A Guy About Cleveland

Favorite music of 2011

2012-01-04T21:36:00.001-08:00

With the new year here, I guess if I want to post a list of my favorite albums from 2011, I had better get to it! It was a strong year for music, from my point of view. I got to listen to a lot of really good albums; some were releases I'd been anticipating and many others were artists I discovered. There were also some great concerts. Godspeed You! Black Emperor in Chicago and The Decemberists at Nautica stand out as two of the most memorable shows I've ever attended. The former was simply one of the most epic experiences of my life, two-and-a-half mind blowing and eardrum rattling hours of post-rock mastery. The latter was an all around great set punctuated by the single most memorable song performance I've witnessed, as a huge cargo ship passed behind the riverside stage in perfect timing with "The Mariner's Revenge Song."

In this post, I decided to list my ten favorite albums of the year. I make no claim that these are the ten best albums of the year; these are strictly my opinions. I listened to about three dozen new albums this year (and at least as many albums from previous years that were new to me). There's undoubtedly lots of great stuff out there that I haven't heard, but this was a good number for me. I like being able to devote extra attention to the stuff I really like, rather than trying to listen to as many different albums as possible.

I'd like to mention When You Left the Fire by The Wilderness of Manitoba, which I reviewed here. It was released in 2011 in the U.S., and would rank pretty highly on my list, but was actually released in 2010 in Canada.

And now, to the countdown.

10. Beirut - The Rip Tide

"Postcards From Italy" off of Beirut's first album, Gulag Orkestar, is one of my favorite songs ever. The words and music together create an amazing mood of nostalgia and of being transported to another time and place. And oh, those horns! Although The Flying Club Cup was pretty good, nothing off of Beirut's sophomore LP really came close, and I found it somewhat disappointing. The Rip Tide, in contrast, has several tracks that evoke similar feelings to "Postcards From Italy," and coming from me, that's saying a lot. Key tracks: "A Candle's Fire," "Santa Fe," "The Rip Tide."

9. My Morning Jacket - Circuital

Here's another band whose previous LP disappointed me, and in this case, a lot of other people as well. Circuital is a nice return to form, just some great roots rock that adds nicely to what the band did on albums like It Still Moves and Z. Key tracks: "Victory Dance," "Circuital," "Holdin on to Black Metal."

8. The Rural Alberta Advantage -Departing

I reviewed this album from the Canadian indie rock trio after it was released. It picks up right where their first album, Hometowns, left off - "Departing is ten more tracks of the RAA's signature sound - Nils Edenloff's Jeff Mangum-esque vocals over purposefully strummed acoustic guitar and propulsive keyboard and percussion." Although I'd like to see them change up their sound a little more in the future, they certainly haven't worn out their welcome yet; there's some great stuff here. Of special note, Paul Banwatt's drumming is killer, not something you often hear in modern indie rock. Key tracks: "Stamp," "Tornado '87," "Good Night."

7. Odessa Chen - Archives of the Natural World

Odessa Chen is a little known, San Francisco-based artist who I discovered several years ago and whose gorgeously moody music characterized by stirring cello, arpeggiated electric guitar lines, and Chen's strong voice I fell in love with. This is her third album; it was funded by a Kickstarter project which I gladly donated to because I enjoyed her previous albums so much. The title of the album refers to Chen's desire to record the stories of the numerous forms of wildlife that are being driven to extinction by human activity. This serves as an overarching theme for the album, which, musically, is fairly similar to her previous work, with a bit more of a rock side. The appropriately nautical-sounding "Oh, Atlantis!" is a real standout. Key tracks: "Deer Perspectives," "Oh, Atlantis!", "The Mercy of Sound," "Cinders."

6. Bon Iver - Bon Iver, Bon Iver

This album ranked highly on a lot of people's year-end lists, and I can see why. I was really surprised by the dramatic evolution in sound here, and I personally like this album quite a bit more than the also quite good For Emma, Forever Ago. Key tracks: "Perth," "Holocene," "Calgary."

5. Motopony -Motopony

This is another album that I already reviewed. I guess it's appropriate that it ends up adjacent to Bon Iver on my list, because I wrote, "In a certain sense, I'd compare this album to Bon Iver's latest. I wouldn't say that Motopony sounds just like Bon Iver (maybe a little) but there is a similarity in that, at its heart, this is a guy with a guitar playing folk music, but then it pulls in all sorts of eclectic instrumentation and stylistic influences and becomes a wonderfully diverse (yet cohesive) collection of songs." There are several songs on this album that are just beautiful. Key tracks: "God Damn Girl," "Wait For Me," "Wake Up."

4. Various Artists - National Parks Project

Here's an album that seems to have flown under just about everyone's radar, and that's a shame. To celebrate the 100th anniversary of Canada's national parks, the National Parks Project was created, a film and accompanying soundtrack album with contributions from a whopping 39 musicians. As a big fan of Canada's indie music scene, it's not surprising that I've found much to enjoy in this album, with contributing artists including some of my favorites (Mark Hamilton of Woodpigeon and Casey Mecija of Ohbijou) and a whole host of others, such as Kathleen Edwards and Besnard Lakes' Jace Lasek and Olga Goreas. What did surprise me was how well it actually works as an album. There's a tremendous variety of sounds, but it all flows together pretty well, and I can imagine the songs here would go well with the scenes one might encounter in national parks - much of the music tends toward the pastoral or the atmospheric in sound. With twenty tracks, It's a pretty long album, but it's well worth listening to the whole thing. Key tracks: "Welcome to the Dark," "Sunblood," "Mystic Morning," "Wapusk," "Kathleen Lake."

3. Moving Mountains - Waves

After two albums of epic post-rock music with emo vocals, Moving Mountains decided to change things up, leaning more toward the post-hardcore side of their sound with an album of songs that are generally heavier and more to the point. Although I do miss their more drawn out post-rock numbers, this album still has the essence of what makes Moving Mountains' music great, with soaring melodies, heavy riffs, and plenty of emotional intensity. If you are into the sort of music that comprises the rest of my list, there's a chance this won't be your cup of tea, but sometimes it's nice to just rock out. Actually, this is the one album on my list that I'd describe as great workout music. Key tracks: "Where Two Bodies Lie," "Furnace Woods," "Full Circle."

1. Okkervil River - I Am Very Far and Ohbijou - Metal Meets (tie)

Two albums stood well ahead of the pack for me, and when it came down to it, I couldn't decide which one was my favorite. (I previously reviewed both.) Okkervil River is my favorite band, so I was expecting to love I Am Very Far, and it didn't disappoint. The band definitely pushed their sound to new places, with a variety of instrumentation making this their biggest sounding album. At times raucous, at times gorgeous, and with more of Will Sheff's reliably brilliant lyrics, it's another outstanding addition to the Okkervil catalog. That another band released an album I ended up loving just as much is a testament to how much Ohbijou has grown as a band. They, too, really explored new places with their sound, adding synths and heavier guitars to help create lush dreamscapes, with the string section and Casey Mecija's angelic vocals reminding the listener that this is still the Ohbijou we know and love from their previous releases. Yet this is definitely their most confident-sounding, and in my mind best, album so far. Key tracks: "We Need a Myth," "Show Yourself," "Wake and Be Fine," "The Rise" (I Am Very Far), "Niagara," "Balikbayan," "Anser," "Scalpel Blade" (Metal Meets).

Treasures in the cheap bin, featuring Lumatic

2011-12-13T20:10:00.000-08:00

I've written before, in a journal on last.fm, about what fun it can be to look for new music by browsing through cheap used CDs and picking out some to buy. To quote from my previous post:

From time to time, I'll go to a store that sells music and browse their used section, then pick out an album (or a few) that I've never heard of but that looks interesting. There are hits and misses, of course. The misses don't hurt much when the CDs can cost as little as a dollar, and when I get a hit in this way there's just something really cool about it. Some of my tactics for increasing my success rate:

-Look for interesting album artwork.
-CDs packaged in digipaks instead of jewel cases seem more likely to fit my tastes (not that I ignore those in jewel cases).
-Look at the liner notes to get a sense of the lyrics and (more importantly) see what sort of instrumentation the music employs.

The best place, by far, that I know of for buying used CDs is an independent store in Columbus, Ohio called Play It Trade It. It's a store that is mainly focused on video games, but for some reason they have all sorts of random CDs there, and at really good prices.

Cara and I discovered Play It Trade It when she still lived in Columbus - it's right down the street from her old apartment - and we would often stop in there when I visited. Now that we are only in Columbus every couple of months or so, we still like to take the opportunity to revisit one of our old haunts. Thanksgiving weekend was a good opportunity, with the store having its usual Black Friday sale, including buy-one-get-one on all CDs. I picked out six albums, and it turned out to be a nice haul. A quick rundown of the albums, with prices:

TV on the Radio - Dear Science ($3.96) - This art rock group is the one really well known band on the list, and the only band I had any familiarity with, but I hadn't listened to them much at all, and thought this was a good chance to check out one of their albums. It's quite good.

Stars of Track and Field - Centuries Before Love and War ($1.99) - I knew nothing about this band except that their name is the title of a Belle and Sebastian song that I really like. It turns out that they are indeed named after the song in question, but their soaring, electronically-tinged rock sounds nothing like Belle and Sebastian, which came as something of a surprise. Still, I've found the album enjoyable.

Broken Spindles - Inside/Absent ($1.99) - I picked this up partly because it's on the Saddle Creek label. It's fairly minimalist electronica, and it seems pretty good, but with so much music on my plate it hasn't really inspired repeat listens.

Blake Miller - Together With Cats ($1.99) - I got this album because Miller is a local Cleveland artist on the Exit Stencil label. This album is pretty simple lo-fi indie folk, but there's a decent variety in sounds from song to song, and it's quite a charming listen.

Eulogies - Here Anonymous ($1.99) - This one definitely takes the silver medal for this trip to Play It Trade It. The infectious, catchy indie rock has a sound appropriate for the band's Southern California home, and might appeal to fans of Weezer. Strong melodies, a nice variety of guitar and synth tones, and some welcome female guest vocals on a few tracks help Eulogies avoid the risk of becoming generic. I've listened to this album a lot, but not as much as...

Lumatic - Swimming to the Hook ($1.99) - With the buy-one-get-one deal, that's six CDs for $7.94 plus tax. Quite a bargain, I'd say, especially with this hidden gem included.

Sometimes I'll come across a really good album and just wonder, how is it that this is so obscure? I'm well aware that most good musicians don't achieve real fame, but this is a fantastic album that seems to have been produced with a lot of effort and care, and the band Lumatic has just 67 listeners on last.fm. (To put that into perspective, my favorite band, Okkervil River, has over 500,000 listeners, and they're far from being the biggest band in the world). I searched the web for reviews of Swimming to the Hook and literally all I could find were two short customer reviews on cdbaby.com. It's almost criminal that this album (released in 2007) got so little attention. Hopefully I can do just a little bit to rectify that.

The title of the album, pulled from the lyrics of "Go Fish," is appropriate, as much of the music feels like it could be the soundtrack to dreamy underwater scenes. The songs here are richly textured, with a great variety of sounds that flow together organically. Katherine Miller's sultry, expressive voice is the clear star. Behind it is some nicely complex guitar and bass work, with synths, cello and accordion adding further layers to the lush dreamscapes. Lumatic's music can comfortably switch from laid-back to intense both within and between songs. It's often thrilling to experience. I can't really think of another album that I would consider similar to this one, although I do get something of a My Brightest Diamond vibe at times. I like Lumatic more, though, in part because they clearly like to rock out and know just when to do it.

They can also create music that I'd have to describe as pretty darn sexy, such as on "Abduction Fantasy," where Miller's vocals really shine. Shortly after, "Reassemble" provides a nice change of pace, with more of an acoustic feel. There are a number of really wonderful moments on this album, and one of my favorites comes partway through this track, when Miller's voice and the music drop out for a moment, and then a lonesome harmonica enters in a way that's somehow just perfect. The next, and second-to-last, track, "Chugalug," is a superb climax, with a great buildup to the heaviest guitar sounds on the album. The short "Serial Monogamist" is a fitting denouement.

On a number of occasions, I've wondered just how it was that some little-known album made its way to a store on North High Street in Columbus, Ohio. That's again the case here, although the NYC-based band does have Ohio roots, with Miller having studied at Oberlin Conservatory. Still, the overwhelming obscurity of this triumphant piece of work bewilders me.

Check out Lumatic here!

A future that is better than today

2011-11-23T12:22:00.000-08:00

I recently spent a few days in Washington, D.C., for the Society for Neuroscience's annual meeting. It just so happened that one morning there, as I was eating a hotel breakfast, Tommy Lee Jones appeared on TV in a commercial for Ameriprise Financial and began speaking with this pronouncement: "In America, we believe in a future that is better than today."

This got me to thinking. Well, to be honest, it's something I've been thinking about for a while, but this commercial provided a perfect impetus for further, more focused reflection. "In America, we believe in a future that is better than today." Sure, it's a nice slogan for a commercial, but is it true?

I remember that when I was a child, the future seemed full of promise and potential. Looking back over the course of human history (in what's clear to me now was a very over-simplified way), it seemed like progress was something that happened naturally. Sure, there were still all sorts of problems for humanity to address, but as civilization advanced, as science and technology advanced, things would continue to get better. Why wouldn't they? In this country, my parents' generation grew up with a considerably higher standard of living than my grandparents' generation. And my generation grew up with a considerably higher standard of living than my parents' generation. As a child, I saw no reason to doubt that this trend would continue.

How things have changed. In the last three decades (over the course of my lifetime, roughly speaking), productivity in the U.S. has continued to rise, but median incomes have stagnated, as the gains have gone almost exclusively to the top. Take into account exploding health care costs (and a myriad of other factors, but that one right there is a killer), and the typical family now is worse off than the typical family in the '80s. To put it bluntly, my children's generation will almost undoubtedly grow up with a worse standard of living than my generation. It's kind of staggering to think about, and to contrast with my grade school self's view of the future.

"In America, we believe in a future that is better than today." After finishing my breakfast that day, I decided to forgo the conference events for the next couple hours and take a stroll through Washington. As I walked, a Washington Post headline caught my eye. But not the headline of that day's newspaper - rather, a headline on an image that appeared on the side of the paper dispenser. It was a rather interesting choice by whoever designed the dispenser's layout.

The sudden promise of huge surpluses for as far as the eye can see is radically altering the way some politicians and economists think about spending money and has raised expectations of bolder government programs in years to come. "We are on the edge, if we will have discipline, of a generation of surpluses beyond reckoning" said Newt Gingrich.

So goes the article, and it's a stark reminder of how, even at the turn of the century, the future seemed so different from today. Government . . . surpluses? The idea seems almost incomprehensible. Now we wake up to depressing headlines about debt panels and supercommittees debating how to cut retirees' benefits and social programs to stave off trillion dollar deficits.

Where did things go wrong?

Well, when it comes to the current deficit issues, at least, the answer is pretty simple. It also has nothing to do with the entitlement programs that are potentially on the chopping block. I don't want to get too analysis-heavy with this post, but this chart is useful.

Let's remind ourselves again that, when President Clinton exited office, we were projected to have surpluses for years to come. Then a few things happened. President Bush slashed tax rates with the benefits going almost entirely to the wealthy. (This was supposed to create jobs. It didn't.) President Bush launched two unfunded wars. And then the economy cratered, which both necessitated increased spending and caused decreased tax revenue. And the economic crisis can largely be linked to financial deregulation, going back to the '80s and '90s.

So, tax cuts, unfunded wars, and financial deregulation. Three actions taken by the government that led directly to the current deficit. If none of these three things had happened, the deficit would basically not exist! What do all three have in common? They benefited a very wealthy few, and did more or less nothing to "promote the general welfare" of this country. Interesting. Why would a government of elected representatives do all these things that oppose the interests of those they represent?

(If you guessed "because money has completely corrupted our political system," a winner is you!)

Returning to the narrative of my day in Washington, I walked a few more blocks down K Street until I came to the intersection with 15th Street. There, in McPherson Square, I came across a sight that would have looked utterly bizarre in the midst of an American metropolis just a few months ago.

As I'm sure you realize, this is the Occupy DC encampment. It was a striking thing to witness in person. I've seen it asked what the purpose of camping out in the streets to protest is. I think it sends a pretty powerful message, personally, of how committed these people are to the cause. I remember, before the first protests started, reading on the Internet that some people were planning to "Occupy Wall Street" on September 17. Neat idea, probably won't amount to a whole lot, were basically my thoughts at the time. A few days in, the movement seemed to be dwindling. I remember that many Internet liberals had a belittling attitude toward the Occupiers in those early days. Well, at least they're trying to do something, I thought. I had to at least give them credit for the effort.

Then something changed. The movement took off. Occupations popped up all over the country, and all over the world. It's really quite inspiring to see a true grassroots movement grow from such small seeds. I mean, everyone knows the system is screwed up. People were desperate for change, which is why Obama won such a sweeping victory in '08. I was a gung ho Obama supporter. I had been pretty despondent about the state of the country, and the Obama campaign provided hope. Lots of people thought he could bring real change to Washington. And in retrospect, it was naive to think that our current system would allow a president who was really going to change things in the ways that are needed, or that one person would be capable of bringing that change even if he intended to. So people are still desperate for change. And a few people realized that the old methods are no longer working. Voting alone (not to say that people shouldn't vote) isn't going to save us when the best you can do is the lesser of two evils. Holding big, one-day protests doesn't do much when everyone just goes home and back to their lives afterwards. So let's do something different, they thought. Let's do something that can't be ignored.

So a few people got together with an idea. And from those humble beginnings, many thousands upon thousands of people have latched onto that idea, and have stood up and said the way this country is being run, it's not working. We need real change. We need a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. Ordinary Americans have woken up to the fact that (contrary to my naive childhood views) progress isn't something that happens naturally, it only happens when we fight for it. The whole thing really is inspirational. I haven't been so proud of my fellow country people in a long time.

There wasn't a whole lot going on at the Occupy DC camp while I was there, but I got a general sense of how things were run, and came away impressed. There's a medical tent, a food tent, a library tent - it was all pretty well organized. And there was a lot of exchanging of ideas. I think one thing I'd take away from the visit is this - people do better when they work together, when they care for each other, when they take an interest in each others' well-beings.

As a society, that's something we've moved away from, and nowhere is this more evident than at the very top, where the elites have become so insulated that it doesn't matter to them whether society as a whole is functioning properly. If the children of the rich and of the poor went to the same schools, for example, then the rich would want to make sure the schools were good. If politicians had to use the same health care plans as everyone else, then politicians would want to make sure we had a decent health care system.

The Occupy movement has faced a lot of criticism, even demonization, in the corporate media. They don't have any clear message! is one common complaint. I think you'd have to be intentionally blind to say that. There are a lot of intersecting issues at play here, but at a very basic level, the message that the government is owned by financial elites and thus does not represent the interests of the people comes across loud and clear. And I think that's a message that a sizable majority of Americans would agree with. What are they hoping to accomplish? There's a long road ahead; these problems are very hard to solve, the obstacles are enormous, and real change won't come easily. But they've already accomplished something - changing the national discourse - and that itself is commendable. Why don't those dirty hippies just get a job? Well, this common criticism is really quite remarkable. Besides the fact that most of the protesters do have jobs . . . with a historic unemployment crisis, you're telling people who are protesting (among many other things) the lack of decent jobs to just get a job? I mean, that's pretty laughable, isn't it?

Again, I go back to the idea, "In America, we believe in a future that is better than today." I suspect that the percentage of people who would honestly agree with that sentiment has taken a precipitous decline in the past few years. Everyone knows things are broken in this country. Most everyone knows the government doesn't really represent the people. More and more people are waking up to the fact that we need a real, fundamental change in our political and economic system, or things are, inevitably, just going to keep getting worse.

There's a feedback loop in action. When money has undue influence on government, then the rich will influence government to enact policies that benefit the rich. Thus, the rich will get richer. Thus, the rich will have more money to influence the government. And so on. Furthermore, even in the absence of government intervention, money and power have a tendency to accumulate in the hands of a few. It's essentially a natural law, and it's why progressive taxation is necessary for a functional society. The best way to become richer is to already be rich. (I defy anyone to argue with this.) And excessive economic inequality leads to a host of societal ills, as well as a less robust economy. The middle and lower classes, quite obviously, spend a greater percentage of their income than the wealthy, so what happens if too much wealth accumulates at the top? Less money flowing in the economy. Less demand. Less jobs.

The ultra-rich continue to get richer, and everyone else suffers.

