If I see that camera again, I'm taking it away...

Went to the Finger 11 / Sum 41 concert on Monday night... But after only taking a few shots of Finger 11, security was all over me like a fat kid on a timbit. Finger 11 was pretty damn good... I'd seen them a few years ago, and they didn't disappoint this time either. Strangely enough, I'd never seen Sum 41 play, even though I've been a fan for a long time now. They were tonnes of fun... but no photos for you!!! I can't understand why they don't allow pictures. Security acted like it was saving the world every time they took an amateur photographer down.

What was cool though, instead of Sum's regular guitar player they had the lead singer of Gob on the strings. Not sure why that made me happy :) They only played one Gob song though. Oh well.

Romance is Dead

I've been downloading songs to make my parents some CDs for their 45th wedding anniversary. (Shhh Dad, don't tell Mom:)... Normally I'm fairly cheese-resistant and especially like to make fun of sappy shit whenever the chance arises (i.e. get up and hurl in the corner)(for reference, see: The 80s called. It wants its music back!).

However, listening to all these old songs from my childhood is totally choking me up.

*Cough*

*Sputter*


Here I sit, listening to the CDs I've made. I stare at spreadsheets of P values and normality tests, examining the skewness and kurtosis of my data through eyes bubbling over in tears. Occasionally I'll belt out "nobody does it better, makes me feel sad for the rest, nobody does it quite the way you do..." or "Baby you left me defenseless. I've only got one plea, lock me away, inside of your love and throw away the key. I'm guilty, of love in the first degree..."

I hope no one can hear me out in the hallway. Eek. Ok, you can come back from the corner now. Those stains had better wash out!!!

God, what's happening to me?

I haven't heard any songs that tug my heart strings quite like these oldies do. Maybe the fact that they're from my childhood, they tap into an innocence and vulnerability that's been part of a huge covert cover-up operation in the works for decades. My heart is a secret agent. Haha.

Or maybe romance truly is dead. Years ago we expected tough times and worked through them. We knew that love prevailed. Nowadays people just want a strings-free roll in the hay and bail if things aren't automatically "easy".

By text. Email. Post-it note. Easy.

"Days may not be fair, always. That's when I'll be there, always. Not for just a an hour, not for just a day, not for just a year... but always."

Sniffle sniffle. Get a hold of yerself girl!!! *SLAP* Phew. Jeaysus, I'd better put on some System of a Down or something. Krike.

The 80s called. It wants its music back!!!

Did you ever notice that people who like 80s music also like country? I think that says something about country music, you have to enjoy gulping down a good heaping shovel full of cheese in order to listen to it.

I went on a date once and the guy forced me to listen to a bunch of 80s music. I tell ya, that was almost a dealbreaker. If your first kiss is to Journey, then you start to wonder what else will end up as the worst soundtrack to your life. Could you stay sane if you have to choke down a large dose of Air Supply with your granola in the morning? Would a long road trip a la Duran Duran drive you to veer the car into oncoming traffic? How long would it take having the Pointer Sisters stuck in your head before you took a fork and poked your eyes out? Jump! Jump! For my loove!

Add country to the mix... Dealbreaker deluxe.


ps. Jump is in your head now, isn't it... Mwah ha ha ha ha! The 80s was eeeveeeel I tell ya, eeeveeeel!

It was madness alright...

You can't even believe how awesome they were. You'll just have to take my word for it.

...

...

UPDATE: Here is a great post about the concert by one of the people who came with us- Forever Young.

Mad for the Mad Caddies

I'm so pumped about seeing these guys tonight! They are one of the best live bands ever. They're really going to have to work it after seeing illScarlett (pictured below) absolutely KILL a couple of weeks ago at the Starlite. But I'm 100% sure that Chuck and the boys won't disappoint. Yay! Me = : )

The Permanent Party Car

There are 3 things I know for sure:

1) When people hear my trunk thumping from 3 blocks away, they don't think I'm cool.

2) Not everyone wants to hear my music. I think it rocks, but I'm not advertising.

3) The people who live in my apartment building do not need to know every time I enter the parkade.

Alas, there is not a thing I can do about it. (Except maybe buy a new stereo. Ugh.)

It started a few months ago. Something went wrong out of the blue. Now the thing plays one song at a time and at one volume: LOUD. It's been hot lately. I must have the windows down. They must think I'm a total punk.

And there are some CDs that play even louder than others. So loud I can't even THINK. Did you ever notice loud music does that? We've all had to turn down the music when parallel parking. Hmm, maybe that's why they play the tunes so loud at the bar. God, that explains a lot of my dumb choices. Ahem. Add alcohol and I totally have a defense! Oops, total tangent there...

