Thighs Wide Shut

Granddady
(Le) Poisson Rouge
February 28th

If you asked me to name one of the more essential albums of the 21st Century, I think I would have to say that one of them would have to be Grandaddy’s The Sophtware Slump.  It was album with past and future tense – and created an incredible soundscape that I constantly wanted to escape into.  And somehow, 17 years have passed since its release, and I somehow escaped from the reality of that album’s amazingness, and the band that created it

Luckily, a memory refresher was headed my way

My musical tastes haven’t really grown in this century, mainly discovering older groups (it’s all about the classics, man!), but I still and will always maintain a love for certain groups of the new millennium (anything Jack White, Air, Franz Ferdinand, Ladytron, etc).  Grandaddy is one of those groups, but I really did forget about them.  Mainly, they forgot about themselves, as they were broken up for awhile, but alas, here we are, and when I heard that Grandaddy was making a new album and touring it, of course I had to see them… 14 years since I last did - pre-Thighs Wide Shut(!!!!), in 2003.  

And so, for prep for the concert, I listened to what I could of the new album – Last Place.  A few singles had been floating around for months, and then with less than week to go, NPR had the album in full, streaming.  Normally it takes awhile for an album to work its magic on you (if it has any actual magic to begin with), but in a short amount of time – I felt like the grand(addy) early 2000s had never ended, and this new album felt a year apart from the essential Slump, not 17 years separated

And live?  Oh man, the old stuff was beyond beautiful music to my ears.  And the new stuff?  It fit in-between the old stuff like a glove (not the OJ type of glove, but the one that fits perfectly – like a new glove, or an old glove)!

The show was 17 songs done up in under 90 minutes, but for every minute – I basked in the bestness that was and remains Grandaddy, and escaped back into the early 2000s, which somehow seems like such a simpler, happier time

Setlist - Hewlett’s Daughter / El Caminos in the West / Laughing Stock / Way We Won’t / Disconnecty / Evermore / The Crystal Lake / My Small Love / Levitz / AM 180 / So You’ll Aim Toward the Sky / I Don’t Wanna Live Here Anymore / Everything Beautiful Is Far Away / Now It’s On / He’s Simple, He’s Dumb, He’s the Pilot

Encore – The Boat is in the Barn / Summer Here Kids

https://www.instagram.com/p/BRFTn5YjQKm/

Matthew Friedberger
Le Poisson Rouge
October 22nd

What was that?  Yeah Matt, what the fcuk was that?  You had like two keyboards on stage.  And you kept touching them, but you weren’t really playing them, even though music was being played from them.  One time you touched one for a second, and then moved over to the other one and touched that for a second, and then went right back to the first one and touched that for a second, and then back to the second one for a second.  Who’s on first?  More like who’s on würst!!!  Well, it wasn’t the würst, but we don’t know what you were doing Matt!!

Sure, your music can sometimes be super dense and moody boos, and REALLY hard to listen to, but you are also capable of producing wonderful sounds, that ooze with breazy fluidity and peppy happiness and playful playfullness that is so full and rich and rich of fullness.  Tonight you leaned toward the former, and it was strange.  You didn’t engage your audience, but maybe you meant to do that.  But whatever it was, it was strange, but your hair looked awesome.  It always does.  But seriously, what kind of performance was this?  You were like karaokeing to your own music, if it were microwaved in an 8-bit bowl of sonic vomitace.  What was that all that?

We always thought you were better off without your sister (who was in the audience), even though we love her and you, and your sibling riving-rule-ing.  Yer first solo album (the Winter Woman half) was brilliaaaaaaaaaaaaaaant.  Easily one of my moist flavorite albums of the 2000s.  Never got to hear it live.  Then you released EIGHT solo albums last year.  Only heard one of them, cause we don’t own a record player.  You have a new album.  It has no words, and I’ve only listened to it twice, but I looooves it already.  Are you exhausted?  You probably are.  It’s OK.  We all need rest, even when there’s no time for rest.  But what was that show all about Matt?  We want to know cause we care, cause we love you and we want you to succeed.  Is this how you succeed in the music bidness, by not really trying?  I don’t know, maybe it is, but keep on keeping on, and pleeeease, one day I’d love to hear you play Winter Woman from start to finish, or even from start to infinity.  Then I won’t have to ask questions.  I’ll just say statements like ‘THAT SH!T FCUKING ROCKEXXEEEDDDD, YO!!!!!!!!!!!!’

Badly Drawn Boy
Le Poisson Rouge
December 4th

How did we forget about Damon Gough, aka that shaggily beareded British dude who wears a tea cozy on his head and goes by the nom del stage Badly Drawn Boy?  And more importantly, why?  Sure, we skipped a couple of his albums over the past decade, but this is the guy that created probably one of the bestestest original soundtracks ever done did: About A Boy!!!!  After grooving like mad to his latest It’s What I’m Thinking: Photographing Snowflakes [mp3|CD], leading up to his show at Le Poisson Rouge, we weres really dangs ashamed at how little we’ve let his incredible voice and indelible melodies climb into our ears over the years!!!  SHAME ON WE!  Shame on you too?

Said show was a mess, mainly cause Drawn Boy was a drunken mess.  He was a not so happy camper to be away from his daughter on her birthday (guess he didn’t look at the calendar when he scheduled his US tour dates), and got rather surly with his audience, even quitting on some songs 30 seconds into em, but by the end of his 90ish minute set of ye olde and ye new goodies (+ a Stones Roses cover with Andy Rourke from The Smiths!), no one seemed to mind the low-jinks that accompanied this ultimately delightful and moving show, especially those fans he was shaking hands with as he sung his hero Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Thunder Road’ when exiting stage right

set list for Friday’s show looked better than ours.  SCHUCKS!!!

newish BDB tune we can’t get out of our heads and don’t want it to: ‘Too Many Miracles’