That's the course we're on. Unless we reverse rising inequality and get corporate money out of politics, we're going to continue on that course. A lot of people have recognized this. The Occupiers have decided they're going to do something about it. Unless you like the status quo of politicians that don't care about your interests if you can't fund their campaigns, you should support this movement. Is it a perfect movement? Nothing's perfect, but I reiterate: without fundamental change in the system, things will get worse.

In this era of crisis, I'm not sure it's logical to believe in a future that is better than today. I do know, however, that a lot of the people I saw in that camp believe in that better future. People everywhere are standing up and fighting for that better future, and that's admirable.

There are a lot of people out there who think this movement isn't about them. They have fairly comfortable lives; they have their HDTVs and iPads and whatnot. Why are these protestors complaining? they might think. And then one day, years from now, they'll wake up and realize that, even after a lifetime of hard work, they won't be able to afford a comfortable retirement. Or they can't pay their medical bills. And even then, they might not realize that things didn't have to be that way, if only our government hadn't decided that preserving tax breaks for multimillionaires was more important than preserving the foundation of our society.

Or maybe things will turn out differently, because a bunch of people got together and decided things had to change and they were going to keep making their voices heard until things did change.

So that's the story of my morning in D.C. As scientists, I think most of us who were at the conference have a hope that our work will, in some way, help make the world a better place. The people I saw at the Occupy camp are also working to make the world a better place.

We're all in this together, and if we remember that, maybe there is hope for a future that is better than today.

Ohbijou: Metal Meets

2011-10-14T21:08:00.000-07:00

Prior to this year, Toronto-based indie band Ohbijou had released two albums, each full of beautiful chamber pop music highlighted by ornate string parts and Casey Mecija's ethereal vocals. At times, they managed to go beyond "beautiful" and create something truly magical - "Make It Gold" off of their sophomore effort Beacons comes instantly to mind. I've come to adore both Beacons and Swift Feet for Troubling Times, but if there's any criticism I'd level, it's that when listening to either album, by the time I reach the end of the album I feel there's a certain sameness to some of the songs. It seems the band liked to work in their comfort zone - and it was a very good comfort zone, so that's not really a bad thing - but it was on the songs when they pushed beyond that comfort zone that their music gained those magical qualities.

Two weeks ago, Ohbijou released their third album, Metal Meets, and from the instant I first heard the powerful electric guitar chords that introduce opening track "Niagara" I felt something was different. That sense of magic? "Niagara" has it in spades, the guitar and some spacey synths complimenting those familiarly gorgeous strings and vocals in a dreamy masterpiece. "Niagara" is an apt beginning to an album that takes Ohbijou's sounds to places barely imaginable from their previous albums. The aforementioned "Make It Gold" was my previous favorite song by the band, but perhaps half of the tracks on Metal Meets are just as good or even better.

What's remarkable about this album is that it's simultaneously a natural progression and a radical evolution in style. Previously, Ohbijou's brand of chamber pop was folk-tinged. That's gone now, with nary an acoustic guitar to be heard. Instead, the listener is treated to richly textured soundscapes built on electric guitar tremolos, airy synth arrangements, and a weightier rhythm section - but it wouldn't be Ohbijou without the strings, and they're just as present and just as gorgeous as ever. It all comes together as a fuller, more confident sound for the band, and the vocals top it off perfectly - Casey Mecija's remarkable voice can be both angelic and mischievous, and the backing vocals of her bandmates compliment it wonderfully.

The sense of sameness that I sometimes felt creeping in on their previous albums is also gone. Each song now feels vital, and each is its own distinct entity (but not in a way that sacrifices the flow of the album). After "Niagara," third track "Balikbayan" is another standout. In a nod to Casey and (sister and bandmate) Jenny Mecija's Filipino heritage, its lyrics are inspired by Balikbayan boxes, pieces of luggage that overseas Filipinos use to send items back home.

"Sligo" is the longest Ohbijou track yet, and it makes good use of its six minutes, starting off at a leisurely pace that's repeatedly punctuated by stately strings, and then going into a drawn-out buildup in its second half that takes full advantage of Ohbijou's newfound penchant for the electric guitar. "Sligo" kicks off a sequence of songs that showcase a band at the height of its abilities. "Anser" is another strong contender for best song on the album. It's a wonderfully dramatic composition, with piano, guitar, strings, and shared female/male vocals all building off each other. This newly dramatic, dynamic Ohbijou continues to strut their stuff on "Obsidian" and "Scalpel Blade," before pulling back toward that leisurely pace for the beginning of "Turquoise Lake." (They operated at a leisurely pace for most of their first album, actually, but this is darker, more impactful stuff.) And then "Turquoise Lake" culminates in another dramatic buildup, with a heavy guitar part that I never would have imagined hearing on an Ohbijou album before now. Yet on this album, it fits right in. There's one more song, "The Dreaming." It's as dreamy as you'd guess from its title, and it's a nice way to close out one of the best albums of the year.

In summary, if you are in any way into lushly orchestrated indie pop music, do not miss this album. I continue to be amazed at all the great music arising from the Canadian indie scene, and Ohbijou has just staked their claim as one of the heavyweights in that scene. If Metal Meets is your introduction to the band, don't miss out on their previous albums, either - they're both gorgeous, and the evolution of Ohbijou's sound is wonderful to experience.

Album review: Motopony (s/t)

2011-10-07T19:55:00.000-07:00

There have been a few occasions when my introduction to a new artist has gone something like this: I hear one song, and really like that song, so I buy their album. Then it turns out that the song I really liked is easily my favorite song on the album. Even if I still enjoy the rest of the album, it's a disappointing thing to have happen.

But there are also happy occasions when the opposite occurs. On the basis of one song, I get an album - and it turns out that the album is far beyond anything I could have imagined from that single song. That's what happened to me with Motopony.

The song? "King of Diamonds." It's gotten some buzz in recent months, and for good reason. It's a really nice, folksy pop tune, good music for chilling out on a summer day. (I'm a little late writing this review - I did get into Motopony over the summer. It's appropriate, I guess, that today felt like a perfect summer day, despite it being October!) Amazon had the song for free and I decided to check it out, and enjoyed it enough to take a chance on the self-titled debut album. If the rest of the album had been made up of songs of a similar style and quality to "King of Diamonds," I wouldn't have been disappointed. But I got much, much more.

In a certain sense, I'd compare this album to Bon Iver's latest. I wouldn't say that Motopony sounds just like Bon Iver (maybe a little) but there is a similarity in that, at its heart, this is a guy with a guitar playing folk music, but then it pulls in all sorts of eclectic instrumentation and stylistic influences and becomes a wonderfully diverse (yet cohesive) collection of songs. The pleasant pop sounds of "King of Diamonds" are followed by the catchy soul of "Seer." But it's on the second half of the album when the music really transforms into something beautiful. Piano, synth, acoustic guitar, and vocals all play off each other wonderfully over the heavy, syncopated backing beat of "God Damn Girl." "Wait For Me" wanders into dream pop territory, and it's just a really gorgeous track.

"Wake Up" is another standout, adding to the list of great songs called "Wake Up." (Seriously, why are there so many songs called "Wake Up," and why is it that when a band I like has a song called "Wake Up" it's invariably one of my favorite songs by that artist? Arcade Fire, Ozma, Mad Season...) Clocking in at over six and a half minutes, it's a haunting slow burner that starts out with just acoustic guitar and Daniel Blue's vocals, with some powerful lyrics (What if these drugs aren't the problem?/What if my freedom's hiding just outside my reach?/What if I never hit bottom?/How far can I go fallin' 'fore I realize fallin's free?) As the song builds in intensity, insistent xylophone and synth parts join in for a dramatic, but not overstated, climax, before the song settles back down. One last track follows, and "Euphoria" is another beautiful song.

Since I discovered Motopony a couple of months ago, their album has become one of my most listened to of the year. They appear to be a band on the rise, and with this great collection of songs, they deserve all the success they get. Check them out!

One more note - I wasn't sure for a while how to pronounce the band's name - mo-TOP-on-y or MO-to-po-ny. It's apparently the latter.

Megafaun at the Beachland Tavern

2011-09-29T20:42:00.000-07:00

This past Tuesday night, North Carolina three-piece-turned-four-piece Megafaun made their third visit to the Beachland Tavern. With the much-hyped tUnE-yArDs show going on in the Ballroom at the same time, turnout for Megafaun was perhaps somewhat smaller than it might have been on another night, but the audience that did show up was very appreciative. Cara and I have been to all three of the band's Cleveland shows, so I guess it's safe to say that we consider Megafaun concerts to be don't-miss events.

For this visit, Toronto-based singer-songwriter Doug Paisley opened with a solo acoustic set. It was a very enjoyable collection of country-folk music; Paisley's vocals and guitar playing were both impressive. I was reminded of Damien Jurado's solo performances. I picked up Paisley's self-titled album after the show and am enjoying it a lot. If you'd like an introduction to his music, look up the song "Wide Open Plain." It's a great track.

After Paisley finished his set, Cara and I wandered downstairs to the Beachland's great vintage shop, This Way Out. I bemoaned the fact that all the clothes I tried on were too short for me before buying a used Haley Bonar CD. We saw her open for Andrew Bird a few months ago, and I've been really into her music recently.

We headed back up to the Tavern about 25 minutes after Doug Paisley finished playing, and I realized as we walked up the stairs that Megafaun had already started their set! This was a surprisingly short break, but fortunately, we hardly missed anything, a minute at most.

Megafaun kicked off the set with the sprawling, My Morning Jacket-esque roots rock of "Real Slow," the opening track from their just-released self-titled album. With lyrics like "People come from miles just to take a seat and watch the show," it's certainly an appropriate choice for a concert opener, and it sounded great. The band proceeded to play the next two tracks from the new album in order, before playing a nice mix of songs from all of their releases for the rest of the set.

There's a lot of variety in sound in a Megfaun concert - or album - as the guys are adept at a cappella or at wailing on their guitars, and pretty much anything in between. As a whole, I'd describe their sound as backwoodsy folk-rock with some experimental/prog elements and killer vocal harmonies. As you might guess, this translates into an excellent live experience.

A highlight of the show came when the band announced they were going to play a song from Gather, Form & Fly, and that we probably hadn't heard it like this before. As they started up with acoustic guitar, the song did indeed sound different from anything I knew, yet still familiar - was it "The Longest Day"? Yep, it was, and hey, guess what, that's my favorite Megafaun song! It's a gorgeous, bluegrassy number about losing a loved one, and it's a song I hadn't expected to hear live, largely because the album version contains some beautiful guest female vocals, and there are no women in Megafaun's touring band. Yet the reworked version was just as effective as the original, and I was thrilled to experience it. Interestingly, the next song in the set, "Everything," was another one which has guest female vocals in the album version. It was also quite different - and also great - live.

The intimate setting in the Beachland Tavern added a lot to the experience. As had happened last time, Megafaun played one song out on the floor, sans microphones. It's always really cool when a band does this (I'm also reminded of The Rural Alberta Advantage). Additionally, there was some nice band-audience interaction. At one point, the band confessed to us that they felt weird about saying "Hello Cleveland," because they feared we would think it too cliched. We assured them that it was cool and we liked it, which they seemed relieved to have cleared up. Better yet was what happened before the band's last song. Earlier during the show, before they played the gospelly "His Robe," drummer Joe Westerlund had made a comment about how tomorrow (Wednesday) was church night, and asked whether we knew this. So then, before their last song, Westerlund came off the stage and was going on some sort of crazy, slightly racy monologue. He was standing directly in front of Cara, and she chimed in "Church isn't 'til tomorrow." Westerlund followed her lead, singing "Church isn't 'til tomorrow" back at us, followed by some other improvised lines (at this point he also put an upside down plastic crate over his head; the whole thing was pretty hilarious) before he returned to the stage and the band played "Eagle" to round out their set.

I've been to a lot of great concerts in my life, but it's rare to experience something like that. It takes a special combination of band, audience, and venue. We'll definitely go see Megafaun again, any chance we get. They and Doug Paisley both come highly recommended, on album or (especially) in person.

Costa Rica Part 6: Vamos a la Playa

2011-09-01T20:43:00.000-07:00

It's been quite a while since my previous entry in this series. In the time since, we've gone on another great vacation, to the Adirondack Mountains, and there has also been a lot going on back here at home. But better late than never - here's the final part of my honeymoon journal.

The guided tour portion of the trip ended after Monteverde. There was an optional two-day extension to the tour, a stay at the Tamarindo Diria Beach Resort on the Pacific Ocean. Cara and I had decided that, considering this was our honeymoon, we could use some time to relax at the beach. So we were among those in the tour group who were continuing on to Tamarindo.

On the drive out from Monteverde, we passed over the same bridge that had given us such an adventure two days before. Fortunately, there were no such troubles this time. After descending from the mountains, we headed west, toward the Pacific. Before going to Tamarindo, we made a stop at the Liberia airport, departure point for the tour, to drop off those who weren't doing the beach extension. We said our goodbyes, and then continued on.

When we reached Tamarindo, it was time to say goodbye to our tour guides. Cara and I got a picture taken with Daniel. We'll definitely never forget him!

The weather was gorgeous when we arrived in Tamarindo, a small town on Costa Rica's Pacific coast. It was definitely a different atmosphere there from the rest of the tour - very touristy, and lots of people trying to sell you things. Yet we found that we loved it there just like everywhere else we had visited. And even if there was a certain tackiness to some of the shops and the multitude of street vendors, there was no lack of beauty to be found there by the ocean. After we departed the bus and entered the hotel's open-air lobby, I heard young Sean declare, "I see heaven." This was (roughly) the view that inspired his words:

As you can see, the resort provided us with two options for swimming - the pool, and the ocean. Cara and I spent a lot of time in the water during our two-day stay; none of it was in the pool, inviting as it looked.

When we arrived at the hotel, we were told that a few of the group's rooms were not ready yet. Cara and I were among the unlucky (relatively speaking, of course!) few. We had about an hour of time to fill, so we joined a few others from the tour group at a cafe attached to the hotel. This resulted in one of the few unpleasant experiences of the trip. The food was fine (I quite liked my fish sandwich), but the service was very uneven. The drinks Cara and I ordered didn't seem to be showing up, so after waiting perhaps twenty minutes, we repeated the order (a Sprite and a Coke) to another server. When it came time to pay the bill, I saw that we were being charged for two Sprites and two Cokes (each at three dollars a pop, to boot!), despite only having received one of each. It was clear that our waiter did not realize the first drink order had never been filled, and in fact thought that I was trying to rip him off. I tried to explain his mistake, but the language barrier made the whole situation very awkward. The extra drinks were eventually taken off the bill. I don't think the waiter was convinced of my truthfulness, so I left still feeling kind of bad about the whole thing - it was undoubtedly an honest mistake on his part. I hope he eventually understood what had actually happened, and I hope he didn't get in trouble. In any case, for me, I didn't feel bad for very long, because there was lots of great fun awaiting us in Tamarindo.

We enjoy going to the Mentor Headlands Beach on Lake Erie here during the Cleveland summers. Going in the water is a great way to beat the heat, and lying out in the sun is very relaxing. It had been years since I had been to an ocean beach, though, and the same was true for Cara. Nothing against Lake Erie, but the ocean is much better. The main reason? Waves!

It's tremendous fun to wade out into the warm ocean water and then just play amongst the waves. You don't need any special equipment, although we both thought that surfing looked fun and that we might have taken lessons if we had had one more day. Still, just throwing your body against the breaking waves, or diving toward the shore as the waves pass and letting them carry you, is awesome. It took me back to my childhood, doing the same thing in North Carolina on a vacation to my aunt's. Cara and I spent large portions of both of our days in Tamarindo just frolicking in the water. We absolutely loved it.

Besides the waves, the other big differences between the ocean and the beach back home included the salt water, and the tides. Salt water is obvious, I guess, but it still took me by surprise the first time some splashed in my face. And the tides - they were very dramatic at Tamarindo, because the beach had an extremely gradual slope. It was an eerie sensation when Cara and I walked out on to the beach at night, near low tide, and we were standing in the sand where we had been in the water that afternoon, peering out into a vast darkness, unable to even see the ocean.

There are two places that, to me, sum up our stay in Tamarindo. The first is the beach. The second? Nibbana restaurant. If you're reading this, I suppose it's more likely than not that you'll never be in Tamarindo, Costa Rica, but in case you do ever have the chance - go to this restaurant!

The first night in Tamarindo, we got almost everyone from our tour group who was doing the beach extension, about twenty people in all, to go to the restaurant together for dinner. I found myself instantly taken by Nibbana's atmosphere. The dining room is open on three sides to the outdoors, and the tropical night air felt great. (I should mention that we were somewhat taken aback by the fact that smoking is permitted in restaurants, as used to be common here in the States, but we fortunately didn't have to put up with significant amounts of smoke during any of our meals.) It was great fun to hang out there in our big group, chilling out and talking about all our experiences of the past week.

Another thing to recommend Nibbana is the happy hour drink specials. Two-for-one drinks during lunch hours and from 5-7, with great cocktails that normally only cost $4.50 or $5.50 each? Hard to beat that deal!

Pictured is a Hawai, a drink with rum, curacao, pineapple, and coconut. They were fantastic.

But how about the food? Oh, it was excellent as well. Cara and I liked it so much that we ended up going there for dinner on the first night, then for both lunch and dinner the next day. My favorite dish was a pasta with vodka cream sauce, lobster and shrimp. Everything we got there was delicious, including tropical ceviche, chicken curry with coconut rice, and more mundane fare like pizza. Not to mention dessert!

Taking all that into account, Nibbana would probably be one of my favorite restaurants ever. But there's more. I mentioned that Tamarindo has lots of people trying to sell you stuff. This includes street vendors walking up to your tables in restaurants. To an American, this seemed very strange, and was kind of annoying. But in addition to the street vendors, there were also roving musicians who came into the restaurant from off the streets and played for the patrons. Amusingly, on the second night a guy played '90s rock hits on an acoustic guitar. It was rather charming. Later that night a band of young men from Argentina entertained us. The first night's music was the best, though. That was when a mariachi band performed for us - a very, very good mariachi band. Cara and I were both in awe of the trumpeter, in particular. They played some stereotypical mariachi band songs, like "La Cucaracha" and "La Bamba." Then one of our tour mates suggested we ask if they knew a traditional Costa Rican drinking song that our tour guide Fabian had performed at the lunch in Arenal. That performance had been an English translation of the song, which was clearly lacking something. Could we get the mariachi band to play the song in all its original glory? They did not speak English, but Cara came to the rescue when she asked them, in Spanish, whether they knew the "Costa Rican drunk song" - and they knew what she meant, and played it for us! Sitting in that restaurant, smiling and laughing and sharing in the moment with the friends we'd made over the course of an amazing week, I just felt really fortunate to be there and to have had such a wonderful experience. Oh, and that mariachi band got some generous tips from our table!

One more unexpected bonus capped off the Nibbana experience. With the bill, we received free shots of guaro (sugar cane liquor) mixed with coconut cream. They were great. We tried to recreate them back home with some guaro we purchased in Tamarindo, but didn't come close.

So, Nibbana was one of the highlights of the whole trip. On our second day at the beach, in between lunch at Nibbana and dinner at Nibbana, we basically spent the afternoon at the beach. This included lots of time in the water. It also included couples massages in the hotel's garden next to the beach. I'd never had a professional massage before, and it was very nice. With the ocean breeze and the sound of the waves, in fact, it's hard to imagine any future massage experience matching up.

The last morning in Tamarindo, Cara and I ate breakfast, and then walked out to the beach. I know we both had mixed emotions. We were looking forward to going home, but at the same time, we didn't want to leave. This latter feeling was augmented by the fact that that morning had the nicest weather we experienced on the entire trip. I don't have any complaints about the weather overall, but that morning was just stunning.

We definitely made a great decision by picking Costa Rica for our honeymoon. Cara and I both agreed that the trip was the most amazing experience of our lives. We hope to go again some time in the future, but until then, we will have with us a few neat souvenirs, a whole bunch of pictures, some good friends, and lots of amazing memories. ¡Pura vida!

Costa Rica Part 5: The Cloud Forest

2011-08-06T14:43:00.000-07:00

After one night each in Sarapiqui and Arenal, our next stop was for another two-night stay, this one in Monteverde. Now, if you were taking a tropical vacation, would you expect to be staying somewhere with high temperatures that just reached 70, if that? I would guess not, but Monteverde is at over a mile elevation, and let me tell you, the weather there felt wonderful! (Especially when contrasted to the weather in Cleveland after we got home!)

Monteverde is in what's known as a cloud forest, which, according to Wikipedia, is "a generally tropical or subtropical evergreen montane moist forest characterized by a persistent, frequent or seasonal low-level cloud cover." So, it rained a good deal, but more often than actual rain we experienced mist. And, as the name Monteverde suggests, it's very green there. (This could be said of almost everywhere we went, but perhaps the cloud forest most of all.)

