8/15/08 - Ella Minnow, Bee vs. Moth, Timeline Post, Sean Kirkpatrick

headed out to hailey's, mainly to hear sean k, but it turned out to be a pretty good night overall.

sean kirkpatrick - seen him more times than i can count, and he slays me every time. he's just one of those songwriters that writes song after song that absolutely resonate with me. would love to know who he listens to - pretty sure i'd love it. his set list is definitely transitioning from first album material to a bunch of new stuff, which is all incredible. (you can hear some of the new material on the crazy jeff show page or the gutterth page, and i suggest you do). did a beautiful amy winehouse cover. i've said it before - sean is one of the very few artists whose covers i enjoy, cuz he does such a great job of making them his own. heard 'life without chocolate' live for the first time - one of my favorites from his album. an outstanding set. sean will be performing with his full band at club dada on the 28th - check it out. timeline post - 2nd time to see these guys - liked it much better this time. 6-man band - 4 guitars, keys and drums. some outstanding, dreamy, wall-of-sound guitar pop (didn't hear the keys too much). only problem - music that strong needs some kick-yer-ass vocals to stand above it, and the lead just doesn't have that kind of voice. probably works fine on a recording, but live, his vocals just got drowned out on every song. can't help but think that some beefy vocals would kick it up a notch. really dug the set, tho. bee vs. moth - um, no thanks. not a fan of jazz. cornet, bari sax, guitar, bass (sometimes upright), drums. seemed like they were good at it, but i just don't dig that stuff. ella minnow - holy shit, ella minnow kicked my ass. totally different take on them vs. the first time i saw 'em. songs kinda all over the map - some early-radioheadish stuff, some bluesy numbers, some 4/4 downbeat-happy songs, some wall of sound anthemic rock, some instrumentals - and all of it was fantastic. lead reminded me of stephen duncan (of chemistry set "fame"), except on speed. lead vox strong (great falsetto), if not exactly conventional (sometimes he reminded me of squiggy from laverne and shirley), but it worked. super-high energy, too - both the lead and the (cape-wearing) key/sax-player were spazzes, injecting the show with tons of energy. man, i loved it. can't wait to see 'em again. (soory for the crappy pic)