We call it the Permanent Party Car now. It's either Party or Silence. So I guess it's party!!!

I'll just have to ignor the fact that I feel like a dork. And I've certainly had to do that before. Once or twice.

A Million Ways to be "Cool"

Jen and I showed up at the Silversun Pickups, Ok Go, Snow Patrol concert on Tuesday night. I can't express how much I thoroughly enjoyed it! Of course, poor Jensies couldn't see much at times. I threatened to pound on some people who were pushing into her. For some reason she said not to. Anyways, I guess it was the last stop on their North American tour, so did they EVER make a show of it. It was so much fun! I liked Ok Go before, but now I'm in loooove. They're cool in a million trillion kajillion ways. So I put together a little video. It's kind of long and the quality sucks, but you will at least get a wee taste of the fun!

ps. There's no Silversun Pickups on there because I always worry at first that I'm going to get in trouble for taking photos. That wears off after a bit...

Sad Kermit

I see that Rose and I aren't the only ones playing with Muppets on YouTube. Click on the photo to see this video of Sad Kermit, doing a remake of the song 'Hurt'

(originally by NIN/Johnny Cash).

The rock isn't just for the kids!

TGIF! Today I'm posting a video that I love, by none other than the band I went to see on Tuesday night. It was a pretty good concert. The lead sinder needs to do a little work on his vocals and goes a little crazy with the microphone. Cute though. The lead guitar, however, caught my attention. I was swooning over his talent. And now I'm even more hooked on their music. The only strange thing about it was that the average concert-goer age was probably 17. I realize that I have a fairly juvenile taste in music, and am no stranger to young crowds, but was wondering where the older fans of Taking Back Sunday were hiding out. There MUST be older fans of this band? Perhaps the music is too loud for the older crowd.

Or maybe their kids were too embarrassed to be seen with them at the show and insisted they don't go. Hmmmm...

ps. The video for Liar is kind of cool. Check it here: Liar (It Takes One To Know One).

Taking Back Sunday on Tuesday!

click to enlarge

Taking Back Sunday was playing at the House of Blues while we were watching Julio Iglesius in Laughlin, just a mere 1.5 hours away. That would've been awesome to see them... One glitch for me: we wouldn't be in Vegas until the next day.

Shite. I was a day late and a ticket short. And boy did I whine about it. I guess I whined to the point where a friend of mine went out while I was gone and bought me tickets to the Edmonton show!!! What??? Yippeee!

My reaction when he gave me the tickets? "Keith, you JERK!" Guess I need to work on my gift-receiving etiquette a bit. But seriously, thanks so much... I'm getting all excited now!

I'm glad my mom got to see Julio though, who is apparently the biggest selling artist of all time and a gracefully aging sex machine!

Wolfmother rocked

For a 3 man band, they made a lot of noise!

It felt a bit like the 70s...

That is, if I'd been to a rock concert in the 70s, this is probably what it wouldve been like.

Cute is what we aim for?

I stumbled across this band a while ago- Cute Is What We Aim For. Not sure about their music... but I got a kick out of one guy's hair.

That's the closest thing I've seen to a young version of the Donald EVER! Wow, I'm speechless.

Are ya sure cute is what you're aiming for there buddy?

Seemed like a good idea at the time.

I watched Van Wilder again the other night. Haha. "Don't be a fool, stay in school." He was in school for 7 years. He came to the realization, thanks to meeting the blonde hottie who would change his life, that he'd been putting off growing up. He buckled down after that and finally graduated!!! Hmm. I think I may have just discovered the real reason I'm still in school. I haven't met my blonde hottie yet!!!

It seemed like a good idea at the time... That's the chorus of an OK Go song, and it could be the motto of my life. I seriously think through all of my decisions, very thoroughly, and there's always a fairly rational reason for why I do what I do. Err, at the time it seemed that way, but looking back... Woops.

Oh man, I just noticed that I'm not the first one to get the idea of imitating that backyard dancing routine (for reference, see the end of the Dance Classes! post). Check these out: Ok Go Dance Contest. I guess it wouldn't be the first time I had an original idea that someone else thought of first.

Uh yeah, I'm working on spreadsheets right now by the way... NOT watching videos! Ok so I got a bit sidetracked there. All I can say is if it wasn't for listening to music while I work on this nightmare heap of data, I would've gone off the deep end LONG ago (rather than treading water in the shallow end, as I am right now, barely... tiring out a bit now, gurgle choke cough).

Have an awesome weekend! Yay, the Ozzy Ozmunds are ripping out some tunes at Urban Lounge! I think it's high time to exercise some stress management techniques, complete with a little help from our friend, El Mojito. It seems like a really good idea right now, doesn't it?