The drive to Monteverde was an adventure, in more ways than one. We had an unexpected delay when, in between Arenal and Monteverde, we came to a narrow bridge that was having construction work done on it. Next to the bridge, a dirt path descended to the shallow stream that the bridge passed over, then went back up on the other side of the stream to rejoin the road. Apparently that path was the detour for the bridge, although there was no way a full-size bus could go that way, right?

Wait, we aren't actually going into the stream, are we? What?? Oh, yes, we were. I think everyone on the bus was at least slightly terrified at that moment. The bus went all the way into the stream and started up the other side - but got stuck; it couldn't make it up the opposite shore. We rolled back into the stream, and stopped for a minute. What now? The only option was to retreat back up to the road, in reverse. This was something I certainly never expected to experience in my life. We made it without incident, and then stopped to assess our options. After some discussion, we decided that all the passengers would disembark from the bus and walk across the bridge.

The major obstacle to the bus crossing the bridge was that there was a large hole in the road in front of the bridge, directly in the path of the buses' left-side wheels. At first, the bus drivers considered just putting a wooden plank over the hole. This did not seem like a good idea. Eventually, it was decided that the hole should be filled with rocks, and then the plank placed over the rocks. So our tour guides collected rocks from the stream to fill the hole.

The name of our tour was the "Costa Rica Eco-Adventure," and as all this was going on, there was plenty of bemused commentary among the tour group about how we were certainly having an adventure. Several SUVs drove through the stream as we waited, and we cheered them on as they accelerated up out of the water. Finally, the hole was filled, and the buses passed safely over the bridge to more applause. We loaded back up, and continued on our way.

Before we even arrived in Monteverde, we experienced a spectacular drive into town. The road was unpaved, narrow, and windy, so in the tour bus, it made for an interesting - and potentially nerve-wracking - experience. At times one could look out the window of the bus and see only clouds. I always felt safe, though - surviving going into a stream and reversing back out of it in a bus probably helped!

Our hotel in Monteverde was El Establo, and it was quite an impressive place. We were situated on the 500 level. That doesn't mean the fifth floor of a building, though - that means the fifth level of buildings that were located all the way up a steep hillside. To get to our room from the entrance of the hotel, we had to take a shuttle. Another interesting feature of the hotel was that the electricity in the rooms was activated by placing your room card in a slot, so that when you weren't in the room the electricity was automatically off. I thought this was pretty neat; they definitely seem to be more eco-conscious in Costa Rica than in the United States.

Another nice thing about our accommodations was the great view from our room. Cara and I both felt that this was probably our favorite place we stayed (well, if we put aside the food - we only had breakfasts at the hotel, but they were the low points food-wise in a tour full of excellent meals).

That evening, Cara and I went on the night walk, an optional excursion. It was a guided walk that promised the opportunity to experience the cloud forest in the dark and see various wildlife. We didn't see that many animals - a few insects, a tarantula (that was definitely cool!), and a couple of snakes that were barely discernible way up in the trees. Still, just being out there in the lush forest with darkness and a light rain falling around us was so neat. Sean, the little boy, was in the same group as Cara and me, and at one point he commented that he thought this was where Jurassic Park was filmed - specifically, the scene with the raptors in the tall grass. (The scene in question was actually in the second Jurassic Park movie, a far inferior film to its predecessor, but that particular scene always stuck with me as being really outstanding.)

We had dinner at an Italian restaurant. Oddly enough, the next night, we had dinner at another Italian restaurant. The restaurants were both good, but I still found this somewhat strange; it was one of the very few things I would have changed about the tour.

On our second day in Monteverde, we got to experience the cloud forest from three different perspectives, and all three were amazing. We started out with a guided hike on a trail - experiencing the forest from ground level. I know I've said things like this many times in this series of blog posts, but the scenery was just so spectacular!

It was a great hike. Cara and I both wished we would have had the opportunity to go on a longer hike in the cloud forest - perhaps on another trip to Costa Rica. After the hike, we got to visit a hummingbird garden in the park. It was hard to believe how many hummingbirds there were and how close we could get to them.

After the hummingbird garden, the next item on the agenda was the canopy tour. This was a walk along a series of huge, rickety suspension bridges. So after first seeing the cloud forest from ground level, we now got to see it from way up among the treetops. It was quite astonishing.

Finally, after walking among the ground level vegetation, and then among the tree tops, came the third way of experiencing the cloud forest - hurtling at up to forty miles per hour, hundreds of feet off the ground.

Ziplining was one of my most anticipated activities on the tour, and it easily lived up to expectations. I've been a thrill ride enthusiast since a young age, so this was right up my alley. If you're reading this, it's possible you've been ziplining before, but unless you've been to Costa Rica, it's unlikely you've been ziplining like this. We first ascended up a tram to the top of a mountain, and then went down a series of nine ziplines that crisscrossed a valley, meaning that each line placed the rider way out in the open with jaw-dropping views of the forest. The mist made it even better - as we departed, the platform would quickly disappear behind us, and then we would accelerate into a white shroud - the trees below were visible, but straight ahead there was only a vast nothingness. Finally, the next platform would come into view. It was very exhilarating!

For many members of the tour group, this was their last night. The next two days at the beach, which Cara and I went to, were optional. So dinner that night was the "farewell dinner." Cara and I both got Hawaiian style pizza, taking advantage of the opportunity to enjoy fresh pineapple. After dinner, we drove back to our rooms in the buses. Before we left the bus, Daniel, our tour guide, spoke to the whole group. It was, in some sense, a final sendoff, and I found myself getting emotional. Daniel was really a remarkable guide, hilarious, informative, and so full of life. Cara and I felt very lucky to have him as our tour guide. There on the bus, he gave each person or group a map of Costa Rica with all the places we'd stayed marked on it, and on the back, a list of all the animals we had seen. But he didn't just hand out the maps - he said a short piece about each person, and I found myself reflecting on how amazing it was that we had all gone from complete strangers to a group of friends over the course of the week, and also how Daniel had gotten to really know each person so well. The words he said to each person were usually very funny and at times very touching. When it was our turn, he began (in a sing-song voice) "Love is in the air...", then said, "Seeing the way that Cara and Jeff see each other, it makes me want to get married too . . . in ten years."

After Daniel finished giving out all the maps, everyone just sat there. It felt like we didn't want to leave; we wanted to keep listening to his side-splitting monologues and his great stories about Costa Rica and life and everything. He had to say something like, "Well, you can go now." And so we returned to our rooms.

That night, Cara and I and most of the younger (teenage and twenty-something) members of the tour group went down to the swimming pool (it was nice that we could still fit in with the younger set!). Amusingly, the lights were off, and because they were on a timer, we could not turn them on, but this did not stop us from enjoying the pool. Unlike the others, I only dangled my feet in the water, and I returned to the room before Cara; I was totally exhausted.

We didn't want to leave Monteverde, but we were grateful that we still had two more days to enjoy before we had to leave the country. Our last stop - the beach - will be covered next.

Costa Rica Part 4: A hot time in Arenal

2011-08-03T20:44:00.000-07:00

We spent just one night in Sarapiqui. The following morning, it rained. A lot. We were supposed to visit an archaeological dig site before departing Sarapiqui, but this plan was scratched due to the weather. It rained almost every day we were in Costa Rica - it is the rainy season, and we knew to expect this - but thankfully, this was the only time the rain actually caused a significant disruption to our planned activities. Instead of the dig site, we went to a museum, which was interesting, but definitely one of the less exciting activities for the week. Fortunately, the day had plenty of excitement in store.

Our destination for the day was Arenal, home of the famous Arenal Volcano, an active volcano. We had another lengthy bus ride to get there, with a couple of stops along the way. Before the first stop, a food and gift shop by the side of the road, Daniel said that we would get to see an "iguana tree" there. He asked if we had any ideas about what an iguana tree was. I didn't really know. Daniel also said that the shop had very good ice cream, so we could get ice cream if we wanted.

It was still raining, although not too heavily, when we came to the stop. Daniel said that if we wanted to see the iguana tree, we should follow him in a single file line out onto a bridge that went by the shop. I was the first in line after him. We walked out toward the middle of the bridge, some thirty feet above a rushing river, and Daniel stopped. I looked to the left, at the large tree there.

A tree that was absolutely full of iguanas.

It was an amazing sight. Glancing back up the line, I could see the others' faces light up one by one as they realized what we were looking at. The size of the iguanas, the quantity of iguanas, and the fact that they were sitting on these branches dozens of feet off the ground added up to make it probably one of the more bizarre yet wonderful things I've witnessed.

We went back to the shop, where most of the group seemed to be getting ice cream, so Cara and I joined in. The ice cream, sadly, was not very good, at all. I guess when it comes to ice cream, we are spoiled back home. I wonder what Daniel would think of Jeni's?

Our next stop before reaching our hotel in Arenal was a local homestead for what was dubbed the "Be My Guest Lunch." We were served a tasty meal, including some chicken and rice and homemade tortillas, and then a group of local schoolchildren put on a performance for our entertainment. The kids, dressed in traditional garb, did three dance numbers. In the first dance, the boys pretended to be bulls and the girls, holding their flowing dresses out to their sides like capes, pretended to bullfighters. The whole performance was a joy to watch; the kids were very charming and enthusiastic.

We continued to Arenal under very cloudy skies. Apparently, getting to actually see the volcano can be a hit-or-miss affair. Daniel told us a story about how one family on a tour of Costa Rica had been unable to see the volcano during their day in Arenal, and had decided to come again and stay in Arenal for five whole days - and again, they didn't get to see the volcano at all. So it was with definite excitement that Daniel pointed out the mountain peak as it appeared through the clouds on our drive into town. We actually stopped the bus for a photo op before continuing to our hotel.

We stayed at the Hotel Arenal Manoa, where each room had a view of the volcano (which was still visible through the clouds when we arrived to our rooms). Like all the hotels, this was quite a nice place, but we didn't spend a whole lot of time there. That night, we had a visit to the Tabacon Hot Springs waiting for us.

Cara and I had never been to natural hot springs before, and this was definitely one of the things we were most looking forward to on the trip. (I mean, just think about it - "natural hot springs" - that sounds pretty awesome, doesn't it?) I can gladly report that it lived up to our expectations and then some. Sitting in a pool of naturally heated water, surrounded by lush jungle, your feet sinking into the volcanic sand at the bottom of the pool, is incredibly relaxing. Tabacon has a huge array of these pools with water flowing down in series of waterfalls from the more secluded locations to the more heavily trafficked central pools. There's one pool with a bench beneath a large waterfall, and wow, did it feel good to sit there! There's even a waterslide (this going into an artificial swimming pool), which I went down a few times. After getting to enjoy the hot springs for two hours, but before leaving the premises, we also got to enjoy an incredibly huge - and delicious - Mexican buffet for dinner. It was actually rather ridiculous. There were about eight different selections for dessert alone. (One of the funniest sights of the tour was a little boy in the group named Sean returning from the dessert table with a plate containing four crème brûlées, then repeating this twice more.)

We returned to the hotel very full, and very satisfied. That night, there was no sign of the volcano. The next morning, however . . .

Yeah, we were pretty lucky. We ate breakfast in an open-aired room with a spectacular view of the volcano, and then headed to the buses for our departure. As we drove away, more clouds began to drift in, and soon the volcano was once more gone from view. And speaking of clouds, we were off to Monteverde, and the Cloud Forest. To be continued!

Costa Rica Part 3: Going bananas and going rafting

2011-08-02T20:16:00.000-07:00

We departed the from Tortuguero the same way we arrived, by boat. Our next destination was Sarapiqui, and much of the trip there was a back-track along the same route from two days prior. The weather was sunny, in stark contrast to the overcast, rainy skies we had experienced on the journey to Tortuguero. This made the boat trip much more scenic; the vivid greens of the jungle surrounded us, and we also saw an additional assortment of spectacular birds.

We then re-traversed the "free massage" road. Now, a portion of this road is surrounded by banana fields. The journey to Tortuguero had occurred on a Sunday, so there had been no one working at that time. On the way out, we made a stop at a Del Monte banana packing plant for a brief educational interlude.

Pictured here is a field of banana trees. The first thing you might be wondering is, what are all the blue plastic bags for? The bags are to protect the bunches of bananas growing on the trees, and our tour guide Daniel informed us that the bags are blue because birds cannot see the color blue.

You might also notice a man running through the field. He's actually pulling a lot of banana bunches which are hanging from a track that runs through the field. It's a grueling job, pulling a heavy load and running many miles a day in a hot, humid climate. The men who perform this task earn $12 a day, which is a one dollar bonus compared to the workers in the plant (their $11 daily wage, or $300 a month, is the minimum wage in Costa Rica).

A lot of the people in our tour group were very shocked when they learned about these minuscule wages. I guess I'm jaded, because I didn't find it particularly surprising. I know that there are lots of people all over the world (some even in this country) who have it even worse. It did, though, help me appreciate how lucky we are to have the relatively comfortable lives we enjoy, let alone that we are able to do things like go on a tour of Costa Rica and stay in fancy hotels there. The image of the banana workers (who are, of course, picking bananas that we buy in our supermarkets) is a stark reminder that anyone who has a comfortable standard of living in a first-world nation could not have all the things they take for granted without benefiting from the exploitation and suffering of less fortunate people. It's an inescapable fact of life; even if you do everything you can to be socially conscious, by simply participating in modern society you are taking advantage of the less fortunate. But just because this can't be escaped doesn't mean it should be ignored.

There are some lessons, I think, to take from this. Well, a lot of lessons, but in particular, today, a few that relate to current events in the U.S.

There are some people here who have far more than anyone could ever need (and could only have these things, I'd remind you again, via the exploitation of others), and who believe that it would be some great injustice if their taxes were raised. Such a belief is certainly erroneous, to put it mildly.

Secondly, giant corporations generally don't care much about the well-being of their employees. They'll do what they can to maximize their profits. If there weren't laws stipulating a 48-hour work week and $300/month minimum wage, the workers would undoubtedly have to work more for even less. It's often suggested that if we just give corporations less restrictions on how they do business, it will lead to better lives for all. I can't help but feel this is very naive.

Surprisingly, though, there is an upside to working in a banana field in Costa Rica compared to living in the United States. All those workers at the banana plant have guaranteed health care. I would consider a country that easily has enough resources to ensure that all its citizens are able to have their basic needs met, and yet does not even come close to accomplishing this, to be a fundamentally broken country. The U.S. has a per capita GDP four times that of Costa Rica, yet Costa Rica has universal health care, and we don't; Costa Rica even manages a higher life expectancy than the U.S.

It's pretty sad.

I didn't think so much about these issues while in Costa Rica. I was, after all, enjoying my honeymoon. The debacle now going on back here at home makes it hard not to think about such things.

However, I don't want this blog entry to be entirely a downer. So, moving on...!

We continued our backtrack by stopping for another delicious meal at the same restaurant with the butterfly garden that we had eaten at two days before. We then continued on to Sarapiqui, where we stayed at the Sarapiqui Rainforest Lodge. When Cara and I got to our room, there was a little surprise waiting for us.

We later asked a few others in the tour group whether they'd had anything similar waiting for them, and they hadn't, so this towel sculpture must have been prepared just for us. I had told our travel agent before the trip that it was our honeymoon. This was the only piece of honeymoon-related special treatment we actually received on the trip, but then, touring Costa Rica was very special in and of itself, more than we could have imagined before the start of the vacation!

That afternoon, we went whitewater rafting. I had gone on one previous whitewater rafting trip, a fairly mild one many years ago with my family in New York. Cara had had no such experience, and was feeling a certain amount of trepidation before we set off. It probably helped her courage that one member of the tour group who joined us in our raft was an 80-ish-year-old woman. There were six of us plus a guide in the raft. I took one of the two front positions, and Cara was in the middle. The guide gave us some instructions on safety and paddling commands, and then, almost before we knew it, we were off into the first rapid.

It was quite an introduction to the river! The first rapid was one of the most intense on the whole trip. I loved it - and so did Cara. The rapids hardly let up after that first one. This rafting trip definitely outclassed my previous one in every way. It was much more thrilling, with significantly less "downtime" between rapids. It was also much more scenic (and we did have some time to enjoy the scenery in between rapids). We got to see some more interesting birds, and the rainforest was gorgeous. There were moments when we barely passed under low-hanging tree canopies that were just awe-inspiring.

And I shouldn't leave out the snack break halfway through the rafting journey. Our snack? Fresh, local pineapple. It was probably the best pineapple we've ever eaten.

After the wildlife cruise the previous day, whitewater rafting was the next thing that stood out to me as a definite highlight of the trip - a "best of the best." If you want a good idea of how much fun we had, just look at the picture!

Costa Rica Part 2: Animal Adventures

2011-07-28T19:45:00.000-07:00

It's been longer than I intended since my previous Costa Rica entry, but I'm still planning to write about the whole trip. So, let's pick up from where I last left off, in Tortuguero National Park.

Tortuguero means "Land of the Turtles." It gets this name because of the sea turtles that make their nests on the beach there. There was an optional excursion to go see the sea turtles at night, which we unfortunately didn't have the cash for. We did, however, see a multitude of other extraordinary animals, almost from the moment we arrived. As we stood in the open-aired reception area, enjoying juice drinks and getting our introduction to the accommodations, there were some bats on the high ceiling, and a small lizard on the wall. We soon made our way to our room, a charmingly rustic place with nice wooden floors and rocking chairs on the porch. It's worth mentioning that we had no air conditioning. Now, we were fortunate that the temperatures at night were comfortably sleepable, helped by big rain storms on both nights we stayed there. The downside to the lack of a/c? It was so humid that it was almost impossible to air-dry clothing, and the money in our wallets even became damp from the air! But that's really a minor quibble; it was an amazing place to stay.

The Laguna Lodge where we stayed is located on a narrow strip of land with water on both sides - a wide river to the west, and the Caribbean Sea to the east. After setting our stuff down in the room, Cara and I headed out to the beach. Yet before we even reached it, we were met with what I'd consider one of the most amazing sights of the trip.

On the ground before us, there was a line of moving things. Leaves - pieces of leaves, to be more accurate. A closer look revealed they were carried by red ants. Lots of ants. In one direction, scores of the insects carried their burdens; in the other direction along the same path, ants headed out to gather more. The line extended for probably fifty meters before disappearing into the forest.

Now, I study invertebrates, so I'm perhaps more inclined than most to find this a captivating sight. But I think just about anyone would have to admit that this was really freaking cool. Especially once you learn more about what the ants were actually doing. They're called leafcutter ants, and as I later learned, they use leaves to cultivate a fungus that they have a mutualistic relationship with. Seriously, ants have a complex society in which they practice agriculture. Check out the Wikipedia article. Ants are amazing. Life is amazing.

After observing the march of the ants, we continued out to the beach, to see a choppy Caribbean. We weren't supposed to swim there because of the currents, but it was definitely fun to put our feet in the water. We also saw some more neat animals out on the beach - crabs, in a variety of sizes, scuttling in and out of their holes. Walking back from the beach, we encountered two more fascinating critters, a large lizard and a very colorful grasshopper.

So at this point, we had been at the lodge for maybe an hour, and I'd already seen an astonishing array of wildlife. As a biologist and all-around nature enthusiast, I was pretty much in heaven, and I found myself marveling at what a wonderful place this was. Things would only get better from there.

The next morning, we went on a guided wildlife cruise through the canals and waterways of the park. Our tour group headed out in three boats, making our way from the wide and open channel by the lodge into narrower, more secluded waterways. Now, I definitely have to give major credit to the tour guides and boat captains here. Most animals find it beneficial to blend in with their environments. I could easily imagine having gone on the same cruise without expert guides and seeing almost no animals at all (although I did feel a certain sense of pride when I was the one who spotted a turtle swimming near our boat). Time and again, we would be slowly floating through the waterways, when one of the guides would point to something, and there would be some conversation in Spanish. We would float closer, all eyes would hone in on the indicated location - and there, among the lush foliage, would be some fantastic bird, or reptile, or even a group of monkeys.

Here in Northeast Ohio, one of the most exciting animals to spot is the Great Blue Heron. We've seen quite a few in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, as well as closer to home at the Shaker Lakes. They're beautiful creatures, incredibly graceful in appearance with their long necks and beaks. In the Tortuguero National Park of Costa Rica, there's an incredible diversity of birds that are each just as astonishing as the herons here. We saw several different types of heron on the cruise. The most striking in appearance was probably the aptly-named Tiger Heron.

