Concert Review: Robbie Fulks @ Off Broadway

Soooo the house concerts have been great but there is still something righteous about going to a club, standing at the bar, paying for a beer and then seeing a band. Seriously righteous. But daddy is old. Daddy is tired and some venues have become off limits. Particularly Off Broadway.

I have vivid memories of going down there time and time again. I would show around 8 because things were winding down at home, kids are in bed are going to bed, the wife is working on a project so rather then watch some more crap TV I go to the club. I pay. “When does the band go on?” I ask and am told the opener is at 9. You look and you see two drum kits stacked on the stage and and you know that you are not going to luck out and have “an evening with” where one artist plays the whole show. So you wait, have a beer, have two beers, then the opener. Often they do not suck. They always go one late, say around 9:15 and get done slightly after ten. Then you see a second band setting up and they are not the band you came to see. GREAT NEWS! Three bands for the price of one! Shit. That mean that if you wanted to stay till the bloody you were there till 12:30 or 1:00. I am too old. I have to work tomorrow! But I stayed. And I loved it. And I hated it. I was ecstatic and I was miserable. I love dichotomies.

The place has changed hands at least three times since I started going to shows but no matter who it was it was always a late place. Even the much missed and lamented Mississippi Nights ran a tighter ship.

http://www.offbroadwaystl.com/

Anyway.... I digress. I read in the RFT or the Post or something that Robbie Fulks was coming to town and playing an EARLY SHOW at Off Broadway. 7:30! How great is that. Even better a good alt-country true believer called and reminded me of the show and even better I was free of other obligations that night so... down we went. Off Broadway is just off of Broadway down south of the brewery and as I said it has been there for years. It was interesting upon going in that there was again new management which is I guess the reason for trying some new stuff. I complimented them on the concept and away we went. The place was all cleaned up with all the trash and memorabilia which had been gathered (read plastered and strewn) all over the place for 20 years or more. The only thing I was sad to see gone was the huge wagon wheel chandelier which used to hang in the middle of the room, awkwardly hanging over nothing but part of the floor. It had always somewhat obscured the view from the awkward little balcony.

They have always had a large beer selection there and I was grateful to see that they had not felt the need to get rid of the Busch and Stag long necks. In fact they had a special on the Busch 20 ouncers but... I prefer glass bottles for my Busch beer. I am classy that way. We had a beer, and had a seat. It appears they had also lost the crappy little tables they formerly had and instead set up seating in about 10 rows of chairs. We got a seat in back and had another beer and I was pleased to see local luminaries like Brian Henneman and Beatle Bob at the show.

Fulks came on at 7:30 promptly with his acoustic and more of slightly more interest or annoyance he was appearing with another guy with an acoustic, Robbie Gjersoe. If anybody cares he plays for a band called Screen Door Music which you can find on My Space... or not. Fulks has a new CD coming out and so he was shilling for that and the new tunes were tuneful and nice and his voice rang clear and true with that sharp, well pronounced twang. It was awesome just to hear him live again. The first time I had scene Fulks was at the old High Pointe. He knocked me out fronting a band and paying loud, funny twang with Nashville and Big Hat hating country songs like "Fuck This Town".

If you want to get a taste of Fulks I would sample the first two CD's "Country Love Songs" and "Southmouth". These Buckcentric CD's are awesome and funny and his voice is so young and pure that when i listen to them now they often seem even more heartbreaking. After that he has a good songwriter catalogue but as i said, I recommend "Georgia Hard" as his best. Fulks cut his teeth doing Bakersfield country and channeling Buck Owens like no one's business but since that time and most specifically with his album Georgia Hard he really came into his own with some beautiful, catchy and dark songs. So the new ones sound good. I will have to get the new Cd and he played a nice sampling of his past 9 albums. One of the great things about Fulks is that most of the songs are 2-3 minute blasts of beauty and angst and it was awesome. Gjersoe played a nice accompaniment and sang high harmony when needed and occasionally pulled out the craftsment 9/16 long neck socket for a little slide guitar as well.

