Mad Tea Party - Zombie Boogie vinyl 7 inch

Went to a great show with my son last weekend: Mad Tea Party and Southern Culture on the Skids at the Grey Eagle in Asheville. More pics, videos and yapping after the jump. Check it out.

So here’s the full story. My son Mars desperately wanted me to take him to see Switchfoot at the Orange Peel. I think they’re OK, but wasn’t excited about going. When I realized Southern Culture on the Skids was the same night at the Grey Eagle I suggested to him that this was the show he ought to see. Somehow he discovered rockabilly on his own and has recently been obsessed with Reverend Horton Heat. Now, we have a very large music collection and a fair portion of it is this type of music, but again he found the roots by himself.

The rock gods were on my side last Friday. Switchfoot sold out. We drove down there, just in case, and after one look at the mostly teenage masses bulging out in both directions from the Peel I told him there was no way we were trying to get in. To be honest, I would’ve been happy to go home and watch TV. Thankfully, Mars got my lazy ass off the couch.

I have seen SCOTS several times, but literally decades ago, late ’80s, mostly in Norfolk, VA at the tiny dive called The Corner. I have always enjoyed their music and live shows, but I was surprised that they’re even better now! They’ve had a lot practice over the years. But the real surprise was Mad Tea Party. I can’t believe what I’ve been missing. I am a massive fan of this type of garage rock, garage pop, or whatever it should be called. Fuzztones, Sonics, Tell Tale Hearts, etc. I love this stuff.

This show was a really good time. People of all ages were there, we had a great time, and didn’t get hit by any flying fried chicken (SCOTS). Best of all it was 100% angst-free.

Being a vinyl freak I had to have this hand printed seven inch EP that was for sale at the show. My thirteen year old son had to have it autographed by drummer/guitarist/singer Jason Krekel. Mar plays guitar and drums, but not at the same time. Be sure to check out the videos below.

My son got Jason Krekel's autograph.

Mars decided to buy their latest album on CD, Found a Reason.

Mad Tea Party - Found a Reason

See them in action. This is my new favorite song, “Every Way” by our new favorite band, Mad Tea Party. Note the use of guitar head as drumstick.

Next up is “You Spooked Me.”

And headliners Southern Culture on the Skids were also fantastic. Oh man, this makes me I wish I could really play guitar. New song, don’t know the name.

“House of Bamboo” and a new song I think is called “Mojo Box.”

That is all.

KISS Streams Their Concert LIVE on Ustream

Just got this from my friends at Ustream. Check it out.

The rock band KISS will be doing a live webcast of their concert from
the Staples Center in Los Angeles at 9p PST on Wednesday, Nov. 25.
This is the first-ever live web concert for KISS, one of rock’s most
iconic bands, as they celebrate the release of their new, three-song
Guitar Hero® track pack. Ustream anticipates this will be a major
concert event that could set new viewership records.

Users can watch and interact by visiting the official KISS Facebook
page at facebook.com/KISS or on Ustream at
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/kiss-live to connect with other KISS
fans. KISS chose Ustream (www.ustream.tv), the leading live video
platform on the web, because of its powerful platform and scalability
in reaching a global audience of unlimited size.

"One Two (tickets) Oh My God!" We got in to see the Beastie Boys.

How ridiculously lucky can you get? This show was at a club that only holds a little over 900 people. It was announced only a day before tickets went on sale, and week before the show. I started loading the ticket page on a couple different computers right before 4 PM, along with a lot of other people. For the most part the site would not load at all after 4. Then, when it did I would get an error when I tried to buy tickets. About 10 minutes later it started saying “SOLD OUT.” I could not believe it. Took a minute to complain/tweet about it. Then, went back at it. Finally, I got through! And it was NOT sold out. Yes!

I wanted to go pretty bad, and my son Mars even more so. Mary said he got so nervous when I was trying to score tickets he couldn’t watch. He went to play his drums for a bit. That didn’t help my concentration.

I got the tickets. You want a shirt, bring money.

We got there over an hour in advance, and the line was already long. The cool thing is it appears the promoters and club did everything they could to keep it fair, and minimize ticket scalping. You could only buy two. Everybody’s tickets were “will call,” even if you got the few they had at the box office. You had to bring the card you used for the purchase and another picture ID. Once you got your tickets you had to go straight into the club. Despite all that I heard people in line with an extra ticket were getting offered crazy money.

I had no idea Biz Markie was going to be there. He DJ’d for about 20 minutes and it was awesome! He totally owned the crowd. His set went through a ton of old school hip hop from the ’80s and ’90s. And somewhat to my surprise the crowd was extra hip hop literate. The Biz kept fading the mix to let the crowd a capella through lines of Grandmaster Flash, LL Cool J, even some Bob Marley, and bunch of other stuff I can’t remember. Massively entertaining. “If you remember that one, I know you’ll remember this…”

Of course, he couldn’t finish without giving us a little from “Just a Friend.” Make SURE to watch this video again.

When the Beastie Boys finally came out it was to Biz Markie doing “The Biz vs. The Nuge” (Check Your Head). Perfect.

And I couldn’t believe they had Money Mark with them. Money Mark’s records get played as much as anything in my collection. He’s been a hero of mine for years. Later in the set Mike D asked Mark to come out from behind the keyboards to play “Mark on the Bus.” Brilliant. (Clip from a different show.)

And what about the Beastie Boys? Well, I don’t how it could have been any better. They were fun, funny and funky. They played everything from their earliest punk stuff to a couple brand new songs with something from just about every record, save for License to Ill. I loved every bit of it, but I was especially glad they did a bunch of their instrumentals like “Pow” and “Ricky’s Theme.”

