Music and Movies and not much else
Time to deal with my OCD-like issues with blogging and captioning photos in rather strict chronological order. I apologize to any readers who have already heard/read anything I say in here. I’m just pulling it all together for myself.
For the last six weeks or so I’ve been really honestly busy at work. Its good and yet really stressful. I’m under a lot of deadlines and its a lot of change. I’ve been dealing with this by escaping into movies and music when I don’t have to be at work.
It feels like it was months ago, but way back at the beginning of June I got in a time machine and went back to 1999. My favorite band from college, 3 Minute Hero, had a reunion weekend in Minnesota, so I joined Brandon & Jenniffer, Josh, Jeff, Frosty & Margaret, BC, and other assorted peeps who dropped in during the weekend for a lot of good times. We danced and partied and ate for three days. It was soooo much fun. See: pictures and videos.
On the movie front, I saw Ocean’s 13 and really enjoyed it. It was the sequel that should Ocean’s 12 should’ve been if only the cast and director had spent more time making a movie rather than hanging out at George Clooney’s Italian villa. Ocean’s 13 was hip and cool and full of great eye candy.
My next musical treat was on June 18th when I went to my first John Mayer concert in Des Moines with Julie and Kelly. Kelly had seen John once before, but she was almost more excited than Julie and I because she knew what she was going to get to see. But it could’ve just been the second row floor seats that I scored that were really the exciting part, I’m not sure. Ben Folds opened and that was great. I’ve liked Ben Folds for a long time. He’s so funny and he puts on a great live show. He did this great I-made-this-up-backstage-tonight song based on a flyer for some march in central Iowa later this summer. I got some decent video of the world premiere performance of “March! To Re-Energize Iowa”:
After Ben finished his fun and amusing set, it was finally time for John to take the stage. Yay! It was a great first show experience. Our seats were great. The way the acoustics were, I could never really tell if the crowd was into it or not, which was ok because I was afraid there would be way too many screaming girls. It was actually a really mixed crowd from families with young kids (like 9 or 10) to couples in their 60’s, with a lot of 20 and 30-somethings in between. John did not fail to impress. He played a great mix of all his songs and while he never really stretched out on any massive guitar jams, I know they’re just out there to be experienced at another show. I was really pleased when he did the acoustic version of ‘Slow Dancing in a Burning Room’ during the encore. That was all I really wanted to hear. See pictures and videos.
Back on the movie front, I decided one trip to Des Moines in a week wasn’t enough as I headed back to DM for a special screening of one of my favorite movies: Serenity (which I have now seen five times in the theater.) It was showing one night only as part of the worldwide Can’t Stop the Serenity charity screenings in support of Equality Now and celebration of Joss Whedon’s birthday. I met up with Kristy VanderWall (nee Phipps) and we had a lovely geek evening. Its been fun getting to know she shares the love of the Whedon oeuvre.
Meanwhile, back at the music ranch, it was Jazzfest time in Iowa City. I volunteered again this year, though my motivations for working backstage security on Saturday were a little more selfish than last year. The reason was that Stanton Moore, a New Orleans drummer of Galactic fame, who also has his own trio, and who also plays with Bonerama on occasion (he’s performed on their last two albums), was playing on the main stage on Saturday. It was the best weekend for Jazzfest as the weather was amazing. Usually its either 100 degrees or its raining, but not this time. I had a great time getting to hang out close to the stage and hear all the great and different acts and just watching the crowd from the side of the stage. Stanton’s set was so good and people were really into it. (Though I did have to fight the urge to go out and tell every single one of them about the upcoming Bonerama show in Iowa City.) Here’s some video I took from backstage:
After getting my music fix for the weekend, I had to get back to the movie theater as I was quickly falling behind with all the summer movies. Taking my duty very seriously, I saw four movies in the theaters in three days (Transformers, 1408, Live Free or Die Hard,, and Ratatouille), then watched the four Harry Potter movies on DVD in a little over 48 hours and then went to the midnight screening of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. I must admit, I was a little dazed and felt like I didn’t know what to do with myself after I got done watching the fifth one.
As far as the entire summer movie offerings are going so far, I’d say this is the order I’d recommend them in:
- Ratatouille
- Waitress
- Transformers
- Pirates 3
- Harry Potter 5
- Ocean’s 13
- 1408
- Live Free and Die Hard
- Shrek the Third (sucked)
- Spiderman 3 (really really sucked)
Ok, that’s it. My mind is now free to catch up on everything I need to be saying about Bonerama tomorrow.
Wow, you’ve been busy! The improvised song by Ben was too funny! I bet the crowd loved it and how great that you got it on video.
I still need to see Rataouille.