Recent Gigs

Saw The Hold Steady this week following Ryan of the Adams the other week.

They were entertaining but very odd. Craig Finn the lead singer is a strange kind of rock star. To listen to him you'd imagine him to be some rugged rocker carved out of the same stone as Bruce Springsteen. The reality is somewhat different. Craig Finn to look at is the rotund bespectacle guy you find at your side in most bars. You wouldnt look at him twice. That is until he gets on stage and uses his charasmatic Minneanapolis snarl and start flailing around the stage. Some rockers ooze cool, some rockers have the crowd in their hand, the audience hanging at their every beck and call. That's not what's going on here. Craig Finn, this man with the most masculine of voices, flails around the stage with a bizarre campness thats hard to fathom. But where I'd imagine a hardened rock crowd to be troubled by such campness, he somehow uses this to strike some strange everyman relationship with the crowd. He's one of them and no one is asking any questions. And the rest of the band look like pretty much any pub rock band you'll see banging out the hits in your local. But the sounds they make is a force of nature.

Ryan Adams was a different proposition altogether and it caught me by surprise. I was expecting some rough hewn finger bleading country rock and what we got was something so polished and artistically perfect that I found myself both in awe and strangely disapointed. But saying that it was still a good night out.

And prior to that I'd also caught Gomez and The Black Keys. Gomez were the usual melodic pop/rock/blues that I love and cant criticise. And the Black Keys were blistering and raw. Just the two of them on stage, the drummer and guitarist banging out seven shades of hell from their equipment. Highly recomended.

And next up Coldplay! (oops)

Just wanted to suggest you have a listen to a couple of the warm up bands I came across that blew me away. The first is Dr Dog who's myspace site is as follows. We saw these guys supporting Gomez and The Black Keys: http://www.myspace.com/drdog The second is The Vasco Era who are a Melbourne based band and they mean it man! They were supporting the Hold Steady: http://www.myspace.com/thevascoera