GOODNESS:
The Hold Steady: "The Cattle and the Creeping Things"
Bob Mould "Shine Your Light Love Hope"
dogs
Jason Lowenstein live at Talking Head last night
Jon Brion "Meaningless"
Pink Floyd "Dark Side of the Moon" Classic Albums DVD
Ampeg Gemini I
Million Dollar Baby
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night TIme
nationalgeographic.com
James Ellroy's Top Ten Crime Movie list
baking Rhubarb Cream Pie
making and drinking shandies while grilling chicken outdoors
almost any temperature below 90 degrees Fahrenheit
dogs

7.11.05

Workbook Studio, Columbus OH. Neal & Jon (& all of Miranda Sound), thanks for a fantastic - if sometimes gruelling - week. What a great place and a great bunch of people. I covet your drum collection! And your amp collection, and your live room with its skylights, and in fact I even covet your scene - it's a nice one.
Route 70 in July with no AC. You just need to get into the right headspace.
Upon returning from Columbus, I nearly set our roof deck on fire with sparklers on the Fourth of July. We get a great view of 3 different fireworks displays so we have friends over every year. Regardless of grim political realities, everybody loves fireworks, right? If you happened to be driving through Butcher's Hill around 9 PM and you heard a drunken choir sardonically singing "America, FUCK YEAH" ... that was us.
Low Moda played last night at Talking Head. They are a new band featuring Peter Quinn, who used to sing for one of my favorite bands of the 90's, Candy Machine. Peter singing, a standing drummer, keyboards, guitar, bass & viola - on the quiet side but commanding, it was only their second show and I thought they were great. The Internet opened - they are a duo from Providence Rhode Island who might have earned "favorite band of July" status in my book. It was a great show all around - I haven't seen a show like it in a long time - reminded me of going to shows at DC Space back in the Olden Days. Well-timed having seen Don Letts' Punk: Attitude documentary the previous night. Not a great film but it included lots of great footage of bands I'd heard and loved but never really seen before - specifically Suicide, The Pop Group, and The Slits. Bands with forceful and unique voices, totally idiosyncratic. The movie one night and then the show the next made a good "anything is possible" two-fer. In fact I have been feeling an undercurrent of possibility in the air around here lately that's made me really happy.
Now I've just got to make something actually happen!