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carvinkeeper12Thanksgiving break had so many cool things going on this year that it was really really short. But incredibly awesome. First off, Wednesday's classes were all canceled so I didn't have anything to do that day. Then Val and I got distracted by video games and Netflix Instant View on XBox Live that we stayed up kinda late. Then we said goodnight at like 4, and I proceeded to read or dick around online or something for the rest of the night. So, in the morning I had nothing to do, what with Val and Ryan asleep and not heading to Val's house for dinner until later in the afternoon. I proceeded to go visit Prospect Park. There's this really cool playground there that makes me wish I were still eight, so I ended up sitting on a bench near it watching the kids and writing down story ideas. (Why I should always have a little notebook with me.) Sadly the only thing that really came to me was this short thing about some girl who has a fairly fleshed out background but didn't give me enough to really start a story about. Oh well.
Anyway, after the park I grabbed coffee from my favorite bagel place (Nick claims he's going to change my mind next Thursday at our Studio II Holiday Breakfast) and headed back to Manhattan. I got all dressed up for dinner in a collared shirt and high heels and *gasp* a bit of makeup. Then I joined Val and Ryan in their room and waited for them to finish getting ready and baking pies. We walked over to the PATH station and off to Jersey we were! We finally reached Hoboken after some crafty "This line isn't running today!" detours and walked up to Val's apartment building. We were greeted by his little sister, who is insanely adorable. Upstairs, we were introduced to his mother and grandmother as we took off our coats and scarves and wandered into the living room to watch Vanessa play videogames until dinner was ready. I squeezed into the end chair of the dining table, and luckily everyone was more than willing to help grab stuff if they were up because there was no way I could get up again until the end of the meal. Better me not able to get up than someone else though. Dinner was delicious. String bean casserole, sweet potato casserole, some weirdly delicious marshmallow and sweet potatoes dish, stuffing, turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, and a bit of pasta if we needed more filler. Everything was delicious, and Val's mom had also made this punch that ended up being like a slushie because she forgot to take it out of the freezer before we got there. It was still delicious. We all ate too much, then realized there was still Ryan's pie to be had. So we sat around for a bit and waited for pie, watching Family Guy. Ryan's pie was delicious (though not the best I've ever had, sorry kid) and a great way to end the night. We bundled back up and headed back to the train, stopping along the way because Val wanted liquor. My feet started hurting, but there wasn't much we could do about that so I toughed it out and just ended up walking a bit slower (they waited, the sweeties, though they didn't have to) until we got back. We then watched The Incredibles because that was the special movie of the holiday for some reason, and then headed to bed.
I think I pretty much just slept all of Friday. This of course meant that my schedule was off, and I ended up not sleeping Friday night again.
Saturday I played around all morning, mostly online, and then around noon thirty I headed up to Washington Square Park. The first order of business was coffee, of course, and they gave me a pretty shitty peppermint mocha. They haven't been doing well with those this year. I got to the bottom and there was so much mint weirdness down there I couldn't stand the texture and almost threw up. It was not so fun. Then I wandered around into vintage stores and such. I find myself really wanting a cute, 50s style dress. I'm not sure why, but I didn't quite find what I was looking for. I did, however, find a cute trenchcoat. Now I have a waterproof, non-black winter coat! Yay! Then I remembered I was out of body wash so I stopped at CVS after picking up my physical ticket for the show later at (le) Poisson Rouge. It was like 2 something by this point, so I wandered over to Qdoba for nummy "Mexican" food lunch. I also made a bit of progress on the book I'm currently reading. Jon texted me to say they'd all be arriving around 3, so when I was done I wandered over to the record store on Thompson (didn't really have much I wanted, and were super expensive) and the comic book store across the way. The comic book store is really tiny and cute, and the guys who run it are super helpful. The clock hit 3:05 and I headed back down the block where Jon and company weren't yet there. However, the lovely Cindy (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
k1cup) was. I settled next to her to await more people and the show. We had a nice chat and I was a bit sorry it was interrupted by the noisy crowd of Jon (capitalq), Bill (teedylevin), Doom and friends. :P Then it started cooling down, which was no fun. It had been like 40 degrees when I left my dorm at noon, and by 3:30 I swear it was like 35. The rest of waiting passed relatively uneventfully. There was just a bit of Bill freaking out about maybe not getting in and everyone freezing their asses off and routinely leaving and coming back with hot cocoa. The guy checking IDs actually did check IDs this time, so Bill called someone and tried to look busy. This was helped because for the "x"s they wanted BOTH hands this time, so we had to strip off a glove at a time and juggling gloves and cell phones at the same time is difficult. Luckily Jon went "He's 18 too" and pointed at Bill when his own ID was getting checked, so Bill just stuck out his hand for the X when the guy got past me. It worked fine and I told him he didn't have to be worried.
