How's My Living? » hockey

CHIRP Playlist: Friday, February 3, 2012

Sarah — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 16:44:57 +0000

Hear my delightful music selections every Friday night on Chicago’s own CHIRP Radio, from 8 – 10 pm Central time. It’s awesome. Next week’s my birthday. I’m definitely playing whatever the heck I want.

9:53 PM Scout Niblett Cherry Cheek Bomb from The Calcination Of Scout Niblett (Drag City)
9:49 PM Radar Eyes Secrets from Radar Eyes (HoZac)
9:42 PM Kid You’ll Move Mountains Volts from Loomings (self-released)
9:39 PM Comet Gain Ballad for Frankie Machine from Howl of the Lonely Crowd (What’s Your Rupture)
9:37 PM Dan Mangan Tina’s Glorious Comeback from Nice Nice Very Nice (Arts & Crafts)
9:33 PM Chin Up Chin Up We Should Have Never Lived Like We Were Skyscrapers (Stephen Snydacker Mix) from Chin Up Chin Up (Flameshovel)
9:29 PM Apparat Black Water from The Devil’s Walk (Mute)
9:25 PM The Roots The OtherSide (featuring Bilal Oliver & Greg Porn) from undun (Def Jam)
9:20 PM Brandi Carlile Dying Day from Give Up the Ghost (Columbia)
9:19 PM Tegan and Sara Living Room from If It Was You (Vapor)
9:14 PM First Aid Kit King of the World from The Lion’s Roar (Wichita)
9:09 PM Teddy Thompson (From Now On All My Friends Are Gonna Be) Strangers from Up Front and Down Low (Verve Forecast)
9:05 PM The David Mayfield Parade Blue Skies Again from The David Mayfield Parade (9th Grade)
9:03 PM Buddy Holly Not Fade Away from Greatest Hits (MCA)
9:01 PM Virgin Forest Big Old Mama from Easy Way Out (Partisan)
8:58 PM The Scotland Yard Gospel Choir …And The Horse You Rode In On (Album) from …And The Horse You Rode In On (Bloodshot)
8:54 PM Hockey Too Fake from Mind Chaos (Capitol)
8:49 PM Royal Baths Black Sheep from Better Luck Next Life (Kanine)
8:45 PM Casiotone For the Painfully Alone Scattered Pearls from Etiquette (Tomlab)
8:40 PM Chappo Island Opiate from Plastique Universe II: Pisces Princess (self-released)
8:37 PM Poliça I See My Mother from Give You the Ghost (Totally Gross National Product)
8:32 PM Noe Venable Five on the Dime from No Curses Here (Intuition)
8:29 PM Cate Le Bon The Man I Wanted from Cyrk (The Control Group)
8:25 PM Andrew Bird Bein’ Green from Muppets: The Green Album (Disney )
8:21 PM Band of Horses I Go To The Barn Because I Like The from Everything All the Time (Sub Pop)
8:17 PM Maná Mariposa Traicionera from Revolución de amor (Warner Music Latina)
8:14 PM Adrian Younge Presents Venice Dawn Mourning Melodies in Rhapsody from Something About April (Wax Poetics)
8:09 PM Broken Records You Know You’re Not Dead from Let Me Come Home (4AD)
8:06 PM Unicycle Loves You Sun Comes Out (And I Don’t Care) from Failure (Mecca Lecca)
8:02 PM Quiet Company The Easy Confidence from We Are All Where We Belong (self-released)

March in Review

Sarah — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 15:39:58 +0000

Know what kind of snuck up on me? The end of the month. So much so that March has already been over for a good while before I realized that I needed to post it. Anyhow, here’s your monthly widget of awesome songs that have caught my attention.

How about you? What’s been keeping you musically occupied?

