Friday, September 04, 2009

Wheels are in motion

Big things are coming, just bear with me, people (Marie, i'm talking to you).

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Clearing the cobwebs

Recently I've had some ideas floating around my head that require a forum more suitable to long posts and i thought to myself why not head back to the place where all this blog nonsense started, some five years ago, and put some of them out there? Why not, indeed. So I deleted most of the archives, except for a few posts i thought were worth keeping around, and in general gave the place a good spring cleaning. I'm hoping to put something up here once a week, but i'm not going to press it if there's nothing there. My tumblr will still be cranking out distractions, but feel free to come check over here every once and a while. There might actually be something interesting.

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

I Have Moved

To smaller setting with more cozy surroundings. Plus, more updates. Find me here:

bg5000.tumblr.com

See you soon.

Tuesday, July 19, 2005

Tales from the Nation - Day Two

Sunday was a much lower key affair than Saturday. Spending all that time in the sun had taken a lot out of us so we decided to set up our home base somewhere in the shade this time. That was fine by me. There weren't as many bands playing that day that I was pumped about seeing so I didn't feel the need to be in the middle of the action. I got to the park just in time to see Dugen, who were quite good, though their set was pretty short. Andrew Bird was also really good and the Wrens were awesome. I could've done without The Hold Steady and I thankfully missed most of those English major limp dicks the Decemberists.

The best part of the day, though, had to be the DJ set by Diplo. I had seen him before when he opened up for Rjd2 last year and thought he was really good. He played a lot of cool mash ups and remixes and his original stuff wasn't bad either. I wasn't really prepared for what he had in store this time. He totally ripped it. He got the crowd moving quickly and didn't let up. Even some serious technical difficulties (mike trouble, speakers sounding like they could blow at anytime) didn't hold him back. He's certainly the best DJ to dance to that I've seen in a long time. It would've been nice if more of Pedro could've been there, but B-unit and I held it down. Next time he comes to town, though, you best believe we are all over that shit.

All in all, the festival was a success. The only bad things about it were the heat, the long food lines (no lines for beer, however) and the tool box announcer that took the stage between each band (he got a little better on Sunday, but I think that's because he was starting to lose his voice). Everything else was awesome. I certainly felt like I got my $21 dollars worth. I also don't really see the need to go to Lollapalooza this weekend. I don't really think it's going to be able to compete, so why spend another weekend standing in the sun all day? I don't need to see Widespread that bad.

Monday, July 18, 2005

Tales from the Nation - Day One

The Intonation Festival was this weekend and, to put it mildly, it was a blast. The value I received for my $21 weekend pass was unprecedented. There's a lot to tell, so I'm breaking this down by days. Saturday, I rolled over there with a solid group: Gaydro, Mia and Mel, Alissa, Suz and myself were there from the start. Action Pap and Whistle Pop joined us later in the day. We picked out a nice spot located right in between the two stages so we would be able to watch all the acts without having to change locations. However, though the view from this spot was nice, it was also super hot. No shade, just sun all day. It was cool, though. There were a lot of bands playing on Sat. that I was super excited about. AC Newman was pretty good, despite some technical difficulties at the beginning. Four Tet was amazing, much more beat driven this time than his set on Friday at Reckless Records. From what I got to hear, Broken Social Scene was really good. I was waiting in line for food with 57 and Suz so I sort of missed out on seeing a lot of their set.

The Go! Team was next and this was the band I was most amped about. They made my favorite album of last year and I still listen to it like I just got it. Unfortunately, I was sort of disappointed by their show. They have this female rapper named Ninja who is in some of the songs on the album, but not often and never for very long when she does pop up. During their set, however, she rapped over almost all of the songs and even rapped new bits instead of the original samples that were in the songs ("The Power is On" being the first example that comes to mind). Now, I'm all for improvisation and the changes to a song that come with playing it live, but these were like completely different versions and I had been really looking forward to the versions from the album that I loved. I was the only one who felt like this, though. Everybody else in the group really like their set.

Prefuse 73 and Tortoise finished out the day (Death From Above 1979 also played, but I missed their set). Both were awesome and the day would've been great if it had just ended there. It didn't though, as I also witnessed one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. Late in the afternoon, Jean Grae and Will Oldham (Bonnie Prince Billy) were doing a DJ set together. This would've been cool enough, and it was really funny to see them interact together and hear their song choices. But during the final ten minutes of their set, they played and acted out part one of "Trapped in the Closet". It was incredible. Not just because it was hilarious, but because I knew I was watching a once in a lifetime event. The only thing that could've made it any better was if Princess, B-Unit, Gaydro and Whistle Pop had been there to see it with me. Still, I'm just glad I got to see it. I plan on telling my grandkids about it.

Tales from Sunday coming soon.