John's Ears Talk
Lollapalooza 2007 Redux
I have no good reason to call this a redux. It sounds better to me than recap. For those that are unaware, I enjoy music. All kinds of music. Even stuff that I admit is bad music. For three years now, Chicago has hosted Lollapalooza. I have gone all three years. I traditionally have sent a recap e-mail to a group of friends, but none of them like music so it has been more for me than anyone. But not this year... This year I have a whole section of a website for my rumblings...
For some reason this year I decided to only go one day, Saturday. I really regret it. Even though it is hot/crowded/expensive, I still very much enjoy it and have found some of my favorite bands at Lollas of years past. This year I didn't know enough of the bands going in for it to be worth it. Saturday had most of the bands I wanted to see, including Muse (one of my favorites), so figured might as well just go one day.
RECAP TIIIIIIIIIME!
1:30 - Pete Yorn: I meant to go to this but I woke up pretty hungover on Saturday. Yes, so hungover that just standing outside would be a challenge. I was told it was good by someone who has no reason to lie, so we'll stick with them.
2:15 - Sam Roberts Band: I had never heard of this Montreal group, but my friend was seeing them and I figured 'what the h'. Sell Point 1: They had a keyboard guy playing special keyboards that I should know the name of but don't. Sell Point 2: Their lead singer was wearing a "Big Trouble in Little China" t-shirt. Sell Point 3: Their bassist might be 10 years older than the next oldest person in the group. Sell Point 4: I liked their music. Sell Point 5: During one song their lead singer blatant hand gestures to match up with the lyrics that rivaled the "Too Legit to Quit" motions that Hammer dropped on us a while ago. 5 sell points earns a gold star. Check them out.
I also realized what a huge advantage it is to be canadian. If you are Canadian you immediately have a whole country pulling for you. I can't name another country that has that as a characteristic.
2:30 - Silverchair. I caught the last song of their set and therefore have no opinion. The highlight was when my aforementioned friend, in reference to seeing Pearl Jam on Sunday, said "My seventh grade self is gonna be so jealous". Well said, Jdub, well said.
Side note: I cured my hangover by drinking 20oz of water and 22oz of beer during Sam Roberts Band.
3:30 - Motion City Soundtrack: I was only half watching this one. They seemed fun and played well. Yeah.
3:30 - Cold War Kids: I went to try to check them out, but unfortunately for some reason they did nothing but have something drone instead of playing a song. I heard they were good. This is a 'I'll check out their CD based on the word of others'
4:30 - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah: This is a very good band. I learned how polarizing their lead singer is. I like his voice, others find it whiny and nasally. I was surprised how well they translated live. They are a little strange in their sound and they were able to sound good live. High energy band. I like 'em. Of Montreal might be the closest thing I can compare them to.
5:30 - Wandering around getting beer, a rib sandwich, and finding some people I know.
6:30 - Yeah Yeah Yeahs: Dear Yeah Yeah Yeahs, I respect you and the energy with which you perform. Your lead singer's bizarre outfits and eclectic approach to the show was much appreciated. However I regret to inform you that I just didn't like the way your music sounded. I'm sure you understand and likely do not care. I just felt I owed it to both of us to inform you of my feelings. Thank you. I will consider giving you another try in the future. Sincerely, John Durbin.
6:30 - Snow Patrol: This was the big surprise for me. They were really good. Very catchy and energetic. They sounded great and I had no idea they were Irish. This concert was helped by the fact that I was, well, 'not in driving condition'. As much as some people (me) made fun of them before seeing their show, they were very good.
7:30 - Spoon?: I actually don't think I watched any of this. I was getting ready for Muse and being social. You can read into that as much as you want. You probably should.
8:30 - Muse: They were great. I am not a big fan of their new album and was a little pensive that they might be playing that more than anything else. Nope, mostly songs from 'Absolution' and 'Origin of Symmetry'. High energy, they sounded phenomenal. All in all a great show. See them if you can.
Those were the bands I saw. Look up Daft Punk's show on Youtube. I heard it was pretty insane good. Big ups to MTV Networks for the hook up in the VIP Cabana.
That's all 'til next year when I'll be waiting with a three day pass in hand.
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4/5/2007 Alanis Morissette Beat Me To It
Recently I saw the video for Robert Palmer's "Addicted to Love". I decided I should do an acoustic cover of it. This is coming on the heels of seeing the acoustic cover of Outkast's "Hey Ya". It sounds awesome, you can listen here.
However, the thing that struck me was someone made the comment how the acoustic version really captured the intended meaning of the song. That's ridiculous. Let's be adults, someone playing muted chords on an acoustic guitar saying "shake it like a polaroid picture" is entertaining but doesn't change the meaning of the song. This was the point I realized that I wanted to cover a song acoustically that barely had a meaning or better yet no meaning at all. That would make it all intense and stuff. Addicted to love seemed ideal.
Official Sidebar: Some People I know right now = "Hey John, didn't you do an acoustic version of Foo Fighters 'Everlong'". Me = "Yes. I did. Like 2 years ago." Those People = "Didn't Dave Grohl already cover it?". Me = "Yes. But my version is different. My version sounds like an Iron & Wine-esque version of the song". Those People = "Whatever dude." Me = "Alright fine, just for that I'm not putting it on this site". Those People = "Good". Me = "Jerks".
Back to where I was going with this.
I saw this. Alanis Morissette covering "My Humps". Absolutely awesome. First of all, musically it sounds fantastic. Secondly, it knows what it is doing but still does it seriously. That's the hardest part of a parody like this. How to make it clear you are making fun of something without ham fisting it. I would honestly believe someone did this if I didn't know better. I am not sure what her motivation was, but I would like to believe it was the same as mine.
This cover accomplishes everything I wanted to do in so much better of a way. I recommend you watch. Also I say kudos, Alanis, kudos and thank you for saving me the trouble of butchering a Robert Palmer song. One Foo Fighters' song is enough...
