Sunday, April 22, 2007

belated show reviews

Saw a great live show last night, and it reminded me that i wanted to write about a show i saw last year. I think i was too much in the throes of personal spaghetti to write much of anything, and i needed to see another show to make me talk about the last one. Or two.

Andey and a friend of ours (taking the ticket we had originally obtained for an ex) went to see the Indigo Girls at the Warfield. They rocked, naturally. Amy wore an amusing shirt depicting several executive-branch types and the words "war criminals" and Emily wore an... AC/DC tee. Opening for them was Bitch. I actually liked Bitch quite a lot, probably because, as a humanist, feminism doesn't bother me. Others i knew that went to the show lauded her musicianship while lamenting her political bent, which is silly. Politics are part of performance, explicitly or not.

In any case, she plugged her next show at a smaller venue, where she was the headline act. Andey and i decided to check that show out. I'm glad we did, but not because of seeing Bitch again. Her act didn't vary in the slightest. Same set in the same order, same jokes between songs, same "spontaneous" talking to the crowd. So... i'm glad we could support her; you know, as a starving feminist artist, or something. I just wish she hadn't plugged a show to people, when it would be the exact same show they saw during the plug.

It did, however, expose me to Mr. Hayashi, a sacramento band that we both really liked. I meant to promote them back then, but never got around to it. The webpage is a myspace profile, but don't hold that against them. Sean writes good stuff, and plays and sings it like he means it, which matters to me. Someone can perform technically brilliant material, but if there isn't feeling behind it, it doesn't really move me.

1 comment:

Salome said...

Bitch used to be part of a duo, Bitch and Animal. They opened for Ani Difranco a lot during a tour several years ago. I hadn't known that Bitch went solo, but I'm bummed to hear that she performed the exact same show 2x in a row. I have an Ani Difranco DVD where she shows part of Bitch & Animal's set a few times, and I liked them. I always wanted to see more of them. Thanks for the heads up on Mr. Hayashi. I pulled up the link and liked the music alot. Found your blog by Googling.