21st
Put On A Slow, Dumb Show For You
Friday, that was a day. A day that began with great boredom and ended with a boy being hopped up on good music to the point some thought he was drunk.
That night at about 7:45 I remembered that The National was playing at the Moore Theatre. I thought in this hipster town that it would surely be sold out which left me skeptical to go. Then I checked the world wide web to see when the show started and found out that Menomena was opening up for them. This intrigued me and I tried to convince Derek to come along but he was buying it. I said to myself, screw it, I have to leave this apartment. I ran down to the basement and got my bike, bombed some of the biggest hills I’ve ever rode on and weaved my way through traffic downtown. Riding on sidewalks, alleys, one-way streets I was determined to make it to the show. I came to a hault at the box window and asked if it was sold out and how much it cost. The guy looked up from his flat brimmed new era hat and said, “it’s not sold out and it’s 20 dollars even.” I asked where the nearest ATM machine was and kept working. After riding the two blocks to the ATM and putting the 20 in my pocket I pedaled back up the hill. Of course everything ends up being uphill in Seattle. I locked my bike walked up to the ticket line and a guy came up to me and asked if I was buying a ticket. I told him yeah and he asked if I would buy one of his. I said, “how much do you want for it?” He told me he was just asking for whatever they were charging at the door. I told him I only had 10 dollars cash and he said, “that’s good enough man.” BOOM! I’m in the show.
As I walk into the venue I realized it was a general admission show and I could sit wherever. The best part about going to shows alone is that you can sit where ever you want. Which for me would end up being pretty good.
This venue was where Pearl Jam filmed their music video for Evenflow in 1991. I sat beneath the wall that Eddie Vedder stands on in the middle of the song.
When I walked in Menomena had just started and if you have heard them on their album it is unbelievable that 3 guys make all those different noises and crazy beats. They were awesome. The drummer for Menomena is ridiculously talented and is like a human click track. After playing nearly their whole newest album, Friend And Foe, they bowed and left the stage. In my opinion I think Menomena is often overlooked by people. Their sounds and compositions are fresh and highly thought out.
Stage change, after about 15 minutes of a bunch of people running back and forth across the stage The National entered into the dim glow of blue and purple lighting. The lead singer, Matt, looks a lot younger in person than he does in magazines. They start the show and I’m a little hesitant to say it was good. Something was missing, at first, it felt empty. Then it progressed, as they performed the next three songs the energy would grow more and more until the whole crowd was really getting into it and you could tell they were having a good time up there.
They would play all the songs from The Boxer and songs that I had never heard but were awesome. The songs not from The Boxer had Matt yelling at the top of his lungs and jumping around the stage like a mad man. Maybe what was so great was that it was nothing you would expect from a guy who really just speaks lyrics to songs.
Eventually they would leave the stage, come back for a two song encore and leave to a huge applause from a well fed audience starving for good music.
After the show I rode back up all those hills back to the apartment and came home to Derek saying, “Dude, we gotta get our rabbit tacos in the next 3 hours.” So that’s just what we did. Walked up the street got goat and rabbit tacos and then walked to the grocery store where I showed Derek the mecca of buying beer and wine. This grocery store has a second level at the back of the store. You walk up about 10 stairs and you find yourself lost in a forest of wine bottles. If you make it through that you’ll be sitting in a clearing of freezers filled with almost too many options for beer…cold beer.
Seattle knows what they’re doing. Mass amounts of good cold beer, awesome shows all the time, everybody recycles and picks up their dogs poop. People are out and about at all hours of the day and night hanging out, just walking around, drinking coffee, shooting the shit. Man, it’s great.