So, in line beforehand, we'd watched Iggy and the rest of the roadies unload the equipment truck, and I'd heard Iggy say something about "Okay, so 15 minutes after the doors open, go ahead and..." I was a bit excited about what would be awaiting us. So, we all filed inside and down to the performance space. When we got there we noticed there were two screens set up and projected onto them was the title screen of the Venue Songs DVD. Sure enough, about 15 minutes after we all got in there we watched as "Play" got selected, and we were treated to a run through of them. Everyone was singing along and it was wonderful.
We then waited a bit for the Driver Quartet to come on. They're actually a quintet: Dave Driver singing, a guitarist, bass player, chick keyboard player/backup singer, and drummer. Either the guitarist or bass player also did backup vocals, but I don't remember who was standing where so I couldn't tell you. They had a fun sound, and it's always entertaining to watch Dave Driver's stage presence. He remarked upon the awesome hand dryers in the bathrooms. (Everyone who hadn't previously had to go check them out afterward. Iggy walked in around the same time and we had a short conversation with him about them and about another kind that are similar but actually dry your hands.) They also played "three songs about three people who we feel passionately about." The first was a condemning song about Karl Rove. The second was about Rahm Emanuel. The third was sung by the keyboardist girl (WHO ALSO PLAYED MELODICA ON THE FIRST SONG) and was about wanting to be Tina Fey. Really cute. They played one more, and then it was time for us to wait for TMBG to come out. Rich and Carly had arrived by this point, and we had a little extra room around us in front of Linnell somehow, so they waded over to us. That was the best phone conversation I've had. Carly was literally 15 feet from me, and we maintained eye contact the entire time as she asked if we had any extra room for them by us. I could even vaguely hear her outside of the phone call which just added a weird reverb to the whole conversation. The nice people next to us were fine with their joining us so long as they got their window between their heads to see through.
TMBG came out to the Stompy intro and played Space Suit right away (the accordion was missing the lowest B key, I guess still from the concert the night before) and we all looked at each other and went "Um...okay. I wonder how this is going to go..." Jon was pushing for a two set night because it was an album show, but Bill and I were skeptical because they'd had an opener. Then Flans got on the mic going "We're gonna play 7 songs to warm up, then you'll get your precious Apollo 18!" I wish that were an exact quote... My favorite was where they seriously had a 10 minute discussion about what the theme for January should be. They mentioned having people bring acoustic guitars and jamming, which they I guess used to do at the Village Gate and it always failed miserably, but I kinda want them to go through with it. I'd have to either borrow a guitar or bring my flute instead, but it'd be fun. When there were three songs left before Apollo 18 Flans had us chant "Three! Three!" for a bit, so then after the next song we started chanting "Two! Two!" but nobody was together so it sounded like we were booing.
I kept switching places with Bill during the Apollo 18 portion, because it's his favorite album and the whole reason we snuck him in. It probably looked really funny to everyone around us, having 5'7" me (which is in no way short) peeking around and under this 6'6" (or so) guy.
And because I've been im'ing people as I've been writing this, I've completely lost my train of thought. HOWEVER! I can leave the rest of the show up to you guys to critique, because there is a free copy of it available for download here.