Lollapalooza 2010 Lineup

Sarah — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 16:14:40 +0000

In case you took an internet hiatus overnight, here’s some “news” for you: Lollapalooza’s lineup for the 2010 festival has been released in full, including all the letters and &s and *’s, because god forbid they write out Fuck Buttons on their website. The lineup had, of course, already been guessed to about 90% completion by the internet, thanks to leaks about the headliners and all those handy letters that Lolla put out for their Wheel of Fortune-esque teasers.

Aside from the fact that I’m always conflicted about Lollapalooza (I’ve lived here since 2006 and finally got around to dragging myself to the festival last year for the first time), the lineup seems a bit “…meh” to me. The headliners overall aren’t as huge as I’d come to expect from the festival, and the supporting tiers seem a bit thin. There aren’t a whole lot of acts who I’m dying to see, and a lot of the acts I’m excited about are actually ones who I’ve already seen (or will have seen by the time Lolla arrives). And I’m sure someone else can analyze this more in-depth, but there’s a huge lack of local music on the line-up. Lolla’s never made any pretense about being a local music festival — it’s a huge (inter)national festival which just happened to find its home in Chicago — but it would be nice to see some more nods towards its host city in its programming.

But, I’ll admit it, even though half of the internet is all OMG LOLLA SOLD OUT, I’m pretty excited that Lady Gaga is one of the headliners. Go ahead, take away any music street cred I had left, but I am absolutely going to be at her set. There, yeah, I said it. (Also, it will be interesting to see how she adapts her notoriously over-the-top stage show to fit the throw-and-go nature of Lollapalooza.)

So now, of course, we just have to wait (and wait, and wait) for the set schedules to come out. (Consequence of Sound has an unconfirmed day-by-day break-down.) Because, knowing my luck, all of the bands I want to see will be playing at the same time.

The lineup is under the jump for your perusal, in case you still haven’t seen it.

Soundgarden, Green Day, Lady Gaga, Arcade Fire, the Strokes, Phoenix, Social Distortion, MGMT, Jimmy Cliff, Hot Chip, the Black Keys, the National, Spoon, Devo, Cypress Hill, Cut Copy, the New Pornographers, Erykah Badu, Slightly Stoopid, Grizzly Bear, Gogol Bordello, Chromeo, Wolfmother, Yeasayer, X Japan, MUTEMATH, Metric, Dirty Projectors, AFI, Mavis Staples, Matt & Kim, the xx, Drive-By Truckers, Blues Traveler.

Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros, the Temper Trap, Jamie Lidell, Frightened Rabbit, F Buttons, Deer Tick, Blitzen Trapper, Stars, Raphael Saadiq, the Cribs, Minus the Bear, Switchfoot, the Walkmen, Mumford & Sons, Wild Beasts, Rogue Wave, Los Amigos Invisibles, the Big Pink, the Dodos, Hockey, Cymbals Eat Guitars, B.o.B, Dawes, Warpaint, the Antlers, the Soft Pack, Rebelution, Balkan Beat Box.

Wavves, American Bang, the Ike Reilly Assassination, Company of Thieves, Nneka, Harlem, the Constellations, Miniature Tigers, Mimicking Birds, the Kissaway Trail, HEALTH, Javelin, the Morning Benders, Foxy Shazam, Violent Soho, Royal Bangs, NEON TREES, Freelance Whales, Semi Precious Weapons, Dan Black, The Band of Heathens, Dragonette, My Dear Disco, Shawn Fisher, Neon Hitch, Skybox, The Ettes, Jukebox the Ghost, These United States, MyNameIsJohnMichael.

Concert Review: Hockey at Lincoln Hall, 3/12

Sarah — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:15:41 +0000

The last time I saw the vaguely-Portland-based quintet Hockey, they were tossing out free beer to a crowd of listeners at Lollapalooza, a sort of consolation prize after their set was cut short due to a significant lack of power to the stage.