We were also lucky to see wild turkeys - both a male and a female at the same time. According to the guides, this was a rare sight indeed. A toucan was another treat. Probably my favorite bird, though, was one I'd never heard of before. It's called an Anhinga. This bird, unlike some waterfowl, does not have oil to waterproof its feathers. This makes diving easier, but before the bird takes flight, it must dry its feathers by spreading its wings out. This leads to a truly spectacular sight.

I spotted several of the birds over the course of the week, and it was always a thrill. Perhaps even more exciting than the birds (and the iguana and caimans) was when our guides spotted monkeys in the trees. We saw groups of both howler monkeys and spider monkeys on the cruise. The encounter with the spider monkeys was especially amazing. We were in a section of the waterways where our boats were roofed in by the trees, and there, up above, were several monkeys, watching us. (They're very intelligent creatures, and I have to wonder what goes through their heads at such moments). After some time, they decided to move, and it turned out that there were more than we were initially aware of. And the way they move through the trees is just spectacular to witness - swinging from branch to branch with what appears to be wild abandon but is no doubt greatly controlled. I'm sure most people have heard of how monkeys have prehensile tails, but I don't remember ever seeing such a thing in action - certainly not in person and in the wild. The way the monkeys would propel themselves through the air and then grab on to a branch with their tails before letting go and grabbing the next branch with their hands was simply incredible. As with the ants, I got a sense of just how amazing life on this planet Earth is.

So, the wildlife cruise was definitely one of the (many) highlights of the trip. The whole stay in Tortuguero had a certain magical quality to it. There are no motor vehicles there at all, adding to the sense of peace and connection with nature. We enjoyed relaxing in the pool, or in our rocking chairs on the porch watching and listening to the rain pour down at night. We also enjoyed some fabulous food. I'm generally not much of a seafood person, but the fish we had at dinner the first night in Tortuguero was probably the best I'd ever had, and it got me on a kick of eating seafood throughout the week. Fresh seafood and fresh fruit are two things that I would never get tired of if I lived in Costa Rica. When it was time to leave Tortuguero after our second night, we were a little sad, but also very excited about all the other great things ahead of us on our tour. And those will be discussed in blog entries to come.

The Decemberists at Nautica Pavilion

2011-07-27T15:53:00.000-07:00

There are moments in life that, if they had been scripted by a Hollywood screenwriter, audiences would mock for being too absurdly implausible. Strange coincidences that no one would ever believe . . . and yet they really happen. Perhaps that's part of what makes life so magical.

Cara and I went to the Nautica Pavilion in Cleveland's Flats last night to see the Decemberists play a concert. It turned out to be an experience we'll undoubtedly treasure for the rest of our lives. It was our first time to the venue, an outdoor, roofed amphitheatre on the west bank of the Cuyahoga River. The place is more corporate than what I typically prefer for a concert, but I'll readily admit that, when the weather is good, it's a nice place to see a concert. The weather last night was perfect.

The Decemberists' set was great from the start (fan favorite "July, July"). Other highlights included "Here I Dreamt I Was An Architect," the whole "Crane Wife" trilogy, and a very rocking rendition of "Won't Want For Love." They closed the main set with "This Is Why We Fight," and I was very pleased with the setlist and performance to that point.

During the first encore break, a surprisingly large number of people filed out of the venue, hoping to beat traffic, no doubt. It didn't make sense to me at the time, but after what happened next, I'm sure that any of those folks who left and then read reports about the concert later are kicking themselves big time.

The encore started with "Raincoat Song." Next up came a song that I'd consider the highlight of any Decemberists concert it's performed at - "The Mariner's Revenge Song." I smiled as I listened to Colin Meloy's familiar introduction, telling the audience to scream at the appropriate time as if we were being swallowed by a giant whale. It's probably the best crowd participation moment I've experienced at concerts, and I doubt it will get old no matter how many times I get to join in (this was the third).

Then they began playing the song.

And then Cara got my attention and pointed off to the right of the stage.

There, just beginning to come into view, was a giant cargo ship making its way down the river.

Let's stop right there to consider things. How cool would it be to see a giant ship float by, right behind the stage, during a riverside concert? Very cool. How about if it was during a concert by the Decemberists, a band with a lot of nautically themed music? Even cooler. Now what about if the ship came into view in perfect timing with the beginning of an epic nine minute song about a boy joining up with a ship's crew and sailing out to sea in a quest for revenge, continued to float by until by the middle of the song the ship basically engulfed the stage in front of it, began to disappear from view at just about the time when the whole several-thousand person audience was screaming in unison for the aforementioned swallowing by a whale, and was finally gone in time for the song's jaunty conclusion?

Well, that would be just about the coolest thing ever, I'd say.

And that's what happened last night.

I truly consider everyone who was there very lucky to have witnessed it. Colin said (clearly joking) before playing closer "June Hymn" that they had hired the ship's captain, and it was very expensive. In my mind, I found myself thinking, "Maybe someone on the ship is a Decemberists fan, and planned it" - a fairly ridiculous notion, I'm sure. But could that really have happened by random chance?

I guess that's what makes real life so magical.

It was a wonderful evening, and I'll also mention that folk band The Head and the Heart were great openers. After their set, Cara and I wandered down to the merch stand, where we saw the really cool custom made poster for the night's show, featuring a stylized picture of the riverside venue. We considered getting one, but I thought it was a little pricey. After the show, I decided that we needed that poster, and we bought one. Years from now, when we look at it, we'll undoubtedly think about the time a giant ship passed behind the stage during "The Mariner's Revenge Song," and marvel at the memory.

Costa Rica - Part One

2011-07-21T20:32:00.000-07:00

Last week, Cara and I went on a tour of Costa Rica for our honeymoon. We had a wonderful time, and I think we'd both say that we'd like to be back there. It would be a nice respite from the heat.

In Cleveland, Ohio, at 11 pm, the temperature is about 90 degrees Fahrenheit with a heat index of 100. During a week in the tropics, we didn't have to endure anything like this. In fact, I can't remember the last time I experienced weather like today. Hopefully the next such occurence will be a long time from now. But I digress; this is a post about Costa Rica.

Cara and I both agreed that our honeymoon was the best experience of our lives. We will definitely take a lot of life-long memories with us from the trip. Yet memories, even the strongest ones, inevitably fade and become distorted with the passage of time. Thus, I felt it would be useful to write down these memories while they are still relatively fresh in mind. I also figure that there are at least a few people out there who'd be interested in a detailed recounting of the trip. So, let's start from the beginning.

On Saturday, July 9, we got up bright and early and took the RTA Red Line to the airport to catch our flight, first to Houston and then to San Jose, Costa Rica. It was the first time Cara had ever flown, and she was a little nervous about it. Our flight to Houston went very smoothly. The second leg of the trip began worryingly, as we were assigned to seats on the plane far apart from each other. I was seated next to a nice man from a mission group who noticed my "Just Married" shirt. We struck up a conversation, and I mentioned that my wife was seated elsewhere on the plane, and asked if he would be willing to switch seats with her when the opportunity arose. He kindly obliged. It was a good thing he did, especially because the descent into San Jose was the most intense experience I've encountered in all my time flying.

As we were making our approach to Costa Rica's capital and flying through some clouds, there was a great deal of turbulence. Then, suddenly, the plane seemed to be dropping from the sky. This lasted several seconds, and repeated several times. It was a little freaky for me, and much more so for Cara, whose strong grip I felt on my leg. Finally we emerged from the clouds, and the actual landing was fine. We were later told that San Jose, because it is surrounded by mountains, is one of the most difficult major airports to fly into in the world. Our next stop on the trip involved a journey of several hours that could also be accomplished with a half-hour trip on a small plane going out of San Jose (in the same general direction we came in) - but that plane trip caused most people who took it to lose their lunches.

We went through customs, where I was asked (in Spanish) how much Spanish I spoke. I replied, "un poco" (a little). The customs agent said something like, "How much is a little?" She proceeded to ask where I was going and how long I would be in the country in Spanish. Although it was slow-going, I did manage to respond accurately in Spanish, which seemed to surprise her. I felt somewhat proud, although as the ensuing week would reveal, Cara's skills at conversational Spanish are much, much better than mine.

We were picked up by one of our tour guides with several other members of the group to take a shuttle to our hotel. It's funny now to think about how all those people were complete strangers to us at the time, and by the end of the trip we considered many of them friends. We were quite tired from a day of travel when we arrived at our hotel, the posh Intercontinental San Jose. We needed to eat dinner, and decided to check out a mall across the street. When we headed outside, we were greeted by one of the first of many amazing experiences with animals on the trip. We heard birds - lots of them. Looking up revealed that the trees were absolutely packed with green parrots. We both got smiles, kind of like, "Yeah, we're really in Costa Rica."

The mall, on the other hand, was not so different from what one might find in the states, except that most things were written in Spanish. The food court mostly contained American fast food joints. We settled on tacos from a place not familiar to us - we didn't want to eat McDonald's or Taco Bell in Costa Rica! They were pretty good. The most interesting part of the food court was a place that served rice pudding - about twenty different flavors of rice pudding. Cara got caramel and I got coconut, and we both thought it was quite good.

We headed back to the hotel, and after relaxing in the room, went down to the large outdoor pool. However, after the sun went down the temperature had become rather cool, and it was too cold for swimming. We did enjoy the hot tub for a little while, before heading back to the room and basically collapsing. The next day would be another early rise.

You see, in Costa Rica, all year round the sun comes up at around 5:30 am and goes down by around 6:00 pm. It seems obvious when you think about it, as it's so close to the equator, but before traveling there, it might not be something you'd consider. Costa Rica is currently two hours behind Ohio, but geographically, San Jose is just two degrees longitude west of Columbus. In fact, with frequent 5:30 wakeups - which is 7:30 here - if anything, our bodies had to adjust slightly in the opposite direction for the time change. In any case, with how exhausted we were at the end of most days, getting on a regular sleep schedule was no trouble at all.

We did not stay long in San Jose - it's, let's just say, not the nice part of the country. We did, though, get to enjoy a fabulous breakfast buffet at the hotel before we departed. It was our first exposure to gallo pinto, rice and beans, the national dish of Costa Rica. Next to the rice and beans was a container of a green sauce, which I added to the gallo pinto, and found the combination to be delightful. The green sauce is called Lizano sauce, and it's the most popular condiment in Costa Rica. I fell in love with this sauce, and we bought some to take home; I'm sure it's something I'll continue to enjoy for years to come. The buffet contained far more than gallo pinto; there was a fabulous assortment of breads, meats, cheeses, eggs, tortillas, fresh fruits and fruit juices . . . this was just the beginning of a week of fabulous food experiences. More on that to come, certainly!

After eating, we loaded up on our tour buses. The tour group had 51 members, and we took two 50-seat coaches, so there was plenty of room to spread out when we felt like it. Each bus had a tour guide. Bus Two's was Fabian, who had picked us up at the airport. Cara and I were on Bus One, with Daniel, who turned out to be a remarkable guide. You will certainly hear some more about him in posts to come.

Our destination for the day was Tortuguero National Park, a remote location in the northeast of the country, on the shore of the Caribbean Sea. On the way there, we stopped for a "second breakfast" (as hobbits might put it) at a restaurant on the side of the road. It was scrumptious (including more gallo pinto, which I'm sure most people tired of by the end of the week, but I didn't - thanks to Lizano sauce!). In the back of the restaurant was a wonderful butterfly garden.

I took a lot of pictures on the trip. I'll include a few in these posts, but many more can be found on my Flickr.

Then it was more driving, much of it on a very bumpy road - the "free massage road," as Daniel put it. However, Tortuguero can not be reached by driving. We had to get off the buses and transfer to boats for an hour-plus ride through both natural and man-made waterways, during which we reached the national park. Already, on both the drive and the boat ride, the scenery on the trip was spectacular. There's just so much green.

And so we reached Tortuguero, where we stayed at the Laguna Lodge. This was just the start of our Costa Rica adventures, but I think I will leave it at here for now. The next entry will describe some awe-inspiring wildlife encounters.

Fitz and the Tantrums at the Rock Hall

2011-07-07T21:56:00.000-07:00

If one were looking for a showcase of reasons Cleveland is an exciting place to live, this past Wednesday evening at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame would be a perfect example - nice summer weather, great food, and a rocking music scene. Rising band Fitz and the Tantrums kicked off the Rock Hall's Summer in the City series of free concerts by playing to a large crowd in front of the world-famous museum on the shores of Lake Erie.

Cara and I headed down early to grab a bite to eat from Cleveland's growing fleet of food trucks, represented that evening by Umami Moto, Jibaro, and Dim and Den Sum. Having grabbed some tasty eats from Umami quite recently, I opted for a burrito from Jibaro, which was quite good. I also got a delicious cinnamon coated, cream-filled churro. Cara went with the always excellent PBLT from Dim and Den Sum. It was a sunny day, and the heat was quite sweltering as we sat and ate, but as the sun went down it turned out to be good weather for an outdoor concert. It was great to see so many people out and enjoying the Cleveland summertime.

Local band Clovers played first, with an enjoyable set of tunes that seemed appropriate for the venue - I got a definite classic rock vibe. It was really a wonderful setting for a concert.

The crowd continued to grow throughout Clovers' set and in the break before the headliners. The turnout was impressive, but not too surprising considering that Fitz and the Tantrums sold out the Grog Shop on their previous (and first) visit to Cleveland. Before Fitz and company took the stage, a man from the Rock Hall came on to give a spiel about the band and the concert series. He remarked that Fitz and the Tantrums have been described as "neo-soul," but he felt this was not really an appropriate characterization, and "retro soul" would be more fitting. I found myself agreeing with him; the band really brings a classic Motown sound to their music.

Fitz and the Tantrums are really picking up some buzz, and their live show made it clear why. Their songs are packed with stellar male-female vocals and grooving sax, keyboard, percussion, and basslines. They played most of their original material for an adoring audience, and also threw in a pair of covers: "Steady As She Goes" by the Raconteurs and "Sweet Dreams" by Eurythmics. The latter, played near the end of the set, became an extended jam session with each instrumentalist getting a solo.

The band proceeded to bring down the house (as it were) with their last song, the absolutely infectious "MoneyGrabber." Before the song, they commented that it was great to see so many children in the audience getting to experience real live music at a young age, and then invited the children up onto the stage to dance along. This was really special to see. I'm sure it will be a great memory for those kids.

And be sure to check out the MoneyGrabber video. If you don't feel like shaking your hips to this song, you might be dead inside.

The Summer in the City series continues with three more shows coming up:

Wednesday, July 13th from 7-9 p.m.: Das Racist with Smoke Screen and Muamin Collective
Wednesday, August 3rd from 7-9 p.m.: The Joy Formidable with HotChaCha
Wednesday, August 17th from 7-9 p.m.: Murder by Death with the Buried Wires

Each one should be a good time, and did I mention they're free? It's hard to beat that deal!

Hey Rosetta! at the Beachland Tavern

2011-06-30T21:06:00.000-07:00

I seem to be on a lucky streak with concerts recently; the last five or six I've seen have all been very, very good. Canadian indie rock band Hey Rosetta! continued the trend with an energetic set for a fairly small yet enthusiastic crowd at the Beachland Tavern on June 29.

Hailing from Newfoundland, Hey Rosetta! (do I have to include the exclamation mark every time I mention them by name? I'm going to say not) are another up-and-coming band making some great music in the Great White North. A six-person rock band including a violin and cello, their sound is hard to pigeonhole; at times it's rather poppy, there are occasional folk elements, and at other times the heavier and/or more intricate guitar parts sound like something out of the post-rock genre. The vocals are also not what you'd expect from a Canadian indie band. I'd actually say frontman Tim Baker's voice sounds like it would be at home fronting a grunge band, which might sound odd, but it works with the music (and I'm a big fan of bands like Pearl Jam and Soundgarden, so I certainly have nothing against grunge vocals).

Overall, as a Canadian indie band making big, anthemic rock songs with prominent string parts, the most obvious comparison is probably Arcade Fire. And while Hey Rosetta are by no means Arcade Fire clones (nor do they rise to the same heights of musical genius, but then, few bands do), I would say it's a useful comparison in that, if you like Arcade Fire, Hey Rosetta are well worth checking out.

This was my first time seeing the band play live. I've greatly enjoyed their 2008 album Into Your Lungs (And Around in Your Heart and on Through Your Blood), as well as this year's Seeds, so I was expecting a good show, but Hey Rosetta blew past my expectations. Seeing them live I got a whole new appreciation for how much goes into each of their songs. Each member of the band contributed excellent musicianship and all the various instruments played off each other beautifully. I was impressed to hear that the bass player was playing only his second show with the band, as the normal bass player is busy getting married. Some of the bass parts are not simple, which is one aspect of Hey Rosetta's music I enjoy a lot, and the fill-in bassist did quite well.

The band's set had about an even share of music from their two most recent albums, along with a couple songs from the earlier release Plan Your Escape. Many of their songs, especially on Into Your Lungs, are characterized by relatively quiet sections followed by dramatic buildups. I've thought at times when listening to Into Your Lungs that they employ this device enough that it risks becoming overly formulaic, but it's not a major complaint, because it's a formula Hey Rosetta use very well. In a live setting, these dynamic shifts definitely added excitement to the performance, with the band executing everything nearly to perfection.

"Red Heart," a catchy number with stirring strings from Into Your Lungs, is my favorite Hey Rosetta song. I was highly anticipating seeing it performed live, but when it did appear in the set, I was taken totally by surprise. The band was playing a down-tempo song with a great, moody guitar part that I did not recognize - then the vocals came in, and it clicked. They totally reworked the beginning of "Red Heart" in a really cool way, and this then transitioned into the familiar, upbeat album version, with Baker belting out lyrics like "Won't you let your red heart show? Don't you let your red heart grow cold-"

"Red Heart" was, for me, the highlight of the evening, but many other songs were not far behind. The whole encore was another high point. After a brief break, the band returned to the stage (which amusingly included the drummer and cellist emerging from the men's room shortly after the rest of the band returned from backstage) and played the closing track from Seeds, "Bandages." It's a very nice song with a toy xylophone adding a whimsical touch. At this point, having taken in more than an hour of music, I certainly would have felt I'd gotten my eight bucks worth, but was thrilled when the band continued on. The final track on Into Your Lungs is a beautiful piano ballad entitled "Psalm." It's immediately preceded by the soaring "A Thousand Suns," but in concert, the band reversed the order, playing "Psalm" and going straight into "A Thousands Suns" to close the show. It was a smart decision; "Psalm" is a better album closer but "A Thousand Suns" was the perfect song to dramatically close out the live performance. It could easily be imagined that the line "We want to thank you so much" was directed from the band to the appreciative audience. And I'm sure that everyone in the crowd would have gladly returned the sentiment.

Concert reviews - Afternoon Naps, Andrew Bird

2011-06-23T21:38:00.000-07:00

Last week Cara and I got to attend a couple of fun concerts, one a small show here in Cleveland and the second a much bigger show up in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

On Tuesday night we had our first date night as a married couple. It started with dinner at Michael Symon's Lolita restaurant, which was outstanding. We will undoubtedly be back. Later that night we headed up to the Grog Shop to catch our favorite local band, the Afternoon Naps.

Now, I've seen the Afternoon Naps more times than any other band; it's approaching double digits. I never tire of their delectable twee pop tunes, but after getting essentially the same set the last three times I had seen them, I was looking for some more variety. And we definitely got it! The Naps opened with a familiar song, "Orange Paw," a cute tune about a stray cat, but then devoted most of the rest of their half-hour set to a bunch of new music. I had previously been told by the band's guitarist/vocalist Tom Dechristofaro that they are working on a new album, so I was hoping to hear some new stuff, and I was thrilled by what I heard. The band is continuing to expand their sound in interesting new directions without straying too far from the charming indie pop mold. As this was the only time I've heard any of the new songs they played, I can't give very detailed descriptions, but I did note that a couple of the songs on which Leia Hohenfeld took lead vocals reminded me a bit of Camera Obscura - which is certainly not a bad thing. All in all, it was a very enjoyable set, and I'm very much looking forward to their new album, which I've heard may come out either this fall or early next year (I'm hoping it will be the former!)

One comment I will make about the Naps' set - more people should dance to their music! Cara and I were dancing to most of the (very danceable, I might add) songs, but few others there were. I know people want to look cool or whatever, but I suspect if they let themselves go a little they'd find it makes the show more fun. Not that it's a major gripe or anything, and not that everyone needs to dance, but I like to see people enjoying themselves, and I know the band members do too.

The Naps were supposed to be opening for the Cave Singers, a band I saw once a few years ago, but the Cave Singers had to cancel due to a band member being hospitalized that night with an illness. Their website reports that he is getting better, thankfully.