I said goodbye to everyone at the A train afterward, and they all proceeded up to Port Authority or Penn Station while I headed back down here to rest up for the screening of Gigantic followed by the Q&A that occurred the next day.
So I got to the 92Y:Tribeca around 6, but they weren't letting people in yet and I didn't feel like sitting at their cafe there, so I wandered around dead TriBeCa for a bit. I got in, and the guy ripped my ticket, then as I was walking into the theater itself, I walked by Linnell being given a tour of the place by an employee/volunteer. I wandered back to the concession stand for a Coke, and then heard Danielle and Mike and friends talking as their tickets were ripped. I moved my stuff to the front row where they decided to settle, then went out to the cafe with them. Danielle and her friends visiting from Ohio wanted an actual meal. Flans and Linnell were sitting at one of the tables, just chilling. We followed them back into the theater once Danielle got her food, and they introduced the film. They were like "We haven't actually seen this since it came out, so this will be enlightening for us too."
They showed the film and it was pretty nifty seeing it on a big(ger) screen. The screening was actually really small, with about 40 seats (I estimate) and a screen about half the size of a theater. Maybe a little smaller actually. So the fact that about 10-15 people didn't show up to the sold out show kinda became obvious.
They came back out for the Q&A and everyone was being shy and not wanting to ask the first question. Eventually Danielle and her friend raised their hands and Danielle went ahead and asked if something Linnell said in the film meant that there's no hidden meaning to any of their songs. Linnell went "Well, I didn't actually watch it this time either, so I don't remember what I said...but I think it might have been pretty specific because there are definitely songs that have particular meanings. I mean, there are a lot that are no deeper than their lyrics, but others definitely are." I can't remember any other specifics, but it was really cool having them RIGHT THERE answering everything. Someone asked if they'd had any weird fan encounters (which was a variation of what I wanted to ask, but mine was a little more spefic, asking if there were any single encounters that stood out to them) and they went off on this thing about how as they gained popularity they encountered a couple of stalker-like people, which they have actually been kinda lucky about because there are multi-millionaires following Bob Dylan all over the world. Also how some of it was just that when they were first starting to get more well known they were really weirded out when on the street people would go "Hey John!" and they'd turn around and not know the person who'd said hello. Then added how now they've kinda accepted that it happens. Flans said something about it making them tip well that made everyone chuckle.
My other observation was that Linnell didn't come off as shy as he usually does at shows and such. He talked as much as, if not more than Flans. Neither seemed uncomfortable at all, though Flans was pretty restless. He kept getting up and sitting down and shifting position in and around his chair. Linnell merely perched - feet on the chair rungs, leaning forward - maybe shifting his legs once or twice. For one question they even called AJ in LA, and we got to see that Flans has a first gen iPhone (of course).
Edit: Danielle's friend recorded it! For crappy, digital-camera quality videos of the Q&A go here for part 1, here for part 2, and here for part 3.
As it ended I was really tempted to stop Linnell and ask if he or anyone he knew needed a babysitter, (Hey, I need money. Next semester I'm getting on the babysitting jobs on CareerNET like none other.) but I didn't.
The rest of the week has continued the pattern of me not sleeping every other night. Between Wednesday and Thursday I was even planning to but couldn't, so got up and did laundry instead. I'm also really fucked in Programming and I need to talk to Keith to see what I can do about that. Preferably before class on Tuesday because Katie told me they didn't finish presentations last week and I accidentally skipped again so I need to do mine (that I never turned in an outline for).
Next week in Studio we're just having a breakfast I think. Our final for that class is awesome: schedule a time with Nick during finals week to go in and chat for half an hour. Other than that, I have my Recorded Music Industry: Past, Present, Future final on Monday, then my Brain and Behavior final on the 15th and my Programming final on the 16th, then I head home. Dan and I are finishing recording Travis mostly next week, and have a couple of mix sessions over finals week. I told him when my tickets home are and he said that's fine and that we'll just get most of the writeup done before then and he can finish up himself. I love working with Dan. It's so laid back, yet shit gets done, and gets done well. I tend to end up feeling a lot less guilty than I do working with anyone else because of my lack of expertise.
