by Michael S. Kaplan, published on 2006/04/19 03:00 -04:00, original URI: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/michkap/archive/2006/04/19/578767.aspx
I have seen all of them within the past few months, not necessarily in that order? :-)
Let's see, I'll start with Kristin Connell. I saw her a few times recently, still love that voice and am very much looking forward to her next album, or at least the work she is doing to help with the vocals on Ryan Smith's album....
There is a song that they wrote together called "For Old Times" the memory of which has been occasionally managing to distract me from the similarly named fifth track of Back To Me (the latest from Kathleen Edwards). I am not sure why *that* song is sticking in my brain, though. If it resonates with any part of my life, it is one from over 10 years ago, maybe 15 years ago (It is that unusual time when you discover can sleep with people and actually just sleep, without it being weird. If you know what I mean). I'll figure it out eventually....
So I also got to see Kathleen Edwards not too long ago -- she played the Swedish and American Hall in San Fransisco and I took the opportunity to fly on a free ticket, BART to a local train, local train to the gig, train back to BART, and BART back to the airport -- net cost < $20, including dinner!
It was a very awesome show and I even got a CD signed for Kristin (Kathleen left it blank after Kristin's name, to leave room to write something when Kristin hands it back some day to be filled out -- it was Kathleen's idea, it blew me away and I still can't figure out why). Another incredible show that included Summerlong (that song I talked about earlier) and lots of my other favorites like Hockey Skates, In State, Back To Me, and so on. Hers is another voice that I doubt I will ever get tired of.....
Opening for Kathleen was Luke Doucet (yes, Sarah McLachlan's gutarist!) -- a man whose latest album "Broken (and other rogue states) is as far as I am concerned the ultimate break-up album. Best listened to if you are on your own, in the dark, especially if you are drinking heavily. Have you ever been in a breakup where you were less happy than the one you were breaking up with? Well, this is an album you probably ought to listen to also, in that case.
I think that his ex, the one who the album is a bizarrely powerful though of course negative tribute to (what did Wayans say in The Last Boy Scout? "I wznt to meet the bitch who fucked you up."), is Emily Haines of Matrix. I could be wrong and I am hardly an expert, but something in his between song comments and what he was saying after the show to a bunch of people when he was signing CDs....
Anyway back in Seattle, I got to see Beth Orton. A very awesome show, this is the second time I saw her. Despite the fact that she was jet-lagged, she was still amazing in concert, and funny as hell. Dinner in the city (Dalhia Lounge) and a quick slide over to the Showbox, a venue that is even more amazing now that you do not have smell like an ashtray when you come out of it. If you know what I mean.
Kristin and Ryan were going to come and see Beth with us, but they were putting down tracks on Ryan's album. Maybe next time. :-)
Anyway, last night that fourth episode of Love Monkey was on, and Aimee got to use that SAG card she must have gotten from her appearance on Buffy where she had that cool line ("Man, I hate playing vampire towns!"). She did "She Really Wants You" and then chats with hero Tom after the show, plus gives him a heads-up later that there was a cancellation on Letterman (How does she even know that? "Dude, it's a mystery!").
So it will all come full circle over the summer when Aimee or Kathleen or maybe both head back around Seattle, and another show even sooner (maybe when Kristin plays somewhere closer than Tacoma, nexr month!). I'll probably write more about most of this some other day, it is the only non-work stuff that is my brain these days that I can actually talk about, which makes it pretty interesting to me (it's the sort of thing that made a GPM call me genuinely interesting last month, so it has to be contributing positively to the work/life balance!).
Anyway, more of this of drunkard's walk sort of post another day. :-)
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