Mix Master Mike put on an impressive show and really turned it out with a scratching solo to open the encore. They finished strong with “Sabotage” and it was time to go home.

A couple other highlights include AdRock giving the crowd dance lessons for the “Jerry Lewis” and the “Funky Penguin.” He’s got skills. And I’ll never forget Biz Markie joining the band to sing Elton John’s “Benny and the Jets.” The Biz took his shirt off and every person in the house pulled out their camera phone to capture the big man going natural.

But wait! There’s more. Thank you Flip owners.

“Sure Shot”

The seeds of rock…

My 12 year old son Mars has been itching to see a real rock show. It seems like most of the shows in town that we’re interested in are not all ages. He’s also been itching to visit a local record store near his school called Harvest Records. Recently he got his mom to take him by the store and he asked a guy there to recommend some local bands. He gave Mars a winner: Bandazian. Not only did Mars like their music he saw a flyer for a live show with them at The Grey Eagle in Asheville this past Friday. It was all he talked about for a week, and I was excited to take him to his first show. It didn’t hurt that I also dig their music.

We got there stupid early because I had to get the kid out of house, he couldn’t wait to leave. So we stood around for a good while until The Humbuckers, a solid country rock outfit came out. After they were done it was Bandazian time! Mars told me more than once “I’m nervous.” He had spent the week immersing himself in their music and playing his drum set along to their CD he bought, In Vacant Fields. (He even emailed the band manager to ask if he could use one of their songs in an animated Lego movie he’s making.) Then we saw the guys setting up. When he saw the drummer he said “I’m so jealous of that guy!” “Why?” “Because he’s really good drummer, he’s in my new favorite band, and he has red jeans!” I feel ya on the red jeans Mars man. I’ve always wanted a pair myself.

Mars brought the CD cover and a marker with him so he could get the drummer’s autograph. When the show was over the drummer and singer/guitarist were standing near us having a conversation. Mars was nervous big time now, but I told him I’ll just let them know we thought the show was great, because it was. He tagged along behind and when we introduced ourselves they could not have been cooler about it. They talked to Mars for a minute and when they found out he had their first album the drummer Kevin said he would grab a copy of the new one for Mars. Well, not only did he give Mars a copy of O Pioneer, he also gave him a hand screened Bandazian poster, numbered and signed by Andrew Findley. Soon to be framed. But wait, there’s more…

Mars with his Bandazian booty

After all this Mars was still nervous about asking Kevin for an autograph. I told Mars “he will think it’s the coolest thing ever if you ask him.” So he asked, and Kevin did act like he appreciated it. He even drew a beard on his picture, because he has big one now, “so you can recognize me.” Then singer Alex Keena walked up and signed it too. It was pretty much a perfect experience, for me as well. These guys have some great poignant songs and the combination of seeing and hearing them live, along with watching my son taking it all in for the first time got me a little choked up. We didn’t stay to see the “headline” band The Poles. There was no way the night was going to any better than it was right then.

Bandazian autographed CD

The video at the top is for the song “Crocodile Tears” and was made by a fan. I’d say that’s a quality fan. Check out Bandazian’s music with the links below.

website: www.bandazianmusic.com
epk: www.bandazianmusic.com/epk
myspace: www.myspace.com/bandazian
virb: www.virb.com/bandazian

They say you snooze, you lose,
Well I have snost and lost

Since the dissolution of Soul Coughing several years ago, Dode has continued making soulful, quirky “alternative” music without quite as much electronic sampling and such. He’s released a bunch of albums and EPs (see ). I haven’t listened to all of them, but I do rather enjoy Haughty Melodic (a palindrome of “Michael Doughty”), which was probably the best-received, critically and commercially. The standout tracks for me on that album are “Sunken-Eyed Girl,” “Your Misfortune,” and “I Hear The Bells,” but “Looking at the World from the Bottom of a Well” is the single, so to speak. It’s been featured on some tv soundtracks lately, so it’s experiencing a bit of a renaissance and you may have heard it on the radio, if you’re into that sort of thing. Personally, I’m more into this sort of thing:

Now Mike has a new album out entitled Golden Delicious. I haven’t listened to it as much as Haughty Melodic but I’ve been playing it for the past couple weeks and I’m really diggin’ it. My favorite track is “I Wrote a Song About Your Car,” and I also really like “More Bacon Than the Pan Can Handle” and the single “27 Jennifers” which was previously released on his 2003 EP “Rockity Roll.” Here’s the video for “27 Jennifers”:

Last night I had the pleasure of seeing Mike Doughty’s Band live at The Fillmore in San Francisco. He played a good mix of songs from his solo work and the Soul Coughing catalog. There wasn’t anything resembling a mosh pit, but we did get more bacon than the pan can handle. He actually played that track on a Roland SP-606 Sampling Workstation, like in this video. It was quite similar to the way that Jonathan Coulton plays “Mr. Fancy Pants” on the Zendrum in his live act. But I digress.

The non-musical highlight of last night’s show was when Dode set expectations with us for the end of the show. Four songs before the end, he explained that the next song would be “the song before the fake last song,” to be followed by “the fake last song” with an accompanying big rock ending and the re-introduction (including hometowns) of all the members of the band plus the soundguy. The explanation continued something like this, “Following the fake last song, we will turn around, and you will applaud, or not, and then we’ll turn around and act surprised to see you and then we’ll play two additional songs, including the song that’s been getting a lot of radio airplay, and then we’ll leave and you’ll leave.” I had never before heard a performer set such explicit expectations for the end of the show, and particularly liked that he called the fake last song by name.

You can hear more Mike Doughty at last.fm.