Andrew McMahon - 10 Feb 2011 - The HiFi (Brisbane)

"Wouldn't it be funny," Al said to me as we ambled along Boundary St in Brisbane’s West End, “If we came all the way to Brisbane to see Andrew McMahon and then somehow missed the show?”

I think she said this to tease me about my worry that we’d forgotten to bring the tickets from Sydney, knowing full well we had them. But I admit to having a moment of panic when, upon entering the venue at 9:45pm ahead of the advertised 10pm starting time, we heard Andrew’s distinctive voice drifting down the corridor through the building.

Yes, he’d started early — so we only made it to the surprisingly packed floor as Andrew finished playing his first song, solo on the piano. He stayed seated at the piano for the rest of the show though he was joined by Jack’s Mannequin bandmate Bobby Anderson on the guitar for the rest of this set. They were lovely in harmony with each other, and even with just the two of them and an instrument each on stage they played with gusto and had a surprisingly amount of energy.



Andrew was adorable on stage — endearing and utterly earnest in performance. He introduced every single song, sometimes adding colour with anecdotes about song name choices and his motivations for writing a song (or admitting he couldn’t remember why he’d written it!) Some of them were serious and illuminating, like the story behind the rather depressingly titled Hey Hey Hey (We’re All Going to Die), and some were just amusing, like his reminiscing about being a stoner and insisting on a blue light in his room for about six months as an intro to She Paints Me Blue.

The set list was a treat, with both Jack’s Mannequin and Something Corporate songs getting an airing. It was a fun singing along to JM songs I love (like La La Lie at Andrew’s urging and the affirming The Resolution) but it was also great, as more of a latter-day JM fan, to be introduced to older Something Corporate cuts like the beautifully sad Down. Andrew even threw in a cover of Elton John’s rocket man, which worked well with his voice and his great piano work.



Andrew left the stage after just over an hour. All through the night there’d been the occasional call for Konstantine from the audience, but as Andrew returned to the stage for the encore, some obnoxious fans started to really yell for the song. Andrew tried charmingly to reason with them about why wouldn’t be playing it, but he became a little flustered as his words fell on mostly deaf ears, and the calls continued. (For the interested, the reason is to prevent him from having to play the song every night of his life — if he plays it at one gig then every following audience would demand and expect it. Fair enough.) However, the night still ended on a lovely, upbeat note with a singalong to Dark Blue, the song staying with me and looping through my head as we walked back to our accommodation.

All in all, I loved seeing him play again, to hear him play a longer set than I've ever managed before. Even though it was a solo tour, which restricted him to the piano and he couldn’t bounce around and be all energetic and muppety, he really is a pleasure to see and hear live.


photo from primroserobinson

Hammer and Strings (A Lullaby)
Mix Tape
Crashin’
As You Sleep
Holiday from Real
She Paints Me Blue
La La Lie
The Resolution
Rocket Man (Elton John cover)
Swim
Down
21 and Invincible
Hey Hey Hey (We’re All Going to Die)
Bruised
Spinning

Punk Rock Princess
Olive (Bobby Anderson side project)
Dark Blue

Menomena - 7 Feb 2011 - Factory Theatre

The last two Menomena albums made my favourites list of their respective years of release, so I was really really looking forward to this show, on their first tour of Australia. And they did not disappoint!

They started loud, strong and muscular with the aptly named Muscle’n Flo followed by two great tracks from Mines, their fantastic album from last year, including the awesome, funky TAOS. All through the show they were such a joy to listen to; the multilayered music, bouncing from atmospheric to rocking, from energetic to haunting and reflective, all with the restless, driving rhythm. I loved the vocals provided by the whole band, strange lines of harmony weaving in and out of each other, an odd mix of voices that shouldn’t work and yet sound so good together.

The four-piece band were fun on stage, with a great line in sweetly snarky banter between themselves and the small but dedicated audience. Justin Harris made time to thank the crowd for appreciating the deep cuts they were playing as they dipped into material from first album I am the Fun Blame Monster!, including The Late Great Libido, one of my favourites, which Harris said was the first time they’d played it live in four years! They were also fairly patient with the obnoxious elements of the crowd who kept heckling and yelling for Evil Bee, which the band demurred from playing since it’s usually sung by recently departed band member Brent Knopf.


The Late Great Libido

Despite the fact it was only their fourth show with Brent’s replacement, the enthusiastic, prone-to-dancing Paul Alcott on keyboard, the band were great, throwing themselves into the performance with abandon, giving it their all. Justin Harris was suffering a cold that was causing him to lose his voice – he apologised after some songs where his voice was noticeably breaking but powered on through the show, singing and playing with skill the baritone sax (to my great instrument-geek joy). And Danny Seim was just AMAZING to watch as he pounded away - the drumming, oh the drumming.