And now on to the second show of the week. After seeing my favorite artist, Okkervil River, the night before our wedding, we got to see Cara's favorite artist one week later. That would be one Andrew Bird, the incredibly talented singer/songwriter/violinist/whistler who has really made a name for himself in the world of indie music over the last decade. We saw him at the Power Center at the University of Michigan, and with seats at the center of the balcony, we were in a perfect position to experience a great evening of music. The venue was a far cry from the first time I saw Bird perform, at a very crowded Spot at Case Western Reserve University, standing in a small, packed room. Coincidentally, one of our Ann Arbor friends who we went to the show with was also with me at that Spot show some four or five years ago.

In another coincidence, the most recent previous time Cara and I had seen Andrew Bird play, we were seated right next to Leia from the Afternoon Naps, who we did not yet know at the time but who I recognized from having seen the band play.

And in yet another coincidence, Haley Bonar, the opener on Saturday night, was another artist I had previously seen play at the Spot. I'm sure I enjoyed that previous show, but it didn't leave that big an impression on me. Her performance this time, though, was quite impressive. I wasn't familiar with any of her music, but she and her band had my rapt attention through their whole set. Haley's strong, twangy vocals and the complex, atmospheric guitar parts in her songs are a surprising combination, and one that worked very well for me. I will definitely be checking out her albums.

Andrew Bird took the stage next, and was fantastic as always. If you've never seen him perform live, it's quite a thing to behold, as he loops multiple violin and guitar parts (all done live) to build up intricate, beautiful songs. Add to the instrumentation his quirky vocals and amazing whistling, and it's clear there are few musicians out there as talented as he is. Bird played most of this show solo; this was the first time Cara had seen him perform without a backing band, and she was thrilled with the experience. He did bring a guitarist from Haley Bonar's band (who he had worked with before) out for a few songs, and Haley also joined in with vocals on a couple of songs, which were among the highlights of the set. Another clear highlight was the song "Why," which is always such a treat live. I did not know this before, but Bird explained that the song was inspired by a college roommate, which I found quite interesting - I'd always assumed it was about a romantic relationship.

As with the Afternoon Naps show, Bird devoted a large portion of his set to new music. In this case, I might have preferred to hear a couple more familiar songs, because I don't get to see Andrew Bird nearly as often as the Naps, but I definitely enjoyed the new stuff as well. There were a couple new songs in particular that I really loved. Again, I can't give really detailed descriptions, but there seems to be a renewed focus on the violin in much of Bird's new music. I also enjoyed the lyrics of a song that used a film projector in a metaphor about the questionable reliability of human memory, a topic I find very interesting. Both Haley Bonar's and Andrew Bird's sets made this a truly excellent concert, and Bird's next album will most definitely be another must-have!

A busy wedding weekend

2011-06-20T20:15:00.000-07:00

I feel like I'm finally starting to recover from last weekend (yes, more than a week later), and I thought it would be nice, for posterity's sake, to do some writing about it.

The wedding was certainly the biggest highlight of the weekend (I'm obviously biased, but I do feel comfortable saying it was the best wedding I've been to). But in addition to the wedding, lots of other fun stuff happened too! On Friday, Cara and I headed down to Columbus, and stopped at Grandpa's Cheesebarn on the way. It's a really cool place with an incredible assortment of cheeses and other delicious foodstuffs. I'd recommend stopping there at least once to anyone who has to regularly make the drive between Columbus and Cleveland. I discovered a new favorite of mine on this particular trip - wasabi peanuts! While there, we picked up some goodies for the groomsmen in the wedding.

On Friday night, Cara and I went out to eat at the Red Door Tavern, a restaurant I often went to as a kid. Cara and I had been there together once before, and we both love their Italian subs. It was a nice bit of nostalgia.

The excitement ramped up on Saturday, as we had our rehearsal dinner at my aunt's house with catering by Junior's Tacos. Yep, we had a taco truck at our rehearsal dinner. Unfortunately, there were some difficulties, as the truck got lost en route (Cara and I arrived late to the dinner after struggling to get my family's printer to print vows on a 5 x 7 card, but this turned out not to be a problem as the food was more late than we were). Then, minutes into our departure from the rehearsal, we saw that the taco truck was broken down on the side of the road. I hope whatever happened to them wasn't too bad, as they did a fantastic job of catering, and brought a fun atmosphere to the dinner. I would highly recommend Junior's.

After the dinner was my second most anticipated event of the weekend - Okkervil River's concert at the Newport. The band did not disappoint, putting on another amazing show. Cara and I met our friends from Windsor there, who, to our great gratitude, saved spots for us so we had a nice view of the stage. Will Sheff and company went through a great setlist full of not only new songs but also a surprisingly large number of tracks from their 2005 classic Black Sheep Boy. "So Come Back, I Am Waiting" was just as stunning as the first time I saw it performed on that fateful night in October 2006. Other highlights of the show included "For Real," "Westfall," "Our Life Is Not A Movie Or Maybe," and the absolutely gorgeous "The Rise" from their new album I Am Very Far. After dropping off Cara at her aunt's and visiting for a bit, I got home at around 1:30, and managed to get more sleep than I might have predicted.

On Sunday morning the weekend of great food continued as I went with some friends to Northstar Cafe. I had a delicious breakfast sandwich with bacon, egg and cheese on a biscuit, accompanied by fresh squeezed orange juice that was the best OJ I've ever had. And soon, it was on to the main event.

The wedding was pretty much perfect. As I said, I'm obviously biased, but I do think we did a lot of things that made our wedding stand out. Probably the biggest one was writing our own vows. We got so many comments about how beautiful that made the ceremony, and it really did; it was the highlight of the whole event in both our opinions. So if anyone is getting married and wants their ceremony to be special, writing your own vows is definitely something to consider. It might not be easy, but I think if you are really ready to marry each other, it's something you should be able to do. What made it even more special was that we did not know each other's vows ahead of time (and yet, as Cara smartly predicted, our vows were rather similar to each other's in many ways). I know we were both very nervous, but it turned out so well! The outdoor setting for the ceremony was also perfect, and we got really lucky with weather that couldn't have been better.

I also feel confident in saying we did a nice job selecting music for the wedding. The Star Wars "Throne Room" music for the groom/groomsmen processional was a big hit, and the Andrew Bird violin pieces for the bridal attendants' and bride's processionals were lovely. For the recessional, we played the beginning part of "Chicago" by Sufjan Stevens. Whether or not this made it a "hipster wedding," I have to say, I thought it was absolutely perfect recessional music. Really, I couldn't imagine any other song going better with the moment, as we walked back down the grassy, tree-shaded aisle getting showered with confetti. We also had some fun music for the reception; everyone loved Weird Al's "Eat It" as the cake-cutting song.

Speaking of cake, this was another point in our wedding's favor. We went with Short North Piece of Cake, and it was amazing. We had two types of cake for the different layers. One was a white cake with raspberry and lemon curd fillings, and the other was a vanilla bean cake with almond cream filling. Both were so good that there's no way I could pick a favorite.

I don't want to get excessively mushy, but I shouldn't leave out that the best part of the wedding was marrying an amazing woman who is also my best friend!

Sorry for bragging about our wedding so much (well, not really), but we were just so happy with how everything turned out. It was such a fun time.

After the wedding, Cara and I went, in our wedding attire, to Jeni's in Grandview. Needless to say, this was very fun, and we were certainly the center of attention. We suspected that we might get free ice cream, and we were right!

I should also mention that that night I did catch the fourth quarter of Game 6 of the NBA Finals, with the Mavericks taking down the Heat, much to the delight of all Clevelanders. I can honestly say that, before Game 5, I was legitimately a little bit worried that Miami would take the next two games and cause our wedding day to be the same day LeBron won his first title, which, if he had done this in his very first year after leaving the Cavs, would have been another ridiculous gut punch for Cleveland sports fans. I'm glad that the opposite happened!

The day after the wedding, Cara and I met our friends from Windsor again, for breakfast at Northstar (actually, this was after our first choice was closed for unknown reasons). It was very good, and as there was a Jeni's right next door, we decided to go again. One can never have too much Jeni's, especially on wedding weekend!

On the way back to Cleveland, we stopped at Grandpa's Cheesebarn once more. I thought this was a nice bit of symmetry. And then we arrived home, very tired, but also very happy. It was a good weekend.

Let's go see Okkervil River... and get married!

2011-06-08T17:20:00.000-07:00

This Saturday, Cara and I will be seeing Okkervil River in Columbus at the Newport Music Hall. They're my favorite band, and I haven't seen them live in more than two and a half years, so I'm definitely looking forward to it. It's not the most exciting thing happening this weekend, though. There's also the little matter of us getting married in Columbus on Sunday.

Going to a rock concert the night before your own wedding might be a little strange by most people's standards, but it would be very hard to convince me to pass up an opportunity to see Okkervil River. There's more, though - in fact, us seeing Okkervil River in Columbus the night before our wedding is wonderfully appropriate! When I saw Okkervil's tour dates and realized what was going on, I actually laughed out loud in amazement and excitement. To understand why requires that we take a journey back to 2006.

I got into Okkervil River at the beginning of that year with Black Sheep Boy, a fantastic album. Not long after, in March, was the first time I met Cara in person after having previously known her from the online word game Psychobabble. We became fast friends. Since I lived in Cleveland and she lived in Columbus, we didn't see each other very often, but talked a lot online and also hung out a few times when I was in Columbus visiting my family. In October, Okkervil River played a show at Little Brother's in Columbus. I was becoming a bigger and bigger fan of the band, and decided I had to make the drive down for the show. I asked Cara if she'd be interested in going with me (we had, in fact, two months earlier, made a trip together all the way to Washington, D.C. to see the band Ozma play a concert) and she said she was. At the time, we were still "just friends," but our friendship had become very strong.

I have some vivid memories of that day. I was feeling very stressed out at the time due to a heavy workload in preparation for the Society for Neuroscience conference for which I traveled to Atlanta a few days after the concert. When Cara got to the concert, I just remember being so happy to see her. Little Brother's was a concert venue I had never been to before, and unfortunately never would again, as it has since closed. I remember it as kind of a long, narrow room that opened up some closer to the elevated stage. Not far from the entrance was the merch table. I recall looking at the shirts, and that Cara asked me if I was going to buy one. I said that I would decide after the concert based on whether the show was good enough to warrant putting down the cash. Spoiler: it certainly was.

Elvis Perkins opened for Okkervil River, and played a very nice set of very sad music which we both enjoyed a lot. Okkervil River came next. I had never seen them before, so I had little idea what I was in for. It turned out to be easily one of the best concerts I've seen in my life. Will Sheff, the band's lead singer, was sick at the time. Because of this, he had to drink a lot of water, and I remember at one point he made a comment about being in the "hydration club." The hydration club would become an inside joke for Cara and me. Despite not feeling well, Sheff put on an amazingly passionate performance, and the rest of the band was right there with him. A definite highlight for me was "The War Criminal Rises and Speaks," one of my favorite songs. It's the only time I've seen it performed, and it was stunning. I also remember some of Elvis Perkins' band joining Okkervil River for "So Come Back, I Am Waiting," which was riveting. "The President's Dead" had not been released yet and this concert was the first time I heard it; it was love at first listen. And "Westfall" was, of course, great as always. The whole set just had an incredible energy to it.

Being with Cara, who I by then considered my best friend, made the experience even better. She has since told me that she felt the urge to rest her head on my shoulder during the concert. She didn't, but I might not have minded.

After the show ended, I did buy a shirt. Cara and I then spent a long time just sitting in her car (it was quite cold outside) and talking before we had to head our separate ways. I'm sure we both sensed there was a real connection there. The next time we saw each other in person was a little less than a month later, when she visited me in Cleveland for the first time. That was when we officially started dating. And now, what do you know, we are about to get married!

We've seen Okkervil River a few other times, but it's been a while - too long, by my reckoning. We traveled to Hamilton to see them on Cara's birthday in September 2007, saw them in Columbus in the spring of 2008 at the same venue as this Saturday's show, and then went to Buffalo for a show in October 2008. (This last one was not long after Cara moved to Cleveland.) Each time is a great memory.

And you know how certain pieces of music are strongly tied to certain times or places from your life? One such association that I have is Okkervil River's album Down the River of Golden Dreams with driving down to Columbus to see Cara. Our relationship started as a long-distance one, so I made the trip fairly often. I always listened to CDs in the car, and at the time, that was the album I was listening to more than any other. I now consider it my favorite album of all time. I'd guess that's not entirely coincidental.

So, yeah, seeing Okkervil River on Saturday and getting married on Sunday. Sometimes, things just work out perfectly.

The Wilderness of Manitoba: When You Left the Fire

2011-05-28T07:55:00.000-07:00

There's something about bands with Canadian provinces in their names.

I've written about my love for The Rural Alberta Advantage, who this year released an outstanding second album and put on one of the best live shows I've seen in a while. A few weeks ago I was browsing my last.fm recommended artists and noticed a band called The Wilderness of Manitoba. Occasionally just the name of a band can give you a pretty good inkling that you're going to like them. That happened for me here, and the feeling was most definitely correct.

The Wilderness of Manitoba released their debut full-length, When You Left the Fire, two weeks ago, and if you like indie folk with gorgeous harmonies, this could just be your new favorite album. The dreamy opening notes of first track "Orono Park" are enough to instantly transport me, perhaps to the wilderness in a simpler time and place. Then the vocals come in, and it's really a thing of beauty. Most of the music on this album is fairly simple. Acoustic guitar, sometimes a banjo or string part. It doesn't have to be complicated; it's there to support the vocals, and their four-part harmonies are what really set the band apart. I've seen Fleet Foxes used as a comparison, and it's probably an apt one. What makes The Wilderness of Manitoba even better, to me, is that one of the vocalists is female, and I'm a sucker for well-done male/female harmonies. And the ones here are done very well indeed.

"Summer Fires" from the album is currently available as a free download from Amazon; it was in fact deemed an editor's pick. I'd strongly recommend it if you'd like an introduction to the band. This majestic sounding song actually made me think of the folksier side of A Northern Chorus, which coming from me is a high compliment indeed. (Hmm, another band whose name alludes to their being Canadian!)

The album continues on with track after track of enjoyable pastoral sounding music. "Native Tongue," the second to last track, might be the album's best track. I'd guess it's the band's drummer's favorite, because it's the only one where his playing will attract a whole lot of attention. That's not meant as a criticism of the rest of the album, because it doesn't need exciting percussion parts. But I'd be happy to hear more songs along the lines of "Native Tongue" in the future. It starts a cappella, and the band's vocal prowess really shines here. Some gentle acoustic instrumentation then joins the voices. A little more than half-way through the song, it completely changes directions, with some atmospheric guitar and an exotic sounding percussion part. It's very different from anything else on the album, but it fits right in, and sounds great.

Closing track "Reveries En Couleurs" is another departure in sound. It's a 13-minute instrumental track, and although it could probably be a few minutes shorter and not lose much, it's quite lovely all the same.

This is definitely an album to check out for indie folk fans, and a band to watch. I saw them open for Cloud Cult at the Grog Shop in Cleveland Heights on Sunday. It was really an excellent performance by both bands; it's rare to see two acts that strong on the same bill. Cloud Cult play high-energy orchestral indie pop; I hadn't listened to them much previously and came away very impressed. I guess a band that includes (variously) a violin, cello, trombone, and french horn in addition to more standard rock instrumentation, and that has up to five people singing at once, is hard for me to resist. On top of all that, they had someone create a painting live on stage during their set. I'd never heard of such a thing before, and it definitely added something to the performance. Anyone who has the chance to see either of these two bands on tour should jump at the opportunity.

Here are a couple of pictures I took at the show; more can be found here.

Okkervil River: I Am Very Far

2011-05-18T21:24:00.000-07:00

Okkervil River released a new album last week, I Am Very Far, and it's amazingly good. That the new album is great comes as no surprise, which is itself rather remarkable. What's truly remarkable about this band is how they give each of their albums its own distinct sound and style, and yet have consistently been putting out great album after great album going all the way back to 2002's Don't Fall in Love With Everyone You See. Really, other than The Stand Ins, a companion album to its predecessor, each Okkervil River album could be described as a pretty dramatic change in sound from their previous work. Few bands can do that for so long and never have the quality falter. It's a real testament to Will Sheff's ability as a songwriter.

I'm going to go on a little tangent here. I've seen a few people express disappointment at this album. Personally, I definitely liked it on my first listen, but wasn't yet sure I liked it as much as Okkervil River's other albums. By now I've realized I had no reason for doubt. That's actually not an uncommon experience for me. I remember listening to The Suburbs by Arcade Fire for the first time and thinking it was definitely not as good as Funeral or Neon Bible. Now it's one of my favorite albums of all time (although I still like Funeral just a bit more). In fact, it's almost always the case that I if I like an album, I will enjoy it more after a few listens than on my first listen. This leads me to believe that a significant factor in our enjoyment of music is its familiarity. The interesting thing is that the degree to which my enjoyment increases with additional listens varies immensely from album to album. Is this related to how "challenging" an album is? To how much it diverges from expectations? Perhaps.

With all that said, it really makes me wonder how many times professional music critics typically listen to an album before reviewing it. I have no idea what the answer is, and if anyone reading this can provide some insight that would be great. I do know that to me, the idea of making a definitive judgment about an album after just one, or even two or three, listens is absurd.

I've now given sufficient attention to I Am Very Far to be able to declare that it's another brilliant addition to Okkervil River's catalog. Opening track "The Valley" is a good preview for the album as a whole. It's big sounding, somewhat chaotic, and lavishly orchestrated with all sorts of flourishes from piano and strings. The second track, "Piratess," will sound familiar to many long-time Okkervil River fans. It's a new version of their old song "Murderess." The decision to remake a slow, low-fi acoustic song into a slick-sounding number with a disco-esque beat is a little curious, and I've seen some serious bitching in the song's last.fm shoutbox (this goes back to that familiarity idea, no doubt). For me, though, the song really works.

After a strong start, the album just gets better. "We Need A Myth" is the centerpiece, and a contender for the strongest track. There's so much going on in this song, and Sheff's lyrics and emotion-wracked vocals about searching for meaning in the world bring it all home.

What we're after is just this
A myth
And I'm sick
Of all these picture books that try

To steal some old reflections for their light
But desperate measures point to desperate times
Which is why
We need a myth

Strong lyrics are one thing you can always count on in an Okkervil River album. To me, Sheff's way with words surpasses any other songwriter out there right now, and it's really not even close.

"Show Yourself" is another definite standout. Incredibly atmospheric in sound, it's so unlike anything the band has done before (perhaps sounding more like a Shearwater track), and yet so, so good. I really hope this one will be a regular in their setlists; I imagine it would be stunning live. And speaking of Shearwater, Jonathan Meiburg lends some excellent backing vocals to a number of tracks on the album. He and Sheff's voices really work so well together, and I was saddened when it was reported that Meiburg would no longer be with Okkervil River, so it's great to hear him contributing to the new album.

The album concludes very strongly as well, with raucous, irresistible first single "Wake And Be Fine" leading into the absolutely gorgeous closer "The Rise." What it all comes down to is that this is yet another classic album from Okkervil River. I'd be very surprised if a better album is released this year.

The Rural Alberta Advantage at the Beachland Ballroom

2011-04-25T16:18:00.000-07:00

Canadian indie rockers The Rural Alberta Advantage rolled into Cleveland on Easter Sunday for the last stop of their U.S. tour in support of their new (and highly recommended) album Departing. They played a great show to a very appreciative audience in the Beachland Ballroom (a step up in venues from their last Cleveland show in the Beachland's smaller room, the Tavern - it's good to see the band's audience expanding). Before I expound on last night's concert, though, I'd like to talk about an experience the previous night.

On April 23rd I went to Columbus to see The Decemberists play at the Lifestyle Communities Pavilion. It was, quite frankly, a disappointing experience. The LC's indoor venue holds 2200 people, and it was sold out. It turned out that it really wasn't my kind of atmosphere for seeing a concert. I can't fault the Decemberists for getting so popular - I certainly think they deserve it - but I can definitely fault all the people at the show who were more interested in getting drunk and talking to their bros than in watching and listening to the band perform. It came close to ruining the show for me. By the end of the night, it was, overall, an enjoyable experience. Especially "The Mariner's Revenge Song," which is just an amazing thing to witness live. Then, at least, being in a crowd of two thousand people all screaming as if we were being devoured by a giant whale added to the experience rather than detracting from it. When the band opened by playing The Tain in its entirety(!!!) and people all around were talking the whole time, on the other hand...

