Brief Coachella Highlights 2006 Review

1) Section Quartet:  Very cool string quartet opening up the festival on the main stage playing covers of alternative music.  Sound was awesome, and Radiohead covers turned out amazing.

 

2) Hip Hop:  Well represented first by Common from Chicago on the main stage, then Kanye delivered a great set.  Kanye was a lot more fun than I expected, and I can see why he's rated as extremely good for a hip hop live act.  Also did catch "Cool Like Dat"  by Digable Planets.

3) Franz Ferdinand was the best band of the first day.  Lots of energy.  Incredibly tight and intricate grooves, great stage presence.  I really am gaining a newer and better appreciation for them everytime I see them live.

4) Damian Marley provided a very cool reggae set on the outdoor stage.  One of the people on the stage just waved a rasta colored flag during the whole set,  no other job or instrument,  just the flag.

5) Depeche Mode.  I found disappointing.  Played newer stuff, but at least they ended with Personal Jesus and Enjoy the Silence.  They did have a very cool video display though.

6) Daft Punk was for many people were the highlight of the whole festival.  They closed out the first night at the dance tent.  They came out dressed as robots which is their trademark.  They were playing in some sort of pyramid with weird lights all over it.  The crowd was just huge.  For those unfamiliar, they are an electronica band with a discoish feel from France.  The crowd was huge, and it sounded and looked amazing but unfortunately Depeche Mode had sucked out all my energy and we had arrived at noon so we were too tired to stay for the whole set. 

7) Arriving Early:  Our new plan this year was to show up at noon.  There was absolutely zero traffic and zero line to get in.  Downsides were that it was so hot both days, it increased our time in the sun and also when arriving that early, by the end of the days we were wiped out and unable to get the most out of the bands on at the very end.  For example, I thought Tool was sounding great (and had disturbing visuals on the video screens), but I was too tired to stay.

8) Kudos to Goldenvoice:  They really know how to run a festival.  Sound has constantly been upgraded throughout the years.  You don't have to stand anywhere near the main or outdoor stages to see the screens and hear great loud crystal clear music.  They added a lot more tents, and shade, and weird exhibits.  Knowing that Madonna was playing the dance tent this year, they adjusted it by taking down the side walls, so you could see from far away, and adding two huge video screens on both sides.

 

9) Giant Drag turned out to be one of my favorite performances of the weekend.  They were the second band on at the outdoor stage on day 2.  They kind a sound like My Bloody Valentine, but their real assett is the sharp wit of lead singer Annie Hardy.  Despite "Tech Diffs" they were able to carry out their killer cover of Chris Isaak's Wicked Game (whom at the age of 8 apparently broke her heart, then "broke my hymen").  She was just spewing dirty weird jokes left and right, and what made it funnier was that she looked like she was still in junior high (despite being in her mid 20's) (I'm not sure if you can appreciate it from the picture).

10) Ted Leo was fun, but played too many songs I didn't know, and it was getting way too hot outside. 

11) Caught a really fun set by Amadou and Mariam, a blind couple from Africa that play cool African grooves, and are pretty well known internationally.

12) Matisyahu seemed like a poser, despite my initial open-mindedness to him.  Ray (of Karen and Ray)  commented that he's kinda like Snow.

13) Oakenfold delivered a high energy set.  He's grown his hair out lately.  Probably one of the better sets I've seen him spin.  It might have to do with the fact that he was playing right before Madonna.

14) Gnarls Barkley wins as buzz band this year.  It's a collaboration between DJ Dangermouse (famous for they Grey Album, a remix of the Jay-Z black album with the Beatles white album), and Rapper-Singer-Producer Cee-Lo.  Their 1st single is huge in England now even before any album has been released.  The backup band and Gnarls came out dressed in a Wizard of Oz theme.  Dangermouse was a Tin Man and Cee-Lo came out as the lion.  Great sound, with great soul singing from Cee-Lo over really cool music.  I'm really excited about the new album.

15) Yeah Yeah Yeahs.  Slightly disappointing.  I was looking forward to seeing them a lot this time because I think their new album is a huge step forward for them.  Karen-O certainly put on a bizarre performance-art esque show that she always does, but the live act didn't seem to have progressed as much as they have on album. 

