Ok, that's wrong. My wife did.


She had a guy over from The Onion yesterday to talk abt advertising in it, they started talking about music / local venues, and slipped in "and it's my husband's birthday," etc. So he gave us two free tickets! I'm fucking excited.

Anybody ever seen him?

I tried to score free tickets, but could not. Lucky you.

Have seen the 97s and liked much. Not witnessed Miller on his own, though.

Yeah, I saw the 97s in 05 with FT and Jagged (and Femgar) they were good, if not loud enough.

Maybe you will be treated to Miller singing "Question" En Francais, come nous.

Cringeworthy...other than that, yeah.

Also, don't get too close to the stage. If we hadn't been standing in back, Miller would have been playing "Dexter" that night.

HAHA

Upon leaving TEH GYPSY TEA ROOM on Saturday after seeing Sparklehorse and Jesse Sykes, me and jagged were telling SpoPo this very tale. I SPECIFICALLY mentioned him singing "Question" in French as the nadir of that particular evening.

Awesome!!!

i've seen rhett miller back when he popped in for solo gigs at fez in new york occasionally. those were good shows. i haven't seen him since he's been solo, though. the fez shows were just, like, him playing 97s songs and others that he'd written and didn't use for the band.

It's at my favorite venue here, the High Noon Saloon. Cheap high lifes, here I come.

if he's playing only his solo material he'd have to play "Our Love" a bunch of times to entertain me.

You have The Instigator? It's a slightly poppier Satellite Rides, of equal quality, to me anyway. I like.

Indeed. Funny to read it so soon.

I took HePoet in November or December. I had seen the Old 97's before, but never Miller solo and LOVED the show.

Yeah, one great song and a GANG of filler. Doesn't even approach MUstache Rides, you dolt.

I own it, and stand by my previous statement.

The first song is f-ing awesome, tracks 2-5 are merely ok and the rest should have stayed as unrecorded demos.

I like The Instigator a lot.

I only saw Miller live once, w/ the old 97's. Great show (at the 40 watt) but Miller kept posing and flipping his hair around like a girl the whole time. That guy is really into himself.

When the instigator came out it didn't do much to change my opinion:



Man that guy is into himself. Great songs though.

ANY OLD '97s ALBUM >>>>> TEH INSTIGATOR >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> TEH BELIEVER

Wouldn't YOU be, too, if:

1. Your name was STUART RANSOM MILLER.

2. You were a SERIAL LADY KILLER.

3. You were blessed with a CINDY CRAWFORD MOLE.

4. You SURE WUZ PURTY.

I blew off his show last night and a friend who went said that it was awful. My friend's a big Rhett/97s fan, too.

What if you're already dead, though?

McGinnis 1
Bland 0

Well, I'll have a full report on our collective desk tomorrow morning. And I shall endeavor not to let my love to all things Twang get in the way of a thorough, honest review.

And he'd better fucking bring the twang, too, or as god is my witness I will get up there, wrestle a guitar from someone and put on a fucking demonstration.

"You eat like THIS!"

Teh Believer is teh suck.

This concert review brought to you by Miller High Life:




Ok so it wasn't Rhett and a band, it was Rhett and his acoustic guitar. That was a let-down, but certainly not anyone's fault. I was ready for some full band action, so I left with blueballs.

Rhett's not the way I pictured him. He's... slicker. He tells little anecdotes between songs with the kind of mindless polish that suggesta a lotta practice. He frequently reverts to "hooray for you guys" local praise that always gets a cheap round of applause - I could do without it. But he's nothing if not a showman. If there's a scale for such things with [Billy Corgan walking off stage if someone farts] at one end and [Al Green performing his ass off no matter what's going on] at the other, Rhett's over near Al territory. He was obviously distracted by something, but he hid it well. I say "obviously" because I counted 5 different chord flubs*, and I left before it was over, so I didn't see all the songs... I think something was up.



[img][650:488]http://img530.imageshack.us/img530/9346/dscn3780ja6.jpg[/img]

He plays that acoustic really, really hard, and it's not the best guitar for it. That particular guitar sounded kinda thin when he pushed it that hard. But that creaky, trembly, emotive voice is almost uncannily on pitch, and carries very well when he pushes it. It hooks you in. And the quirky sense of humor helps to kill the time while he's tuning.

All in all, he put on a very good show, for a guy and a guitar. I'd still prefer to see him with a band, because a lot of those songs sound better with the band shoving them along at a good clip, but he made more out of them alone than I thought he could.













* For the non-musicians, a "chord flub" is when you accidentally go for the wrong chord during a song, then correct it quickly. It can be so fast that most people miss it, or it can be painfully long, where you cannot come up with the right chord, and just play some mush till the next chord hits. Understandable when you're drunk, covering something by someone else. Not so understandable when you do it once every 4 songs, playing your own material, sober, and your material is 90% in G, C, and D. Not the end of the world, but not something the performer wants to happen.