the quiet revolution

Total. Bass. Craving.

Must be time to get my dance on again. It's been quite a while. Mmmm, bass...

*chair-dances*

Last week Alex and I went out on a school night to see Regina Spektor play at the Tivoli theatre. Doors opened at 6:30pm, and since it was a Monday night we assumed the gig would start around 7. How wrong we were. The old theatre grew stale with people as we waited an hour and a half for the support act to come on. We passed the time playing with the camera and chatting to the folks around us, including uber fan-boy and his unyeilding BO. We were tired, our feet ached and our noses threatened to strike, yet we did not move, for I had staked a spot as close as I could get with a clear line of sight to Regina's piano. The collective impatience was palpable, and then a small man, a boy really, with Tom Baker hair and an accoustic guitar emerged stage left. He instroduced himself as Only Son and strummed out 20 minutes of pleasant tunes to the accompanyment of his iPod, then told us a stream-of-conciousness story about a koala.



Another wait ensued, but only half an hour or so, then a face with a mischevous smile poked out from behind a curtain. The audience got a wee bit excited and Regina Spektor hobbled out, supported by a fancy black cane. My view of the stage disappeared as people pushed in and my smaller stature gave them the advantage. I'm bigger than Regina though: she's quite short, and remarkably beautiful and gracious (even when she's being naughty). She introduced herself, apologised for being high on pain killers, showed off her cane and arduously limped to the piano. Once seated, all appearance of fragility vanished. When she plays the piano she is suddenly bigger, stronger, more vibrant. Her quiet voice and shy mannerisms vanish and there she is, in glorious voice and completely present. In short, she is wonderful.



The show contained a good mix of material from all her albums, at least once you included the encore. Twice, I think, Regina embarked from the piano for the guitar, via a treatcherous walk across the stage. We (the audience) would have been happier if the roadie had carried her (she's small enough), rather than wincing in sympathy at every step, but she made the trip without incident each time. She slowly exited at the end of her set, only to return for the encore.



The show was excellent. All her pieces were performed flawlessly, with the exception of a stumble in "Us" in her encore. Not bad for a girl high on pain killers. A show well worth catching, should you get the chance. More photos ( behind the cut. )

...I have tickets to see Regina Spektor!

It's a Monday night, but hey, it's Regina!

Smiley's not at work today. Smiley has a cold, so she's at home with happy hard pumping loud. Long live BiPolar!



So, Mayhem. What can I say? Fan-f*cking-tastic once more. I spent the day before madly sticking my fingers with a sharp needle, making groovy arm decorations for Alex and myself. By 7pm we were all done and wondering where our celebrity guests had gone, and we were overdue to be invaded by Melbourne folks. Eventually, zenandtheart, nurseysarah, the_trav and binkee arrived, and we all crammed for the bathroom at once. An hour later we were all dressed up with somewhere to go.



We arrived at the venue to find a strong police presence, and as expected, the sniffer dogs were out. Now, from a harm minimisation perspective, I'm not a big fan of the dogs, so they have no right to be so damn cute! Alex and I were confronted by a very young and extremely wriggly black labrador that was just so excited about it all. Eventually we all made it inside and quickly located the other 10 000 people we knew (well it felt like that, anyway.) I had a chat to Mr. Alek Szhala himself before commencing the hugathon. Names and faces; Flash, Jason, Alex, Josh, Lisa, Milan, Ty, Danny, Dash... It seemed most everyone had made it.



I decided that first things first, I'd tour the grounds and grab a few photos. This plan whent exceptionally well until I realised BiPolar were on in the main room, so I dashed back to the cloak room, ditched the camera, then made my way to the front of the dance floor, where (surprise) I found my hubbie and most of our crew. Bang on! At the end of their set I caught a bit of Sven/DJ Hiro in the chill room, then hit the Happy Hard room for Finn number 1, Drumhead. His set finished all too soon, so after a bit of a wander it was back to the main room for the next 3 hours: Carbon Based (live FiNRG), Clerics of Anarchy (live locals, freeform), and Alek Szhala (also Finnish). Just wow.



Carbon Based had quite a stage presence and so much energy. During their set I found Amanda and Sarah in the crowd, then turned around to see a super-cute Corch behind me! Carbon Based were good fun and got a decent crowd going, but as they finished, the crowd really swelled, as next on the decks were the Clerics, local hero Seventy7 teamed with Wispa (and yes, they came on stage in the robes). What can they say? They completely blew me away. Set of the night as the two of them bounced around and pumped out some of the freshest, fastest freeform I've ever heard. Absolutely everyone went off and I didn't move from my spot, despite having an extremely full bladder I couldn't leave; the music was just too good! After a quick dash to the ladies, I was back for Szhala, though after COA, his set lacked oomph. He was still worth seeing, the talented man, as he performs all his own music and does get the crowd going.



Now it was 3am and I'd seen all the main acts I'd come to see, so I thought I'd go for a spin ont he dodgems. It turned out everyone else had the same idea. Ditto for the jumping castle, so Alex and I wandered around chatting to people before settling into the chill room for a bit of a snuggle. Turns out the DMF folks had the same idea! By 4am, the underslept among us were starting to fade, including stil not recovered from the trip Alex and I. By 5am we were walking out the door, and for the first time in 2.5 years Alex and I weren't there for the very last set, but then again, no one we were that keen on had the closing set.



So a select party (Amanda, the Trav, Corch, Sarah and Pam, along with Jason and Alex and 2 of their friends) headed back to our place to recover, where we were later joined by Flash and a friend of his. At 7am I mysteriously recovered my energy and managed to bounce around for the next 3 hours until everyone deserted us.



At some point I grabbed 3 hours sleep, and then we were off to collect Josh for a de-briefing of his night. We watched Miyazaki's Nausicaa and the valley of the wind over dinner then crawled into bed around 9pm. As I closed my eyes, lasers flickered before me and the bass beat filled my head until I drifted into sleep.

Music is a wonderous thing. It has the power to unify us, to unite us in joy and admiration. Music can inspire us and raise us up. And it can just plain be fun.



On Saturday night I saw the Mountain Goats play at the Zoo. Alex and I were supposed to go together, but the boy had a fever and was rather miserable. After ringing around lots of people who were out of town, miss_verucasalt agreed to come see a band she'd never heard of. We got there early and settled down to listen to the first act...

( ...and the head stones climed up the hills )