Bodyrock w/ DJ Skeme Richards, Nov.23, M Room
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| Photo l DJ Statik |
| Skemeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! |
The day after Thanksgiving when my pants were just a wee toooooo tight, I knew I had to get out the house and work off that stuffing and yams. The solution came in the form of Ill Vibe Collective’s Bodyrock party. One of the longest running dance parties of its kind returned to the M Room last Friday with a little help from Freshout Media. When I say ‘of its kind’, I mean an event that is truly like a house party - bodies squeezed into a tight, but comfortable space rockin’ out to a smorgasbord of multigenre rhythms. The Ill Vibe crew are behind the wheels the majority of the time. Once in awhile special guests stop by to do a little something, and last week it was Skeme Richards, the Philly bred and raised Rock Steady Crew DJ that keeps party people vibin’ until early morning hours. Some asses were planted at the bar, some were planted at the tables eating more grub (not me!), but most were sweatin’ it out on the dancefloor to classic hip-hop, reggae, house, soul, R&B (not sure who played it, but props for Amerie’s "Hate2LoveU") and an ounce of breakbeats. The bboys/bgirls did what they do - creating a circle to get down, show off and have a few rounds of friendly battles. Bodyrock is definitely back in effect and I hope it stays that way - I need to lose a few more pounds and dancing is way more appealing and cheaper than going to the gym. Ill Vibe Collective Click For More »
Hate Mail, Act II
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| Photo | Lauren L. Wright |
| Charlotte Northeast and Damon Bonetti |
Through Dec. 9, Act II Playhouse, 56 E. Butler Pike, Ambler, 215-654-0200, act2.org.
Though Hate Mail started as a sardonic response to A. R. Gurney’s Love Letters — an oft-produced romance told solely through correspondence that, due to actors not needing to learn lines, has been performed by countless television actors — it’s actually a celebration of the lost art of written correspondence.
Bill Corbett (best known for writing and acting contributions to Mystery Science Theatre 3000 and its bastard child, The Film Crew, but also an accomplished playwright), and Kira Obolensky (Quicksilver, Lobster Alice) wrote Hate Mail in 2004 as letters, sort of an improv in writing. Their inspired tale of a spoiled midwesterner’s written attempts to force a refund for a broken “I-Heart-NY” snow globe from a bitter clerk and would-be artist seems almost impossible these days; do any civilians (i.e., non-journalists or English teachers) use words so well?
Hate Mail is a joy to listen to, as accomplished actors (and real-life couple) Charlotte Northeast (as struggling Manhattan photographer Dahlia) and Damon Bonetti (as Preston, a Minneapolis trust fund baby who rebels by writing complaint letters) recite their missives to each other, never making eye contact.
Unfortunately, director David Stradley doesn’t quite trust them or the material. Ignoring the theater maxim (and specific suggestion from the authors) that “less is definitely more,” he works overtime to disguise the play’s best feature with fussy staging — hell, his production STARTS with a scene change! — that lengthens and deadens the play.
So Hate Mail, which could play splendidly with two music stands, receives walls of yellow and green panels that open to suggest different locations, plus two big puzzling wooden spools and an ugly map of America from Melissa Guyer (it could be a set for some other play, one that needs a set) and extraneous costume changes from Jessica Riser-Milne. Perky production assistant Jessica Galletta dresses up as a postal employee to help, and all this busy cleverness turns what could be a lovely eighty-minute one-act into a labored two-act event.
Preston and Dahlia fall into hate, love, hate, and something sort of like love again (their relationship is like “the Titanic and Watergate together”) through glorious letters (not the monosyllabic laziness of e-mail, until the final scene), ranging from elegantly crafted insults and heartfelt bursts of passion to brief blunt notes punctuated with dead lizards. Despite this production’s counterproductive ambitions, Corbett and Obolensky’s twistedly brilliant correspondence champions a dying art.
See also: Act II.
