Story in San Francisco
20 11 2006 Comments : 2 Comments »
Categories : Art, Life
Death of a Salesman @ the Actors Theater of SF
11 11 2006If you have the chance to go see this performance of Arthur Miller’s most famous work, do it.¬† While tickets are a bit pricey at $30/piece, the acting of Keith Phillips as Willie Loman is reason enough to revisit this classic play.¬† At no point during the entire performance do you doubt Keith’s authenticity as the quintessential Willie Loman, a man blinded by superficial desires and the American dream.
The supporting cast of the Loman family (Biff, Happy, and Linda) does a good job of providing the framework for Willie’s downfall and failing mental state although I noticed a few hiccups by Linda.¬† If you’re open to the story it will make you re-think your life and what you’re really striving for.¬† If not, you’re in for some great acting and an evening’s worth of entertainment.¬† Either way – try and see it.
Categories : Uncategorized
Brand New Heaviness
10 11 2006 
Wednesday was the concert for the recently re-united Brand New Heavies at Mezzanine - apparently someone here has taken a list of my favorite bands and asked them to come perform – thanks Travis! I had heard of the Brand New Heavies back in my high school days, but I was too deep in teenage angst to realize what great music this was. So i show up on Wednesday and I happen to run into the guitarist and lead singer of Phonofly. I’m not sure if the title is official yet, but at the last show for Phonofly (Halloween at the Rock-It Room) I think they dubbed me official dancer for the band – I still have to pay the cover charge to get in though :<
Back to Brand New Heavies – a couple years back I picked up their album Trunk Funk Classics 1991-2000 and was hooked on this combination of soul/funk/pop/hip-hop. Brand New Heavies has a really unique sound that you can instantly recognize. Their big hits, “Stay This Way”, “Dream On Dreamer” and “Sometimes” are all on this CD that also features my favorite track, “Soul Flower”, a collaboration with Pharcyde. If I had to describe Brand New Heavies in terms of other bands I would say James Brown mixed with Erykah Badu, blended and dusted with pop.
Unfortunately I’d lost the CD a while back so I didn’t have a chance to catch up for the concert, but the opening act, Sutro (the lead singer’s crazy hat pictured to the left reminded me of a Seinfeld joke… the 90’s called, they want their hat back) got the party off to a decent start. Their music is a mix of live instruments and programmed tracks that pull heavily from the trip-hop and downtempo genres. Their music was good, but I never felt like it went anywhere – no breakdowns, no liftups – at least none powerful enough to remember. Decide for yourself on their MySpace page by clicking on their name above.
Brand New Heavies came out to cheers and clapping from the almost packed house. They started playing and immediately I remembered their sound – funk/pop/soul goodness – it’s the type of guitar playing and rythm that make your body want to pop & lock, your hips shake, your eyes close, and for a few minutes the world seems pretty damn good – oh and it also makes you want to get laid.
I was lucky enough to meet two friends there, Jodi and Jill, so I got a special invite to a birthday party upstairs… Happy 30th Jameson, Manager at Mezzanine!
They opened with Dream on Dreamer and then progressed through a number of songs I didn’t recognize. Then the decidedly Scottish sounding guitarist got on the mic and he introduced each of the band members – each did a wicked solo. All in all it was a good concert – perhaps not worth the $30 ticket, but good to see a great band back together. Also whoever decided that concerts on a Wednesday should go until 1am needs to take a hike. If a concert takes place during the middle of the week I say I should be able to be home by midnight. Am I the only one who feels this way?
Video of Brand New Heavies performing Seven Nation Army by the White Stripes
-one of these days I’ll get a better camera, or there will better light… I promise
Click here to listen to some original tracks by the Brand New Heavies
Categories : Music
The Knife
7 11 2006Whenever I see this band’s name I am reminded of the time in Paris where I was too dumb to be mugged. These kids kept repeating, I have a kuh-nife. They didn’t get any money off of us because we knew they were amateurs – the k is silent ,bitches.
So in my neverending quest to soak up good music in this city I was at Mezzanine again this past weekend for a show by The Knife, a Swedish electro group. The female singer in the group is 5 months pregnant so the show started promptly just before 10pm… We arrived to packed house and the group performing at about 10:05pm. They had erected a ________(insert theater term for screen) in front of the stage to project images onto while they were doing their set. Everything was pretty much to a “t” exactly as it sounds on their CD, but the presentation was pretty over the top.
Both members of the group were in crazy costumes that looked like they were being protected from nuclear fallout; there were blacklights and lot of crazy individual lights behind them (much as I saw with Metric). They really held the audience’s attention as the female sang and the man used what looked to be the orange directing cones that airport workers use to guide planes to play samples on a drum pad. You really got the feeling that they had put a lot of effort into making this a unique show for their fans. The video of Silent Shout is below. If you are feeling adventurous check out the following tracks: Heartbeats, Na Na Na, and the Captain. Fellow Swede (born of Argentine parents) Jose Gonzalez does a great acoustic remake of Heartbeats as well.
Categories : Music
JUSTICE / MSTRKRFT @ Mezzanine
3 11 2006
As usual Mezzanine hosts some of the best music in SF… Wednesday night was no different. Justice and MSTRKRFT put on an amazing show. Two highlights of the night
1 – Everyone getting up on stage during the Justice set (middle picture above). I can’t tell you how many people put their arms around me and started singing, “We ARE, YOUR FRIENDS, YOU’ll NEVER BE ALONE AGAIN!”
2 – Russell Simmons on X. Okay, it wasn’t russell simmons, but close enough. There was a guy rolling his ass off dancing the entire night. When the house DJs were playing he got up on the main stage and nearly sent the turntables crashing into the ground. His dancing was more crashing into people than anything else. In the bathroom he stopped peeing, turned to me, and asked who I was here to see… what was my favorite song? Is it We Are your friends, you’ll never be alone agaain!! or No Excuse? This is the EXCUSE THAT WE”RE MAKING”… he proceeded to sing all of these songs to me, while I was at the urinal, and while his dick was hanging out of his trousers. Eyes forward, don’t look, if you make eye contact you’ll only encourage him – my thoughts.
Categories : Uncategorized