Even though their set was a little over an hour long, they were so charming and talented live, with a show so full of wonderful music, I didn’t feel cheated at all and enjoyed every moment.


Muscle'n Flo
Five Little Rooms
TAOS
Weird
Tithe
Strongest Man In The World
Twenty Cell Revolt
BOTE
The Late Great Libido
Queen Black Acid
Dirty Cartoons
Rotten Hell

Ghostship
The Pelican

The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas (TBR Challenge Book 1)

It all starts at that well-known symbol of the Australian summer, the suburban backyard BBQ. In attendance at Hector and Aisha’s house one hot summer afternoon is a party doubles as a cross-section of modern Australian society - young and old; friends, family and colleagues; and a mix of races and cultures. Then in one heated moment, Hector’s brother slaps the recalcitrant child of another guest. The Slap then follows the story of ten people at the BBQ that afternoon as they navigate and weather the repercussions of that moment in their own lives.

If you’ve never encountered Tsiolkas’ writing before, The Slap may be the place to start – it’s his most accessible novel to date. He leaves behind in-your-face tales of the marginal and the grotesque that so marked Dead Europe and Loaded and focuses on the heart of the suburbs, that bubbling cauldron of fidelity, friendship, family tension and race relations in every day Australian life. The characters he draws are so vivid, so human; presented with myriad flaws that can make them hard to like, but Tsiolkas is smart enough to flesh out their motivations that you can never fully condemn each person for their apparent sins.

My main issue with the book is that the divergent character points-of-view never quite gel together as one narrative for me. ‘The slap’ ties all the characters together but not their stories, and the exploration into the personal life of each character takes away from the overall narrative drive. But as standalone character pieces, they’re each an interesting commentary on romantic, familial and platonic relationships in contemporary Australia, though some are arguable more successful than others in their critique and/or emotional impact. The sections that struck me the most were Manolis’ bittersweet elegy on ageing, as Hector’s father reconnects with his past, with the brothers-in-arms who immigrated to Australian alongside him, who supported each other through those early days in an unfamiliar clime; and the joy of being young and alive in the tender, surprisingly hopeful ending section seen through Richie’s eyes.

Tsiolkas is such a powerful, angry writer that in the end, it doesn’t really matter that this ambitious, sprawling novel doesn’t completely hold together. I appreciate that it’s a good, uncomfortable read, a book that challenges, repels, and provokes thoughts about the ugly truths and issues that are too often kept hidden under the facade of polite and respectable society.

TBR Challenge - my 12 books for 2011

Best of: Music in 2010

Here be my 10 favourite albums of the year:

1. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy by Kanye West
All those crazy, musically-diverse layers - beats, lyrics, themes, ego and doubts - through the album.

watch: the trailer (or "moving portrait" as Kanye called it) for the video for 'Power' (which is rumoured to be 40+ minutes long), my favourite song along with 'Monster' (but I love Monster more for Nicki Minaj's verse - she steals the song out from everyone)


2. The Suburbs by Arcade Fire
The album did not grab me on first listen, but it was definitely a grower - just like previous album Neon Bible - and by the end of the year I had completely fallen in love with the storytelling, the atmosphere. The music is lighter, but the claustrophobia of the Suburbs is clear still within, the dark heart under the beautiful, peaceful surface.

Listen: 'The Suburbs' / 'Month of May'


3. All Days are Night: Songs for Lulu by Rufus Wainwright.
I love that Rufus Wainwright's idea of“stripped back”still includes gorgeously lush piano-driven heartbreaking paens to grief and love.

Download: 'Who are you, New York?'

4. Everything Under the Sun by Jukebox the Ghost
So many fine, catchy pop songs, so much intelligent thought behind it. Great follow-up album.

Watch: the band being interviewed at the 'Bean' in Chicago, where they talk about Ben Folds Five comparisons and why they have such a weird band name.


5. Mines by Menomena
I love the musical layers in the songs, from the different qualities of the voices to the fuzzy bass to the beat to those great horns.

Download: 'TAOS'

6. Danger Days by My Chemical Romance
Anthemic and built to be played loud - it's not rocket science, but it is damn catchy and fun.

Watch: Art is the Weapon - a trailer of sorts for the first single, the intro for the thru-story and palette and concept for their whole album.