After he put in an hour he started to take requests but other then a couple of suggestions he pretty much ignored them and played what he wanted. Although disappointed not to hear "The Buck Starts Here", there are no bad songs in his catalogue and he was playing before about 50 hard core fans. The show was done by nine and I was able to have another beer on the way home and be in bed shortly after 10. That night, life was good indeed. Here is to the early show.

Book Review: Movie Review: "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo"

Sooooo....I keep coming back to Bob Lefsetz and his blog and email streams. He is linked on the Diner review home page now and I do not follow anyone, simply because no one is as interesting as me... other then maybe this guy. I will devote another blog to him but he kept touting this guy Stieg Larsen and the series of books that start with "The Girl With the Dragon tattoo". I had picked it up in the book store in hard back and set it down. Murder mystery, Sweden....yawn. I do not know any Sweedish authors. I don't want to know them. What could they have to say to me? Murder mystery? Seriously?

But when Lefsetz touts it...over and over again....referring to it as a club that only the readers understand.... well then that appeals to my inner and outer snob. I indulge that snob, a lot. Sometimes it leads me to crap but this was a really interesting read. Part financial thriller and part murder mystery and part portrait of a rich, hugely dis functional family it becomes really hard to put down. Our male lead is guy named Mikael Bloomkvist. This is the first problem with Swedish authors, they use Swedish names. The nerve! Bloomkvist is an investigative journalist, hip magazine publisher and his life has fallen in on him through a messy story and a libel verdict against he and the magazine. he is ruined.

he is approached by the scion of a wealthy industrial family to investigate the disappearance of an heir 30 years before that hangs over the family. His female protege, the girl for whom the book is named is a private investigator, computer genius with extremely bad brain chemistry, more then a little sociopathy and a troubled, deeply troubled family back ground and back story. I had read about 170 pages of the book (590 pages) when the movie came out.I saw it advertised and knew this was supposed to be a hip and cool story and book (Why? Because Lefsetz said so) and so it was a Friday date night and I took my wife to see it at Frontenac. I like going to see movies at Frontenac. I like a cocktail with a movie. I like the older crowd. I like the whole thing. We got there and settled in and watched and it was good. I must warn you it did have the hated sub titles. I really hate sub titles but you could follow it. It is also fun to see movies without stars. Without people that you know and no star power and the actors were really compelling. The dragon tattoo girl appeared to be about an 87 pound psycho and she was perfect. Bloomkvist was too good looking by half, the way that William Hurt used to be.

We watched until we got to the part where I had stopped reading and then things began to deteriorate as the girl is put into some extremely troubling and sexual abusive scenes. I had not gotten to these in the book yet. My wife is a nice person and literally cannot watch this stuff so she left and I came and got her when the scene was over and offered to leave but she was enjoying the movie so we stayed.... till the next scene...and then I got her again and she still wanted to stay.... until the next scene.... and then we had to leave. We were almost at the end, but it was just too much. Even for me.

Still the story was great and when I got back to the book I still found the story totally compelling. I have read some very graphic, troubling stuff but this was dark and cold in a way that could only be, well....Swedish. It is a great story and I highly recommend it as a read. I will be reading the next in the series which is "The Girl Who Played With Fire". But I will wait a little. Miss the movie. It should be out of the theatres already.

College Visitation

OK....sooooooo....if life is good to you and you are blessed with a child or two... and they live to be a certain age... and they have not (yet) flunked completely out of school, been incarcerated (in too serious of a manner) and are still living in your home as they approach college graduation, you will be blessed with the opportunity to "help" them choose an institution of higher learning for them to matriculate (mature with alcohol). If you are blessed with intelligence, in addition to all these other blessing you will say NO and just stay out of it.

I mean, of course for your C+ student it might not make sense to build up their hopes regarding Harvard or to let them do the same. In the same manner you probably need to give them a heads up about scholarships and you and your child probably need to let go of that sure thing, the full ride athletic scholarship for your baseball playing son (news flash, hitting high school pitching for a 300 average is not going to do it). But past that you need to be very careful. This is really hard.

You want them to learn from your (30 year old and totally irrelevant) mistakes. You want what is best for them but you also have some selfish wants. Maybe you want them to go somewhere you will enjoy visiting. Maybe you want them not too far from home. Maybe you want to show up once a month and totally embarrass them by living out the college fun which you might (or might not have) actually enjoyed in college.So if your not going to stay out of it altogether, pick your spots. For us there were only two rules. You have to leave town coupled with you cannot be too far away. 500 miles or so seemed the arbitrary definition of too far.