This time, there were no such energy crises, and also no free beer. But the band has tightened up their act a good deal since their turn on the Lollapalooza stage. They seemed much more at home in front of the sold-out audience at Lincoln Hall, and slightly less nervous, to boot. Singer Ben Grubin was just as animated as always, twisting and posing and gesturing along with the music.

While the band has a decidedly 80s, new-wave sound, they showed that they can take it down a notch, with Grubin strapping on an acoustic guitar and a harmonica for a song. The band played most, if not all, of the songs from their debut album, Mind Chaos, as well as a few new tracks. Granted, they don’t have that much material, but they did manage to stretch it out to be about an hour and fifteen minutes of music. With the exception of just a few down-tempo songs, their entire performance was highly energetic, with some expertly timed flashing lights and yes, even the disco ball at Lincoln Hall got some action.

The band is still very young, though, and that showed during the sometimes awkward silences in between songs. Perhaps the band just wasn’t connecting with this audience very well, or perhaps they’re just still working out how exactly to work a crowd, but their attempts at banter fell flat. Working a crowd is something that takes time to perfect, especially if it doesn’t come naturally. This crowd wasn’t an easy one to connect with, anyway; it seemed like everyone came to hear Hockey’s more well known songs (“Song Away”, “Too Fake”, “Work”) and then completely checked out during most of the other tracks.

I’m looking forward to watching Hockey mature as a band and add to their repertoire. They’ve clearly got talent and charisma, they’ve just got to learn to leverage it better, especially against slightly disinterested crowds.

See the rest of my photos over on Flickr.

Hockey: Official Website | MySpace | Facebook | Twitter | Shop

This Week in Great Music: 3/8 – 3/14

Sarah — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 17:22:50 +0000

The entire world is gearing up for SXSW. I’m gearing up for reading tons of great blog posts about SXSW.

This week, I’ll definitely be at the Hockey show at Lincoln Hall. Hopefully, the power won’t go out on them like it did at Lollapalooza. I’m debating going to see Sonos tomorrow night; they’re an a cappella group and I’m a sucker for stuff like that. And that SXSW Send-off party at the Hideout looks too good to pass up. There’s a free show by JC Brooks and the Uptown Sound tonight at the Empty Bottle, but I also think that and they’re als playing at the Tonic Room on Wednesday, though I can’t confirm that since the only place I remember reading about it was on MySpace, which I can’t call up here at work.

Also, I don’t know what’s so magical about that Jeff Tweedy show at the Vic, because that’s one steep price tag.

Monday, March 8
The Magnetic Fields, Harris Theater. 7:30 pm, $30-35
Efterklang, volcano!; Lincoln Hall. 9 pm, $12
JC Brooks and the Uptown Sound, Empty Bottle. 9:30 pm, free

Tuesday, March 9
Howie Day, House of Blues. 7 pm, $18-21
Sonos, SPACE. 8 pm, $10-18
Via Audio, Pattern is Movement, Blane Fonda; Schubas. 8 pm, $10
Califone, Lincoln Hall. 9 pm, $15-18

Wednesday, March 10
Califone, Lincoln Hall. 9 pm, $15-18
Vetiver, Empty Bottle. 9:30 pm, $12

Thursday, March 11
We Were Promised Jetpacks, Lincoln Hall. 9 pm, $12-14

Friday, March 12
Muse, Silversun Pickups; United Center. 7:30 pm, $49.50-59.50
Jeff Tweedy, the Vic. 8 pm, $100-250
Gaelic Storm, House of Blues. 9 pm, $32.50-35
Ben Sollee and Daniel Martin Moore, SPACE. 10:30 pm, $10-18
Hockey, The Constellations; Lincoln Hall. 11 pm, sold out

