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Archive: April, 2008
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| Photo | John Vettese |
A couple of chairs were the only difference between night and day. Put Sharin Foo and Sune Rose Wagner onstage with their web of effects pedals, stenciled amplifiers, and the awesome primal drumming energy of Leah Shapiro, and whatever the hour, faces are pretty much gonna melt.
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| Photo | John Vettese |
Nighttime is more the natural element of their reverb-kissed harmony-pop, so The Raveonettes' appearance at Johnny Brenda's last week felt a bit more right. The duo, on their feet, rocket back and forth, blasted through the new Lust Lust Lust ("Dead Sound" and "Hallucinations" sounded especially great) then broght out the back-catalogue goodies like "Love In A Trashcan" and "The Great Love Sound." Some of us realized we should really tally up how often Foo and Wagner use either the words "Love" or "Sound" in song titles. Meanwhile, heads bobbed. Drunk people shrieked. Sober people professed their undying love for the onstage Dane of their liking. Raveonettes fans are freaking insane.
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| Photo | John Vettese |
After such a boisterous night, one would think that the band's lunchtime appearance at World Caf' Live the next day would be drained and listless. And yeah, Sune Rose and Sharin performed seated, in folding chairs, diminishing most of their visual appeal. But the music - focusing this time entirely on Lust3 - sounded every bit as loud and brash, confrontationally cutesy. Or cutely confrontational. Whichever it was, lights were kept appropriately low, reflecting the previous show's environs, and the liquid lunch partaking crowd was lured in. Gradually they rose from their cafeteria-esque seating and moved to the front of the stage. By the time "Aly Walk With Me" closed the daytime show as it had the night, hips were shaking to the sexy groove. I think I actually heard somebody scream.
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| Photo | John Vettese |
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| Photo | John Vettese |
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| Photo | John Vettese |
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| Photo | John Vettese |
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Regie Cabico didn’t waste any time. He opened his one-man show, Unbuckled, Uncensored, struggling to tell his mom he was gay, physically strained as he attempted to mince words and soften phrases. After a couple awkward attempts, he came right out with it and professed his love for both men and Broadway musicals. Like the following hour of poetry, spoken word, singing, dancing and monologues, the scene was as uncomfortable as it was really, really funny.
I imagine it’s not easy to come out to quite a few parents, but Mrs. Cabico had some secret weapons: Catholic guilt and plenty of names for the Blessed Mother. (Our Lady of Pert Plus? Genius, woman.) Much of the show revolved around Cabico’s relationship with his parents, sisters (Faith and Charity, naturally) and New York City as a gay Filipino artist. Which he managed, impressively, to make pretty relatable to a diverse audience. Turns out, awkward dorm sex is awkward dorm sex regardless of race, creed or sexuality.
Performed solo and with only a few props, Unbuckled, Uncensored is the perfect vehicle for someone like Cabico, who can go from belting out Annie tunes to re-enacting a painful break-up scene without the slightest bump. The minimalist theater it was performed in, however, was not intentional. Displaced twice by the Convention Center expansion, the Asian Arts Initiative is working out of a temporary salon space before while it renovates its new home on Vine St. Check them out at asianartsinitiative.org to see how you can help out.
(You can catch Regie Cabico at the AAI Wednesdays and Sundays for playwriting and performance workshops now through May 31. Call 215-557-0455 or visit the Web site for more info.)
Classic footage from Atom's final show. Includes a full-band version of Atom's "Goalie" song, followed by the abusing of an Atom-head pinata. Here's the Zambonis' review of the show back in the day.
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| Photo | John Vettese |
Now, I'm not blaming Sean Agnew or anything. But when that day-of-show R5 list e-mail went out saying that the eels' Philly appearance last weekend was "the biggest production we have ever done in the sanctuary," I was imagining something akin to the Oh, What A Beautiful Morning live album. Lush arrangements. A full orchestra. Lisa Germano on backing vox. None of these was the case, and the production we got - while massive in its own way - was more perplexing than anything else.
Opening the show was a screening of Parallel Worlds, Parallel Lives, an BBC documentary on eels impersario Mark Oliver "E" Everett's search to learn more about his father, quantum physicist Hugh Everett III. It was cheeky and touching, but filled with heady mindfuckery about parallel universes and double slit theoretics and waveforms and Schr'dinger's Cat. Fascinating stuff, but it quickly felt like, man, when are we going to lighten the mood and talk about death for a few hours?