16)  So we joined 30,000 other people rushing back to the dance tent to see Madonna.  We ended up outside the tent, but we could still see her and had a great view of the video screen.  She went on a little late, but came out eventually and the crowd went nuts.  Madonna did her thing with all the dancers etc.  I thought it was really fun.  I loved the opener from her new album "Hung Up", and Ray of Light turned out really cool as well.  The only downside is that I had to pee really really bad, and I couldn't make it to a bathroom cause of the crowd, and nearly exploded.  I ended up hiding behind a trailer for relief. 

   

17)  After really thinking about it I have to say that the Go Team set near the end of the 2nd day was the best band of Coachella.  They play this high energy infectious musical pastiche dance-rock.  On album, it sounds kind of like DJ music and it was all created by that skinny dude standing in the middle of the picture.  Live however, the band really brings the music to life.  The black girl aka Ninja just gets crazy dancing and getting the crowd involved all night.  Kinda difficult to describe but just extremely extremely fun.  Mixygirl loved it.  It even got me off the ground as I was recovering from exhaustion and near explosion of the bladder during Madonna.  Again I would've liked to stay later for more Scissor Sisters and Tool on the second night, but we called it quits soon after Go Team.  Not a bad way to end Coachella 2006, not bad at all. 

Caught a David Sedaris reading yesterday with Mixygirl, Presser, and Michelle.  Sedaris is a pretty funny author who has written some short comedic autobiographical novels.  He also writes columns frequently for the New Yorker and is  an occasional NPR commentator.  The dude is totally hilarious, and I've been into him since Presser loaned me his book Naked, during residency.  Unforunately we had a really big Thai dinner right before the reading and everyone except Mixygirl suffered from food coma.  Still very funny nonetheless. 

Caught Dinosaur Jr. again live last night at the Troubadour with Mixy and Bagel.  This was by far the loudest one yet, louder than the Stones show recently.  I didn't use ear plugs though, cause it made the sound really muffled.  Dinosaur was famous for being the loudest punk show back in the day.  Now that their reunion tour has been going on for so long, they're definitely sounding better and better.  Now J does a lot of long extended guitar solos.  That can be lame in some situations, but J is one of the great alternative guitar players of all time (the best being Frusciante in my opinion).  At the end of the set the bass tech took over the bass from Lou Barlow and pushed him into the audience while he sang "Don't"  which consists of repeatedly screaming "Why Don't you Like Me".  A fun ending considering it coming from the guy who ended up doing mellow stuff like fronting the Folk Implosion, later in his career.  Here's the setlist.

GARGOYLE
BULBS OF PASSION
BUDGE
WAGON
NO BONES
LUNG
KRACKED
FORGET THE SWAN
IN A JAR
LOSE
FREAKSCENE
RAISANS

encore:
SLUDGEFEAST
JUST LIKE HEAVEN
LITTLE FURY THINGS
DON'T

Sorry, no updates for a couple of months now.  Just seems like an insurmountable task to load all those pictures.  Here's the highlights of my last few months.

1) Hawaii trip with Mixygirl, Mark, and Ploy was great.  Standout restuarants were Mavro's, Alan Wong's Pineapple Room, Alan Wong's (regular restaurant), Orchid's Sunday Brunch at the Halekulani Hotel, and 3660 on the rise (AHI KATSU IS SUPER DHS).  Sidewalk Cafe was decent too.  We got to see Jonathan Antin at the mall in Oahu.  I think he was there selling his new shower filter head.  It's going to be on TV next week. 

 

On the left is a picture of Jonathan from Blowout in front of a picture of himself.  His manager and one of his product line marketing executives are in the shot as well.  On the right is a pic of the dish of the trip, Ahi Katsu @ 3660 on the Rise. 

2) Towards the end of February, Mixy, Juddy and I caught a Mamet play called Boston Marriage at the Geffen.  Play wasn't so hot,  really difficult to understand Edwardian-English spoken too fast (a Mamet trademark).  We all agreed that the best part was at the end, when Alicia Silverstone and Mary Steenbergen stayed later and gave a Q and A with the audience. 