I recall going through the college search process with some gusto with my eldest who is soon to be graduating (another story entirely). I looked at catalogues, went on line and watched as my wife thoroughly reviewed and evaluated exhaustively about 376 institutions. We went to college fairs and read literature mailed to us and bought books and went on college visits. Jon ended up going to Valparaiso which has been an amazing place for him, having a great time and evolving into a fine young man. All of that had NOTHING to do with anything my wife and I said or did. He went there because it made sense to him. He chose well for him and all of the other stuff was just window dressing. I think we visited 5 colleges for him to sniff out but there was rarely any doubt where he was going. He knew people there and knew of a lot of graduates from there and it played out along with his goals of being on staff at a camp we frequented and... it was done.

My second one chose Truman strictly on the basis of the fact that "he had friends there" and despite (or perhaps because) of my promise that "I will never visit you there"... away he went to Kirksville Missouri, armpit of the world to a very competitive academic environment in which he seems to be thriving. Who knew? I guess the point is that we had already given up by the second one. Now i am on the third one and it seems pretty clear to me and the wife that we are mailing it in and out daughter will go wherever she damn well pleases. The whole idea that you can have any real, meaningful insight into what College you child should be attending is an illusion propagated by the University INDUSTRY to feed the illusion that you as a buyer of a very expensive commodity can make an informed choice.

It is a lie. it all has to do with luck, who your kid falls in with when they get to school and how mature the child in question is. The rest...luck and conjecture. At best.

Miscellany

Soooo... that has been the earliest and nicest Spring I can remember....EVER! Of course my memory is not really that it good, it has never been good, it seems in fact to be getting worse but I digress. What a Spring. Everything is just busting out and it is April. I love it. We sat on the back porch last night and worked in the yard yesterday and there is a fine sheen of green pollen on everything each morning like a light dusting of snow. Lets enjoy this run as much as we can because if it were like this all year long here all our houses would be worth a million bucks. In celebration of it a favorite of mine.

Spring and All by Greg Brown:

Spring and what's left of the hippies return from old rooming houses and
Mexico.
More letters, more journals, more poems to burn; Real heat at last.
At last my words glow.

My friend Jim just broke up his band, the guys all have jobs and the nights
got too long.
He's selling the amps, one guitar, and the van.
I'm sure you could have it all for a song.

Snow on the north side, trash in the yard, love like a newspaper tattered
and stained.
A two bourbon twilight, fog from God's cigar.
the neighbor's retarded dog chasing the train.

Don't see any good in just hanging around, take a tip from the birds and
change the scene.
Find some long river and follow it down to where our old sins have washed
up in New Orleans.

Spring and what's left of the songbirds return, to fight about loving and
nesting and such.
Thanks for the letters you sent back to burn.
Their smoke is as light, and as dark, as your touch.

***

END OF THE WORLD UPDATE! It has been about 19 days since health care (OBAMA CARE!) passed and was signed. The sun still cam up this morning. Additionally all those companies that took those HUGE write downs for their increased costs. Still in business. I am not saying that this will not further bankrupt our country but keep in mind we have been funding a several hundred billion dollar war off the books for 10 years now, eight of it under the fiscal conservatism of the republican Party. I think they are going to win the mid term elections pretty big and you what? The sun is going to come up the day after that too.

***

Tiger is back. I had no idea that they had been playing golf for the last several months. Imagine my surprise. I watched all this without comment. What is there really to say and other for the prurient interests all of the life lessons that this story entails are trite cliche's and they are also true which is what makes them so hard to pay attention to. here are couple:
1. People are sinners
2. Absolute power corrupts pretty absolutely
3. Once you set yourself on a pedestal in the information age you are well and truly screwed.
4. Even when you have it all it is never enough.
So lets forget about Tiger. Feet of clay and all that. he is an extraordinary athlete and person and is proving in the Masters that he is going to be back providing excitement and inspiration for the golfing public, but lets remember and have a serious pause before we hold these athletes out as role models for ourselves...or our kids. And that includes the already sainted child Tim Tebow and maybe even...gasp...Kurt Warner (though in both cases I hope they hold up). I am not cheering against these guys, I just do not understand why we as a society never recognize that although extremely talented in their niche, these guys are just people. That should make them even more interesting for us, but with the media, we want icons and Gods. Silliness. I hope he makes a run today. Golf is more interesting when everyone is there not just to win the contest but to beat him. And i like watching him win, even now.

