So, went to the Pixies show last night. I was by myself for a variety of reasons, mostly because I'm a loner, Dottie, a rebel. It went something like this:
--Leave work super early, because I...do that. I'm always arriving way ahead of time for movies, concerts, plays, etc. Being late for things makes my insides wobbly.
--Greek Theater. Stack parking among the rolling Hollywood Hills. However, by arriving so early, I'm near the front. Next to a tree. And a large truck.
--As I'm walking to will call, I hear a familiar refrain. "Hi, you look to be under the influence of [insert given event / attraction here ], so we need to give you a smile citation." Ah, the Krishnas. Gotta love 'em. I gave $2 bucks to feed a family...a veggie burrito I'm guessing. For that I got my sticker that says 'Life is a Beach,' and a copy of the Krishna screed. This would have been funnier when I went to see Alanis Morisette. 'Thank you, India.'
--I get my ticket, head in to find the Greek...more or less empty. I'm like there 20 minutes before the third-billed Grant Lee Phillips goes on. What the hell is wrong with me? I curtail this line of internal questioning and get some chicken tenders and an $11 beer.
--The T-shirt selection is pretty lame. But I get one anyway...because I always get a T-shirt. I can't help myself.
--Grant Lee Phillips is pretty good, folky-country-tinged rock. Acoustic guitar, stand-up bass, drums and fiddle. I only know him because he's the town troubadour on 'Gilmore Girls.'
--The Distillers are next. The Greek is barely half-full and the vast majority of the crowd could care less. The band says 'thanks for being patient' twice as they run through the set. Brody is cool and I'm going to pick up their new CD after hearing the new stuff. And she has a fine ass.
--Pixies go on at 9:05. You know, on the back of the tour shirts it says 'Pixies Sellout' and it's hard not to see the non-irony of that. They played a ton of awesome songs and played them well...but there was a certain 'going through the motions' aspect to it. I was glad to see them and I sang along to 'Hey' and 'Number 13' and 'Gigantic.' But there wasn't a heck of a lot of spontaneity. Who knows, maybe they were never about that in concert 15 years ago either. Oh, well. It wasn't bad...but it certainly wouldn't make my top 5 concerts of all time either.
--Because it's the Greek, all concerts have to be done by 10:30. So, after the world's shortest fake encore break, they came back out to do 'Wave of Mutiliation' (the fast version, they had done the UK Surf version earlier,) then 'Debaser.' Then...ding-dong, 10:30 and the house lights come up and the crowd does a collective sigh of 'shenanigans.'
I do believe they would have played another 2-3 songs, but...oh well.
--Shuffle out with the crowd, get to my car and realize everyone in this section of stacked parking will have to drive off a five inch curb. Oh, joy. The truck next to me pulls out and misses scraping my car by so narrow a margin, I was wondering where I put my insurance paperwork as he was rolling past.
--Finally, it's my turn. The BMW in front of me takes the curb straight on...bad idea...and I see his muffler squish under the weight of the car. I go off as sideways as I can, bottoming out the car with a thud, but otherwise avoiding the crunching of any important car parts.
A drive home...and so ends this concert experience.
--Leave work super early, because I...do that. I'm always arriving way ahead of time for movies, concerts, plays, etc. Being late for things makes my insides wobbly.
--Greek Theater. Stack parking among the rolling Hollywood Hills. However, by arriving so early, I'm near the front. Next to a tree. And a large truck.
--As I'm walking to will call, I hear a familiar refrain. "Hi, you look to be under the influence of [insert given event / attraction here ], so we need to give you a smile citation." Ah, the Krishnas. Gotta love 'em. I gave $2 bucks to feed a family...a veggie burrito I'm guessing. For that I got my sticker that says 'Life is a Beach,' and a copy of the Krishna screed. This would have been funnier when I went to see Alanis Morisette. 'Thank you, India.'
--I get my ticket, head in to find the Greek...more or less empty. I'm like there 20 minutes before the third-billed Grant Lee Phillips goes on. What the hell is wrong with me? I curtail this line of internal questioning and get some chicken tenders and an $11 beer.
--The T-shirt selection is pretty lame. But I get one anyway...because I always get a T-shirt. I can't help myself.
--Grant Lee Phillips is pretty good, folky-country-tinged rock. Acoustic guitar, stand-up bass, drums and fiddle. I only know him because he's the town troubadour on 'Gilmore Girls.'
--The Distillers are next. The Greek is barely half-full and the vast majority of the crowd could care less. The band says 'thanks for being patient' twice as they run through the set. Brody is cool and I'm going to pick up their new CD after hearing the new stuff. And she has a fine ass.
--Pixies go on at 9:05. You know, on the back of the tour shirts it says 'Pixies Sellout' and it's hard not to see the non-irony of that. They played a ton of awesome songs and played them well...but there was a certain 'going through the motions' aspect to it. I was glad to see them and I sang along to 'Hey' and 'Number 13' and 'Gigantic.' But there wasn't a heck of a lot of spontaneity. Who knows, maybe they were never about that in concert 15 years ago either. Oh, well. It wasn't bad...but it certainly wouldn't make my top 5 concerts of all time either.
--Because it's the Greek, all concerts have to be done by 10:30. So, after the world's shortest fake encore break, they came back out to do 'Wave of Mutiliation' (the fast version, they had done the UK Surf version earlier,) then 'Debaser.' Then...ding-dong, 10:30 and the house lights come up and the crowd does a collective sigh of 'shenanigans.'
I do believe they would have played another 2-3 songs, but...oh well.
--Shuffle out with the crowd, get to my car and realize everyone in this section of stacked parking will have to drive off a five inch curb. Oh, joy. The truck next to me pulls out and misses scraping my car by so narrow a margin, I was wondering where I put my insurance paperwork as he was rolling past.
--Finally, it's my turn. The BMW in front of me takes the curb straight on...bad idea...and I see his muffler squish under the weight of the car. I go off as sideways as I can, bottoming out the car with a thud, but otherwise avoiding the crunching of any important car parts.
A drive home...and so ends this concert experience.
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