7. Life is Sweet! Pleased to Meet You by Lightspeed Champion
Great songs that are more complex than they seem at first, with lush orchestral arrangements, clever lyrics, and diverse musical styles.

8. Steel Train by Steel Train
Sweet, fun indie pop that I've had on repeat constantly this year.

Listen: 'Turnpike Ghost'

9. The Age of Adz by Sufjan Stevens
I'm still not sure I entirely like this album end-to-end though that might be my reflex reaction to at times deliberately harsh electronica mix through his trademark his beautiful, floaty music. But the album does have some absolutely terrific moments, such as I Walked and the 25 minute standout, Impossible Soul.

Download: 'I Walked'

10. The ArchAndroid by Janelle Monae
I love her voice, and the ambitious mishmash of genres and styles all through her music, while remaining catchy as hell.

Watch: the video for 'Tightrope' - great song, great storytelling, creepy video with some mesmerising footwork. What's not to like?


Honourable Mentions

Bad Books – Bad Books
Belle and Sebastian - Belle and Sebastian Write About Love
Annuals – Sweet Sister EP
Boy & Bear – With Emperor Antarctic EP

Looking forward to new releases in 2011 from:

Patrick Wolf (Lupercalia)
Panic! at the Disco (Vices and Virtues)
The Decemberists (The King is Dead is out now)
Bright Eyes (The People's Key)
Okkervil River (I am Very Far)
Manchester Orchestra (Simple Math)
Taking Back Sunday

also rumoured to release new albums are:
fun.
Radiohead
Blink-182

It's looking to be an exciting new year of music! And hopefully some of these guys tour, which brings me to...

live music from 2010!

I saw a total of 19 bands at 16 shows. This included seeing Kevin Devine 3 times and Brand New twice in the space of five days and I don't regret any of that at all (as you will see from the list of best shows below).

Nine Favourite Performances

1. Kevin Devine @ East Brunswick Club, 29 Mar
2. Brand New @ Enmore Theatre, 25 Mar
3. The Decemberists @ The Metro, 19 Jan
4. The Pixies @ Hordern Pavilion, 14 Mar
5. Delta Spirit @ Factory Theatre, 3 Oct
6. Band of Horses @ Enmore Theatre, 29 July
7. Spoon @ The Forum, 7 May
8. Sunny Day Real Estate @ UNSW Roundhouse, 23 Feb
9. Neko Case @ City Recital Hall, 12 Jan

Upcoming Shows:
Sufjan Stevens, Menomena, Andrew McMahon, Belle and Sebastian

Dec 2010 live music compendium (Lemonheads, Jebediah, Lightspeed Champion)

I had three shows lined up for December and unfortunately all three were rather frustrating.

The Lemonheads - 1 Dec 2010 - The Metro
To be honest, this was really 'Evan Dando and friends who are not the original Lemonheads playing through It's a Shame About Ray and then another twenty songs'. All within an hour and a bit, mind - it was an automated assembly line of songs, one note-perfect, joyless rendition after another. The room, sweaty and fully packed for the sold-out show, perked up at the singles and created a nice atmosphere with nostalgic singalongs, but on stage there was nothing fun at all. Dando barely acknowledged the audience, saying about ten words the whole night - and eight of them were 'thank you'. There was a one song encore, a shambolic version of Outdoor Type with old friends and support band Smudge, but at least Dando seemed to be enjoying himself for the first time all night. The band were proficient in their playing, and he still has that great voice (rather unfairly, it seemed that all that hard living has agreed with him) but ultimately, it was not a rousing comeback or even a fun nostalgia trip.

Jebediah - 9 Dec 2010 - Annadale Hotel
And Jebediah was not the fun nostalgia trip I was looking for either. I had such a good time at their last show at the Annadale. This time though...yeah, they were still loud and energetic and still ridiculously young looking (Kev Mitchell has surely drunk from the fountain of life). But after the late start, an hour of listening to them play obscure songs from their back catalog and none of thie hits, weaksauce banter and one too many moments of tech problems, we decided to bail. Just one more song, Al and I said, wanting to give them the benefit of the doubt, but after four times we gave it up for lost. You can't go back to being sixteen again...again.

Lightspeed Champion - 3 Jan 2011 - Spectrum
This was a show steeped in chaos from the start. Cancelled and then rescheduled in the new year, after Devonte Hynes was stuck in New York due to snowstorms, it was a tiny crowd that gathered about a foot from the stage on the night, with the much more popular Born Ruffians show on at the same time just three doors down the road.

