Hi everyone! Sorry, no posts in January. It was a pretty busy month for me. I drove back to school on January 9 and started classes again. I'm taking three this quarter: intro to creative writing, intro to American literature, and a writing workshop. Lots of writing to do for those classes, so the blog had to take a bit of a back seat. Any way, I wanted to update you all on what I've been up to. First off, I've thought about it for a while and I've decided to bump my star rating for the ARW show down to a 6 instead of my previous rating of 7. The more I think about that show, the more disappointed I become with it.
Second, I have been to three concerts so far this year, and I thought I would talk about each of them for a little bit. First I saw Eric Johnson. I got those tickets as a Christmas gift. I was pretty excied, because I had been wanting to see a full concert of his since seeing him with Experience Hendrix in 2010. Yes, I hadn't seen him since my very first concert ever. He played at The Rose in Pasadena, a venue apparently under the same ownership as the Canyon Club in Agoura and the Saban Theatre in Beverly Hills. It was a pretty nice venue, but the show itself.......meh. When we got to the venue, that was where we learned that this was in fact an ACOUSTIC Eric Johnson show, which disappointed us right off the bat. I was hoping to hear some blues guitar! Not only that, he was apparently recovering from an illness, so he didn't have much energy on stage. Also, the audience was pretty obnoxious. Lots of drunk, insufferable patrons clapping really loudly and shouting things at him. I could tell it was really getting on his nerves at some point. I didn't blame him one bit. It got on my nerves too. Overall, I'm giving this show a 5/10. Not horrible, but definitely could have been a lot better. It had a lot of potential, but in the end, it didn't quite get there.
Next I saw something much better: Stick Men, the trio featuring Tony Levin, Pat Mastelotto, and Markus Reuter. They played at the Canyon Club, a nice local drive for me. Not the best venue, but it was a much more interesting show. I sat directly in front of Tony Levin, and in the end was given a setlist, which I got signed by all of them. Pat hinted during the show that King Crimson would be playing at the Greek Theatre in May or June. I hope I can make that show, as I have quite a few things going on during that time. Overall, this show was a lot of fun and I hope to see King Crimson when they come back this summer. 7/10.
Third, I saw Tom Chaplin of Keane on Thursday at the El Rey Theatre. I hadn't been to that venue in about 4 and a half years. The last time I came there was for Katatonia in 2012. So far, this is my favorite concert of the year. I'm a huge Keane fan so it was a cool opportunity for me. As usual, I was right up front in the general admission crowd. I tend to have good luck with general admission. Being only 5'4, I can't really afford to NOT be up front. Anyway, Tom put on a great show with lots of energy and a great set list. Most of the songs I knew, but there were a few rarities that I did not recognize. My only complaints really are about the sound. The piano was very hard to hear at times and the drums were way too loud, at least from where I was standing. 8/10
My Marillion endeavor continues. Since January I have been adding more to my collection. I got vinyl copies of Fugazi, A Sunday Night Above the Rain, and most recently, Script for a Jester's Tear. I'm very much looking forward to hearing all of these. I figured I would get the rest of the Fish albums first since there's only 4 of them.
