Out of the Wild

As I type this post, I'm sitting in a coffee shop in downtown Anchorage, buzzed on caffeine, waiting for my plane. I'm leaving Alaska after a little more than four months.

I know that my posts from Alaska have been scant-- filled with pictures but containing little substance. I've been busy, and when I wasn't busy, I was lazy. And I was at work quite a bit. And sometimes I was hungover. And there was a period where I didn't have my laptop. And another period where I didn't have my laptop charger. But enough excuses. On my last day here, let's talk about Alaska.

Alaska is a beautiful, beautiful, wild place. I went on several hikes that I will remember for ages. The landscape is vast and harsh, overwhelming and bewitching. I was almost attacked by a moose. I got to pet a particularly curious fox on a drunken night on the way home from the bar. I got within twenty feet of a black bear who was thankfully indifferent to me. I rafted on a glacier fed river. I bathed in a stream miles away from the nearest person. I saw the northern lights dance across the sky. I explored the state capital, inaccessible by road. I wandered the biggest city, Anchorage, and enjoyed a street fair and a baseball game (starting at midnight and utilizing no artificial light) in Fairbanks. I dosed acid and wandered through a music festival, convinced something big was happening. I had an incredible live music experience at the World Famous Denali Salmon Bake with the Stumblebum Brass Band. I cooked a grouse, and ate part of a moose and fresh caught Alaskan salmon. It was four months filled with amazing experiences.

I went there to work at a gift shop, and let's be honest, that was awful. It was the worst job I've ever had. The place was poorly ran, the employers were indifferent to the employees, and the customers were generally rude and haughty. I met several people thee as well-- some I enjoyed and others I delight in never having to see again. I made several assumptions about native Alaskans, seasonal workers, and Alaskan tourists that are negative and irrelevant to this post. I do not regret my time here.

What do I regret? I never made the 9 hour bus trip out to Wonder Lake to photograph Mount McKinley. I never camped overnight in Denali National Park. I never got a good view of a grizzly bear, and never saw a wolf or a bull moose sporting a giant set of antlers. I never made it north of the Arctic Circle. Alas-- there's always next year.

I do not think I will come back to Denali next year, but I think I will return to Alaska. The Kenai peninsula looks inviting. Maybe a short weekend trip up to Denali to do some of the things I missed? We'll see. Right now, though, it's back to New Orleans

Time Well Wasted

It was Jeana's birthday, and, in celebration, we went to the Paisley Party tour held at the New Orleans Arena.  

Opening act was Dierks Bentley, giving off the impression of trying to hard to be affable and 'down-home' as he sang all his hits, most of which I like very much.  Was much the change (not necessarily  for the better) from the show he did five years ago at Tipitina's where, by the end of the evening, so drunken was he that the audience sing along was all that could get him through 'What Was I Thinking'.

Followed up by Brad Paisley, guitar virtuoso and probably the most viable artist in country music (great singer, affecting songwriter, astounding musician) singing most of his most recent and popular songs (could have used some 'All I Wanted Was A Car' or 'Time Well Wasted', Brad...).  Said wonderful things about New Orleans, attempted to sing 'City of New Orleans' but was very honest about clearly not knowing the words... promised to learn it next time, sang 'When the Saints Go Marching In' instead.

Anyway, Brad's AV unit deserves an award of some kind, as their displays were breathtaking and at times threatened to overshadow the performer.  Pre-recorded cameos by Taylor Swift, Dierks Bentley, Keith Urban and B.B. King were entertaining.  Pre-recorded cameo by Alison Krauss was not, because my enthusiasm that she's really on the stage!! made me look quite foolish when she turned out to be a video projection.

In all, a fine show.  Drank plenty of Jack Daniel's, felt warm and fuzzy.  These are not my personal photos, but instead belong to Russo-- I forgot my camera.

"Take Me Back Outside"

So, I finally got to see Conor Oberst live.  I came close twice in New Orleans and again in Knoxville, but neither time panned out.  Everything worked out in Austin.  Do you want to see the pictures I took?