Saturday, March 13
SXSW Send-off Party: Via Tania, The Hood Internet, Mickey, Hollows, Tom Schraeder, Love Of Everything, Tyler Jon Tyler, Mittens On Strings, Plastic Crimewave Sound, Waco Brothers and the Life During Wartime DJs; Hideout. 3 pm, $10
Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, Bottom Lounge. 7 pm, $15
Jeff Tweedy, the Vic. 8 pm, $100-250
Gaelic Storm, House of Blues. 9 pm, $32.50-35
Zola Jesus, Beat Kitchen. 10 pm, $8
Ben Sollee and Daniel Martin Moore, Schubas. 10 pm, $12

Sunday, March 14
Copeland, Metro. 6 pm, $16

Album Review: Hockey, Mind Chaos

Sarah — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 17:20:14 +0000

In an effort to start cleaning off my desk, I’m selecting albums at random from my “to be listened to and put away” pile to write about, and then… well, most likely to then fail to find anywhere to put the album because all of my shelves are full and I haven’t gotten around to buying new shelves. Ahem, anyhow, I digress. The first album in my absolutely random untimely review series is Hockey’s Mind Chaos.

I was introduced to Hockey at Lollapalooza last year, by virtue of them being the first band to take the stage on the side of the festival that I would essentially be spending the whole day at. Despite their set being plagued by bad weather, sound problems, and eventually, power outages, these guys put on a solid show. It’s tough to get anyone’s attention when most of the festival-goers are still waiting in line, but Hockey definitely managed to get it done. I can only imagine what they would be able to do in a better environment.

Hockey isn’t really the type of band that would get much attention from me. But I am easily wowed by a great live show, so I was excited to check out their album when it finally was released here. The album is full of great songs which stand on their own: singles, if you will, if anyone still thinks of music in that way. ”Too Fake”, which leads off the album, is one of those songs; in fact, I’m pretty sure that it shows up at random in a commercial. Call it selling out, call it a great way to get your music out there to the public, whatever, I just like hearing the song on TV, even if it does get stuck in my head after I hear it.

Mind Chaos, for the most part, maintains a pretty steady pop feel, with just a few songs that veer off in one direction or another. With “Work” and “Song Away”, as well as “Too Fake”, the first half of the album is entertaining and mostly upbeat. The second half gets a little more disjointed, with a few songs that don’t feel like they belong on the album. While everything else has a synth-pop feel, “Curse This City” feels like a more traditional rock song. And if you take away the chirpy synth beats in “Four Holy Photos”, you’ve got a fantastic alt-country song hiding in there. They make the album sound a little less cohesive, but also show that the band has more to offer than dance hall beats.

Overall, this is a really strong debut album from a young band. Singer Ben Grubin’s voice is just unique and unusual enough to grab my attention without being irritating. I’m interested to see what they come up with next, because they have an enormous amount of potential.

Hockey plays at Schubas on March 12. The show starts at 10:30 and tickets are on sale now for $12. Behind the jump, check out a video of their performance of “Song Away” at Lollapalooza — complete with the uncalled for power outage.

Hockey: Official Website | MySpace | Facebook | Twitter | Shop

This Week in Great Music – 10/5 – 10/11

Sarah — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 14:58:25 +0000

Another week, another great round of live music. I could see myself at a show every night, if I were, you know, made of money and didn’t have other responsibilities. I will be at the Decemberists show on Thursday, and so have the next few days to decide between that age old dilemma — do I head straight for a seat in the balcony when I get to the Riviera, or do I try to battle it out amongst the rest of the crowd to get a good spot on the floor? It’s a Hazards of Love show, so I may opt for the balcony, the better to see things with. As for Thursday’s Hideout lineup, I don’t know anything about any of the three bands (Disappears, Follows, and Implodes), but I love the fact that all three band names are verbs and that alone kind of makes me want to check it out. I’m way sad that the Portugal. The Man/Hockey/Drug Rug shows sold out at Schubas before I figured out if I wanted to go or not. I’ll be keeping a lookout for some last-minute released tickets at Schubas, if I’m lucky.