Colin Meloy definitely noticed it, as he made a comment at one point in the concert about how the people toward the back didn't seem to be paying attention. It makes me wonder whether bands might sometimes prefer to play for somewhat smaller crowds who are all paying them rapt attention. It's hard to imagine an artist wishing that less people would listen to their music, but there are tradeoffs to popularity, I suppose - both for artists and for their fans.

Moving forward one night to the show at the Beachland, the atmosphere couldn't have been more different. The crowd was at best one-tenth the size of that at the LC, but everyone who was there was there to see music performed.

I very much enjoyed opening act Lord Huron. I had never listened to any of their music before, but after the show I ended up buying both of their EPs. They play a breezy brand of indie folk-rock. At times in the show I was reminded of a folkier Local Natives. I've also seen "a tropical Fleet Foxes" used as a descriptor, which I could see. I've since learned that the EPs were a solo project of the lead singer, and he has now put together a band to play shows and write new music. Lord Huron could work on their consistency, as I found some of their songs to be just decent. Several of the songs they played, on the other hand, were just outstanding, including "The Stranger." I'm pretty sure some of the songs I most enjoyed are as yet unreleased. They really had some killer harmonies, so I'll definitely look forward to the full band's recorded output. This is a band to watch.

The RAA took the stage next, and performed a roughly one-hour-twenty-minute set that covered the large majority of their two album catalog. I recently reviewed their new album, so I would find it redundant to describe their music in great detail, but suffice it to say that they are even better live than on their albums. Each of the three members of the band brings a tremendous passion and enthusiasm to their performances. Nils Edenloff really packs the emotions into his nasal, at times heart-wrenching vocals. Amy Cole's synth parts and pretty backing vocals provide a vital complement, and Paul Banwatt's drumming is just a marvel to behold in person. Here's their setlist (I managed to snag Amy's after the show):

Luciana
Muscle Relaxants
Don't Haunt This Place
Under the Knife
Rush Apart
Tornado '87
Ballad of the RAA
Two Lovers
The Breakup
Eye of the Tiger (Nils solo)
Four Night Rider
Edmonton
Frank, AB
In The Summertime
Drain the Blood
The Deadroads
Stamp
___________

North Star
Barnes' Yard
Sleep All Day
The Dethbridge in Lethbridge
Good Night

Some of the highlights to me included "Frank, AB" and "Stamp," but really, the whole set was great. When Nils introduced "Dethbridge" as the last song, I was thinking, "No! Play 'Good Night' too!" ("Good Night" was not on the written setlist.) So when Nils led the band off of the stage and down onto the floor among the crowd as "Dethbridge" came to its close, I was both thrilled and relieved. The band closed, as they had the previous time I saw them, by playing "Good Night" unplugged standing in the middle of the audience. It's really a special thing to experience. I couldn't help but think about how this would never work with the crowd at the previous night's show.

Nils said on stage that this was the last night of their tour, and they couldn't think of a better way to end it. He was obviously very sincere in his gratitude for the great audience response, and it was a really cool thing to see. All three band members were eager to chat with the crowd by the merch table after the show. I absolutely love this poster, which they were happy to autograph:

It was just a fantastic night, and I'm really appreciative of both a great band, and the great venue I got to see them in.

On a related note, the same night that The Decemberists played Columbus, another band I really like, The New Pornographers, played in Cleveland at the House of Blues. I saw them play the Beachland (with Okkervil River opening, truly an amazing show) a few years ago. As reported in Cleveland Scene, during the show Neko Case said, "I like the Beachland about 8000 times fucking more" than the House of Blues. As if I needed any more reason to like Neko Case!

But I guess this goes back to the idea of tradeoffs that I mentioned earlier. For me as a fan, I kind of feel like the RAA are at a near ideal level of popularity - they tour regularly, and I can see them with a good-sized but not overwhelming crowd in an intimate venue for pretty cheap. And of course, they clearly very much enjoy playing such shows as well. But if they grew to a Decemberists level of popularity, they would undoubtedly be able to be more comfortable making a living from music. I wonder what the musicians' feelings on these matters are?

Jeff and Cara's Day Off

2011-04-11T15:20:00.001-07:00

About two weeks ago, on March 26, we made the drive to Chicago to see Godspeed You! Black Emperor play at the Metro. This was something I never thought I'd get to do, until Godspeed announced these shows last fall. I got into the band some time after they went on hiatus, I love their music, and I'd heard about their legendary live shows. When they came back from hiatus to go on tour, I knew this might be a once in a lifetime opportunity. I had to go. Fortunately, one of the Chicago dates fell on a Saturday, making it a convenient opportunity for a weekend away.

Unlike Cara, I had been to Chicago several times before. I have a lot of memories there. My most recent visit had been for the 2009 Neuroscience conference, when I fell in love with the food in Chinatown. Further back, I had been there for three cross country meets and one indoor track meet.

For the first of the three cross country meets, the men's team actually raced at Notre Dame on Friday, and we then went on to Chicago, where the women's team raced on Saturday. The next two years, both squads raced in Chicago. Also notable is that the indoor track meet, the conference championships, was the last time I competed for my school. I knew going into that race that I was outclassed by the competition, and I intentionally went out at a faster pace than I thought I could handle in the hopes that I was actually in better shape than I knew. Not surprisingly, this wasn't the case, and I came in last (although not by an embarrassing margin), but it was a good effort. The next day's 12-miler along the lakefront was probably one of my favorite runs ever.

I've had a lot of good runs in Chicago, actually, including my fastest 8 kilometer cross country race ever my senior year. So yeah, lots of memories...

I actually really enjoy going to a place like Chicago with Cara and getting to show her things I've seen before but that she's never experienced. Chicago is an awesome city. Our first experience there on this visit, though, was being stuck in horrendous traffic. This was at about 4:30 on Saturday afternoon, and I shudder to think about what it's like during rush hour on weekdays. I could never put myself through that every day.

We made it to our hotel without too much trouble, though, and after unwinding for a bit we headed out to get some of the famous Chicago-style pizza at Giordano's. A big part of visiting any city for us is experiencing the local food, and Chicago is definitely quite a place in that regard! We both agreed the pizza was fantastic.

Next on the agenda was the main attraction on the trip. Cara and I have enjoyed traveling to other cities to see concerts in the past, and it's always been a great experience. It had been quite a while since we had made such a trip, though, since October of 2008, so in a way this was like old times. And as usual when we travel to a concert, this concert was a very memorable one.

We arrived at the Metro to find it, not surprisingly, already very crowded. Fortunately, we were able to make our way to a spot in the balcony with a decent view of the stage. Opener Eric Chenaux was already playing. Neither of us found his music particularly interesting (an opinion we felt was not uncommon in the audience), so we were glad that he didn't play for too long. Then, the waiting...

Godspeed began their set with a long drone number. One by one, the members of the band came on stage, each adding their own touches to the "Hope Drone." Once they were all set, they moved into the next number, the first two movements of "Storm" from the album Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas To Heaven. It was so beautiful, I was almost moved to tears.

I love music. Sometimes, on rare occasions, a really great concert can be like a spiritual experience. This was one of those times.

Godspeed You! Black Emperor play powerful instrumental music that I'd describe as an appropriate soundtrack for the end of the world. Some of their compositions could fittingly play as one ascended to heaven. Some would be more appropriate accompaniments for visions of fire and brimstone. And much of their music could track a more mundane conceptualization of the world's demise - decaying cities and landscapes ravaged by industrialization and over-consumption.

To my amazement, the band played for two and a half hours without a break. It was, no question, one of the best concerts I've ever been to. They closed by playing the Slow Riot For New Zero Kanada EP in its entirety, with extended versions of both "Moya" and "Blaise Bailey Finnegan III." Wow. Seriously, it was just spectacular. As the concertgoers slowly filed out of the venue afterwards, there was a palpable sense that we had all just experienced something utterly staggering.

Also, something extremely loud. Godspeed are known for loud shows, and I warned Cara repeatedly to bring earplugs. We both were very thankful we had them; we also noticed that many attendees did not. This, to me, seems like the height of stupidity. The folly of youth, I suppose.

Cara had not listened to GY!BE much before, but was just as blown away by the show as I was. (Incidentally, I'm listening to a bootleg as I write this; I'm always grateful when there are recordings available of memorable shows I've been to. It's nice to relive the experience.) So, for the concert alone, the trip was well worth taking. Luckily, the fun was not over yet, as we had some time to be tourists the next day.

We started with a trip to Montrose Harbor. This is a place which I remember well - it's the site of the aforementioned cross country meet. Going to a place that you've visited before and remember well but haven't seen in years is an interesting experience. Memories rush back at you. In a way, I'm a different person now than I was then, yet there's obviously a very strong connection with my past self.

Even had I never been there before, Montrose Harbor would be well worth visiting for the views of the city alone.

We also took a walk out along the beach there. It was a chilly, windy day, but quite gorgeous.

Next, we went downtown to Millennium Park. It's a really cool place, and the sunny day made for fantastic sightseeing.

Cara got a neat picture there.

More pictures!

We finished up our time in Chicago with a visit to Chinatown, where we ate at Joy Yee Noodles. I'd been there on the Neuroscience trip, and loved it, so I wanted to share the experience with Cara. They have my favorite bubble tea in the world - I go for the coconut. Our food was also wonderful.

This will certainly not be the last time we see Chicago. If we're really lucky, maybe it also won't be the last time we see Godspeed You! Black Emperor.

The Rural Alberta Advantage: Departing

2011-03-09T15:50:00.000-08:00

Canadian indie rockers The Rural Alberta Advantage really struck gold with their debut album Hometowns, going from being unsigned when they made the album to having it reissued on the Saddle Creek label, home of Bright Eyes. Last week they released the followup Departing. Having the pressure of high expectations placed on them this time around, could they come through and deliver more musical excellence? The answer is a definite yes.

Departing is ten more tracks of the RAA's signature sound - Nils Edenloff's Jeff Mangum-esque vocals over purposefully strummed acoustic guitar and propulsive keyboard and percussion. The RAA are a three-person band, and they don't put anything extraneous into their music; every part of each song feels like it should be there. This lends a real vitality to the music.

The first five songs on the album are all quite good, but generally not truly exceptional. If the rest of the album continued in the same way it might be seen as something of a sophomore slump. Instead, the album really picks up in the second half as the ensuing two tracks, "Stamp" and "Tornado '87," are easily two of the band's strongest ever. When I saw the RAA live in July 2009, I was particularly struck by the intensity and precision of Paul Banwatt's drumming. His talents are on full display in "Stamp." The video for this song is worth watching. I rarely find music videos very interesting, but this one is hilarious, and it's a great song too.

Album closer "Good Night" is another standout track. It's one where the vocals are the focus - Edenloff's incisive, nasal lead vocals and Amy Cole's pretty backing vocals as the perfect counterpoint. In concert, the band has a tradition of stepping off from the stage to play this song among the audience, sans microphones. It's an amazing thing to experience - here's a video I found from the show I attended, although being there in person was far better than watching it on YouTube. The album version does a remarkable job of recreating that. It sounds like a really good live recording, closing out the album wonderfully.

As a whole, Departing is not much of a departure in sound from Hometowns. The band does let up from their typical frenetic pace on more of the tracks of the second album than on its predecessor, but all the emotional intensity is still present. None of the songs on Departing would sound out of place on the RAA's debut. When the music is so good, though, this isn't really anything to complain about. (Maybe if their next album or two also lack much evolution, then I would start to be bothered.) Actually, my biggest complaint about Departing is that it's too short, and anytime you can say that it's pretty certain that you have a good album on your hands.

Zoey Van Goey: Propeller Vs. Wings and The Cage Was Unlocked All Along

2011-03-05T22:33:00.001-08:00

I've been meaning to write something about Zoey Van Goey for some time now. I discovered the Scottish indie pop band close to a year ago, and really fell in love with their debut album The Cage Was Unlocked All Along, but never got around to writing about it. Now that they've released their sophomore effort, Propeller Vs. Wings, I figured it would be worth covering both albums in one post.

The first piece of information you might want to know about Zoey Van Goey is that Stuart Murdoch of Belle and Sebastian produced their first single ("Foxtrot Vandals"). Now, Zoey Van Goey are hardly Belle and Sebastian sound-alikes, but like Belle and Sebastian, they play indie pop music that I would describe as, well, rather charming. Both bands are also from Glasgow. So if you like Belle and Sebastian, you might want to check out Zoey Van Goey.

The Cage Was Unlocked All Along was released in 2009. When I put together my list of favorite albums from that year, I had not yet heard of Zoey Van Goey. Looking back now, they would in fact occupy second place on that list; the album is that good. It's hard to name standout tracks; the songs are almost uniformly very good from start to finish. This is impressive for such a young band; also impressive is Zoey Van Goey's ability to vary their sound from song to song and excel in each. Witness "We All Hid In Basements," containing a heavy guitar part near the end of the track that would sound right at home on a post-rock album. It's followed right up by the beautifully dreamy "Two White Ghosts," and then the more straightforward but incredibly catchy, handclap-laden pop of "Foxtrot Vandals." Clever lyrics, lush instrumentation and girl/boy vocals add to the irresistible nature of Zoey Van Goey's music. The Cage is a fantastic debut that indie pop fans should not miss.

After such a strong first album, I was very much looking forward to the followup. Propeller Vs. Wings picks up nicely where its predecessor left off. In general, it's more of the same sort of charming indie pop. Kim Moore's vocals are even stronger on Propeller than on The Cage; she especially shows off her vocal pipes on "Escape Maps." All in all, though, I have to admit I'm slightly disappointed in the album. Don't get me wrong, it's very good, it's just hurt by how great its predecessor was. There is what I would consider a mis-step on third-to-last track "Robot Tyrannosaur" (The Cage's weakest track was also in the third-to-last slot, but "Nae Wonder" was a much smaller mis-step comparatively.) I don't want to focus too much on negativity, though, as the album is well worth listening to. And while "Robot Tyrannosaur" has lyrics that are a bit, well, dumb, amusingly affecting lyrics abound on other tracks, such as "You Told the Drunks I Knew Karate":

I do the dumbest things for you
Why do I do the dumbest things for you?
I almost broke my collar bone
I didn't care, you were the most exciting thing I'd ever known

I go back to that word "charming." I think that's the best way to describe Zoey Van Goey's music. It's also consistently catchy, fun, and at times beautiful. I very strongly recommend The Cage Was Unlocked All Along, and if you like that album, definitely check out Propeller Vs. Wings as well. Each album has a free track available on Amazon:

The Best Treasure Stays Buried
The Cake and Eating It

Moving Mountains at Peabody's Pirate's Cove (and prior adventures) (and NEW Weaver at the Loom!)

2011-02-19T21:14:00.000-08:00

Moving Mountains, who played in Cleveland on Thursday, are a band I'd been hoping to see live for a long time.

Well, I should clarify that. I'd seen them twice before. But I never felt like I really saw them play a proper set until now. Both of the previous times were, shall we say, interesting experiences. The first, in fact, was quite an adventure.

On July 4, 2009, Moving Mountains (whose music I'd describe as heavy post-rock with emo vocals) played a show in Youngstown, Ohio. Being a pretty big fan of the band, and never having had the chance to see them before, I decided to make the hour-plus drive down to Youngstown for the concert. I had seen on the venue's MySpace page that the show, which featured three bands in total with Moving Mountains headlining, was supposed to be at noon. This seemed a little odd, but since it was the 4th of July holiday, I accepted it. So I drove to Youngstown and arrived in the early afternoon. When I got to the address, it looked like a somewhat run-down house. I approached the building, and when I saw someone, said I was there for the concert.

I was very early, as it turned out. The show time had been moved to 4. So I had several hours of free time to kill in Youngstown, a city I'd never been in before.

Youngstown is honestly a pretty depressing place, and this is coming from someone who loves Cleveland. I managed to make a good time of it, though, having lunch at a local restaurant and then going for a nice long walk in Mill Creek Metro Park. When I made my way back to the venue, there was still a good amount of time to wait before the music actually started, which turned out to be closer to 6, as I recall. The show was an outdoor concert - the house itself was in the process of being converted into a concert venue. So imagine seeing a concert in someone's yard; that's basically what this was. The members of the three bands and a handful of concertgoers hung out in the yard, eating hot dogs. I watched the members of Moving Mountains (conveniently four in number) play cornhole.

When it came time for Moving Mountains to play their set, just before they started, the lead singer went off to a Port-a-John. He returned to the makeshift stage to announce that he had gotten sick. So the set was off to an interesting start. Moving Mountains gave a great performance full of energy, but only played for about half an hour. And not surprisingly, given the venue, the sound was lacking. It felt odd to have driven so far for that, but I did enjoy myself.

The second time I saw Moving Mountains was far more disappointing. They played at the Beachland Ballroom, the first of four bands in a show headlined by Say Anything, who were also supported by Eisley and Moneen. Honestly, I was only going to the show to see Moving Mountains, and my interest level dropped with each subsequent band on the bill. I felt a little odd paying as much as I did just so I could see the first band in a four band lineup, but I really wanted to see them in a proper venue after the Youngstown adventure.

The show was scheduled to start at 8. I arrived at 7:50 to find a long line outside the building. I had not expected this at all - the doors were at 7; why was there a line now? The problem apparently stemmed from the fact that this was a show with a very young audience compared to most shows I go to. The line moved dreadfully slowly, at times seeming not to move at all. When I finally got in, it was 8:10, and I had missed half of Moving Mountains' set. Yes, they only got to play for twenty minutes, and I missed half of it. I was quite angry at the time, but it was my fault.

So when they announced they would be playing a headlining show in Cleveland, I was pretty pumped. Amazingly, the same thing nearly happened to me as at the Beachland. The show was scheduled to have doors at 7, and according to Peabody's website shows generally start an hour after doors. There was one opening band. I arrived at 8:25, thinking I might catch the end of the openers' set. Instead, I found Moving Mountains already getting ready to play. They started just ten minutes after I arrived.

I had never been to Peabody's before. The Pirate's Cove, the smaller of two venues in the building, is actually a surprisingly cool place to see a concert. It's a small room, but with a nice, elevated, well-lit stage, and a good sound system. There's even a balcony. I wished I had brought my camera, but that's okay.

Finally, more than a year and a half after that July 4th adventure, I was getting to see Moving Mountains play a proper set. They did not disappoint. Each time I've seen them, they've brought tremendous energy to their performances, moving around a lot on stage and really getting into the music. This was easily the best performance from them I'd seen. They did not let up the intensity through a 50 minute set, mixing up new songs with tracks from their previous releases Pneuma and Foreword. I have to say, the new stuff really sounds great. It tends toward the heavier side of their sound, from what they played, at least. In general I don't listen to much music where the vocals contain screaming, but with this band, it really works for me. I can't wait for the new album, which should come out next month.

As I write this, I'm listening to another band that fans of Moving Mountains would be well advised to check out. That band is Weaver at the Loom. They, like Moving Mountains, could be described as post-rock with emo vocals, although they have a more atmospheric, mellow sound and no screaming. Both bands are masters at creating really epic, emotional songs. And lo and behold, I've just learned that Weaver at the Loom have released new music for the first time in years! This is something I'd feared would never happen. They've only previously released a five-song EP in 2007, and I've been returning to those five songs again and again. "You can't evade them" and "Without fear of their return" in particular give me chills. Apparently the band is now just one guy, but he's the one who's been the creative force behind the project the whole way. There are two new songs out new; I'm listening for the first time and I like what I hear!

Who the hell is Arcade Fire?

2011-02-16T15:59:00.001-08:00

Arcade Fire winning Album of the Year at the Grammys has been an unexpected source of amazing entertainment.

I've always thought the Grammys were a joke that were more about popularity than quality of music. I'm not some total elitist who thinks popular music is inherently bad, I just think that the correlation between quality and popularity is fairly weak, at best. On the night of the Grammys, Cara and I watched a little of the show while eating dinner, then decided to watch a movie. The only thing still coming up that I was interested in was Arcade Fire, and I certainly didn't expect them to win.

(The movie was Winter's Bone, which Cara had had recommended to her by some friends, but unfortunately we both found it terribly boring.)

After the movie, we went back on the Internet and saw, to our great surprise, Arcade Fire had won Album of the Year! The best part of this was how shocking it was to everyone. The video is great, because you can hear the confusion in Barbara Streisand's voice when she announces the winner, and then see how completely dumbfounded with shock and giddiness the band members are. The first words out of Win Butler's mouth in the acceptance speech are, "What the hell?"

I loved seeing the disdainful reactions of some people on the Internet like "Who the hell is Arcade Fire?" and "I've never heard of them!" It seems so funny coming from my perspective where, among my favorite bands, Arcade Fire is easily one of the most popular. Plus, a band that played a sold out Madison Square Garden can't really be called obscure.