I can't wait to go home for a month. I mean, I love it here, I love my friends here, but at the same time I've been really missing everyone at home. Also it'll be nice to have a room to myself again and getting to drive and just...rest. No school. Sleep. Skiing. *sigh* Two weeks.
Anyway, after the park I grabbed coffee from my favorite bagel place (Nick claims he's going to change my mind next Thursday at our Studio II Holiday Breakfast) and headed back to Manhattan. I got all dressed up for dinner in a collared shirt and high heels and *gasp* a bit of makeup. Then I joined Val and Ryan in their room and waited for them to finish getting ready and baking pies. We walked over to the PATH station and off to Jersey we were! We finally reached Hoboken after some crafty "This line isn't running today!" detours and walked up to Val's apartment building. We were greeted by his little sister, who is insanely adorable. Upstairs, we were introduced to his mother and grandmother as we took off our coats and scarves and wandered into the living room to watch Vanessa play videogames until dinner was ready. I squeezed into the end chair of the dining table, and luckily everyone was more than willing to help grab stuff if they were up because there was no way I could get up again until the end of the meal. Better me not able to get up than someone else though. Dinner was delicious. String bean casserole, sweet potato casserole, some weirdly delicious marshmallow and sweet potatoes dish, stuffing, turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, and a bit of pasta if we needed more filler. Everything was delicious, and Val's mom had also made this punch that ended up being like a slushie because she forgot to take it out of the freezer before we got there. It was still delicious. We all ate too much, then realized there was still Ryan's pie to be had. So we sat around for a bit and waited for pie, watching Family Guy. Ryan's pie was delicious (though not the best I've ever had, sorry kid) and a great way to end the night. We bundled back up and headed back to the train, stopping along the way because Val wanted liquor. My feet started hurting, but there wasn't much we could do about that so I toughed it out and just ended up walking a bit slower (they waited, the sweeties, though they didn't have to) until we got back. We then watched The Incredibles because that was the special movie of the holiday for some reason, and then headed to bed.
I think I pretty much just slept all of Friday. This of course meant that my schedule was off, and I ended up not sleeping Friday night again.
Saturday I played around all morning, mostly online, and then around noon thirty I headed up to Washington Square Park. The first order of business was coffee, of course, and they gave me a pretty shitty peppermint mocha. They haven't been doing well with those this year. I got to the bottom and there was so much mint weirdness down there I couldn't stand the texture and almost threw up. It was not so fun. Then I wandered around into vintage stores and such. I find myself really wanting a cute, 50s style dress. I'm not sure why, but I didn't quite find what I was looking for. I did, however, find a cute trenchcoat. Now I have a waterproof, non-black winter coat! Yay! Then I remembered I was out of body wash so I stopped at CVS after picking up my physical ticket for the show later at (le) Poisson Rouge. It was like 2 something by this point, so I wandered over to Qdoba for nummy "Mexican" food lunch. I also made a bit of progress on the book I'm currently reading. Jon texted me to say they'd all be arriving around 3, so when I was done I wandered over to the record store on Thompson (didn't really have much I wanted, and were super expensive) and the comic book store across the way. The comic book store is really tiny and cute, and the guys who run it are super helpful. The clock hit 3:05 and I headed back down the block where Jon and company weren't yet there. However, the lovely Cindy (
k1cup) was. I settled next to her to await more people and the show. We had a nice chat and I was a bit sorry it was interrupted by the noisy crowd of Jon (capitalq), Bill (teedylevin), Doom and friends. :P Then it started cooling down, which was no fun. It had been like 40 degrees when I left my dorm at noon, and by 3:30 I swear it was like 35. The rest of waiting passed relatively uneventfully. There was just a bit of Bill freaking out about maybe not getting in and everyone freezing their asses off and routinely leaving and coming back with hot cocoa. The guy checking IDs actually did check IDs this time, so Bill called someone and tried to look busy. This was helped because for the "x"s they wanted BOTH hands this time, so we had to strip off a glove at a time and juggling gloves and cell phones at the same time is difficult. Luckily Jon went "He's 18 too" and pointed at Bill when his own ID was getting checked, so Bill just stuck out his hand for the X when the guy got past me. It worked fine and I told him he didn't have to be worried.So, in line beforehand, we'd watched Iggy and the rest of the roadies unload the equipment truck, and I'd heard Iggy say something about "Okay, so 15 minutes after the doors open, go ahead and..." I was a bit excited about what would be awaiting us. So, we all filed inside and down to the performance space. When we got there we noticed there were two screens set up and projected onto them was the title screen of the Venue Songs DVD. Sure enough, about 15 minutes after we all got in there we watched as "Play" got selected, and we were treated to a run through of them. Everyone was singing along and it was wonderful.