***

Michael Steele. Seriously?

***

Mine disasters. They happen. We need the coal. it is really dangerous. People do dangerous things to make money and we cannot protect everyone all the time. Are we done wringing our hands over this? I sympathize with the families but deaths in coal mines are an example about how our news sources warp our common sense. Are we going to stop coal mining? No. Should we? No. Is it tragic that there are whole regions of people where this is their only employment option? Yes. Is THAT something we should be wringing our national hands about? Absolutely.

***

While I am being an insensitive lout I am sick and tired of New Orleans angst. HBO has a new series that finally does the disaster justice. Seriously, why do we as a country feel this tremendous need to allow our entertainers to feed us these tragic human interest stories over and over again to fuel our national shame and angst and even worse our national need to blame. Was it a tragedy? Absolutely. Did the Bush administration woefully under respond? Without a question. The "great Job Brownie" quote from W. was one of the great examples of Presidential detatchment and tone deafness but really it was a natural disaster.

Also, I guess no one there knew that the town resided below sea level. Fortunately a lot of it is now being built below sea level. Brilliant. It reminds me of all that development in Chesterfield Valley in reliance on the the new levees put out there. I remember what it all looked like under water. It reminds me also of the late (great) Sam Kinnison when talking about one of the frequent famines in the deserts of Africa suggesting we should not send them food, we should send them luggage.

"You live in a desert!
You know what it's going to a be
a hundred years from now?
It's going to be a ------- desert!
We have deserts in America
we just don't live in them!"

The same can be said for living on the gulf coast below sea level.

***

Upcoming events...."The Daddy's" House Concert Review, "Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" book and movie review and wait for it...Becker goes to Istanbul, will he be able to come back?

What Is The Big Deal? Huh?

Soooo... Avatar... still have not seen it. Looks like a bunch of really tall, blue versions of Jar Jar Binks. People tell me I am wrong but listening to people is what gets you to pay money to see a movie like "Hot Tub Time Machine". At least three people have told me how "hilarious" the movie is. All I can think every time I see the trailer is:

1. How did THIS happen to John Cusack?
2. I have seen every funny part of the movie when I watch the trailer.

Of these things I am certain.

But I digress.

Avatar and then the "How to Train Your Dragon" movie, then "Alice In Wonderland" and now "Clash of the Titans" (RELEASE THE KRAKEN!) They charge more for these movies. You have to wear queer glasses when you watch them. They charge more for these movies. There is not talk of 3-D TV. 3-D sports broadcasting. It goes on and on and while in the beginning or "at the cusp" as I like to say of this massive trend all I can say is...."milka what!?"

Seriously. Of the above films I only saw one and that was "Alice In Wonderland" which I thought was reasonably great (see earlier review) but it did not seem that great to me. The 3-D part was interesting but only that. I don't know, I just cannot help but think that....MY WHOLE LIFE IS IN 3-D! Why do I need to pay a higher ticket price, put on funny glasses and sit in the dark with 200 people and feel like more of a dork when.... I can just look around, sitting in my chair and literally my whole life is in 3-D. it seems stupud to me.

I mean, my life is kind of boring too. Soon, will I get to pay more and put on some different funny glasses so that I can sit and watch some other over weight, balding middle aged man sitting watching the show "Community" while he pecks away at his computer, maybe with his ugly dog in front of him...IN 3-D! Sounds great. I cannot wait. Wake me when it is over.