Kamikaze

If my neck is sore tomorrow, I'll know why... The culprit? That song 'Nothing Special' by illScarlett. I must have listened to it about 94000 times. That's right, it's now up to 94724 plays on Myspace.com. Can't find it on iTunes though, so I'm forced to go to Myspace over and over in order to feed my addiction to the song.

My neighbours haven't knocked on my door to yell at me yet. The people upstairs can't really complain though, because almost every day lately it sounds like they're up there running around their apartment with cement blocks on their feet (like escapees from the MOB) or practicing wrestling moves on each other (perhaps the Hogan family has moved in?)

It's been far worse the last while than it ever was before, even though I whined about it back then (blog entry: The People Upstairs). Speaking of which, I used to hear them having sex all the time and haven't in a long time. There are 3 possible explanations for this as I see it...
1) They moved out and it's a new crew up there making all the racket, or
2) The couple has passed the honeymoon stage of the relationship and have gone from having sex to having fights, or
3) They moved on from quasi-normal sex to some sort of Kamikaze Kamasutra (I was first made aware of this bizarre sexual practice in the movie Fatal Instinct, God it's been so long since I saw that movie. It's so classic).

Alright... Time to shut the music off and go to bed. Hopefully the Hogans have tired themselves out by now.

Sam Roberts Band at Edfest

You can't see that band so well, but it looks cool nonetheless.

MTV Movie Awards

You know, people gripe a lot about how bad award shows are. I'm gonna just fess up here and say that I kind of like them. I enjoy seeing all the beautiful people and what they're wearing and all that shit.

Jon Stewart hosting the Academy Awards this year just made it that much better.

But the MTV Movie Awards are my favourite. It's usually riddled with comedy... from the parodies to the hilarious acceptance speeches. I mean, where else can you find Jim Carrey, Will Ferrell, Steve Carell, Jimmy Falon, Andy Dick and Owen Wilson in one place?

The parodies are my fave part though. A couple of years ago, this is where I first saw the parody of Mission Impossible II. To this day, whenever I hear the Mission Impossible theme song, Ben Stiller's voice rings through my head, "This mission just got a whole lot more impossibler." This year they did a pretty funny spoof of Mission Impossible III. Check it out here.

Gnarls is Gnarly

When I start to pout... I put this song on and it makes me de-pout.

It's Crazy by Gnarls Barkley.

Does that make me crazy? Does that make me CRAAAAZY?

I don't remember when I lost my mind, however. I think it's kind of like gaining weight. Slow and insidious. Creeping insanity. The thing is (about putting on the pounds) you don't know it's happening until one day you have to buy a size larger, and then two, etc. But you definitely remember being a smaller size...

When you've lost your mind bit by bit, you have no mode of comparison.

You don't remember how sane you used to be. There's no 'sanity measuring stick' that tells you that you're mentally obese. No calculation. No formula.

Maybe I'm CRAAAAZY... Probablyyyyyyy.

The Mad Ladies

You can get a sense of the mood we were in before the Mad Caddies concert the other week. To be fair, we'd had a couple of drinks. And Nancy was killing me with her 100% exuberance. You can totally hear Jen and Nate laughing in the background. For those of you who know us... I'm sure you'll get a good chuckle and shake your heads while thinking "it figures." For those of you who stumble on this little video by accident... Sorry.

Hey, we didn't make up these dance moves... Chuck has actually used some of these on stage!!! I think? Ok, we probably made a couple up... Hope you enjoy!

ps. Now that I can video post, there may be a few showing up here and there! Perhaps that one of Jen breakdancing would be postworthy;)

Daily Dancer

If you really need a good grin some days, check out this blog where the guy dances purely for your entertainment. If you're an aspiring dancer, you may want to practice some of his moves.

Daily Dancer

Keep on dancin', my friend.


p.s. It's funny to check out the expressions on people's face when their hardcore given'er on the dance floor... Like the daily dancer in his routine: Hips Don't Lie.

The Mad Caddies are coming!!!

The Mad Caddies are so much fun to see live. I have to see them whenever they're in town!!!
If you want to check out their music, go to Fat Wreck and scroll down and get some songs:)

My friend Nancy and I met them a few years ago at the Ship in Calgary the night before Van's Warped tour. She was bashing their new album, unknowingly, to their trombone player. Hahaha. The rest of the Caddies were behind us the whole time! In our defense, we'd only heard the new album once or twice at that point. Anyways, we had a lot of fun with them that night (everything from setting off firecrackers to singing Sublime tunes) and got to see them play at Van's the next day.

Good times.