And a weekend recap (with some extra!)

It's gotten to the point where I really don't post nearly as often as I should. So that's why you get big recaps. :)

Friday night was the Abney Park show, which was a blast as always. We didn't stay there as late as I might have been inclined to do if we hadn't had early Saturday morning plans. But the merch booth ceased to be a zoo, so it seemed like a good time to escape. Now Jeremy has seen the madness that is working merch for Abney Park. I think we'll do it again. :)

Saturday kicked off with walking around Green Lake, which I had not done previously, despite living probably close enough to walk TO Green Lake. :) Headed to Beth's Cafe after that, which probably negated any benefits from walking around the lake. But it was tasty. :) Then it was off to run a handful of errands, including dropping off my bottle cap belts with Marlo so that they can go to Happy Delusions. Then we headed over to The Dreaming, which is Jeremy's comic shop of choice.

However, the owner was running late, which meant we ended up in a record store where I mostly behaved myself (only bought a 2-CD set of old NIN and a CD of Cure covers), and also got to check out the tattoo shop that one of Jeremy's friends recommended to me a while back. It seems like the sort of place I could deal with being tattooed at (read: not pretentious and the people there will speak to me as though I'm a human being even though I have no visible mods), and at least two of the artists seem to do work that I like.

Since we had gotten all of about 4 hours of sleep previous to walking, we decided to take a nap before going out for the evening. Someone was misinformed about when the Rat City Roller Girls bout was, but getting there early meant we got good seats. And holy crap, am I a fan of roller derby! I got a new, limited edition Krysztof shirt, and have learned how to make some sense of what's going on while they play. I'm still a little fuzzy on scoring, but it seems that's not entirely unusual, as it usually takes a bit before the score is updated. :)

Sunday would have been a lovely day for sleeping, but oh no. We'll sleep when we're dead. :) Instead, we headed to Denny's for breakfast with Jeremy's friend Darrin, who is a player in the big LARP that I briefly played. He gave me hope that I might be able to go back to the Changeling game, at least when I want something to do on the nights Jeremy has D&D. After breakfast was my turn to run One Hit Wonders, where I ran Star Wars after forgetting to really read the rules and not quite finishing my plot. :) Nonetheless, it was fun.

I spent yesterday at home, recovering both from lack of sleep and the edges of a migraine, which may, in fact, have been related. So I slept late, worked on some crochet, and did thrilling things like cancel my old cell phone and do my taxes. I also got some quality Rock Band time in before heading downtown for dinner and Coraline with Jeremy. I'll talk more about Coraline another day, but for now, I was mostly pleased with the movie. Mostly.

Nine Inch Nails and the rest of the weekend

So before anything else, Nine Inch Nails. Oh. My. God.

The opening band, Crystal Castles, ended up being a sad disappointment. Last Wednesday, we went to their MySpace, and they seemed like they would be a band I like. I made a comparison at one point that they kinda seemed like the twisted love child of Ladytron, Atari Teenage Riot, and Tatu. Now that's an interesting love child.

Sadly, they really weren't that good live. The lead singer seemed to believe that since she was playing a HUGE venue, she needed to scream into the mic to be heard. This was not the case. Mics are for amplification, you see. But when you scream into a mic, and it's being run through a synth, you end up sounding just completely unintelligible.

Now granted, I shouldn't be too harsh. This band obviously did something right to be opening for Nine Inch Nails. But I think this was their first performance in a really big space, and they're just not ready for it.

But NIN more than made up for the sucky opening band. I felt kind of out of it at first, because for whatever reason, I haven't listened to their newest albums as religiously as I should have. Aside from the singles, anything after With Teeth was sort of like "what is this?" But seeing as they played plenty of older songs, I was okay after a little bit. :)

However, I have discovered that I'm getting too old to headbang, and that makes me really sad. My neck is still bugging me this morning. :(

Oh, and having a xylophone (or two) at an industrial show? Frickin' awesome. :)

+++++

In other news, I spent a lovely day yesterday hanging out with some of the EtsyRain folks, visiting a show in Renton and LOTS of thrift stores. And a really big JoAnn's. And a Half-Price Books. And super yummy Japanese food. :) All in all, a great day. :)

Of course, I'm paying for it now, in that we have a TON to get done this week. But at least I'm in Seattle for a few weeks. Not sure when or where the next trip will be, but I'm really keeping my fingers crossed for Kansas at the end of August. I wanna see my nephew!