We then waited a bit for the Driver Quartet to come on. They're actually a quintet: Dave Driver singing, a guitarist, bass player, chick keyboard player/backup singer, and drummer. Either the guitarist or bass player also did backup vocals, but I don't remember who was standing where so I couldn't tell you. They had a fun sound, and it's always entertaining to watch Dave Driver's stage presence. He remarked upon the awesome hand dryers in the bathrooms. (Everyone who hadn't previously had to go check them out afterward. Iggy walked in around the same time and we had a short conversation with him about them and about another kind that are similar but actually dry your hands.) They also played "three songs about three people who we feel passionately about." The first was a condemning song about Karl Rove. The second was about Rahm Emanuel. The third was sung by the keyboardist girl (WHO ALSO PLAYED MELODICA ON THE FIRST SONG) and was about wanting to be Tina Fey. Really cute. They played one more, and then it was time for us to wait for TMBG to come out. Rich and Carly had arrived by this point, and we had a little extra room around us in front of Linnell somehow, so they waded over to us. That was the best phone conversation I've had. Carly was literally 15 feet from me, and we maintained eye contact the entire time as she asked if we had any extra room for them by us. I could even vaguely hear her outside of the phone call which just added a weird reverb to the whole conversation. The nice people next to us were fine with their joining us so long as they got their window between their heads to see through.
TMBG came out to the Stompy intro and played Space Suit right away (the accordion was missing the lowest B key, I guess still from the concert the night before) and we all looked at each other and went "Um...okay. I wonder how this is going to go..." Jon was pushing for a two set night because it was an album show, but Bill and I were skeptical because they'd had an opener. Then Flans got on the mic going "We're gonna play 7 songs to warm up, then you'll get your precious Apollo 18!" I wish that were an exact quote... My favorite was where they seriously had a 10 minute discussion about what the theme for January should be. They mentioned having people bring acoustic guitars and jamming, which they I guess used to do at the Village Gate and it always failed miserably, but I kinda want them to go through with it. I'd have to either borrow a guitar or bring my flute instead, but it'd be fun. When there were three songs left before Apollo 18 Flans had us chant "Three! Three!" for a bit, so then after the next song we started chanting "Two! Two!" but nobody was together so it sounded like we were booing.
I kept switching places with Bill during the Apollo 18 portion, because it's his favorite album and the whole reason we snuck him in. It probably looked really funny to everyone around us, having 5'7" me (which is in no way short) peeking around and under this 6'6" (or so) guy.
And because I've been im'ing people as I've been writing this, I've completely lost my train of thought. HOWEVER! I can leave the rest of the show up to you guys to critique, because there is a free copy of it available for download here.
I said goodbye to everyone at the A train afterward, and they all proceeded up to Port Authority or Penn Station while I headed back down here to rest up for the screening of Gigantic followed by the Q&A that occurred the next day.
