I went to a Sigur Ros concert last Friday at the Greek Theatre.
I saw Gogol Bordello at Slim’s in San Francisco last Sunday.
I went to Blizzcon this weekend.
tuna sings
I went to a Sigur Ros concert last Friday at the Greek Theatre.
I saw Gogol Bordello at Slim’s in San Francisco last Sunday.
I went to Blizzcon this weekend.
OOh! How was Gogol Bordello? I was just thinking of wanting to see them the other day
So they were fucking amazing. Have you been to Slim’s? I hadn’t before; it’s a very small venue, more like a club, so anywhere you are you have a good view of the stage. Gogol Bordello was in town for the bluegrass festival that day–they headlined–and they played at Slim’s as a benefit concert for Muttville. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/pets/category?blogid=48&cat=1609 and http://www.muttville.org/ They took a long, long, long time to come out, and everyone was getting antsy, and the audience was so rude to the lady that came out before the concert and tried to say some nice things about Muttville. She brought it on herself by trying to tell us a story about kindness though.
Anyway Gogol Bordello ran out on the stage accompanied by two young hot girls with green eye makeup dancing. The main singer guy clutched a bottle of red wine under his arm and took swigs out of it. He was like already covered in sweat from jumping around everywhere. He filled up a mouthful of wine and then throw back his head and do a blowhole thing by exhaling his wine all over his face. That was a little disconcerting but I’m a prude. So he ran around singing and he was totally crazy and he hung off of the posts. Fritz and I squeezed into maybe the 5th or 6th row and it was pretty rowdy in there. There was a small older lady, okay maybe just middle-aged, but she was pretty fragile and she had to get out. People at concerts are real assholes. Also there were two guys in wheelchairs in the very front and people not directly adjacent to them didn’t know and would push the people between them and the wheelcharis to try to get closer cuz they could see an empty space.
But like yeah, we’d jump up and down with the crowd, and we were covered with sweat, even my purse was soaked through, through my tshirt and my sweater (I was wearing a sweater because it was COLD SF outside)…
I can’t give you a setlist because I don’t know their songs. Fritz shouted along with everything cuz he loves Gogol Bordello; I don’t know their songs that well. They started out with the one that goes “DOGS ARE BARKING!!!! (CLAP CLAP)” and at the end, for the first song of their encore, the main singer guy came out onstage by himself with an acoustic guitar and did the one that goes “thank you alcohol” (which I have a sneaking suspicion is just called “alcohol”), and the whole thing was hugely high-energy and crazy and fun except when I had to breathe disgusting man smells and except when there were elbows on soft parts of me and except when I had to stand crushed behind this guy with incredibly soft beautiful curly hair but he used this really strong-smelling floral shampoo. I hated that shampoo. I couldn’t breathe. It is 19847850917407854x better than disgusting smelly man-BO though so whatever. Anyway it was really fun to jump up and down with them. They have crazy energy. They didn’t do the one song I know the best, the one that’s about a harem in Tuscany, and Fritz says that’s because that one requires a whole string section, and the venue was so small they didn’t have their string section with them. I wonder if they did when they played the bluegrass thing.
The violinist is a fucking badass!!!!!!!! We got a picture with him. I’ll post it when I get home or something.
They’d like dance with each other on stage and stuff, and run around even the stage was tiny. The Mexican dude like put on a Mexican wrestling mask and a wig and ran around. The hot girls came on and off with slightly different outfits and hair and banged washboards and drums and cymbals and were like really hot. The violinist was a badass (as mentioned above). He’d like saw at his violin and his bow would fray and every time he’d get a moment, he’d grab the frayed ends and pull them off and go back to sawing away. He was cool cuz he was able to convey lots of energy without like being totally crazy and spitting wine on himself.
You should talk to Fritz about it; I was there for a good time. I like Gogol Bordello a lot, and like them even more after the show, but I don’t like know lyrics to their songs.
Fritz’s roommates are really, really plugged into awesome free events in SF. They went to Love Fest on Saturday (free), and the bluegrass thing on Sunday (free), and then the Gogol Bordello benefit concert (not free, but you’re saving dogs). A couple months ago I tagged along with them to this free concert in golden gate park about peace and we totally saw ziggy marley http://www.powertothepeaceful.org/index2.php . One of them works several jobs; one is as a bartender and the other is with some sort of concert-promoting thing so she always knows what’s happening too. Like one day she came home in the afternoon and was all stressed out because some concert got cancelled at the last second and they were having a Talib Kweli show instead. I was like “Woah Talib Kweli!” and fritz was like “you know who taht is? I don’t know who that is.” I know who that is because I lived with a DJ for three years. Anyway she was like “man I hope people come to this Talib Kweli concert we’re throwing together.” We asked her about it later and they did.
OOh thanks for the details! yeah, I was torn between going to strictly hardly bluegrass on sunday and the AES convention. I kinda think I should have gone to the concert instead…. i should have gone to a lot of concerts. bah, what’s wrong with me?