Monday, October 5, 2009
Erin McCarley and Landon Pigg, Schubas. 7 pm, $15.
Hope Sandoval & The Warm Inventions, Lakeshore Theater (3175 N. Broadway). 8 pm, $20.

Tuesday, October 6
Yo La Tengo, the Vic. 7:30 pm, $24.
Vedera, Hard Rock Café (63 W. Ontario). 9 pm, free. Donations accepted at the door to benefit Chicago’s own Breast Cancer Network of Strength.

Wednesday, October 7
Ian Anderson, the Vic. 7:30 pm, $70.
Colbie Caillat, Howie Day, and Trevor Hall, the Riviera. 7 pm, $27.50.
Vienna Teng, SPACE (1245 Chicago Ave., Evanston). 8 pm, $18-34.
Andrew McMahon, Lakeshore Theater. 8 pm, $25.

Thursday, October 8
Maxwell, Common, and Chrisette Michele, United Center (1901 W. Madison). 7:30 pm, $20-150.
The Decemberists and Laura Veirs & The Hall of Flames, the Riviera. 7 pm, $30.
The Horse’s Ha and Simon Kashama, Chicago Cultural Center. 6:30 pm, free.
Disappears, Follows, and Implodes, Hideout. 9 pm, $10.

Friday, October 9
Mat Kearney and Diane Birch, House of Blues. 7:30 pm, $23-27.
Leon Redbone, Old Town School of Folk Music. 8 pm, $24-28.

Saturday, October 10
They Might Be Giants, the Vic. 4 pm and 8 pm, $25.
Paramore, Paper Route, and The Swellers, House of Blues. 7:30 pm, $27.50.
Loney Dear, Asobi Seksu, and Anna Ternheim, Bottom Lounge. 8 pm, $15.
Jonathan Coulton and Paul and Storm, Park West. 8 pm, $20-22.
Portugal. The Man, Hockey, and Drug Rug, Schubas. 10pm, sold out.

Sunday, October 11
Brazilian Music Festival, Nichols Concert Hall (1490 Chicago Ave., Evanston). 1 pm, free.
Portugal. The Man, Hockey, and Drug Rug, Schubas. 8 pm, sold out.

Concert Review: Lollapalooza, Day 1

howsmyliving — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 23:31:27 +0000

Lollapalooza Friday review, in bite-sized updates.

The Line: I felt like I might as well have just walked out of my apartment and gone a few blocks east to the lake to find the end of the line, we were that far north. Alright, it wasn’t that long, but it seemed like forever. A+ to the friendly Bonnaroo-going hippies in line in front of me, F- to the clump of assholes who wanted to try to cut in line. Don’t think so, kids. Other amusing things about the line: the disclaimer stating that entering the premises allows C3 to use your image in perpetuity, across the universe, forever and ever. Also, awesome to get to see the back of the modern wing of the art museum – I never have reason to go back in that direction, so I haven’t had the opportunity to check out the new addition.

The Security Check: lulz. I think my expectations were too high. Security dude barely even peered into my bag. (Somehow, I had been expecting much more intense security. Whenever I went to Grant Park for Obama’s Election Day rally, there were metal detectors and x-ray machines and everything. Sure, Security of the President-Elect trumps Security of Drunken Fratboy Festival-goers, but, you know, whatever.

The Weather: Can it be both a fail and a win at the same time? One thing that’s kept me away from Lolla in the past has been my lack of desire to stand outside in upper-90s temperatures, so it was a nice surprise to not feel like I was going to instantly die of heatstroke. However, being soaked to the bone (despite the umbrella) and shivering on an August day got to be a little bit ridiculous after a while.

Behind the jump: Reviews of the actual music! April Smith, Hockey, Manchester Orchestra, Gringo Star, The Knux, The Gaslight Anthem, Bon Iver, Ben Folds, Fleet Foxes, The Decemberists, Andrew Bird, and Kings of Leon.

