A Spectacular Concert

Tonight I had the pleasure of seeing what will now go down as my second favorite concert ever (nothing has yet to top seeing Rush at Nissan Pavilion). Not only were The Decemberists even better live than I had expected, but I discovered a new artist to immediately add to my ever-expanding collection, Andrew Bird.

The concert at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia opened with a guy I was unfamiliar with, Robyn Hitchcock. Honestly...although he's apparently been around since the 70s, I wasn't too thrilled with him. He basically sounded like if John Lennon decided to start a punk band whose lyrics bordered on the surreal. All I remember about his music at this point was angular guitar noises. His vocals were not fantastic. At one point, Colin Meloy came out to provide some tambourine and back up vocals. The two of them were not in harmony at all. However, I consider this opening performance a minor speedbump at best. What came next more than made up for the eccentricities of an old, quirky British man.

I had never heard Andrew Bird before tonight. He was amazing. If I had to describe him, I would say imagine Thom Yorke if he was a top-notch whistler and a classically-trained violin player. His music reminded me at times of The Verve, but overall his style is very distinctive and unique. He combines jazz and classical music with those kind of free-flowing, cascading sonic backdrops typical of post-rock bands like Mogwai or Explosions in the Sky. It's definitely the type of music I would love to just kick back and relax to, the kind of music that passes over you and carries you with it.

But, of course, the main attraction was what made this concert such an amazing experience. This was my first time seeing The Decemberists live and I wasn't sure if their extremely literate, folksy, and downright idiosyncratic brand of indie rock would translate as well on stage. Well, it did...more than I could have predicted. They kicked prodigious amounts of ass. What I didn't know before was that frontman Colin Meloy, in addition to being the singer and songwriter, really pulls his weight as a guitar player as well. They played The Hazards of Love in its entirety, without any break between songs as it was meant to be played. If you read my review of the album, you know I am a huge fan of it. Every member of the band was working overtime to fully realize the music and the narrative behind it. I have to say, after seeing it performed live, somehow the story behind The Hazards of Love actually makes some semblance of sense. Maybe it's because I was actually paying closer attention to it.

The vocal performances of Colin Meloy, Becky Stark, and especially Shara Worden were awesome. Shara Worden as The Queen was the highlight of the concert for me. Every time she came to the front, her performance was full of such power and intensity that I was literally on the edge of my seat. She would flail her arms, wave her hands in the air, and jump around the stage as her body writhed and squirmed like a serpent. I don't know if I'd say she really conveyed the image of an evil queen, but all the same she was fun to watch. Becky Stark did a great job too, but her chirpier, higher-pitched voice (still quite lovely) combined with the fact that she was swaying back in forth in a wedding dress while decked out with an excessive amount of make-up made her considerably less endearing to me than Shara Worden. Seriously, I think I might have a crush on Worden.

After the conclusion of The Hazards of Love, the band left and then returned minutes later to play what was basically a second concert consisting of some of their more well-known hits. Colin Meloy interrupted "A Cautionary Song" to narrate one of the strangest adaptations of Hamlet I have ever seen, portrayed by the other members of the band acting out in the middle of the audience on a riser. We did get to see Chris Funk and John Moen have a sloppy makeout, so bonus, I guess. A few songs later, in a completely unexpected and amazingly ballsy move, Shara Worden and Becky Stark came back out decked in snazzy white outfits to perform "Crazy On You" by Heart. Before that, Colin Meloy performed what he described as "the worst song he'd ever written" entitled "Dracula's Daughter" only to seque into one of their biggest singles, "O Valencia!" Finally, he got the crowd singing aloud in a most heartfelt way to the closing song, "Sons and Daughters."

I don't regret one penny of the money I spent to see this concert. It was emotional, triumphant, and downright fun. This cemented The Decemberists as one of my favorite bands. And now, I have to go out and acquire Andrew Bird's albums as soon as possible.

Movie Review: The Hangover

The Hangover was funny. That's basically it, pure and simple. I saw the movie tonight, and I laughed basically from beginning to end - even during the ending credits. I probably haven't laughed that hard at a movie since Beerfest. As you can clearly tell, my taste in movies is extremely high-brow.

When four dudes head to Vegas to celebrate their friend's impending nuptuals with an epic bachelor party, a sequence of increasingly improbable events leaves them waking up hungover and completely oblivious to the events that transpired the night before. The character of Stu, played by Ed Helms (Andy Bernard from The Office) is awakened by a rather indifferent chicken to a hotel room that has been, in a word, trashed. There's a tiger in the bathroom and a baby in a closet, and none of the guys - Stu, Alan (Zach Galifianakis), or Phil (Bradley Cooper) - have any idea how they got there. Worse yet, the bachelor himself, Doug (Justin Bartha), is missing without a trace. The trio sets out to piece together the scattered fragments of their wild, alcohol and roofie-induced evening and figure out just what the hell happened.

