Thursday, July 21, 2011
Hot in Cleveland
Summertime pilgrimage to the Cleveland area for grandkid's birthday and Sharon's semi-annual grit-recharge....it's always muggy in Cleveland this time of year, but this year's "heat dome" seems to have made it even worse. Home in a few days.
Top 500 Albums?
Rolling Stone, struggling as ever to remain relevant in the post-music rag age, just posted their Top 500 Greatest Albums of all time.
We're suckers for their little mini-reviews of fave albums, and we're always mining for good crit-speak nuggetry to steal, but apart from finding a way to infuriate each of the remaining 80 or so self-professed multi-generation music fans who actually subscribe to it, we're not sure what the point is.
Oh yeah, and Sgt Pepper's is number 1.
We're suckers for their little mini-reviews of fave albums, and we're always mining for good crit-speak nuggetry to steal, but apart from finding a way to infuriate each of the remaining 80 or so self-professed multi-generation music fans who actually subscribe to it, we're not sure what the point is.
Oh yeah, and Sgt Pepper's is number 1.
Sunday, July 10, 2011
Nothin' doin'
Still above 7K. We bagged the weekend, Cleveland trip starts Thursday. Guess we'll hit it when we come back.
grrrr.....
grrrr.....
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
The flow
After teasing us for a few days that the Roaring Fork might subside to marginally sane levels, the crik done spiked agin !!! Passed 8K before dropping in its usual day/night sine wave way. Cooler weather in store the next or so, we'll see what Thurs and Fri suggest.
I'm good at 5K, maybe a tad more. 6K ? Hmmm....
I'm good at 5K, maybe a tad more. 6K ? Hmmm....
Monday, July 4, 2011
The Classic Rock season
A few notes on the three old-fart shows we show in May and June.
The Moody Blues - tepid fan from BITD, the joke about the Moody Blues is that they've been playing the same set for 40 years, which is only partially true, since the set we saw included a fair number of their second-level hits from the 1980's. Justin Hayward's voice is still pretty strong at 61, and the band (Hayward, original members John Lodge and Graeme Edge, plus a handful of relative youngsters) found a way to breathe some life into chestnuts like "Question", "I'm Just a Singer" and, naturally, "Nights In White Satin", after which they seemed to kind of milk the predictable prolonged applause. Tacky, we thought. Almost as tacky as Lodge's 80's style big hair and rock-star posturing, which we found a little embarrassing given the guy's age. But...no harm, no foul. The band has been in business for 37 years, almost as long as the Rolling Stones, so they can do whatever they want. Scary, that.
Overall, fun set for the old farts, not bad musically, and long life to them. Edge (who is technically the band's only original member, from 1964) had just celebrated his 70th birthday - his drumming was polite and not much more than a token - their real drummer, Gordon Marshall, who has been playing with them since 1991, is a genuine powerhouse and a force of nature. Easily the most fun musician to watch.
Kansas/Jethro Tull - We were actually looking forward to seeing Kansas, one of the last arena-big Midwestern rock bands still in business. My college roommate sophomore year, a math guy from Missouri, was a true from-the-first-album fan, and made me a parttime believer in this outfit. I had a grudging respect for their ability to borrow some of the canoodling fun from the prog world but still craft catchy, hook-laden AOL hits, stradding the line between the former's garish excesses and the latters rote preditability. Plus they had a violinist, which was cool.
Anyway, their mostly-daylight set was tight, all business and surprisingly vigorous, framed as it was around their three big radio hits from the late 70's ("Carry On Wayward Son", "Point of Know Return" and "Dust In The Wind", the latter being every hyper-sensitive 70's girl's favorite pop ode to existentialism). I felt like these guys could have phoned in their set, but they played like they were still trying to win fans, and for a thirty year franchise, we liked that. We were actually very happy to hear "Song For America".
I'd seen Tull at least five or six times, extending back into the late 1970's, including the famous "stripper" show they played at McNichols in the late 1980's (ask me about it sometime), so I knew what to expect. (No riots this time...) Anderson's voice has aged somewhat oddly, with a far narrower range centered in the upper register, unlike most of his still-working contemporaries who eschew the higher notes by playing in a different keys, re-arranging the songs or handing off to background singers (e.g., Donald Fagan). This renders most of their aggressive material somewhat bereft of its trademark snarl. For classic-rock fans accustomed to the album versions, this has left some disappointed ticket holders - personally, we find his voice more interesting, and the songs more curious pieces of work.
And give then fact that Anderson and Barre and Co were delivering, on its 40th anniversary, the entirety of Aqualung, the results were...mixed. Anderson's flute playing and onstage antics were engaging as always, but much of the original music's oomph seemed a shade hollowed out. Which, of course, is probably an unfair observation, since neither Anderson nor his audience can snap their fingers can make 40 years vanish. Nor does it really matter, since most of this material is genuinely ancient anyway, and its performance onstge is merely a gift to classic-rock 50-somethings, rather than a genuine campaign to infuse them with meaning. Anderson has sung "Locomotive Breath" so many times, it's difficult to believe it carries much meaning for him.