April Smith: Unsigned artist from Brooklyn. I wasn’t able to catch all of her set, mostly just bits and pieces as we wandered around the area of the BMI stage, but I was incredibly impressed with what I heard. She’s got a very strong voice and some catchy songs. For being the first artist to take the stage on the northern end of the festival, her music was very commanding of attention. I hope to hear more from her in the future. Her music is available on iTunes, Amazon, and CD Baby, for those of you who, like myself, still prefer to be able to hold a CD in hand.

Hockey

Hockey: New-wave quintet from Portland. Way, way better than I had expected from anything described as new-wave, as I usually shy away from that genre. They had a great energy, and managed to persevere through some initial technical difficulties. While I had never heard of their music, before, I enjoyed myself immensely… until the power went out a few songs into their set. The drummer filled the space with an extended drum solo… but still no power. The band members ended up tossing free beer from backstage out into the crowd while waiting. The power came back up for another song and a half or so, and then, fzzt, out again. Technology fail. I was definitely impressed by their music, though, and would probably consider going to see them again, hopefully at a show not marred by loss of power.

Manchester Orchestra: Too much screaming, not enough to keep my attention. Maybe they’re better on CD, I don’t know. I ended up wandering off in search of food and merchandising and things that didn’t involve listening to Manchester Orchestra.

Gringo Star: What I expected: Spanish-language covers of Beatles songs. What I got: Alt-country-poppy tunes. Pretty good, wish I had stuck around to see more. Will definitely be checking them out.

The Knux: The Knux are a pair of brothers originally from New Orleans, displaced after Hurricane Katrina. They’ve got a great energy, pulling fans up onto the stage to dance with them and everything. I’m not a huge rap fan, but these guys certainly kept me, and the whole crowd, entertained and engaged.

The Gaslight Anthem

The Gaslight Anthem: A very pleasant surprise for me. I’ve heard of this New Jersey rock band, but I don’t think I ever bothered listening to their music before. They put on an incredibly enjoyable show – only slightly dampened (pun vaguely intended) by the rain that kept pouring down throughout their set. The energy and enthusiasm from the crowd was apparent even despite the rain and the fact that we were way in the back of the field. The dude next to us kept singing and playing air guitar along with the songs, it was that kind of exciting. This was their first big outdoor festival, and the singer/guitarist noted how fabulous they thought Chicago and the festival in general was. I wound up picking up their CD later on that day – trust me, that’s high praise coming from me.

Bon Iver: I still stand by my assessment that Bon Iver just doesn’t work at a huge outdoor festival like Lollapalooza. Maybe Pitchfork or Hideout’s block party or something, a festival that’s a little more niche-oriented. But not Lollapalooza. While I enjoyed the music, and while I think it would have been more enjoyable up front in the crowd instead of on the back fringes, between the Playstation and Budweiser stages, it’s hard to get into it when everyone else around you is talking/drinking/not paying attention. Regardless, Bon Iver’s music is just downright beautiful, and somehow made even more poignant by the falling rain. I would love to see him in an intimate little club or something, where his work is going to be more generally appreciated.

Ben Folds: A solid set, as usual. The rain and relative lack of enthusiasm of the crowd around me put a bit of a damper on the show. I would have loved to have been closer to the stage for this one, in the midst of the crowd. He opened with the leak version of Bitch Went Nutz — something tells me that the songs from the fake/leaked version of Way to Normal are more popular than the ones from the album itself. There was a good mix of new songs and old favorites, including “Army” and “Narcolepsy”. I always enjoy Ben’s shows and his enthusiasm and his crazy, crazy piano playing, and all things considered, this was no exception.

Fleet Foxes: I only stayed for the first few songs of their set, as I was cold and hungry and needed to use the bathroom, and I knew I would be seeing them the next night at Metro anyway. Their harmonies are absolutely divine, though, and the crowd was way excited to see them. (Their show on Friday at Metro, by the way, was fantastic. There were drawbacks, of course: everything started late and it was about a million degrees inside Metro, but definitely a quality show.)