Once the screen dropped, the performance itself seemed underwhelming as much as it was hugely complex. The stage was scattered with a bevy on musical instruments - drumkit, pedal steel, singing saw, harmonium, piano. As the show went on, it quickly became clear that the only who would be operating said instruments were Everett and an accompanist he called "The Chet." (Wikipedia indicates his name is Jeffrey Lyster; me and my friends Joey and Eric all nerdily thought it was some nod to "The Cheat" a la Homestar Runner.) The two men rushed from instrument to instrument, mixing up the sounds and reworking songs but occasionally shortchanging things in their attempt to be ambidextrous.
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| Photo | John Vettese |
To add levity to Everett's weighty, morose topical material, the production was positioned as a variety show of sorts...between songs, he self-depricatingly read bitter fanmail aloud, while Lyster read pages from Everett's recent autobiography Things The Grandchildren Should Know. Sometimes an omnisient offtage voice-of-God (get it? God? In the Church?? hahahahaha, man that joke's never been made before) would chime in with remarks like "MARK EVERETT THIS IS YOUR LIFE" or whatnot.
Dispensing with the obvious gripe ("woulda have been nice to know the show was starting with an hour-long physics lesson"), its still hard to make heads or tails of the performance. Entertaining as it was watching E and The Chet dash between instruments, I went into it expecting an orchestra, or at the very least a large band, and what I got felt disappointingly spare.
Further, the disparate production elements (the film, the fanmail, the autobiography) didn't seem very well thought-out. Everett changes his M.O. with each eels tour - rock band to string quartet, solo acoustic to orchetra - to keep fans constantly on their toes. But here it felt like he was being conceptual for conceptual's sake, and the pieces fell just short of connecting. (The autobio bit was a bit self-indulgent, to boot.)
At the same time, I can't in good conscience say the performance was a unilateral disappointment. Its spare nature made possible the inclusion of beautiful songs that Everett rarely performs - namely "Elizabeth on the Bathroom Floor," a stirring sketch of his late sister that appeared on eels' 1998 album Electro-Shock Blues. The beautiful songs he always plays were made moreso in the setting - the piano-led "It's a Motherfucker" rang off the rafters and sent chills down my neck. Daisies of the Galaxy recieved thorough setlist representation ("I Like Birds," "Mr. E's Beautiful Blues," "Flyswatter"), and the criminally underrated Souljacker popped up via parts one and two of its title track. Even a fakebook cover of Zeppelin's "Good Times, Bad Times" (with E on drums The Chet on guitar and vox) was spot-on and fun.
So...good show? Bad show? The puzzle pieces are all there, and yet it's difficult to say. Perhaps, as Everett's music so deftly mixes beauty and poppy tenderness with bereavement and personal tragedy, so too we are to learn from this show that there is no simplicity in the universe. Life is complex, quantum physics are complex, and it should all be embraced as such.
Or, perhaps, the lesson came less from Everett-the-philosopher, and more from the grouchy side of his persona, teaching us to join the ranks of the pessimists.
To wit: if I'd expected nothing, I would have been pleased with what I got.
It's like Bee Season, but you're all by yourself
I was thinking today of playing a great big joke and directing you to this game, but I figured I'd be nice (check it out anyway as it's fairly hilarious). I realized, though, that I've yet to talk about Bookworm, my personal favorite online game of all time. I've spent so much time making words, you would think this post wasn't riddled with errors before I posted it. You couldn't be more wrong, though.
Bookworm is what would happen if Scrabble and Connect Four had a virtual baby. Basically, you make words on a vertical board by connecting lettered tiles, except there's no sneaky sis to mess things up. You get more points for longer words or for using tough letter - like J or Qu. You've got to watch, though, as someone is sneaking flaming tiles into the mix, and they threaten to burn down the library. What will dorks do if that happens? On the other side, you'll also get gold and green tiles that up your score, and each level you'll be given a word to make by the eponymous Bookworm. Make it, and you'll get loads of points.
Get your dictionary, and head over here.
I can't shake the notion that the worm's name is Randy.
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