I guess everyone needs a vacation sometimes, and my camera decided that Friday would be it.  The video I took was also extremely disappointing, with horrid sound quality and blurry images.  But, I remember the show fondly.  It was, almost, a perfect show and, without a doubt,  the best I've seen in ages (well, at least since May).  

It was barely hampered by the fact that it was at an outdoor venue and that it was in the forties.  It was barely hampered by the fact that the first of two opening acts was, inexplicably, a hip-hop band that combined overwrought lyrics with hipster '80s nostalgia pretension.  It was aided immeasurably by the fact that the second opening act was the Felice Brothers, who put on such a stupendous show that I went home and downloaded their album and have since listened to it several times.

And then there was Conor, performing here as 'Conor Oberst and the Mystic Valley Band' in support of the Conor Oberst self-titled CD, which I delight in.  However, he seems to want to put a great distinction between 'Conor Oberst and the Mystic Valley Band' and 'Bright Eyes', and thus, at this show, performed no Bright Eyes songs that I recognized.  It is possible some of the filler tracks were Bright Eyes B-sides, but I doubt it.  I think they were unreleased tracks from the self-titled album, since no one else in the audience seemed familiar with them either.

But anyway, delight in these videos, which aren't my own (since mine were awful), nor are they from the Austin show...but they're essentially the same thing.

The Felice Brothers

Proving that sometimes he performs both Bright Eyes standards and Mystic Valley new material

Souled Out!!

Fun Fun Fun

Today was the final day of the annual Fun Fun Fun Festival at Waterloo Park across from the University of Texas campus. It's an indie rock/punk/comedy festival, fairly small but jam-packed with live fun.

I saw several bands whom I enjoyed (up to a point... no one demanded I run to the merchandise tent and buy their album or log on to ITunes and download anything) including St. Vincent, DOA, and another band whose name escapes me entirely. The official Fun Fun Fun Fest website in turn offers little help either.

So, the bands were generally just okay, but the comedy stage was nice. That's where I saw Dragon Boy Suede (shown above), the rapping alter-ego of comic Howard Kremer. He was followed by Tim and Eric Awesome Show, doing a live version of the things they do weekly on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim. Unfortunately, on stage they floundered, trapped in a format that was inappropriate to support them.

In all, it was a fine day. The weather was lovely (even if the grounds were a bit dusty) , dinner afterwards (at Kerby Lane, an Austin institution) was fabulous, and falling deeper into the intoxicating music scene here in the capital of Texas was a joy.

Southern Boys: Tim McGraw Live at Jazz Fest

Because I am kind and benevolent, I took the following videos of Tim McGraw performing Sunday at the Jazz and Heritage Festival. Unfortunately, I was not overly familiar with the video functionality of my camera, so I apologize for the fact that the videos begin and end abruptly and at odd times throughout the songs. I also apologize for being a little stoned and turning the camera awkwardly away from the stage to look confusingly at the crowd, and also for turning the camera sideways. My bad.

First two verses/choruses of "Live Like You Were Dying"

First verse, first chorus of a new song called 'Southern Boys'.  He forgets the words at one point.

Edit, 04/30: An angry poster on YouTube informed me that the name of this song is not 'Southern Boys' but 'Southern Voice'. Okay. Another angry poster pointed out that before performing the song, McGraw mentioned he may forget some of the words. Yes, he pointed that out. I wasn't making judgements, only statements. People on YouTube are bitches.

Stop, Disney. Stop

Look at this utter nonsense.  I think I threw up a little in my mouth.

Have you ever seen such garish, humiliating, stupid costumes?  Why is that crab the size of a palomino?  Why didn't they use puppets, a la The Lion King?  And are those dancers really on roller skates?  And why is that set so goddamn ugly?   For that matter, why is Ariel so goddamn ugly?  And who decided to cast Sebastian as a screeching fag?  Ugh.

Hell, they ruined Tarzan...why not The Little Mermaid?  Sacrilege this is, pure sacrilege.