 2003. She only got to perform five songs because she was sharing the show with some bluegrass performer.

She played:

Whatever You Want
Blue Caravan
Now Three
Unwritten Letter #1
Harbor (perhaps the BEST live version of Harbor I've ever heard)

After the show Carlette and I went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner. I simply can't resist the cinnamon butter! Very very sad.

There was some terrible construction traffic trying to cross the bridge back into Ohio, but thanks to my Direction Man skills, we successfully thwarted it. We finally got home a little after midnight.



( Videos! It's worth it for the Harbor video )

WHO'S GOIN' TO PITTSBURGH WITH ME ON MAY 9TH TO SEE THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS?


(That's a Wednesday, btw)

Friday night I went with ladyoceanstar and athanasios to see The Cruxshadows perform at Outland in Columbus.



This was my second time seeing Cruxshadows in concert. I'd been looking forward to this show for weeks, so the fact that I had to be at work at 8:30am the next day was not deterring me from going ^_^

The show was delayed in starting, but the house music they were playing was pretty good, so I got my dance on. Toby and Dave and I staked out our spot sort-of-front center and stayed there all night.

The first band was Ego Likeness. I saw them open for Cruxshadows in October 2005, and they were pretty much the same. Eh. All right. Not who we were there to see. ^_^

The second band was Ayria. I knew nothing about them, but I knew that violetsrblack and Dave were both REALLY excited about them. Jennifer is HAWT! And the music was great; they were very energetic and got the crowd moving. I bought one of their CDs after the show.

Ohh...we stood and danced for so long before Cruxshadows came on! We arrived a little before 9pm, because the flier said the concert started promptly at 9pm. The first band didn't go on until more like 10pm, and Cruxshadows didn't go on until after midnight.

They were fantastic! Apparently they played a few songs from their new album; I didn't recognize them. They also played a bunch of my favorites.

We also had THE BEST spot, because Rogue came out into the audience several times and each time he came and stood right in front of us. During one song he held my hand and sang right to me. *swoon* During another song he carried a bar stool into the middle of the crowd and climbed on it, again, right in front of us. Awesomesauce ^_^

At the end they invited Ego Likeness and Aryia back on stage for "Marilyn, My Bitterness," and I knew at the end he'd be pulling people up on stage. I wanted in on that! So Rogue pulled me up on stage, but I slipped and fell and had to climb up. *face red* I'm so smoooooooooooth. There were about 20 people crowded on stage moshing and singing together, and it was just a terrific energy. After the song Rogue hugged me!

It was a fabulous night, but I didn't end up getting home and into bed until 4am. And then up again 8am for work. Ugh.

( Pictures! )

Cruxshadows sing "Deception"



Cruxshadows sing "Winterborn"