Home again, home again..

My entire day today will be spent traveling. Not a terribly thrilling Friday, but ah well. It gets me home at the end, and that's what matters. :)

I realized that since I get back to Seattle late this evening, and then we're going to Nine Inch Nails tomorrow, we won't get to go see the new X-Files movie until sometime next week. That sucks. :( But when you weigh getting to see NIN with getting to see Mulder and Scully kiss ('bout damn time), I will go see Trent, even if he isn't the scrawny little goth boy that I loved when I first saw him. :)

And the End of the Work Week Wisdom:
"Gas prices are high.
We are not."
--Seen on a hotel marquee in Ukiah

(Read about Mendocino County on Wikipedia if you want to get the good laugh out of that one.)

Almost time to go home...

It's Thursday now, which means almost time to go home. I've got to hit two research locations today, and then tomorrow will be spent primarily driving and flying. It's very sad when you have to drive for almost twice as long as your flight will take you. This fact and the no cell phone reception may, in fact, be related. :)

As if I weren't already looking forward to getting home, now I'm doubly looking forward to it. We knew that Nine Inch Nails was gearing up for a tour, but at home, we can't access the NIN site. It's utterly bizarre. So Jerome asked me to take a look at the site while we were chatting last night.

As it turns out, the show in Seattle is this Saturday, and was not sold out. I nearly fell over from shock. On top of that, the ticket prices weren't nearly as bad as I was anticipating. So hurrah for serendipity, because we're going to see NIN now! :)

I haven't seen them since 1995... more specifically, Valentine's Day of 1995. I have surprisingly fond memories of driving from Kirksville with my then boyfriend and one of my bestest buddies in college, to retrieve said boyfriend's buddies in his hometown, and then my buddy's girlfriend in St. Louis. So six people crammed into a tiny little car, and a couple of totally illegal U-turns, so that we could get there. :)

I remember seeing Jeff with his damn floor seats, watching all of the freaks go by, and seeing the Jim Rose Circus Side Show. I honestly can't remember who the opening band was. I think it was either Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds or Big Head Todd and the Monsters. I know it was "some guys name" and "some sort of other thing." :) I hate to think that it was Nick Cave, though, because I remember not liking the opening band much, and just wanting them to get on with things. :)

I also got a T-shirt that night, which I think Megan might still have. Don't ask me why I gave it to her. My only excuse was that it was a sort of off-white color, and I probably gave it to her during my "I'm only wearing black" phase, which I have only slightly grown out of. :)

Ah, I just love concert reminiscences. :)

This. Is. GOTH!

I haven't talked a whole lot about music lately, mainly because I really haven't found much in the way of new music lately. Sure, we've bought some new CDs, but they've mostly been new CDs by bands we know and love. I think the last three CDs we bought were Abney Park, Flogging Molly, and They Might Be Giants.

Now, I have an unreasonable hatred of YouTube. I'm not sure quite where this hatred comes from. I just know that whenever anyone sends me a YouTube link, I generally ignore it.

And then Jerome goes and sends me four of them after I went to bed last night, so they're in my inbox this morning. Well, if they're from Jerome, they must be important. He knows of my loathing of YouTube, and only sends me the really good stuff.

Oh yes, this is a win!

In case anyone else loathes YouTube like me and is hesitant to click on the link, if you like Nine Inch Nails/Trent Reznor, and/or are, were, or ever thought about being a goth, click it. You won't be sorry you did. (It's Trent Reznor and Peter Murphy doing "Bela Lugosi's Dead.")

(Okay, read the title in the "This. Is. SPARTA!" voice now, and you will laugh more.)

And seriously, I want to get a screen capture of short-haired Trent screaming "Bela Lugosi's dead!" while Peter showers him with rose petals, and make an LJ icon that says "This. Is. GOTH!!!!!!!"

I will now cease my fangirl squeeing over Trent Reznor. Yeah, he may have short hair and not be scrawny anymore, but I still love him from when he was the scrawny heroin junkie with crazy hair. :)

Back in November, my friend Shawn played a few songs for me. Some were songs I had heard before, some were not. But all of them were making me laugh hysterically. What were these brilliant pieces of work?

The demos for the songs on Pretty Hate Machine, and a few songs that didn't quite make the final cut for the album.