The 1-Upper: Flute Hero
I’ve never played any of the Guitar Hero games, and even though I’m sure I’d be terrible at it (I tried the real guitar and the resulting sound was as melodious as, say, a pack of screaming babies) I still want to get it. The ridiculous price tag is what’s keeping me from any rocking, so luckily I can bide my time with Flute Hero. The game works the same as the Guitar Hero games in that buttons that correspond with certain notes - in this case the number keys. In Flute Hero, there are 10, which makes it ridiculous, and I’m hoping the developer was kidding when they suggest that you hold your keyboard in the traditional flautist position. Of the four difficulty levels (easy, medium, hard, and insane) I did nothing less than horrible on the easiest. I suppose that makes me a flute loser, but, hey, at least it wasn’t the piccolo, the dorkiest of all woodwinds (sorry piccolo players). I do have to point out that the game does have a volume knob that goes up to 11, a nice touch. Go play it here, but be forewarned, there is a cuss word used in the countdown to the game starting, so it’s midly NSFW.
Mike Doughty, Nov. 19, World Café Live
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| Photo | John Vettese |
The question jar was overflowing at the beginning of the night, but Mike Doughty got through damn near the entire thing. The stalwart alt-rock songwriter’s latest tour isn’t just an impressive, two-and-a-half hour revue of his oeuvre, covering his Soul Coughing days all the way to the forthcoming Golden Delicious…it also functions as an interactive interview. Fans submitted questions - about songwriting, politics and vices - into an onstage wine bucket before Doughty’s set began. In between songs, his cello / dobro accompanist Andrew “Scrap” Livingston plucked three or four slips of paper at a time and read them in a hysterical deadpan monotone. Think of it as the concert equivalent of DVD commentary, with “no question too taboo.” Well, almost none. Of the 70 questions Doughty answered, crumpled into a ball and tossed to the stage, there was one single slip of paper he shoved into his jacket pocket as quickly as possible. He explained he wouldn’t read it during the show, but if any interested parties really wanted to know, they could come talk to him afterwards. As far as we saw, nobody took him up on the offer. Highlights and photos after the jump. Click For More »
The 1-Upper: Cursed Winds
I spent hours and hours of my life as a child holed up in my parents’ basement playing games like Sid Meier’s Pirates! and The Secret Monkey Island on my Tandy computer that I was very excited to stumble across Cursed Winds the other day. The game takes one of my favorite parts of Pirates!, the ship to ship combat, and adds lots of fun twists, like an upgrade system that adds crew members, more cannons, and artillery support (where was the artillery when I kept dying trying to take on Black Beard back in 1988?). Cursed Winds uses the arrow keys to control your movement in the water as a fleet of ship descends from the top of the screen, much like a maritime Space Invaders. Your job is to maneuver around, jamming on the spacebar as your cannons slowly reload. After you weaken your enemy’s defenses, move in close for a little hand-to-hand combat, and, if victorious, loot and sink the ship. You’ll get the chance to move on to more difficult levels and upgrade your ship if you can take on the stage’s flagship. Be forewarned, the games moves at nearly the same pace as a real ship, so set aside some time if you want to play. You can find Cursed Winds here.