So I got to the 92Y:Tribeca around 6, but they weren't letting people in yet and I didn't feel like sitting at their cafe there, so I wandered around dead TriBeCa for a bit. I got in, and the guy ripped my ticket, then as I was walking into the theater itself, I walked by Linnell being given a tour of the place by an employee/volunteer. I wandered back to the concession stand for a Coke, and then heard Danielle and Mike and friends talking as their tickets were ripped. I moved my stuff to the front row where they decided to settle, then went out to the cafe with them. Danielle and her friends visiting from Ohio wanted an actual meal. Flans and Linnell were sitting at one of the tables, just chilling. We followed them back into the theater once Danielle got her food, and they introduced the film. They were like "We haven't actually seen this since it came out, so this will be enlightening for us too."
They showed the film and it was pretty nifty seeing it on a big(ger) screen. The screening was actually really small, with about 40 seats (I estimate) and a screen about half the size of a theater. Maybe a little smaller actually. So the fact that about 10-15 people didn't show up to the sold out show kinda became obvious.
They came back out for the Q&A and everyone was being shy and not wanting to ask the first question. Eventually Danielle and her friend raised their hands and Danielle went ahead and asked if something Linnell said in the film meant that there's no hidden meaning to any of their songs. Linnell went "Well, I didn't actually watch it this time either, so I don't remember what I said...but I think it might have been pretty specific because there are definitely songs that have particular meanings. I mean, there are a lot that are no deeper than their lyrics, but others definitely are." I can't remember any other specifics, but it was really cool having them RIGHT THERE answering everything. Someone asked if they'd had any weird fan encounters (which was a variation of what I wanted to ask, but mine was a little more spefic, asking if there were any single encounters that stood out to them) and they went off on this thing about how as they gained popularity they encountered a couple of stalker-like people, which they have actually been kinda lucky about because there are multi-millionaires following Bob Dylan all over the world. Also how some of it was just that when they were first starting to get more well known they were really weirded out when on the street people would go "Hey John!" and they'd turn around and not know the person who'd said hello. Then added how now they've kinda accepted that it happens. Flans said something about it making them tip well that made everyone chuckle.
My other observation was that Linnell didn't come off as shy as he usually does at shows and such. He talked as much as, if not more than Flans. Neither seemed uncomfortable at all, though Flans was pretty restless. He kept getting up and sitting down and shifting position in and around his chair. Linnell merely perched - feet on the chair rungs, leaning forward - maybe shifting his legs once or twice. For one question they even called AJ in LA, and we got to see that Flans has a first gen iPhone (of course).
Edit: Danielle's friend recorded it! For crappy, digital-camera quality videos of the Q&A go here for part 1, here for part 2, and here for part 3.
As it ended I was really tempted to stop Linnell and ask if he or anyone he knew needed a babysitter, (Hey, I need money. Next semester I'm getting on the babysitting jobs on CareerNET like none other.) but I didn't.
The rest of the week has continued the pattern of me not sleeping every other night. Between Wednesday and Thursday I was even planning to but couldn't, so got up and did laundry instead. I'm also really fucked in Programming and I need to talk to Keith to see what I can do about that. Preferably before class on Tuesday because Katie told me they didn't finish presentations last week and I accidentally skipped again so I need to do mine (that I never turned in an outline for).
Next week in Studio we're just having a breakfast I think. Our final for that class is awesome: schedule a time with Nick during finals week to go in and chat for half an hour. Other than that, I have my Recorded Music Industry: Past, Present, Future final on Monday, then my Brain and Behavior final on the 15th and my Programming final on the 16th, then I head home. Dan and I are finishing recording Travis mostly next week, and have a couple of mix sessions over finals week. I told him when my tickets home are and he said that's fine and that we'll just get most of the writeup done before then and he can finish up himself. I love working with Dan. It's so laid back, yet shit gets done, and gets done well. I tend to end up feeling a lot less guilty than I do working with anyone else because of my lack of expertise.
I can't wait to go home for a month. I mean, I love it here, I love my friends here, but at the same time I've been really missing everyone at home. Also it'll be nice to have a room to myself again and getting to drive and just...rest. No school. Sleep. Skiing. *sigh* Two weeks.