The movie is offensive, crude, irreverent, and hilarious. The plot is extremely similar to that of Dude, Where's My Car? but...come on - who gives a shit about Dude, Where's My Car? That movie was a piece of shit. This movie, on the other hand, was inspired comedy. Even the ending credits were awesome. The photographs that more or less fill in the details are as funny as anything that actually happened during the course of the film. I did wish they had explained where the chicken had come from - while you don't see any chicken in the pictures, you do see some cock. See what I did there?

I think the character of Alan, a socially-inept man-child, stole the show. This was actually my first experience with comedian Zach Galifianakis and I have to say - he was delightful. Everything he did and everything he said was guaranteed to make me burst out laughing. Clearly I have been missing out here.

The movie went for laughs at every opportunity no matter how cheap or juvenile they were. There were plenty of unanswered questions even with the photo slideshow at the end. For example, just how did they manage to steal that cop car? How did they find out where Mike Tyson lived and how did they get into his house? These questions alone guarantee to me that the DVD is unquestionably going to be a worthwhile purchase. I can't wait to add it to my collection, but before that I'll definitely be seeing it in theatres at least once more.

For once, I have to say that Roger Ebert summed it up best: "Now this is what I'm talkin' about. The Hangover is a funny movie, flat out, all the way through. Its setup is funny. Every situation is funny. Most of the dialogue is funny almost line by line."

Album Review: The Hazards of Love by The Decemberists

I'd like to try my hand at music reviewing, so I think I'll start with an album I acquired recently: the newest release from one of my favorite not-quite-so-indie-anymore bands The Decemberists. The Hazards of Love may be their most ambitious album yet. Similar to their last album, The Crane Wife, The Decemberists have a story to tell on this one - albeit one far more convoluted. To quote the Rolling Stones review, it's "a tale of a maiden knocked up by a shape–shifting beast who may be her future husband. There's also a psychotic queen and three revenge–seeking ghost kids." The Hazards of Love is actually the name of an EP from 1966 by English folk-singer Anniee Briggs. Frontman Colin Meloy wanted to use the title as the name of a song, which developed into a 17-song suite about shapeshifters, cunning rakes, and treacherous fairies. All the songs flow together, starting with the gradual buildup of "Prelude" which seques directly into "The Hazards of Love 1", which sets up the rest of the album with a lush, somewhat melodramatic ballad typical of The Decemberists.




The intensity continues to build as this song moves into "A Bower Scene", which features a motif that reminds me of the guitar riff in the song "Transatlanticism" by Death Cab for Cutie, which gets swallowed up by an oppressive wall of distortion several times in the song.

The next track, "Won't Want for Love (Margaret in the Taiga)" opens with a nice bluesy riff before introducing the first of several guest vocalists who contribute to this album. Becky Stark of Lavender Diamond provides the voice of Margaret with her lilting, ethereal vocals. She performs a duet with Meloy on "Isn't It a Lovely Night?"



To me, the stand-out song on this album is "The Wanting Comes In Waves/Repaid". After a few minutes of Colin Meloy accompanied on mandolin, the gloves come off and a simplistic yet badass guitar riff introduces the Queen. The Queen is voiced by Shara Worden of My Brightest Diamond. Worden might be my new favorite female singer. She has a commanding, powerful voice which she utilises as the spiteful Queen to full effect. I checked out some of her songs with her band and they are quite good. Check out her cover of the song "Feeling Good" as well.





This album is overall more bombastic and dynamic than their previous efforts. The Decemberists seem to have adopted a greater desire to rock the fuck out. More guitars, more distortion, more everything. "The Queen's Rebuke/The Crossing" is practically coated in sludge, the screeching, frantic wah-wah solo is blistering and fierce, and Shara Worden is downright intimidating. There's even an organ solo.



After this, the album begins to draw towards its conclusion, but not before a reprise of the theme from "The Wanting Comes in Waves" and a choir of ghostly children, something that might be out of place elsewhere but not on a Decemberists album. After the riffage that gets unleashed in the middle of the album, the end descends back to earth with a more pensive, melancholy closer featuring some nice pedal steel guitar. In general, the flow of the album is similar to that of "The Tain", just vastly expanded.

In summary, The Hazards of Love is not likely to bring any new fans into the fold. Those who already wrote The Decemberists off as pretentious or just plain nerdy are not about to be proved wrong here. However, if you're already a fan, you'll find this album highly rewarding. It's everything you already expect from the band - highly literate lyrics, colorful instrumentation, and a general affection for all things theatrical - plus more metal sensibilities and some great guest vocalists. Don't worry about following the plot, I didn't even try.