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Wow.
I didn't know a single song, yet that was one of the best 10 concerts I think I've ever seen. I've only heard 5 or 6 of their songs a few times on Launch or XM, and they were good, but not "go get this" good. They seemed much more somber on recorded medium. Live, it was just soooo good, so happy / serious, so very very well-done.
They were wearing private school getups, with ties and all.
So we had those "backstage" passes, courtesy of a co-worker's dad being friends with Jenny the keyboardist's dad. Turns out they play Texas Holdum together in Portland. Afetr the show, they shoo'd everyone else out, and told us to have a seat in the front row. Then, they cleaned the place up for about 45 minutes. We were honestly 60 seconds from leaving...
... when a guy says "you're jenny's guests, right? Hang on, she'll be right out." Sure enough, she comes out, figures out how she knows our friend carol, and a very pleasant conversation ensues for the next half hour.
Highlights:
- The gear that got stolen has been found pretty much. Turns out that someone within the crystal meth community in Portland tipped the cops off that a house had musical gear in it. It was raided. Their old bass and a few other goodies were there. But the info in that house led to the taking down of a 17 or 18 house ring all over town, which yielded other goodies, including info that led to the discovery of a 5,000-sq-ft storage facility that was FULL of stolen musical gear. Almsot every bit of it is turning out to be from NW bands who've been ripped off in the last 2 or 3 years. The feds are involved, apparently. This just went down about 2 or 3 days ago, she said, so more details might pop up, but as it stands, the Dec'ists have friends back home who are picking up the gear and de-toxing it (was "covered in nasty chemicals" she said, from being in a meth lab.) Yayy!
- They marveled at how people find out about them and come out to the shows. We discussed music boards, and I mentioned Obner, as an example of how people discuss what they like and then trade samples. She agreed that there's a lot of future in that, and it seems to account for more word-of-mouth than traditional promoters might be willing to admit.
- And then we talked about miscellaneous stuff, touring stories, life on the road, etc. She was damn nice.
Then the violinist came out, sat behind us, and looked really pooped. I told her nice show, you look tired, etc. And then we took off. As we were walking up towards the exit, I saw the singer come out in a red hoodie sweatshirt, but the moment was over.
So that's it. Great show, nice people, can't wait to see them again. Okkervil opened, btw, and I only caught one song but it was pretty damn good. Something about staring at the river, and only the river stared back, or something like that. They look Young!!
Last edited by Cap'n Squirrgle on Sun Apr 17, 2005 12:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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