Florence + The Machine

Florence Welch (Florence + The Machine) breaks up a fight in Scotland during a concert.  I started watching this expecting to be cynical and to say something derogatory about the Scots (I'm half Scottish myself), but I actually got a lump in my throat and a tear in my eye at the kindness and tenderness Florence exhibited.

According to eye-witness reports, the woman in the fight had to take one of her daughter's friends outside to be picked up by her mom because she felt really ill, and as she was trying to get back to her own kids some guy got pissed with her because he thought she was cutting in or something.  They argued and he threw a drink all over her, and Florence interrupted her set to sort it all out.  The girl that got hugged was apparently the daughter of the woman in the fight.  

Seapony

Oh, look.  Seattle dream-pop band Seapony have released a new video for their song Be Alone.  

Seapony brightened the morning back on September 3, the most awesome day of Bumbershoot 2012, the same day M83 performed, among many others.  Seapony performed a set at 12 noon, just as the sunny Seattle sky was starting to warming up, the Labor Day crowd was arriving, and the realization of what a terrific day was ahead was just starting to dawn on your humble narrator.

Formed in Ohio in 2010, Seapony is longtime couple and songwriting duo Jen Weidl (guitars, vocals, lyrics) and Danny Rowland (guitar, lyrics, and Jason Schwartzman impersonations).  In Seattle, they teamed up with bassist Ian Brewer, Rowland's childhood friend and former bandmate, and drummer Aaron.  

Their LP Falling was released September 11, and is available here.

M83

You really have to hand it to the French electro-pop band M83 - a full year after their album Hurry Up, We're Dreaming comes out, they finally get around to releasing the video to what I consider to be the most beautiful song on the album, the lovely and understated Wait.  I don't understand a thing that's going on in the video, but it's still fun to watch.  

Here are some more pictures of M83 performing in Seattle at Bumbershoot 2012, where a riot almost broke out when the audience overran the security guards and bum rushed the open floor of Key Arena during M83's performance,

Television (the medium, not the band)

Okay, maybe this post isn't about music, but it is about pop culture, so deal with it.  The point of this post is that I own a television primarily for the Sunday evening premium channel series, and as of this week, they're all on hiatus.  

Last Sunday was the finale for the first half of this season of AMC's The Walking Dead; the second half of the season doesn't begin until February 10, begging the distinction between a "season break" and a "new season."  Whatevs.

Two weeks ago was the season finale of HBO's Treme, a show I've come to like once I realized that it's about the only series on television about both the lives of musicians and the music that they make.  Can you imagine if they came up with a similar premise, but set in the indie rock world of, say, Brooklyn or Portland, and featuring many of the actual musicians in supporting roles, like Treme does?  Now there would be an interesting show.  It actually wouldn't be too far of a stretch for HBO's How To Make It In America (also between seasons right now) to do this, basically just change the central industry from the fashion designer profession to the music profession. I'd watch it, and I bet many other people would, too.

Boardwalk Empire aired it's season finale last Sunday, the same night as the last Walking Dead.  Except for the Richard Harrow character, the series hasn't really lived up to its potential in my humble opinion, but it does have the Richard Harrow character and that's more than enough to keep me watching and bemoaning it's current hiatus.

Sons of Anarchy, a Tuesday night outlaw-biker series on FX, also wrapped up for the season last week, concluding with a run of 90-minute episodes.  

Meanwhile, HBO's Game of Thrones doesn't start its third season until March 31.  True Blood is between seasons.  The HBO comedies Curb Your Enthusiasm, Girls, and Real Time with Bill Maher are all off the air right now. Even the difficult to love The Newsroom is off until next June.

And why the hell didn't FX ever bring back its show Terriers after its initial season?  

Note that if any of these shows were on the air right now, I would be watching them and not writing whiny posts like this.

RIP John Lennon (October 9, 1940 - December 8, 1980)

Hospitality

Hospitality at The Basement, April 2012

Best new band of 2012?  It's hard to think of too many other bands with a songwriter as creative and original as Amber Papini.

Hospitality at 529, Rocktober 2012

Lost In The Trees

Somehow, between the technical problems over at the LiveJournal site and the crash of my computer, I forgot to post the pictures of Lost In The Trees performance at The Earl back on November 3 - which is a shame, because it was a really terrific show. It wasn't until I stumbled across their Morning Becomes Eclectic set over at KCRW that I remembered that I had forgotten.

  

The opening act was Atlanta's Oryx and Crake, a fine orchestral pop outfit worthy of wider attention.

Touring with Lost In The Trees were North Carolina's Midtown Dickens, who played a spirited set of Appalachia-influenced Americana.

Headliners Lost In The Trees played a magnificent set, mainly performing songs from their latest album A Church To Fit Our Needs, a cycle of songs frontman Ari Picker wrote about the passing away of his mother, but also including some older songs, such as Walk Around The Lake.

In addition to violin, cello, and even french horn accompaniment, Picker had Midtown Dickens join them on stage late in the set to provide even more strings and, yes, that's a bowed saw being played behind him.

For the end-of-the-set finale, Picker and company left the stage to perform an acoustic and unamplified version of Song for the Painter, one of my favorite of their songs.  An encore after that touching and intimate performance would have been superfluous.

I'm just now realizing that I haven't been to The Earl since that November 3 set - maybe not a record for me, but certainly an exception to my usual behavior.