Hynes' was truly playing a solo show - just one man on stage, with an electric guitar, an acoustic guitar, a keyboard and...a laptop. And this is where things get kind of bizarre - he chose, for half the set, to sing along with his backing tracks playing on his laptop, forsaking live instrumentation for the pre-recorded version, even when he *had* said instrumentation at his disposal. This meant that at times, it felt like we were watching someone at karaoke - well-sung karaoke, sure, but still a little underwhelming as an audience at a show. The biggest shame was that when Hynes chose to go without the track and just accompany himself on guitar or keyboard, he was really good and the music was really really lovely. The highlights, for me, were an acoustic version of Deadhead Blues and of Flush Out, a new song (which he released for free download today!).

He was well-received, none the less; surrounded by enthusiastic fanboys and one very persistent photographer, he struck poses and sang his heart out and for the last song, a cover of Hello, he sang to the crowd in the thick of the crowd on the tiny floor, which finally broke the nervous atmosphere and gave the show and the room some life, just a little too late.

2010 reading round-up / The 2011 TBR Pile Challenge

So in 2010, I read 113 books, which was a fair bit up on last year's total (of 68). Yay for public transport time once more!

My top 3 books from last year were:

Fun Home - Alison Bechdel
This is such a rich, wonderful book - in story, in themes, in the storytelling. It’s a memoir in comic form, tracing Alison Bechdel’s childhood to her early twenties, her relationship with her somewhat distant father, and the complex, related issue of sexuality. It’s beautifully written and drawn, funny and heartrending in turn, as she circles closer and closer to an understanding of childhood memories that seem to gain more sinister meanings in the wake of her father’s death a few weeks after she comes out to her parents. Beautifully written and drawn, funny and heartrending in turn.

Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
I started one morning before work in April, thought about it all day when I wasn't reading it, and finished by that night. And months later, I still find myself thinking over it every now and then. I loved so much about this - the different voices, the different genres he plays with, the fantastic structure folding into each other.

The Orchid Thief - Susan Orlean
This was such a fascinating, beautifully written piece of journalism, thoughful and detailed and somehow quite loving about the very insular, slightly crazy world of orchid breeding and collecting. I definitely looked at orchids in a different light after reading it - and I don't even *like* orchids.

rounding out my top 10:

The Fall of Kings – Ellen Kushner and Delia Sherman
Perfect Circle – Sean Stewart
The Cutting Room – Louise Welsh
The Monkey's Mask – Dorothy Porter
In Cold Blood – Truman Capote
Magic for Beginners – Kelly Link
Hikaru no Go (manga series)

Where do I get all these books from?! Well, every year I love seeing where and how I economically acquired each year's reads. As always, Alison is my greatest single book enabler...

47 borrowed from Alison (which includes 29 volumes of manga)
22 bought from secondhand bookshops, Book Basement and other discount book sellers
13 from the library
11 from Bookmooch
10 read for free at bookshops
4 borrowed from other friends
2 bought full price

This brings me to The 2011 TBR Pile Challenge. I may read a fair bit, but it's safe to say that I acquire even more books each year - and a large number of these then sit forever on my 'to be read' shelves (and I literally have four shelves of books TBR). Hence, the TBR Pile Challenge:



The Goal:
To finally read 12 books from your "to be read" pile, within 12 months.

Each of these 12 books (plus 2 alternates, just in case you can't finish one or two of the original 12) must have been on your bookshelf or "To Be Read" list for AT LEAST one full year. This means the book cannot have a publication date of 1/1/2010 or later (any book published in the year 2009 or earlier qualifies, as long as it has been on your TBR pile).

So I went through the pile and decided on:

1. The Slap - Christos Tsolkas
2. Foucault's Pendulum - Umberto Eco (see Alternate no. 14)
3. Cat's Eye - Margaret Atwood*
4. A Contract with God - Will Eisner
5. We So Seldom Look on Love - Barbara Gowdy
6. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
7. The Flight From the Enchanter - Iris Murdoch*
8. Nekropolis - Maureen McHugh
9. Jonathon Strange and Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke
10. Beauty - Shari S. Tepper
11. Blood Meridian - Cormac McCarthy*
12. The Mysteries of Pittsburgh - Michael Chabon*

alternates
13. Beauty - Robin McKinley*
14. On the Road - Jack Kerouac

* indicates a book I've borrowed from Al, most likely for years

One of the requirements of the challenge is to post book reviews as I go, so that should ensure that I blog at least 12 times this year...which would probably double the amount of posts, ahahahasigh. So watch this space!