 

 

3) For Mixygirl's birthday at the beginning of March, we stayed at the St. Regis where the wedding was, for a weekend of relaxation.  We also visited the Montage hotel in the OC which was quite beautiful, and had a great dinner with Toro at the Stonehill Tavern.  Later that week with my family and Jober, we had another Mixygirl birthday dinner at the famous Brazilian Churrasceria branch on La Cienega, Fogo de Chao

4)  In early March, I also got a chance to catch the Rolling Stones live, at the forum opened by Queens of the Stone Age!!!  It was incredible, and incredibly loud.  There was one point during Satisfaction where I just couldn't believe I was actually finally seeing the Stones live.

5) No, I can't slide on a rail on a snowboard.  But, Mixygirl and I did decide to try to learn how to snowboard this season.  We made two trips to Mammoth, and one trip to Mountain high.  We got pretty good at the falling leaves thing, but were worried that we wouldn't progress.  Fortunately during our last trip to Mammoth, everything finally clicked, and we were finally linking turns.  I can't wait for the next year's season.  We might check out other cool locations like Park City. 

6) Really weird story near the end of March.  Mixygirl, Bagel and I were at a Clap Your Hands Say Yeah show at the El Rey.  I got recognized by a patient, who heard me perform an intense bowel disimpaction on a bipolar lady in the ER the night before!!!  Out of all the things to get recognized in public for....

7)  A couple days after that I went with Ed and Julia to a cool show at Universal sponsored by KCRW Sounds Eclectic.  Caught Sia, Feist, Ben Harper (with Ziggy Marley singing duet on a Bob Marley tune), Gomez, the lead singer of Spoon, Surprise guest FRANZ FERDINAND!!!  (awesome surprise), and Death Cab for Cutie. 

8) Earlier this month Mixy and I caught Donovan Leitch and Bijou Phillips in Hedwig and the Angry Inch at the Roxy.  They weren't as good as the original cast, but still it was a really good show nonetheless.  Bonus, it was really cool catching in a small rock club.  Very appropriate for the subject matter.

I saved a grandma's life today.  I made a young mother cry.  I'm grooving on Coldplay right now.  It's 5:30am.

In the holyshit, I can't believe it's true category:  Madonna is playing the second night of Coachella in the Dance Tent!!!

 

Mixygirl and I caught a fantastic show a couple nights ago at the Staples Center.  It was Lenny Kravitz opening for Aerosmith!!!   I've liked Aerosmith for a long time now, but being that I'm not a heavy metal fanatic anymore, I never really made an effort to see them live.  Well, they're getting pretty old now (all older than 50) so I felt I had to see them before one of them kicked the bucket.  Their show was amazing (crying, crazy)!!!  Steve Tyler and Joe Perry were in top bad-ass form despite looking really old.  The music, was loud, and the guitar solos were fast.  They played only a few of their popular hits from the 90's.  They didn't play anything from Permanent Vacation, or Pump.  They played a lot of hits from the 70's, and a few of the songs from their new blues oriented album called Honking on Bobo.  For me the highlights of the show were Sweet Emotion, Dream On, and Cryin'.  The talkbox guitar intro with the bubbling bass line during Sweet Emotion were just unreal.  I couldn't believe I was actually seeing it live finally. 

Lenny Kravitz turned in a great set as well.  Normally the arena is half empty during the opener (for example when we saw Fiona Apple open for Coldplay recently).  Kravitz on the other hand had them packed in already, and eating out of his hand.  He played with a big band including horns, and backup singers, with a backdrop of a brightly lit LK.  Lenny's singing and guitar playing were amazing.  He also had the advantage of being able to play hit after hit.  He's also another musician that I've always wanted to see live, but had just never gotten around to it.  I remember early on in college, Aram Sarkissian telling me how great this guy was live.  He did hit most of the famous songs, such as Are you gonna go my way, Let Love rule, Always on the Run, and American Woman.  On a final note, having seen Coldplay recently at the forum with Toro, and Mixy, and seeing this show at Staples, I can definitively say that the Forum sucks!!!

 

Well, as you can guess Mixy and I have come back from Oahu.  Big post to come, but I need to catch up, so here's the Mammoth post from our first snowboarding experience ever, at the end of last month.  Mixy and I stayed at this cool German style lodge called Austria Hof.  It's right next to the parking lot of Canyon Lodge, so in the morning you actually just walk through the parking lot and you're ready for the slopes!!!