The Decemberists

The Decemberists: Performed the whole of The Hazards of Love. A+++ so glad they did. It might be a bit blasphemous, but I think I prefer Hazards to a lot of their other material. Shara Worden pretty much rocks my world. One review I read mentioned that they didn’t think that she had much of a stage presence — I don’t know what show that reviewer was watching, because Worden was all over the stage, dancing and jumping and generally kicking ass at conveying the character of the Queen. All of the band members played their parts well, since Hazards really is a story more than anything else, with each member having a role to play. I left the area after “The Rake’s Song” so I could make my way through the crowd to get to Andrew Bird’s set, but I could still hear the rest of the Decemberists set from across the field, and it was as amazing as I would have expected it to be. I’m sad that I missed seeing “The Queen’s Rebuke/The Crossing”, because it sounded amazing from where I was, but thankfully Youtube has allowed me to play along at home.

Andrew Bird: If I had it my way, I pretty much would have camped out in front of the Playstation stage all day in order to be right up front for this set. The desire to do so was lessened by the fact that I managed to be within arm’s length of Andrew Bird when I saw him at Schubas on Thursday. Besides, I don’t know how I would have dealt with going to the bathroom or eating, so maybe it’s for the best that I didn’t enact my plan.

Andrew Bird

Anyhow, Bird, as usual, is a complete maniac on stage. The way in which he wholeheartedly throws himself into his show is always amazing to watch. He ripped through a set of new and old songs, the first half comprised largely of songs off of Noble Beast, and the latter with old favorites. (Setlist, for the curious: Fiery Crash / Masterswarm / Opposite Day / Fitz and the Dizzyspells / Oh No / Effigy / Not a Robot, But a Ghost / Anonanimal / Imitosis / Scythian Empires / Tables and Chairs / Fake Palindromes.) The addition of “Not a Robot, But a Ghost” was met with much enthusiasm from the crowd; as I’ll mention in my Schubas review, he said that he rarely performs it live, but after the reaction he’s been getting, hopefully it will make more appearances in the future. The last four songs were absolutely epic in intensity and excitement. While I love the more sedate environment you get from other venues, there’s definitely something to be said for jumping up and down and shouting out Bird’s esoteric lyrics with thousands and thousands of other fans. (As an aside, there were sign language interpreters on stage for Bird’s set: I really, really want to know how in the world they interpreted things like radiolarians and troglobytes.) Bird promised that there would be snacks (a reference to a lyric in “Tables and Chairs”) and he provided them in great multitudes.

Kings of Leon: While I missed a good deal of their set, what I heard was very strong. I’d never paid a whole lot of attention to them in the past; for some reason their music never really resonated with me, but I’ve been enjoying their new album, and their live show definitely had the crowd pumped. After hearing their show, though, it’s got me motivated to check out more of their music.

There’s not much I can say about them, though, as I spent a majority of their set waiting in line at the FYE autograph tent to meet Andrew Bird. Yes, I did, in fact, buy a CD I already own just so I could get a spot in that line. Anyhow, it was a little difficult to focus on Kings of Leon when I was busy running over and over in my mind what, exactly, I wanted to say. Eventually, after waiting forever, I finally got to the front of the line and managed not to trip over my words and turn into a blubbering idiot. I told him simply that I feel like it’s a privilege to see him perform, every single time. It’s the honest truth, really, and I was rewarded with a sincere grin and a thank you, which was worth more to me than an autograph or anything else.

Overall verdict on Lollapalooza: much better than anticipated, with plenty of nice surprises for me. Will I go next year? Maybe. I’d need an incredibly strong lineup (like Friday’s) to get me to go out again, let alone go out for all three days. But despite the rain and the fact that my legs still sort of hurt from all of that standing, there were enough priceless moments during my Lollapalooza day that I don’t have any real complaints.