The whole thing is both awesome and hilarious. The Grammy for Album of the Year went to the album that was, in fact, my favorite album of the year? I looked up a complete list of Grammy winners and the only other time that's ever been true was when Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band won.

It will be interesting to see whether this has any broader effects on popular music. I could envision the airwaves being filled with crappy Arcade Fire knockoffs, but somehow I don't think that's likely to happen. It would be nice, though, if this did help bring more attention to all the great music coming out of Canada these days. (Especially if Woodpigeon could gain enough popularity in the States that they would tour here!) Something about the Great White North really seems to inspire musical artistry - or at least music that appeals to my personal tastes! I just checked my last.fm stats for the last year, and a remarkable six of the top eleven artists are from Canada (along with three U.S. and two U.K. artists). For a nation of thirty million odd people, that's certainly more than would ever happen by chance.

As I think about it more, my worldview as a whole is more in line with a typical Canadian than a typical American point of view, and I wonder if there's any connection. Obviously, my taste in music and my opinions on any other subject all arise from the same brain. I wouldn't be surprised if there is some sort of relationship there -both involving the internal processes of my brain and how those processes have been shaped by my life experiences. It's really quite interesting to ponder.

Oh, by the way, I'm a neurobiologist, and clearly a huge nerd!

My first bike race

2010-09-27T17:29:00.000-07:00

On the morning of Saturday, May 22, I woke up thinking that on the following morning I would be competing in my first ever cycling race. The event was the first race of the 2010 Colavita Eastern Time Trial Series, a 20 km time trial race. I've been doing running races all my life, and after getting more and more into cycling over the last few years, I wanted to test myself in a different endurance sport. I was really looking forward to seeing how I could do.

As it turned out, on the next morning I awoke after spending my first night in the hospital with a broken hip.

I still have done close to no running since the injury. Racing has always been an important part of my life. I find it tremendously fulfilling to push myself to my physical limits, knowing my achievements are the results of months and years of hard work. In 2009 I competed in 13 running races. This year? Zero. If I end up not doing any running races, it will be the first year since the 1980s in which that is the case.

So, that time trial series? It consisted of five races, one a month from May through September. By September, I had recovered enough that I could ride my bike pretty well again. With one last race in the series, I had an opportunity to get to race, even if not in my most preferred discipline, and I wanted to seize that opportunity.

The race was Sunday, September 19. I watched the forecast all week leading up to it with a sense of anxiety as the percent chance of rain went up and down. After suffering a broken hip caused by a cycling accident on a slippery road, I did not want to ride in the rain, but I really wanted to ride! The morning of the race Cara and I (for she was also doing her first cycling race) awoke at 5:45 with an hour drive ahead of us. The forecast still showed a chance of showers. We set out in the dark and drove through some rain on our way. I felt a certain uneasiness, no doubt. Thankfully, the weather ended up cooperating beautifully. There was not a drop of rain during the race, the roads had dried, the temperature was about 60, and winds were light. Perfect weather for riding fast.

The time trial was a different sort of event from any running race I've participated in. In a time trial, each rider starts at one minute intervals. Drafting is prohibited; it's a test of individual riding ability. Honestly, I would find a normal cycling road race scary, especially after my fall. Some day, perhaps, but for now I was happy to do a time trial.

For the race in May I had been expecting to go over 23 mph average on the rolling, out-and-back 12.68 (to be precise) mile course. Now my expectations were somewhat more modest, of course. I set out hoping to top 22.

Although the course was not extremely hilly, the turnaround point was about 100 feet higher than the start. After the turnaround, my average speed was 21.5, so I was in good shape. I picked up more speed than I expected in the second half, ending up with a 22.74 average for the race. Quite frankly, I was thrilled with this outcome, considering I was less than four months removed from a broken hip!

At the end of the race, my legs were burning. So was my throat - I really needed a drink, in a way I don't recall being the case after running races. I guess the wind from riding fast might have something to do with this. I coasted into the parking lot, stopped at the car to chug some Gatorade, and then headed back to the finish line to see how Cara did.

She came in, clearly giving it her all with a hard surge to the finish, several minutes sooner than I actually expected. She averaged 18.25 mph. When I think back to where she was when she started riding a few years ago, I have to say she really deserves a huge amount of credit for that accomplishment. She said after the race that she had never exerted herself quite like that before, but really wanted to do another. I realized then that she now understood me better than she had before. It was pretty cool!

I'm sure that next year we will both be back out there, and riding even faster. There's just something about racing that nothing else really compares to. I also highly recommend this time trial series to any northeast Ohio cyclists wanting to test their skills. It was a small event, with about 35 entrants, but it was very well organized, with a good course and friendly people.

New music August!

2010-08-23T21:26:00.000-07:00

Summer marches on, another year of school starts, and I wonder where all the time has gone. I'm mostly over the broken hip now, which is a relief. I've gotten in some good bike rides lately. More on that, perhaps, in a later entry. For now, some brief thoughts on a couple of exciting new albums that dropped this month.

August, it turns out, contained releases from two of the heavyweights of the indie music scene, and both will undoubtedly be in many conversations for album of the year. Early in the month, Arcade Fire unleashed their third album, The Suburbs, amidst much hype, which it more than lived up to. In contrast, Sufjan Stevens made many people's days (weeks, months, years?) when last week he released a new EP completely out of nowhere. Well, it's called an "EP," but like the new Arcade Fire album, Sufjan's All Delighted People EP clocks in at an hour long - despite containing half as many tracks.

Looking back to five years ago, both of these artists were significant in the evolution of my music tastes. In 2005, my music horizons broadened greatly. It was an exciting time, as I discovered artist after artist putting out great music I had never heard before. I remember looking up numerous albums on Amazon. You know how they have a section for "Customers who bought this album also bought"? I couldn't help but notice that for almost every band I looked up, Arcade Fire's Funeral appeared there. So I bought it, and today it's still one of my favorite albums ever. Although I still consider their debut LP their strongest effort, Neon Bible was an excellent followup, and now I'd say The Suburbs is an even better third release. A couple great things about Arcade Fire - each of their albums is an evolution in their sound, and each of their albums is a real, cohesive album. "Sprawl II" is an amazing song, definitely one of my favorites of the year, but it wouldn't be nearly as powerful if the album hadn't been building perfectly to that point. It's pretty likely that The Suburbs will end up being my top album of the year, and the only band with a string of three albums that I would collectively rate as better than Arcade Fire's first three LPs is Okkervil River (Down the River of Golden Dreams, Black Sheep Boy, and The Stage Names would be my pick there).

Back to 2005. Sufjan Stevens at the Beachland Ballroom was the first big concert I went to after getting into the indie music scene. It was a great show, and I thoroughly enjoyed Illinois, but it's really been in the past year that I've gotten more and more into Sufjan. He's a brilliant artist, but at times it feels like he could use an editor. Illinois is a great album, and its high points are stunning, but it's also a bit longer than it really should be. The (much) less grandiose Seven Swans may actually be his best album. Actually, this probably sounds funny, but my personal favorite Sufjan release is Songs for Christmas Vol. 5. "Sister Winter," "Star of Wonder," and "Holy, Holy, Holy" are three of his greatest and most beautiful songs.

Anyway, I was lucky enough to see Sufjan again last fall, and it was another great show. I admit, though, that I had a mixed reaction to the new material he played then. He's definitely grown much more experimental in his sound. I felt like some of the new stuff was breathtaking, but some of it left me . . . well, somewhat confused. "All Delighted People," the title track from the new EP, was one of the new songs he played, and at 11+ minutes, it had enough in it that I was able to have both reactions within one song. Having listened to it more now, it's definitely grown on me. The last few minutes are especially gorgeous. There are still spots in the song where I feel Sufjan goes a bit over-the-top; at this point I'm pretty sure I prefer the 8-minute "Classic Rock Version," which is probably my favorite track on the EP. The rest of the album contains five shorter, more straightforward (relatively speaking) songs, with "The Owl and the Tanager" being a definite highlight, and closes with the 17-minute "Djohariah." Know what I said earlier about sometimes feeling Sufjan could use an editor? Well, surprisingly, I don't think this is one of those times. The final track really works for me, and the 17 minutes don't drag at all.

So, August has been a good month for music. Arcade Fire and Sufjan Stevens both released albums that will be showing up on lots of end-of-the-year lists. Personally, I rank Arcade Fire's higher, but anyone who is at all into this sort of music would be crazy to miss out on either of these albums. It's a good time to be a music fan!

Roxboro Ravine . . . it rocks!

2010-06-29T17:29:00.000-07:00

I thought it might be fun to write some posts about neat places around Cleveland (this isn't entirely a music blog!), so now, while I'm still recovering from a broken hip, some words about one of my favorite places to go when I have my normal mobility.

I suspect that not many people are familiar with the term Roxboro Ravine. A Google search returns very few results. Here's one, though; I think it's where I learned the name:

Path down into the Roxboro Ravine (formerly known as Ambler Park), approximately where Bellfield meets North Park Blvd. (from Cleveland Heights Historical Society)

Quite pretty, isn't it? The spot pictured doesn't look exactly the same today, but anyone who has spent a lot of time in the ravine would have no trouble recognizing the image. I'm sure that a lot more people are familiar with the place known as Roxboro Ravine than with the name Roxboro Ravine, but at the same time I'm sure many people pass by it often while remaining unaware of the wonderful place hiding in plain sight between North Park and Fairhill roads in Shaker Heights.

I was certainly one of those people once. As a cross country runner at CWRU, I often ran along North Park, on the grass right next to the ravine. I undoubtedly glanced down into the ravine from time to time while running by, but (to my memory) did not venture down there at all for my first two years of college. I remember a run my junior year where a couple of my teammates suggested heading down the wooded trails there. I voiced my disagreement, worried that it might be dangerous and not wanting to risk an injury.

I've since been injured twice on those trails, but that hasn't hampered my enthusiasm for running there. The trails aren't inherently dangerous; they just require somewhat more care and surer footing than running on roads. The broken arm in particular was due to completely reckless behavior on my part - I was walking, on a fallen tree, across the brook that flows through the ravine. That was risky enough, but then, as I neared the end of the tree, I began to pick up speed. I guess I just couldn't wait a few more steps until I reached solid ground, and I paid the price for my stupidity when I slipped, fell backwards several feet to the ground, and caught myself with an arm that one glance instantly revealed was broken. I walked out of the ravine up to North Park and was lucky enough to immediately encounter some other people, one of whom was a student at the Case Medical School and drove me to the hospital.

So I've certainly had some adventures in the ravine. (Since learning the proper name, I still usually think of it as just "the ravine." Cara and I have another name for it, as well - "Leslie Anne Ravine," a pun on the Decemberists' song "Leslie Anne Levine." I'm not even sure now which one of us came up with it, I think it was her? We are pretty silly.)

Roxboro Ravine really is a fantastic place for running. In the past few years, I've come to enjoy trail running more and more. It's a great way to commune with nature, and it's much more stimulating to my senses and my mind than running on the streets. The trails in the ravine require more attention than most. There are all sorts of rocks, roots, sharp turns, and quick ups and downs to navigate through. None of it is excessively difficult if proper care is taken, but it's a much more rugged trail than what one might typically find in, say, the Metroparks. I have to say, somewhat egotistically, that running is more fun when you can run fast, and running fast through a rugged, forested trail full of twists and turns is really fun. I've covered the trails through the ravine so many times that my feet practically know each step of the way. I really feel lucky, living in an urban environment, to have such a great place for trail running so close by. (It also seems to be a popular place for mountain biking. I've never tried mountain biking myself, and frankly, the idea of doing it on some of the more treacherous segments of the ravine's trails seems rather scary.)

Running in the ravine is great, but sometimes it can be nice to take in the joys of nature at a more leisurely pace. Cara and I often like to go on walks or hikes together (again, I'm looking forward to getting back to doing this after my injury is all better!), and Roxboro Ravine is one of our favorite places for such excursions. We've traversed the trails there in all seasons. Our most recent hike there was on a beautiful spring day, and contained a cool surprise. As we walked, we noticed there was music coming from somewhere nearby. And not someone's stereo system - this was live music, played by a couple of brass instruments. After we walked farther down the trail, an upward look revealed the musicians' location. They were sitting on the back patio of one of the houses on Fairhill that overlooks the ravine (I'm really jealous of the people who live there). It was like having a concert performed just for us while we enjoyed a great stroll through nature.

That was a memorable hike, but definitely not as memorable as the one that took place on March 7 of this year. That was when Cara and I got engaged. Here's a picture of the spot where it happened, which I took just before the big moment (the ring, at the time, was hidden in my camera bag).

Earlier in the walk, Cara had mentioned that the ravine was "special" to her. This secretly thrilled me, knowing what I was planning to ask her before we left the ravine that day. So I definitely agree, Roxboro Ravine is a special place, for many reasons.

Dreamend - A trip down memory lane

2010-06-11T11:17:00.000-07:00

This show was almost two months ago now, but I still wanted to post something about it.

I suppose it would also be worth mentioning that I currently have a broken hip. Three weeks ago I had a cycling accident. As I was attempting to make a turn my wheels came out from under me (apparently this was due to the road both being wet and also having an oil slick on it) and I went straight down on my left hip. It was a painful experience. I'm on crutches and will be for at least a few more weeks. It's certainly frustrating, especially with the nice weather we've been having, but hey, sometimes these things happen, and I am getting better.

Now for the main part of this post. In April the Chicago-based experimental/shoegaze/post-rock band Dreamend played at the Grog Shop, opening for The Appleseed Cast. Both members of the lineup attracted me to the show, but I was definitely more drawn by Dreamend.

I like Dreamend; they've released several good albums . . . but I would hardly call them one of my favorite bands. Yet this was a show that I did not want to miss. Why? Well, I'd seen Dreamend once before, in the fall of 2005, at The Spot. It was actually one of the first concerts that I ever went to. A quick Google search informs me that the date of this show was October 12, 2005. In the summer of 2005 I, for the first time, started exploring music outside of the mainstream, and in September of 2005 I started going to concerts on a regular basis for the first time in my life. It turns out that that Dreamend show was one day before the first time I saw Nada Surf, and three days before the first time I saw the Decemberists, so it was a very memorable week for concerts.

That Dreamend concert was certainly not on the same level to me as the two other show that week, but I still quite enjoyed it, and as I think back, Dreamend may very well have been my introduction to the genre of post-rock. So my reasons for wanting to see Dreamend in 2010 were largely nostalgia-driven.

Dreamend played a solid set at the Grog Shop. I actually didn't recognize at least half of the songs. Early in the set, though, when they played "Can't Take You," I felt some nostalgia stirring. You see, back in 2005, my music collection was rather lacking. I eschewed illegal music downloads (and still do); instead, I obtained a large number of songs by going to bands' websites and downloading the free tracks they had available. I placed all these songs in an iTunes playlist called "cool DLed tunes," and would often listen to it on shuffle. "Can't Take You" was one of the songs I got from Dreamend's website.

So it was nice to hear this song, but there was another song I wanted to hear far, far more. "Passing," the last track on their 2004 album As If By Ghosts, was another of those songs I downloaded from Dreamend's website way back when. It's also, in my opinion, easily the best thing they've ever done. But I didn't have high hopes to hear it; the set seemed to be focused more on newer songs, and the time Dreamend had left was running low . . .

When the opening notes of their last song sounded, I recognized them immediately, and was thrilled. I'll be honest. Up to that point, I had enjoyed Dreamend's set, but I could have missed it and it wouldn't really have bothered me. When they played "Passing," though, I could only stand there enthralled for seven minutes. I guess Dreamend agree with me that "Passing" is a career highlight. It's an epic post-rock piece that would not feel out of place on an Explosions in the Sky album. I got video (missing the very start of the song, and unfortunately when it gets loud the sound quality is kind of poor); here it is:

Fortunately, the great music that night was just beginning. The Appleseed Cast performed their emo-tinged post-rock albums Low Level Owl Vol. 1 & 2 in their entirety, back-to-back with a brief intermission in which Saved by the Bell clips were amusingly projected on the wall. It was an outstanding performance, with great musicianship all around and impeccable sound quality. I probably had a somewhat unusual perspective, having heard just the first of the two albums previously. Despite this, I felt The Appleseed Cast easily kept the momentum up throughout their show. Overall, they were definitely the stronger of the two bands that night.

But for me, "Passing" was the highlight of the evening.

Pearl Jam Wash away Indifference in Cleveland

2010-05-11T22:21:00.000-07:00

I very rarely attend concerts in venues that hold more than a few hundred people. For me to go to an arena show is almost unheard of. But when Pearl Jam hit the Q on Sunday, I was there. They're the only band I would not hesitate to shell out the money for to see at an arena show. (They're not quite my favorite band, not anymore, but none of the handful of bands I like better would have any business playing an arena.) Pearl Jam are actually the only band to be counted among my favorites in middle school, in high school, in college, and still today, as my tastes in music have changed quite a bit over those years. This was my third time seeing them live, and they can always be counted on for a great show.

Opener Band of Horses played a good set. I hadn't really listened to them before. They reminded me somewhat of My Morning Jacket, who opened for Pearl Jam the last time I saw them, although I'd say I prefer MMJ. The highlight of BoH's set was "The Funeral" (I had not heard the song before, but recognized the title).

When Pearl Jam took the stage, the excitement in the arena was palpable. To my surprise, I didn't immediately recognize the first song they played. Once it clicked, though, a wide, somewhat shocked, grin appeared on my face. They opened with "Wash," an old B-side and not a song I would have expected to hear at all. And it was a stunning opener.

A cool thing about Pearl Jam's website is that you can view setlists for every show they've played (here is the Cleveland setlist), and you can also view a list of every time that any given song has been played. So I can see that before Sunday, "Wash" had only been played once live since 2006. Talk about good luck! And that was just the beginning.

Pearl Jam always mix up their sets a lot, with a good mix of their big radio hits, tracks from their recent album, and older fan favorites. At any show, there's a good chance you'll hear a song or two that rarely comes up in their live rotation. Of course, some of those songs are better than others. If I had been tasked before the concert with making a list of songs I most wanted to hear Pearl Jam play live, "Sleight of Hand," a track from the under-rated album Binaural, would have been near the top. It had been played just twice since 2006, barely more than "Wash." Partway through the concert, Eddie went into a description of the next song, saying something about people going to work and living their lives while putting on false exteriors... I don't really remember exactly what he said, but the description sounded familiar. Sleight of Hand, Sleight of Hand... I silently pleaded... and then they played "Sleight of Hand," and I was floored. It's one of Pearl Jam's more experimental tracks, incredibly atmospheric in sound, and fantastic live. After that, and "Wash," and lots of other great songs like "Corduroy," "In Hiding," and "Immortality" (which would have thrilled me even more than "Sleight of Hand" did, except they also played it last time in Cleveland), this was already my favorite Pearl Jam concert yet.

They ended up playing for almost two and a half hours. Pearl Jam have a reputation for being a great live band, and it's well earned. They've been around for twenty years, and they're still capable of rocking out with high energy for two-plus hours a night, while putting together truly unique sets for every show. Eddie Vedder and company truly deserve to be thought of as rock legends.

In the second encore, I was delighted to hear "Black" and "Alive" - yeah, they're the big radio hits, but that's due largely to them being genuinely great songs. It was also great to hear "Smile," another of those tracks that doesn't come up so often live, although it had been played the last time in Cleveland. "Smile" was a fan request, and Eddie had the woman who was holding a sign for it come up to the front of the crowd when they played it. He then gave her his harmonica after he was done with it for the song. Lucky girl!

So it was a night packed with fantastic performances, but there was one more surprise in store for me, and it was the best of all. That list I might have made, on which "Sleight of Hand" would have appeared? "Indifference" would have been at the top. And the last song they played? After "Alive," I was expecting "Yellow Ledbetter" to close the show. When I realized they were in fact closing with "Indifference," I got giddy. The last track on Pearl Jam's second album, Vs., it's my favorite Pearl Jam song ever, and one of my favorite songs period. The mood the song creates, and Eddie's vocals ("I'll swallow poison until I grow immune/I will scream my lungs out 'til it fills this room")... wow. It was the perfect way to end an amazing evening.

Kaki King concert (or: Mind Status: Blown)

2010-05-10T20:30:00.000-07:00

I have decided that this blog, despite all appearances to the contrary, is not dead.

Among other things, I'd like to get some concert reviews written. Here is one of them!

After seeing Kaki King at the Beachland Ballroom on May 4th, I commented, "That show pretty much blew my mind."

