Modern Minstrels

Explosions in the Sky

I went with Nick to see a band called Explosions in the Sky at Cafe du Nord in San Francisco on Friday. First I'll say the two opening bands left something to be desired. The first was a guy and a piano. I shouldn't be hard on him though because he said he lost his voice, so he didn't sing anything and instead just played the piano. He played 3 songs, and they sounds pretty simplistic, so I think the singing would have helped. The second band, Lazarus, rather unfortunately did sing. The lead singer really didn't have a good voice, and the lyrics weren't really that exiting. They did do something cool which was have this home video type thing playing behind them on most of their songs. The lead singer was definitely drunk, high, or both and after 3 songs in a row asked "Can I get some more electric guitar in the monitor?" (said in a drunken slur). Then came Explosions in the Sky and it was all worth it. Their music is completely instrumental. You can preview some tracks on iTunes here. The changes in mood throughout any given song were amazing. It would be all slow and then they would go into these fast, crazy guitar riffs. They were really awesome to hear, and if they're ever playing a show in your town you should definitely check them out.

Warm October Night

Last Sunday I went to the Yellowcard show at The Warfield in San Francisco. Yellowcard played, without a doubt, the best set I have ever heard. They played a 20 song, hour and a half set. They played lots of their old songs and quite a few songs they haven't done live before. The setlist was as follows (all the songs are right, but might be a little out of order):

• Piano/Violin Intro (Pete and Sean)
• Inside Out
• October Nights
• Breathing
• Believe
• Powder
• Finish Line
• One Year, Six Months
• Rough Draft
• Trembling
• View From Heaven
• Empty Apartment
• Back Home
• Life of a Salesman
• Only One
• A.W.O.L.
• For Pete's Sake
• Way Away

  Encore

• Rocket
• Gifts and Curses
• Ocean Avenue

I was most excited to hear Gifts and Curses, which is a song they wrote for the Spider-man 2 Soundtrack. It's a great song, and the piano and violin sound really good together. Sean also gave a shout out to his Dad who was at the show, before playing Life of a Salesman.

The opening bands were quite good. The Starting Line played about a 45 minute set right before Yellowcard. It included Best of Me, Up and Go, Cheek to Cheek, Leaving, Left Coast Envy, A Good Night's Sleep, Given the Chance, and about 4 new songs. Good stuff.

The other two openers were Reeve Oliver and The Matches. Reeve Oliver was your typical 3 person punk band. Not bad, but nothing exciting. The Matches had a bit more unique sound and I enjoyed their set. Even better though was after the show was over, The Matches were outside with acoustic guitars rocking out on the sidewalk. It was pretty entertaining.

New Music

Picked up a couple of debut album's yesterday, Straylight Run (self titled) and Denver Harbor (Scenic). Didn't know the Denver Harbor CD was coming out already, but I saw it was listed on the iTunes Music Store. Then when I got to Best Buy, they had it for a mere $7 so I had to get it. Denver Harbor features 2 members (including the singer) from a band called Fenix TX that Mike introduced me to freshman year but they broke up a year ago or so. Their one "mainstream" appearance was their song Phoebe Cates included on the American Pie 2 soundtrack. Anyway, the Denver Harbor CD is a good CD, definitely very similar to some of the heavier Fenix Tx songs such as Ben. Not much needs to be said about the Straylight Run album, it is amazingly beautiful. My one gripe with it is the first song, The Perfect Ending. Even from the name you might question why it's the first track. Even aside from that the song is waaaaaay to slow to be the first track, so I pretty much always start on track 2, The Tension and the Terror. Don't get me wrong, The Perfect Ending is a good song, though it has taken some time to grow on me, but it really should have been the last song on the album. Mike put up a couple Straylight songs from an acoustic radio performance which I highly recommend you download. In addition to those albums Sarah brought me a couple movie soundtracks, namely Garden State and Napoleon Dynamite. Both were great movies, and have equally great soundtracks. The Napoleon CD is worth it just for the audio clips from the movie, including the greatest pickup line ever: I see you're drinking one percent, is that because you think you're fat? (pause) Because you're not, you could be drinking whole if you wanted to.