Foodie week

So I was pretty sick for most of this week and there were some other RL problems, but I was determined to make it through a gamut of food-related fun things. In the end, I fine dined, enjoyed a workplace Christmas dinner, and on the weekend I baked, cooked and ate some more. All with tonsellitis, hah.

You can see some evidence of the fine dining above. :) It was nice, which seems a very anaemic word to use about such a meal, but I kinda knew going in that I just wasn't in the right frame of mind to be ultra-excited. I couldn't smell a thing due to being sick, and between that and having to socialise I just felt so buggered by the end of the night.

Work Christmas dinner at Rhodes Phoenix was fun and relaxed. We did have chilli lobster, which is a nervewracking thing to eat in front of company anyway since it's so messy and fussy, and then on top of Joey (of FoodiePop started analysing my work practices through the way I tackled the lobster, heh. (I was told I was "logical" in the way I removed all the shell from the pieces of meat before me before I started eating, just like how I sort all the medicines from our daily suppliers alphabetically before I put them away. Logical, or obsessive-compulsive? You decide...)

And then I spent a fair bit of time in the kitchen over the weekend. I made choc chip cookies for a fundraiser at church, and then dinner on Sunday night for my parents.



This recipe made about 50 cookies. And my favourite comment was "These are even better than Subway cookies!" Yes, yes they are.

Choc Chip Cookies
originally from Thomas Keller's Ad Hoc At Home cookbook, via Baking Bites

2 1/3 cups plain flour
3/4 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
225g butter, , chilled and cut into small pieces and divided equally in two portions
1 cup (packed) brown sugar
3/4 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
400g chocolate (mix of dark and milk), chopped

Preheat over to 180 Celcius. Grease and line a baking sheet with baking paper.

In a medium bowl, mix flour and baking soda and salt.

In a big bowl, beat half the butter with an electric mixer until softened. (Because the day was so hot, I kept the other half of the butter in the freezer just to keep it chilled in the meantime.)

Add in the brown sugar (original recipe called for dark, which I'd run out of - but I think it would make an even more delicious, chewy cookie so I'd love to try it again with the dark brown sugar) and the white sugar and cream with the butter.

Beat in eggs, one at a time. (We had a near-miss at this point as it turned out the first egg I cracked was a bad one!)

Add in the vanilla extract, then beat in the remaining butter at a med-high speed until well incorporated. It's quite a fluffy mixture at this point.

Mix in the flour mixture at low speed on the mixture (or if you want strong arm muscles, fold in by hand).

Stir in the chocolate chunks. (I lessened the amount of chocolate from the original recipe, but was still told by appreciative eaters that there was plenty of chocolate in each cookie.)

Use a tablespoon to drop rougly 1 inch balls (about 1 rounded tablespoon) onto the baking sheet, leaving about an inch and a half between for spreading.

Bake for 13 minutes until cookies are set, matte-looking and lightly golden brown.

Cool for 3-4 minutes on the baking sheet then transfer to cool on a wire rack.



Tonight's dinner was spaghetti with seafood ragu, herbed mushrooms stuffed with mozarella, and a simple garden salad with a honey-balsamic dressing. The critics at home declared the pasta the hit of the night but rejected the mushrooms completely (I screwed up on that one as I substituted too many things because I didn't have half the ingredients).

But the ragu...oh, the briny, tomato-y deliciousness. Would definitely make again!

Ragù di Pesce
originally from The Wednesday Chef

1 kg seafood/marinara mix, roughly chopped
1 onion
2 garlic cloves
1/4 cup minced herbs (I used basil and parsley)
2 tomatoes, chopped
1/2 can canned tomatoes
1 cup dry white wine
450g spaghetti
Chilli flakes (optional)
Salt and pepper to taste

Finely dice the onion and garlic. In a wide, deep pan, cook over medium heat in olive oil, along with several spoonfuls of the minced herbs. Keep stirring to make sure the mixture doesn't burn.

About 7 minutes later, add the seafood mix and stir well to coat the seafood in the oil, onion, garlic and herb mix. Cook for a few minutes until the seafood takes on colour around the edges.

Add the wine and let it cook down for a few minutes.

Add the tomatoes (fresh and canned) to the pan and stir. Throw in a good amount of salt (I used a teaspoon). And a nice pinch of chilli flakes if you want it a little spicy (mmm, spicy).

Let the sauce come to boil, then let it simmer away for about 10-15 minutes until it has reduced and is a little thick. Then turn off the heat, stir in the rest of the herbs and add cracked black pepper for seasoning (and salt if necessary).

Cook your spaghetti until al dente, then drain it and add it to the pan with the sauce and mix well before serving.