KUBE POST MORTEM! (Butler Wins In Our Dreams)

One of the greatest final games in recent memory was provided to us by the beloved Butler Bull Dogs and the hated (much hated) Blue Devils of Duke. It was an excellent effort by the boys from Indianapolis and they treated us to quite a show. it was really, really, awesome. You have to give it to Duke. they were defended tough and sunk some unbelievably clutch 3 pointers. For a Duke team that was seen as "not one of their best" they played so well, and so consistently that they deserved it. I hate to say that. And the Butler Bull Dogs had it in their power until the end when Hayward couldn't make an off balanced (knocked off balance) floating right hander from 15 feet. And then could not make a simple half courter 4 seconds later.

Hayward was so far and away the best player on the court that it is not even worth discussing. Stevens his coach (there is speculation that he might give up coaching at Butler and go back to 10th grade, get his braces put back on and finally go through puberty) did a great job and they were so well coached on their defense and so disciplined on offense that Duke never hit their rhythm like they did when they humiliated West Virginia. it just was fun, and painful to watch.... right to the end and tournaments and life do not get much better.

The KUBE also ended with a bang instead of a whimper. Henry (mo Money) Warshaw won the whole damn thing. He skipped the Berkeshire Hathaway annual meeting in Omaha so that he could really, really focus on his brackets. His choice of the Wisconsin Badgers to win it all was inspired, brilliant and just good enough with all of his other masterful picks to win it all. Henry of course invests for a lot of people and we all hope that he continues his quality picks for his clients. The SEC will likely be opening up an investigation of his company on Friday based on this new "investment vehicle" that he found which yielded him a 135 times return on his investment. He is doing a new offering in the company in early 2011 to fund his brackets next year. We wish him luck.

The Mulvahill.... ahhh the Mulvahill. This young man, to be married in three short months flinched and finished out of the money when Haywards gritty shots went awry. He is muddling though bravely and claims that he will "put away the Jamiesons and go back to work when Butler wins the national championship next year." Good heart Tom.

CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS GUY IS 65?

So out winner was Warshaw, second was a man known as Mark Brandom. Mark funded his bracket pics with TARP money and there is again some talk of another FDIC investigation. The rich get richer. All except for our third place finisher Jim Blair. His staff filled out his brackets for him Tom Blair, noted local philanthropist and do gooder is lobbying Warshaw and Brandom to follow his lead as he has evidently already agreed to donate his winnings either to:
1. The Butler Alumni Club
2. Tom Mulvahill's Honeymoon Fund
3. Tom Mulvahill's Employer (Friends of Kids With Cancer)
Way to lead by example Jim!

the KUBE Finals party was an unprecedented success with the best and brightest of St. louis glitteratti in attendance. The party was well attended with at least 15 KUBE players eating chic fil et nuggets, white castles (Henry ate 9) as well as home made Kukla pulled pork a home cooked ham and some duck thing wrapped in bacon. Becker celebrated by drinking too much. Maria Kukla locked herself in the bedroom sobbing at the random people Becker had invited to her house. Mrs Sandra Becker commented on "what a nice party this is without any of those Kowert/Winstroer people! Hard to argue with. David Kowert has assured me that they will be back next year even though his cousin deadbeat Jaime still owes us 10 bucks. As of this date he and two unidentified and unrelated Beckers are the only ones who remain unpaid. We know where you live.

Thanks for playing the greatest KUBE ever. Please make my dream of 500 participants come true for next year! There is talk of going exclusively to master card/pay pal for next year so be ready, talk it up among your friend, participate and come to the party. Be well and have an awesome 2010! From all your friends at KUBE!

Never forget our motto: "STUPID PEOPLE DOING STUPID THINGS!"

KUBE ALERT!

DO NOT FORGET ABOUT THE NCAA FINALS PARTY AT THE DEPOT! RSVP TO KUBE KKORDINATOR! GET IT DONE NOW! FLY IN FOR IT IF YOU NEED TO! YOU KNOW YOU DO NOT HAVE ANY OTHER FRIENDS. I CAN PROMISE YOU:

1. BEER

2. CHIK FIL ET NUGGETS WITH ALL THE SAUCES

3. A CRAVE CASE OF WHITE CASTLES

4. BEER!

5. WHATEVER KUKLA CAN PULL OUT OF FREEZER!

6. THE LOVELY AND TALENTED MARIA KUKLA!

Do not miss this. Do not make Don and I sit with Kowert/Winstroer clan again.

I am begging you.

BE THERE!