But it was the stuff in between the radio staples we enjoyed the most. "Wond'ring Aloud" was a lovely bit of acoustic introspection..."Mother Goose", the menacing "Cross Eyed Mary" and probably my favorite Tull song "Wind Up" were all highlights as well.
And the non-Aqualung pieces - the full "Thick As A Brick", "Bouree", "Songs From the Wood" and the magnificent and heart-rending "Farm On The Freeway" (my favorite concert surprise all year) were all outstanding.
One odd thing - the Tull combo formed a surprisingly tight onstage configuration, almost clubbish in their proximity to each other, as if Anderson wanted to keep the show (despite the expansive Red Rocks environment) as if playing a pub. No pics, sorry - couldn't get a decent shot, despite good seats about Row 24 stage right.
We'll throw up our Peter Gabriel review soon.
The Moody Blues - tepid fan from BITD, the joke about the Moody Blues is that they've been playing the same set for 40 years, which is only partially true, since the set we saw included a fair number of their second-level hits from the 1980's. Justin Hayward's voice is still pretty strong at 61, and the band (Hayward, original members John Lodge and Graeme Edge, plus a handful of relative youngsters) found a way to breathe some life into chestnuts like "Question", "I'm Just a Singer" and, naturally, "Nights In White Satin", after which they seemed to kind of milk the predictable prolonged applause. Tacky, we thought. Almost as tacky as Lodge's 80's style big hair and rock-star posturing, which we found a little embarrassing given the guy's age. But...no harm, no foul. The band has been in business for 37 years, almost as long as the Rolling Stones, so they can do whatever they want. Scary, that.
Overall, fun set for the old farts, not bad musically, and long life to them. Edge (who is technically the band's only original member, from 1964) had just celebrated his 70th birthday - his drumming was polite and not much more than a token - their real drummer, Gordon Marshall, who has been playing with them since 1991, is a genuine powerhouse and a force of nature. Easily the most fun musician to watch.
Kansas/Jethro Tull - We were actually looking forward to seeing Kansas, one of the last arena-big Midwestern rock bands still in business. My college roommate sophomore year, a math guy from Missouri, was a true from-the-first-album fan, and made me a parttime believer in this outfit. I had a grudging respect for their ability to borrow some of the canoodling fun from the prog world but still craft catchy, hook-laden AOL hits, stradding the line between the former's garish excesses and the latters rote preditability. Plus they had a violinist, which was cool.
Anyway, their mostly-daylight set was tight, all business and surprisingly vigorous, framed as it was around their three big radio hits from the late 70's ("Carry On Wayward Son", "Point of Know Return" and "Dust In The Wind", the latter being every hyper-sensitive 70's girl's favorite pop ode to existentialism). I felt like these guys could have phoned in their set, but they played like they were still trying to win fans, and for a thirty year franchise, we liked that. We were actually very happy to hear "Song For America".
I'd seen Tull at least five or six times, extending back into the late 1970's, including the famous "stripper" show they played at McNichols in the late 1980's (ask me about it sometime), so I knew what to expect. (No riots this time...) Anderson's voice has aged somewhat oddly, with a far narrower range centered in the upper register, unlike most of his still-working contemporaries who eschew the higher notes by playing in a different keys, re-arranging the songs or handing off to background singers (e.g., Donald Fagan). This renders most of their aggressive material somewhat bereft of its trademark snarl. For classic-rock fans accustomed to the album versions, this has left some disappointed ticket holders - personally, we find his voice more interesting, and the songs more curious pieces of work.
And give then fact that Anderson and Barre and Co were delivering, on its 40th anniversary, the entirety of Aqualung, the results were...mixed. Anderson's flute playing and onstage antics were engaging as always, but much of the original music's oomph seemed a shade hollowed out. Which, of course, is probably an unfair observation, since neither Anderson nor his audience can snap their fingers can make 40 years vanish. Nor does it really matter, since most of this material is genuinely ancient anyway, and its performance onstge is merely a gift to classic-rock 50-somethings, rather than a genuine campaign to infuse them with meaning. Anderson has sung "Locomotive Breath" so many times, it's difficult to believe it carries much meaning for him.
But it was the stuff in between the radio staples we enjoyed the most. "Wond'ring Aloud" was a lovely bit of acoustic introspection..."Mother Goose", the menacing "Cross Eyed Mary" and probably my favorite Tull song "Wind Up" were all highlights as well.
And the non-Aqualung pieces - the full "Thick As A Brick", "Bouree", "Songs From the Wood" and the magnificent and heart-rending "Farm On The Freeway" (my favorite concert surprise all year) were all outstanding.
One odd thing - the Tull combo formed a surprisingly tight onstage configuration, almost clubbish in their proximity to each other, as if Anderson wanted to keep the show (despite the expansive Red Rocks environment) as if playing a pub. No pics, sorry - couldn't get a decent shot, despite good seats about Row 24 stage right.
We'll throw up our Peter Gabriel review soon.
All that water
Historic runoff in Colorado this season has more or less grounded us. The Roaring Ford, which by now is usually in the 1000-2000 cfs range, is still pumping 7000cfs, which is a bit higher than I've done it before. Hopefully it'll come back to the 3-4K range by next weekend. Getting antsy to get wet.
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