 

Having moved back to LA a while ago, I forgot how cold winter weather could get.  The pic on the left is of the huge snow drifts right outside our room window.  The first day was extremely cold and snowy!!!

 

Here's our room shots of the snowboarding action to come.  We don't have any pictures of us on the slopes, and in retrospect it was a good idea not to have brought a camera up.  They would have surely gotten demolished because the entire day was spent falling.  It turned out to be what I truly think was the most physically painful experience in my life.  Injuries included a mild concussion, whiplash, getting the wind knocked out twice, many falls on the buttocks, and many falls on the knees leading to severe bruising.  Fortunately I had gloves with wrist protectors in them.  After our second day of whiplash,  I couldn't even turn my head in bed without having to grab my hair and lifting my head off the bed to physically turn it.  Fortunately, our skills were slowly improving, and the second day was a lot enjoyable (we still have a long way to go).  We had originally intended to snowboard for three days, but we scratched the third day because we were already too sore. 

 

On the third day we just drove to the Main Lodge and chilled out.

 

We took a cool gondola ride from the Main lodge up to a smaller lodge located midway up the mountain.

 

There fortuitously turned out to be a great restaurant at that location.  It was really cool, cause it was on the mountain and you could see all the skiiers and snowboarders going by while you were eating.  I particularly liked my dish (right) of seared fennel seed crusted ahi, with caramelized onions, on a bed of lentils. 

 

We spent the rest of the afternoon just enjoying the beautiful snow scenery. (On the left is Mixy's imitation of the SNL Superstar pose). 

 

The last night of our trip, we had dinner at our hotel restaurant which is known for its German cuisine.  We had this amazing traditional German Sampler.  The sausages were amazing.  We definitely couldn't finish it so we finished the rest for breakfast the next day.

 

On the left is a picture of Mixy from dinner, after I tried to get creative with the digital camera.  On the right is our last view of the Sierras as we drove away!!!

 

We definitely want to go snowboarding a couple more times this season.  Probably not all the way up at Mammoth again(but you never know Jober? Juddy?  Turtle?  Toro?).  We ended up picking up a pair of boards.  My bamboo topped Arbor Roundhouse is on the left, and Mixy's Burton feather is on the right. 

Mixy and I are leaving for Oahu tomorrow!!!  We're going to go with Mark and his girlfriend Ploy (sp?).  Should be really fun.  I didn't post the Mammoth pictures yet, but will do that when I get back.  Have a good week everyone!!!

Just went through some of my pictures from the end of last year, that I didn't get to posting yet.

 

In early December, I went to Wendy Lin's birthday party with Mixygirl at Lucky Strike bowling alley in Hollywood.  We stopped off before the party at Beard Papa, a famous Japanese cream puffery chain.  We had been to one in NYC, but this one in LA just opened recently.  The shell and the cream filling are just perfect.  It's located in the mall next to the Mann's Chinese theatre.

 

 

The party was really fun and a good excuse to see Brown med, and UCLA ER alumni.  I've never been to Lucky Strike before, but it seemed to be a really good idea to have a bowling alley with more of a slick club-like feel.  A good setting for a birthday party. 

 

I guess the party was really good, cause it inspired Mixygirl to pose for some modelling shots as we were leaving via the exit tunnel.  I think she blows Zoolander out of the water!!!

 

Speaking of modelling, I scored these awesome photos a couple days later at Point Dume, a cool bluff located a couple of miles north of Malibu.  Juddy looks quite like an Abercrombie model on the left, and on the right Jober is having a contemplative moment overlooking the Pacific Ocean.

Bonus picture, of Karate Kid AKA Jober

Just got back today with Mixygirl from Mammoth mountain for our first time snowboarding!!!  It was quite the painful but fun experience, and full post to follow.  Had a great dinner tonite at a nice Italian pasta place in Brentwood with Jober, Juddy, and Mixygirl called Pizzicato.  Great appetizer of breseola, mozzarella, sundried tomatoes, and basil.  My entree was asparagus ravioli with a beef bolognese, mushroom, and prosciutto sauce.   We spent the rest of the night setting up Jober's new Ipod, and the first song downloaded as suggested by Juddy was a cover of Hey Ya! by the Supersuckers.