Dead Milkmen Review in the New York Press

Crappy photo of Dead Milkmen at the Warsaw in Brooklyn

What could make a Dead Milkmen concert better? Add a plate of sausage and pierogies, and a tall can of Zywiec Polish beer to the mix and you have yourself an amazing experience.  Lucky for me that’s what the Warsaw in Greenpoint offered last Friday for the first New York Dead Milkmen show in over a decade… (read the rest on the New York Press website).

Jeffery Lewis at Mercury Lounge

Last night I went with Maya to see Jeffery Lewis and man, it was lovely.  Lewis’ clever and heart felt lyrics were enhanced by the straight forward rock the band played.  A straight faced young man, Lewis’ played the crowed well, treating us to some of his large from comics about Barack Obama, a comic noir, and an unfinished piece on Korea.

Lewis played some of his covers from the band Crass, much, much slower versions. The band also played a couple songs by Jack, the bands bassist. I thought Lewis had a Kimya Dawson sound to him, kind of that anti-folk thing.

The whole show was really enjoyable one the drunk fat guy left us alone. Blue Moons and moody musicians. How do you spend your Friday night?

My Brightest Diamond (nyc live!)

Well, what can I say? Shara Worden is an amazing, energetic ball of bliss. Last night at the Blender Theater she rocked the stage with her live orchestra and despite some microphone problems the show went great. Dressed in black and white circus-styled clothes and white pointy birthday hats, which she passed out to the people by the stage, she belted out the first song of the night, “Inside a Boy.” Next came the throaty “Black & Costaud.” Both these songs are off her new album, A Thousand Shark’s Teeth, which I reviewed for the NY Press. You can also check out a profile I did of Worden for the Brooklyn Paper a few months back.

Anyway, Worden played mostly songs from her new album but did sing a few from her first record including, “Golden Star” and “Dragonfly.” She also did a slow and girlie version of Prince’s “When the Doves Cry.” I took a video of her singing “Bass Player” but for some reason I am having a hard time getting it off of the computer, so it will have to come later. And to any of you that missed the show, your loss! My Brightest Diamond just gets better and better.

Tragedy Beyond the Story

Anyone that knows opera, and even those that don’t, have a sense of the tragedy that surrounds the stories. Though recently real misfortune has hit at the Metropolitan Opera.

I wonder if there is some sort of taboo on certain productions. The Mets’ run of Tristian and Isolde has been fraught with problems. From the illness of the first choice, Ben Heppner, then the poor performance of his replacement John Mac Master, and finally the other night’s nasty fall of Gary Lehman.

The again the actual tale of Tristan and Isolde is horrible tragic. But as one of my professor says, “three times a trend.”

Balkan Beat Box Rocks

Ori Kaplan (formally with Gogol Bordello) on sax.

Check out the review in Anthem Magazine and the Balkan Beat Box myspace.com page.

The Blow Live: Blender Theater

Think of your sweetest, most tragic romance. Got it? Now start putting music to it. Probably you have The Cure somewhere in there and maybe a song by The Knife or Portishead and something hard like PJ Harvey. But what happens when one woman can give you the entirety of your relationship in a song, in a show?

This is exactly what Khaela Maricich of The Blow did last Friday at the Blender Theater in Manhattan. Not only did she sing most of her album Paper Television, but she gave a 12 step program for how to deal with love, heartbreak, loneliness and that burning desire to have something that you can’t—or more, someone who won’t have you.

The first step was to yell at an inanimate object, like a plastic bottle. She sang, “Hey Boy” in which the chorus repeats, “Hey Boy. Why you didn’t call me?” Maricich molded the bottle and went from desperate wanting to sad rejection with songs “Babay (Eat A Critter, Feel Its Wrath)” and “Hock It.” Each song was accompanied by a robot-like dance and the audience never felt the absence of other band members. The tunes were electronic and chaotic, but the words clever and straight to the heart.

At one point Maricich began to sing about the hopeful side of love with her songs, “Pardon Me” and “Parentheses.” She finished up with a story bout picking up a girl and being distraught that she had been dismissed. Then, in a hopeful leap, she sang the response, “True Affection” which repeats the idea of “you were out of my league…” There are few shows that leave you wanting more, Maricich exhausted most of her songs and by the end there wasn’t anything left to give, just the feeling of having gotten over some horrible heartache and optimistic about the future. –Linnea Covington