I've seen a lot of good concerts recently, but it's especially cool when a show is not only amazingly good, but also far exceeds any expectations I had going in. That was the case here. I only very recently started listening to Kaki King. What got me into her was hearing her new single "Falling Day" in the car on WRUW. I was instantly enthralled by the song, and although I did not catch the name at the time, I decided I would have to go check out the show playlist when I got home and see who it was. After seeing the name Kaki King, I remembered a friend had told me about her a couple months before, and that she would be playing the Beachland. I decided to get Kaki's new album Junior before deciding whether I would go to the show. I liked it - a lot - and also checked out ...Until We Felt Red for good measure. Having thus familiarized myself with a decent portion of Kaki's catalog, I was very much looking forward to seeing her live, but I had no idea what was in store.

Kaki is an amazing guitarist, and also employs an amazing variety of musical styles, all of which she pulls off very well. She opened the set with the previously mentioned "Falling Day," to my delight. Admittedly, I didn't find the live version quite as good as the album version on this particular song; I didn't think her vocals sounded as confident live. She may be getting used to singing rock vocals; her previous albums have had less singing and not really in this style. Still, it was a good opener, and things really picked up from there.

The most impressive part of the set was when Kaki's two bandmates left the stage and she played a few solo acoustic songs. This was a part of the show that I did not know to expect, and her complex finger(nail)picked and fingerslapped instrumentals were simply jawdropping.

Although her technical skills on these songs were absolutely stunning, several other songs left me even more in awe. The first of these was when she created a mini-suite by placing the fantastic new song "My Nerves That Committed Suicide" in the middle of an older song which I unfortunately do not recall the name of. This was a more epic post-rock performance than anything I saw at the Caspian and Red Sparowes concert last month. Almost as good was main set closer "You Don't Have To Be Afraid," the ending of which rocked way harder than the also fantastic album version.

Kaki did not make us wait long before coming out for a several song encore. The final song, "Gay Sons Of Lesbian Mothers," was another definite highlight. She started it off solo with a lap steel, on which she built up the various parts of the song with looping. After she played for a few minutes, her bandmates joined in, and she set her guitar down while the looping continued. She had said before the song that we were going to dance. True to her word, she came down off of the stage and danced with the delighted crowd. It culminated with Kaki dancing on a table.

Kaki played for almost two hours, and the whole show was pretty much brilliant. And as if her singing and guitar wizardry weren't enough, she also had plenty of genuinely interesting and amusing stage banter, including a story of her crazy German friend telling Kaki about a song the friend had written called "Skypefuck," which Kaki hilariously imitated with a couple seconds of exaggerated metal vocals.

So to sum up, if you get the chance to see Kaki King live, do it. And check out her albums, too.

Music roundup

2010-03-10T15:55:00.000-08:00

It's been too long since I wrote anything here, but I've been quite busy recently.

Yesterday Woodpigeon's new album Die Stadt Muzikanten was officially released in the United States some two months after the Canadian release. It's an amazing album that anyone who likes artists like Sufjan Stevens or Belle and Sebastian should definitely check out. I wrote a review a while back. I hope this album does well, because I really really really want Woodpigeon to do a U.S. tour and come to Cleveland!

Also yesterday, Family of the Year put out a new five-song EP. I first became aware of this young band when they opened for Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros in Kent last fall. I was impressed with their performance and thoroughly enjoyed their album Songbook. The new EP Through the Trees is a solid followup. I especially enjoy "Princess and the Pea," which is highlighted by some sexy horns, and the catchy "Chugjug."

Family of the Year will be playing at the Beachland Tavern tomorrow night, opening for Ben Sollee and Daniel Martin Moore, who are touring in support of their new album Dear Companion. I saw Ben Sollee in a stripped-down performance (just him and a female vocalist) at the Spot last fall and was impressed by his soulful voice and cello playing. This should be a good show. Conveniently, a Daytrotter session with four songs from Dear Companion was recently posted.

And here's a new Daytrotter session that shouldn't be missed: Megafaun. These guys put on one of the best live shows I saw last year. They'll be playing at the Beachland Tavern again on April 7, just four days after Shearwater. There are a lot of good concerts coming to Cleveland in the next few months!

Sledding is awesome

2010-02-15T20:32:00.000-08:00

It's been another snowy winter here on the North Coast. When I was a kid growing up in Columbus, I absolutely loved to go sledding, but was frequently disappointed at the amount of snow we got in the winter. Here in Cleveland we tend not to have that problem (although they've been getting hammered in Columbus too!) and I'm not at all ashamed to say that, at 26 years old, I'm still very into sledding.

Cara and I have gone out sledding several times over the past few years, and had a few adventures along the way. We'll never forget how ridiculously cold it was the first time we went at Forest Hill (which also happens to feature a half mile trek from the parking lot to the sledding hill). And then there was the time that we wanted to go sledding after a big March snowstorm, but had no sleds here, and were unable to find any in the stores. We ended up buying some foam insulation at Home Depot and cutting off pieces on which we slid down the hill. This proved only moderately effective, and we were lucky when someone took pity and let us use their sled for a few runs.

This year we've had our best sledding yet. We seem to have mutually decided that we prefer sledding at night, mainly because of the lack of crowds. While it's fun to observe kids enjoying themselves on the sledding hills, it's less fun to have to constantly look out/wait for people sitting at the bottom or walking up the middle of the hill. It's also not fun to cringe at kids nearly smashing into each other, or parents sending their three-year-old down the massive and steep slope at Forest Hill. Plus, sledding at night has a really cool atmosphere to it.

A few weeks ago we hit up the Cain Park hill, and it was the best sledding I've experienced in maybe a decade or even more. It reminded me of some of the great times I used to have at Wyman Woods in Grandview. The sledding surface was nicely packed down, a bit icy, and very fast, and if you were so inclined you could hit some bumps and receive moderate to huge air. Speaking of Cain Park sledding, I found this picture from 1970. I see a lot of Flexible Flyers - that was my favorite sled as a kid.

Tonight we went to Flavor Tripping at the B-Side Liquor Lounge, which was also a lot of fun (and I think Cara may write about it). Yet another snowstorm was picking up in intensity as we headed out. After the party (the highlights for me were lemons and goat cheese), we walked over to Coventry Peace Park with our sleds. This is a relatively small hill, but it's still quite fun. At least an inch or two of fresh powder covered the previously packed down snow. As we rode, our sleds carved smooth paths into the glistening hillside. It was really rather beautiful to look at.

Does anyone have any other suggestions for the best places to sled in Cleveland? I've read that some of the Metroparks have good hills.

Trying out some new toys and nearly freezing to death

2010-02-01T21:08:00.000-08:00

For Christmas my parents got me some new accessories for the road bike that I had gotten from them three years previously (and which is probably the best Christmas present I've ever gotten, come to think of it). I finally have clipless pedals and a pair of cycling shoes. For anyone who is uninitiated in the world of cycling and may be reading this post, this means that the shoes lock in to the pedals while riding, enabling a somewhat greater transfer of power with each pedal stroke. I got the pedals installed on my bike last weekend, then promptly got sick, and then went through a few days of weather that was snowy and/or bitterly cold. I had been itching to give my new toys a try, so today, with the temperature a balmy 26, clear streets, and very little wind, I thought conditions were good enough and went out for a ride.

In previous cold weather rides, I have experienced some extremely cold hands and feet (even with two pairs of socks). I recently picked up some toe covers for my cycling shoes, so I put those on. To protect my hands, I equipped myself with two pairs of gloves.

My ride started well. I haven't done much outdoor riding recently, but I'm pretty sure that, thanks to the new pedals, I was riding in higher gears than I typically would with the same effort. Unfortunately, my bike computer doesn't like cold temperatures, so I could not actually see how fast I was going. Hopefully I'll get a chance for that in the not too distant future.

I ended up going about 23 miles. About halfway in, I realized that my fingers were getting very cold. Unfortunately, I was over ten miles from home; I had no choice but to suffer through the return leg of my route. My fingers grew increasingly numb. Two pairs of gloves were obviously not enough - I definitely plan to pick up some hand warmers before going on any more lengthy rides in this sort of weather. (The toe covers, on the other hand, proved effective.) I surged through the mostly downhill last few miles and was greatly relieved to reach home. The worst part, though, was yet to come.

My fingers were extremely cold and numb. I needed to warm them up, and I ran some warm water over them. I knew this would be painful, but the pain was far more excruciating than I can ever remember feeling in similar situations in the past. But it went away in a few minutes.

Hot chocolate has never tasted better.

My top five albums of 2009

2010-01-25T13:56:00.000-08:00

It's a little late to put together a tops of 2009 list, but since I just started this blog, I felt like making one. Also, I'm home sick today. My criteria for this list are simply which albums I considered my most favorite. It couldn't truthfully be called a "best of" list, because I did not make an effort to listen to every critically acclaimed album of the year. That's not to say that I don't seek out new music, but I would rather give extra attention to the albums that I do really enjoy than try to listen to as many different albums as I possibly can. (Looking at my Rate Your Music account it appears I have about 30 2009 albums in my collection.) First, a few honorable mentions: Songbook by Family of the Year, Backspacer by Pearl Jam, The Hazards of Love by The Decemberists, and Sainthood by Tegan and Sara. Now, without further ado:

5. Afternoon Naps - Parade

This album is twee pop at its finest, and we are lucky to have such a delightful band here in Cleveland. With ten songs and 31 minutes of music, Parade barely qualifies to be Afternoon Naps' first LP. It's also their most accomplished work. They expand their sound in several ways, even adding some disco influences on a couple tracks. It's still full of the great hooks and boy-girl vocals that made their previous EPs hard to resist. Key tracks: "Mitten Fingers," "Beach Bums," "Catholic School"

4. Mono - Hymn to the Immortal Wind

It's a Mono album. If you've listened to the band before, you have an idea of what you're getting. Some might see that as a bad thing, but on this album, they take their style of post-rock and execute it really, really well. Music doesn't get a whole lot more epic than these seven tracks. Key tracks: "Ashes in the Snow," "The Battle to Heaven"

3. Andrew Bird - Noble Beast

Andrew Bird is an incredibly talented man. If you haven't seen one of his live shows, you should do so at the first opportunity. He has really created his own unique sound, notable for his superb vocals, his fantastic violin playing, and his amazing ability at whistling. The Mysterious Production of Eggs and Armchair Apocrypha are very good albums, but Noble Beast tops them, and is the first one that I feel really does justice to his immense talents. Key tracks: "Anonanimal," "Oh No," "Not a Robot, but a Ghost"

2. Megafaun - Gather, Form and Fly

I saw this band live over the summer, and I was mainly there to see Bowerbirds, but Megafaun blew me away. Their sound is a mix of experimental folk and more conventional folk rock with some country and bluegrass elements. They do it all very well, and their vocal harmonies are something to marvel at. Key tracks: "The Longest Day," "The Fade," "Kaufman's Ballad," "Guns"

1. Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros - Up From Below

I must say that the people who book the bands to play at The Spot at Case Western Reserve University have done a very good job. This merry folk rock troupe rolled into town for a show just as they were beginning to blow up in popularity. I personally had no familiarity with them before going, and it turned out to be possibly the best show I saw all year. With nine or ten musicians on stage, it's quite an impressive spectacle as they fill your ears with joyous music that would have been right at home in the late '60s. The live show sets a very high benchmark, which the album very nearly lives up to. If you haven't heard "Home," a duet that is surely one of the happiest love songs ever, go listen to it now. Key tracks: "Home," "Desert Song," "40 Day Dream," "Janglin"

Woodpigeon: Die Stadt Muzikanten and Balladeer

2010-01-24T13:33:00.000-08:00

It's unfortunate that Balladeer / To All the Guys I've Loved Before, the new album just released by Calgary band Woodpigeon, is likely to be largely overlooked. It's another collection of indie folk gems by Mark Hamilton, Woodpigeon's amazingly prolific and talented leader. This is a quieter album than Treasury Library Canada or Songbook, Woodpigeon's previous full-lengths. It's more reminiscent of the Houndstooth EP, with songs primarily driven by acoustic guitar and vocals, although additional flourishes from instruments like violin or clarinet are employed masterfully.

Hamilton has a knack for great melodies, and great lyrics to match. He conjures up some nice imagery in "So Hold": In a flat tin box/Your first letter to me, five years on/Didn't read what you wrote/Cuz I'm sure by now, it's not what I'd want. Album closer "Beth Jeans Sleepover" is just a really gorgeous song, while the haunting "An Entanglement of Weeds" deserves special mention. It clocks in at nearly seven minutes long and tells the tale of a twelve year old boy drowning after falling into a river while attempting to rescue his friend, recounting his thoughts as he realizes that he is going to die.

Why is this fantastic album almost undoubtedly going to receive little attention? Well, despite containing 12 songs and 44 minutes of all new material, Balladeer is merely a bonus disc attached to Woodpigeon's other new album, Die Stadt Muzikanten (did I mention that Mark Hamilton is very prolific??).

And while Balladeer is an excellent piece of work, Die Stadt Muzikanten does deserve top billing. It's a masterpiece, Woodpigeon's best album yet. I've previously written that the main elements that make Woodpigeon's music so appealing are the catchy melodies, lush instrumentation, and boy-girl harmonies that I can only describe as delicious. All of that is still present in spades. Die Stadt Muzikanten, though, just sounds bigger than any previous Woodpigeon release. While comparisons to artists like Belle and Sebastian or Sufjan Stevens may still be appropriate, Woodpigeon have really found their own sound here. They're equally adept at infectious chamber pop ("Empty-Hall Sing-Along," "Enchantee Janvier") and heart-achingly beautiful balladry ("Spirehouse," "Our Love is as Tall as the Calgary Tower"). They rock harder than they have in the past on "The Street Noise Gives You Away" and "My Denial in Argyle" (the most danceable Woodpigeon track yet). And I would be remiss to leave out a pair of nautically themed numbers. "Redbeard" is a clever song in which the protagonist hunts down a pirate who "stole and burned most everything, the life that I once knew," for the purpose of revenge, only to fall in love. "...And as the Ship Went Down, You'd Never Looked Finer" is a tour de force. It contains the most interesting arrangements and instrumentation on the album, building from a simple, repetitive percussion and piano intro to a rousing climax with violin, banjo, accordion, and stirring vocals playing key roles along the way. It's interesting that on both Balladeer and Die Stadt Muzikanten, a strong contender for the title of best track is about drowning - Colin Meloy would be proud.

Die Stadt Muzikanten can be streamed in full on Woodpigeon's website. The album won't be officially released in the U.S. until March, but is available to purchase from digital retailers, and the CD version can be ordered from Boompa. I would highly recommend the latter; the bonus disc alone is worth the price of admission, and Balladeer is only available with physical copies of the album.

A Northern Chorus's final show and the power of music

2010-01-20T17:10:00.000-08:00

Note: this was a journal entry I wrote on last.fm on June 30, 2008, about what may have been the very best concert I've ever attended. I'm reposting it here because (a) I think it was a pretty good journal (b) it will make my blog less empty and (c) damn, that was an amazing show.

A Northern Chorus have been one of my favorite bands for about two years. Over the course of four albums, the Hamilton, Ontario-based dream pop outfit excelled at creating lush soundscapes of rare beauty. No other band I know is quite like them. Low are a definite influence, although a better description of some of ANC's more epic tracks might be to take Explosions in the Sky and add some deeply stirring vocal and string parts. The bottom line is that, to my ears, A Northern Chorus had an unparalleled ability to create aural beauty. I first saw them in concert for free at my school in the spring of 2006. I had never heard of them before, and had only listened to a few songs prior to going to the show, but the experience was one of sheer bliss. Ever since, I hoped that they would play another show in Ohio, but it did not happen. When I found out via a MySpace blog post that they were calling it quits, I was saddened. The same post announced that they were playing two farewell shows, in Toronto on June 27 and Hamilton June 28. I immediately decided that, despite Hamilton being four hours away, I had to go to the final concert.

It was a very good decision. This concert was one of the most emotionally intense musical experiences of my life. The performance, lasting a good two hours when all was said and done, had all the grandeur of my previous ANC concert experience, along with a passion that could only come with a special occasion like this one. I was in the very front row, and could clearly see in the faces and body language of each member of the six-piece that they were deeply affected by the fact that they were playing their final show after all those years. They put their all into their instruments and voices, and the audience responded with enormous enthusiasm. The setlist was stunning, containing all of the songs that I most wanted to hear. It was dominated by tracks from their last album, The Millions Too Many, and 2005's Bitter Hands Resign. The latter is the most gorgeous album I have ever had the pleasure of hearing, and certainly in the running for my top five albums of all time. The former is not that far behind in my rankings. Thus, this setlist was quite pleasing to me. Several older standouts from 2003's Spirit Flags rounded out one of the greatest collections of songs I've ever heard at one show. They did not play anything from their debut, Before We All Go To Pieces. This did not actually bother me, because, while I like the album a lot, it does not quite compare to their other works. It doesn't have the same majestic quality that makes so many of A Northern Chorus's songs so breathtaking live.

The full setlist went as follows:

The Millions Too Many
Remembrance Day
Costa del Sol
Victory Parade
Carpenter
Red Carpet Blues
Let The Parrots Speak for Themselves
Ethic of the Pioneer
Winterize
The Shepherd & the Chauffeur
Skeleton Keys
Candle Song 3 (Mojave 3 cover)
Fragile Day
Subjects & Matter
No Stations

*first encore*
Prisoners of Circumstance
The Canadian Shield

*second encore*
Louder Than Love

There were some great moments beyond the music itself, too, such as when guitarist/vocalist Stu Livingstone announced that his parents were there celebrating their 37th wedding anniversary. This got a nice round of applause from the audience. Another fun moment was the whole band, in between encores, taking a round of shots on the house.

(Cara, who went to the show with me, took these pictures.)

Things got really, really emotional during the encores. Tears were visible on the faces of the majority of band members. Cellist/vocalist Alex McMaster in particular was really breaking down.

A very surreal moment came after the first encore, when the band appeared ready to call the show over, but relented to audience demand for one last song, the last one that the band still had available to play of those they had rehearsed. Then it was discovered that the sound for the cello had just stopped working. After an incredible emotional display with what was supposed to be the last song, they were left to stand around on stage bantering for several minutes while fixes were attempted. Nothing worked, and finally Alex, visibly holding back her emotions, said something like "fuck the cello, I'll just sing" and they launched into one last epic performance.

It's hard to really put into words just how amazing an experience this concert was. In a way, it was profoundly sad. The reason for A Northern Chorus's breakup was not that they no longer liked each other, nor that they had no more desire to make music. It was that, financially, the band just wasn't working out, and after all those years this had taken too much of a toll. I'll certainly always consider them one of the most underappreciated bands I know. But while they never reached a particularly wide audience, the crowd at this show made it clear that their music was beloved.

And while this experience was at times a sad one, it was also profoundly exhilarating, life-affirming, even. Truly great live music has an effect on me that few other things do. For example, I saw WALL-E, the new Pixar movie, the previous night. It was stunning, gorgeous, unbelievably imaginative, and one of the best movies I've seen in my life. But its effect on me did not come close to this concert's. I will continue to wish that A Northern Chorus could go on making more of their wonderful music, but I'll also be eternally grateful that I got to be there for this, their unforgettable swan song.

Welcome to my humble blog

2010-01-20T15:24:00.000-08:00

SO... I decided to start a blog.

Why, after having spent copious amounts of time on the Internet for the last, oh, half of my life, did I finally decide to take this momentous step?

I like writing. I don't spend as much time doing it as I used to. It probably wouldn't be a bad thing to write more. It's definitely true that I enjoy looking back on things I wrote in the past (like that prize-winning book from first grade, "The Fight for the Forestmen's Treasure," based on the adventures of my Lego people!), and I'm sure that, say, ten years from now, I'll like having a written record of some of my thoughts at this point in my life. And I might as well share them with the rest of the world, because hey, if no one reads the blog, no big loss, and if people do read it - well, most people like attention in one form or another, and I'm not unusual in that regard.

So, a little about me. I'm a graduate student who lives in Cleveland with my wonderful girlfriend Cara. (I am not very good at coming up with clever titles for things, so I shamelessly imitated hers for my blog.) Things I like include music, running, cycling, the outdoors in general, food, Cleveland... yes, I like Cleveland. A lot of people would probably find that a strange declaration, but there's a lot to like about the city I call home. To start, how about the great music scene, lots of amazing restaurants, and the fact that we have both a great metro parks system and a national park a 30-45 minute drive away?

What will I be writing about here? Probably a lot about music, along with whatever else I feel like. I've written some journals on my last.fm page, but I find the way their journal system is currently set up somewhat unsatisfactory. I will probably crosspost music-related entries here and there. Maybe I should have one catch-all blog and another music-specific blog? I'm not sure if there's really a reason to do that or not.

I guess that's all for my intro post. So welcome, and please enjoy your stay!