I'm fairly certain most people are familiar with the tracks on Pretty Hate Machine, so I won't comment much on them. But if you want a general idea on the differences, think more 80s synth pop, and less industrial, and you'll get the picture pretty well. It was 1988, what more do you expect, honestly?

But there was at least one track that didn't quite make it. (I think there were two, but I'm not 100% sure about the 2nd one, so we'll leave that to discuss another day.) Well, I got my hands on a copy of it the other night, and wow... yeah.

The song is called "Purest Feeling." You really should find a copy of it if you can. It'll make the rest of this make more sense.

Don't worry, I'll still be here when you get back... and recover from the laughing fit that will inevitably ensue...

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Back with us? Done hyperventilating? Good to hear. :)

So yeah. "Purest Feeling." For those of you who were not able to go find it in the interim, let me just say this. HORN section. Yes, Trent Reznor, singing with a horn section in the background (synth, of course, but that's not really the point).

Even though I know that if I had heard this song at that time, along with the others from Pretty Hate Machine, I probably would not have seriously considered Trent as the goth-industrial god he is today, I can't help but rock out to it. Oh, granted, it's a different sort of rocking out than is dictated by most Nine Inch Nails music. It's much more of a dance-y rocking out.

Which I suppose isn't really rocking out. But anyway, that's not the point.

The point is that Trent often makes me smile. It's usually more of a "damn, he's sexy" sort of smile. This time, he makes me laugh. And somehow, that's a good thing. :)

::..::

In other news, yesterday was an odd day. Today promises to be less odd, I think. Tomorrow will probably be odd again. No, I don't think it's at all coincidental that the numbers of the days are odd... that's not what I meant by odd... :)
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Ummm, music. Not anything new to mention, other than the fact that Gregg's taste in music SUCKS... ;) If you read this, Gregg, I'm mostly kidding... but you do like a lot of bands that I don't like. :)

I've got a list of stuff to download at home, and there are a couple of new bands on there... so we'll see how that pans out.

If you're in C-dale or the immediate area, you could go see Brat Pack on Friday night at the Copper Dragon. I won't be there, as it turns out, but it's still a good show to try to catch. Of course, the biggest problem is whether you will end up standing in line in the cold for nothing, or actually get to see them. Apparently the line for Hairbanger's Ball last Saturday was snaked around all of the buildings around Copper, and many people in line didn't get in. So yeah, though I did want to see them on Friday, I won't miss the "standing in the cold without a coat and maybe not getting in" aspect of the equation... :)

As for another concert, NIN is playing in Cham-bana on February 10th. There are still tickets available, and they're only $35. There's also no opening act announced as of the last time I checked. If I could find out who was opening, that would make my decision a lot easier. Gonna go look into that when I'm done with this post...

And finally, the Sisters of Mercy are playing in Chicago on March 14th (I think). On hearing this, I went "kewl... now I guess I should hear some of their stuff before I decide that I'm going..." :) Still haven't decided on that. I'm thinking no-ish.
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You would think that a person who is perfectly happy sleeping till the last possible minute (and sometimes beyond) during the week would relish the opportunity to sleep late on the weekends... weird, isn't it? :)

I'm still waiting to see Queen of the Damned. The weather last night was rather snowy and icy, so we decided to stay in. But before the weather got bad, we took a fun trip to the Art Museum in St. Louis, and then I got to watch a couple of kewl DVDs... the Nine Inch Nails concert that just came out (And All That Has Ever Been, or something like that), and a handful of Type O Negative videos. I'm leaning back towards my "just barely off the mainstream" goth music again, though I'm still really enjoying my extremely obscure goth bands that I can only find on compilation CDs. Hmmm... why not, I'll just put a request right here. If anyone knows anything about finding full length CDs (heck, even EPs would make me happy) by the Morgans and/or Lucyfix, please E-mail me!

Well, vacation is all the way over when I get back home this afternoon, so I may start working on a new chronicle. First order of business is finding players, I suppose... and then figuring out which of my chronicle ideas most appeals to the group as a whole. I have five (yeah, five...) ideas at the moment, all of which would be fun in my mind, but they're fairly diverse, and not everyone would enjoy all of them. But I'm sure there will be more on this front in the next few days. In actuality, I should be working on my stuff for Egyptian Campaign, which is just over a month away... knowing me, however, I'll put it off till the last minute, and wing what I haven't prepared... ;)