Dashboard Confessional, Nov. 15, Electric Factory
The Polyphonic Spree, Nov. 14, The Trocadero
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| Photo | John Vettese |
Eight confetti cannons multipied by three firings equals a small forest floating downward from the Troc’s rafters. But anybody who’s already caught The Polyphonic Spree their tour in support of The Fragile Army could have told you that. The crepe paper showering is all part of the spectacle and revelry they create, the joyous Flaming Lips vibe they go for in pushing the symphonic crescendos of "Running Away" or "When the Fool Becomes a King" just that much further. What made last night’s confetting so cool was the aftermath. As the show let out, a layer of thin, white paper coated the Troc floor, probably a couple inches deep. But since co-headliner Rooney did a meet-and-greet afterwards, security wasn’t as quick to usher the audience out the door as usual. (Sidebar: there seemed to be an interesting Rooney-Spree fan divide, to the point where the last song of the SoCal popsters was met with screams of "ROONEY’S FINALLY DONE!" and loud cheers from the lobby.) Taking advantage of this extra time, a few dozen Spree fans hung out on the floor for a good ten or fifteen minutes to happily throw confetti balls at one another, toss it in the air, slide around in it and generally act like big kids. Photos of the show and the fallout after the jump. Click For More »
Patrick Street, Nov. 14, Crossroads
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| Photo | Mary Armstrong |
Crossroads takes place in a grand old church, with the requisite above the street elevation. No matter how tall you are, on some step you will have the concert flyer tacked to the door glaring in your eye. “’The original Irish supergroup’ indeed!” sniffs I. That’s forgetting the earlier bands these four played with. Andy Irvine (bouzouki, harmonica, ringing vocals) was an ornament to De Danann and Planxty, fiddle legend Kevin Burke had a fine long run with the Bothy Band — a supergroup if ever there was. Guitarist and singer Ged Foley (House Band) and mutli-instrumentalist John Carty, winner of Irish TV’s traditional musician of the year disction a few years back round out the latest version of Patrick Street. Save for Carty’s picking up the wooden flute time-to-time and Irvin’s neck-racked harmonica, they are folk string quartet. The expected reels, jigs and hornpipes made the 120+ in attendance grin widely and pat feet, but never quite get up from the seats for a set, resisting the pulse of John Carty’s plectrum banjo showed remarkable restraint. Kevin Burke’s dry, needling sense of humor carried the group from one tune to the next, whether flogging the dozens of different CDs the band members had for sale or explaining the meaning of an upcoming song. He seemed to take particular pleasure in digging Irivine. When they returned to the stage after the first standing O, Burke quipped, “You might wonder why he is tuning now… that might’ve been done at the start…. but that’s all right! We have another concert tomorrow night!” The tuning police also want to question why two such accomplished fiddlers as Burke and Carty can’t agree to intonation in the higher positions when playing in unison, so this could be a very subtle diversionary tactic. Aside from a few passages of questionable intonation though, you won’t hear livelier, more compelling music. Treated to excellent sound reinforcement those who own the new CD On the Fly (Loftus) will agree that the sets lifted from that recording sounded even better live.
The Low Road, Nov. 10, Tin Angel
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| Photo | Patrick Rapa |
What to say? It was a great show. The band sounded wonderful, like old champs summoning up their peak level muscle memory for one more round. I’d forgotten what a killer song "Natural" is, or that it’s bassist Allan Hewitt who sings it. The band played a lot of the old favorites, with a few curveballs, and left a couple staples off the setlist to make sure we come to the next reunion. They like to leave em hanging.
See also: The Low Road
Stevie Wonder, Nov.8, Wachovia Center
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| Rolling Stone |
| different look, same sound |
Those words came to the legendary Stevie Wonder after the 2006 death of his mother. He said she echoed that to him one day when he was in mourning. The result of that spirtual encouragement is a nationwide tour, which I had the ultimate pleasure of attending when it rolled through Philly last week.
There was nothing keeping me from seeing Stevie. Sure, tickets were a bit steep, but I had confidence that this experience would illuminate my musical soul for quite some time. I was 100% correct. My parents witnessed Stevie 25 years before me and they said how complete and phenomenal his show was. They were 100% correct.
The night started off quite humorous. A Stevie Wonder impersonator entered the building and people went crazy running over to him, taking pictures, getting autographs, and giving hugs. Oops!
Around 8:15, the REAL Stevie Wonder appeared on stage escorted by his daughter and background singer, Aisha Morris. Stevie was in signature style with a sharp black outfit that boasted colorful faces on the sleeves. After an introductory speech why he decided to tour, he sat down at his piano and started to play, "Love’s In Need Of Love Today." Aisha accompanied him on the vocals. The band - consisting of 2 other background singers, 2 percussionists, a drummer, 2 guitarists, 2 keyboardists and bass player Nathan Watts (who has been with Stevie for a long time - thanks to my UK bud Simon for hipping me to that fact) casually strolled out mid-song and started to play. The adrenaline and excitement skyrocketed with the instrumentation filling the arena.
The next 3 hours was a music lover’s paradise. It is impossible for him to cover every hit that the man has had during his 40+ career, but he did a damn good job trying. Where do I even begin with the songs? Damn…