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Velvet

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Posts posted by Velvet

  3. Posted · Report reply

    On 2017-07-23 at 5:53 PM, Freak By Night said:

    My trip was short.

    I left Ottawa early Friday morning and made it to the hotel in Jersey City by 4:20 pm a quick shower then I was on my way by the PATH train to the 33rd street station, right near Madison Square Garden. Met some peeps at a nearby pub, then it was off to the show at MSG.

    Phish killed it! What a great show with many musical peaks. I finally had a good seat for a show at MSG and I really enjoyed it. Musical highlights for me were "Halfway to the Moon", "Slave", "Suzy Greenberg" and "Tweezer". No reprise though! Maybe that will come later during this residency in New York. They also nailed a cover of Bowie's "Moonage Daydream" and the encore of Zep's "Good Times Bad Times".

    In all, I thought the concert was excellent. I met some really good people at the show. New York is a lot of fun.

    Afterwards it was a walk up to Times Square to catch moe. in a sold out late performance. As you've probably heard, Rob will be undergoing cancer treatment and they had to cut the summer tour short. This was one of the few dates they kept. The outpouring of love and support for Rob was great. There were several huge cards to sign at the merch table. The show was a lot of fun, I was dancing at the front to start but fatigue overcame me after a short while, I moved to the back where there were plenty of free seats in this very nice theater. I remained there for the rest of the show, which finally ended at about 3:30. The band got into some serious weird jams but finished with a stellar Rebubula and a touching cover of "Halleluja". It was a long day and I was very tired when I got back to the hotel just before 5 am, but I'm glad I caught moe. before their forthcoming hiatus.

    I'm seriously thinking of returning for the final weekend of these baker's dozen shows, the first weekend in August. Gotta scrape up some $$ for tix and accommodations.

     

     

    Good work.

  7. Posted · Report reply

    About six months before this show Doug (eventually from The John Henry's) was at my place and heard YEM (NYE '00 I think?).  It was his first time hearing Phish.  "I feel like I just heard Hendrix for the first time," he said, and he asked to borrow the cassette.  

    Three months later he's at my place again and he says, "Oh, I have that Phish tape to give back to you."

    I asked him if he learned anything from it and he told me he had learnt YEM.  "Show me," I said, handing him an electric guitar.

    Now if you know Doug, you know he learns things right, and this was in an era when the two of us did nothing, and I mean nothing but play/study/teach guitar.  He had spent several hours a day for months working on the tune by ear and he sat on the couch in front of me and played along with the tape for the entire twenty minutes without missing a single guitar note.  I swear it was as exciting to watch as being on the rail at a Phish show.

    And so I brought him to this show in Toronto, and all I wanted was for the band to play YEM.

    They did, and it was awesome.

  8. Posted · Report reply

    Y'know, I went through the schedule and listened to a lot of the bands I hadn't heard of and I honestly think the reason this year's lineup doesn't look very interesting is because it's loaded with blues and blues-leaning acts that most people haven't heard of (myself included).

    Oh the irony.

    Anyways, I found lots of stuff that interests me this year.  This is what I'll be seeing:

    Thu 6

    Bill Durst

    Pokey LaFarge

     

    Fri 7

    Old Whiskey Road

    Melissa Etheridge

    Matt Anderson

     

    Sat 8

    Angelina Hunter

    Too Slim

    Sugaray Rayford

    Molly Hatchet

     

    Sun 9

    Vanessa Collier

    Slam Allen

    Yonatan Gat (this sounds pretty interesting)

    Pat Travers

     

    Tue 11

    Carolyn Wonderland

    The Zombies

     

    Wed 12

    The Shins

    Gary Clark Jr.

     

    Thu 13

    Wicked Grin

    Coco Montoya

    Fabulous Thunderbirds

     

    Fri 14

    The Campbell Brothers

    Jack Semple (wow, have you heard this guy?)

    Anderson .Paak

    Gregg Allman Tribute

     

    Sat 15

    The Jivewires

    Thornetta Davis

    Hamish Anderson

    Delicate Steve

    Busty and the Bass (crazy good stuff)

    Xavier Rudd

     

    Sun 16

    Souljazz Orchestra

    Sari Schorr

    BITB Teachers showcase (featuring me!)

    Tom Petty

  12. Posted · Report reply

    When I was a kid the television set was my best friend.  We laughed and learned together and we had the same heroes.  My favourite tv shows were Sesame Street, Batman, Get Smart, and Planet Of The Apes, pretty much in that order.  

     

    Funny, when I look back it occurs to me that Batman was the only one of these shows that I didn’t really ‘get’.  I knew that Sesame Street was an educational show, I knew Get Smart was a comedy and while I didn’t realize that Planet Of The Apes was a statement on racial issues in America I certainly knew it was a drama.  

     

    But Adam West was so deadpan, delivering absurd dialogue with such conviction that I thought Batman was a legit superhero action show.  Little did I know that my psyche was absorbing camp-style humour that would flow through my brain forever more.  Suffice to say, the dry, near-psychedelic comedy of Adam West’s Batman made a huge impression on me, whether I knew it or not.

     

    Sometime in the mid-to-late 1980’s the Batmobile was touring as part of the annual car show that came to the Moncton Coliseum and Adam West was there too.  Of course I went (the car show was a non-missable event in my family) and marvelled at the beautiful automobile with it’s shiny chrome rocket launchers, ultra-cool rear turbo blaster and sharp, bat-like angles all around.  What an awesome machine.

     

    And beside the car was the man himself, Adam West, sitting all alone behind a small folding table.  I was amazed, and so starstruck that I almost didn’t go up and say hello.  As I gazed Mr. West glanced my way and gave me a smile.  I took a deep breath and approached him.  This was long before the whole comicon thing (I think) and certainly long before people had the audacity to charge money for autographs and yet there was nobody at all anywhere near Batman.  

     

    Once I opened my mouth I began to gush, breathlessly trying to explain what an impact he had on my childhood and my whole level of being, all the while feeling silly that here I was almost twenty years old and I was acting like a little kid.  I guess I still didn’t quite ‘get’ Batmen even then, otherwise I would have been fully aware that I was exactly his demographic; a former kid who was getting his first full taste of nostalgia.

     

    I don’t remember much of what Adam West said to me, but I can picture the easy friendliness on his face, which is kind of odd because I can’t for the life of me remember if he was dressed in his Batman outfit or if he was in street clothes.  I do recall walking away feeling great about the encounter, so I’m sure he was very nice.

     

    It’s curious to note that my childhood love of Batman has caused me to virtually run to every Batman movie that has come along since and I haven’t really cared for any of them, and I’ve never ever been into the actual comic books.  I guess I wasn’t a Batman fan after all.

     

    I was an Adam West fan.  His comedic approach made him my superhero.

     

    Farewell caped crusader, thanks for all the batcomedy.

    Davey Boy 2.0 reacted to this

  15. Posted · Report reply

    http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/hard-rock-international-partners-with-rideau-carleton-raceway-1.4115181

    The Rideau Carleton Raceway will undergo a multimillion-dollar expansion that will bring a hotel, a music venue and hundreds of new jobs to the struggling Ottawa horse racing and gambling facility.

    The Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) announced Monday that Hard Rock International will partner with the raceway, with the two companies investing more than $320 million to create an "integrated entertainment destination" in the city's rural south end.

    Hard Rock Casino Ottawa will take over the day-to-day operations of the slots at the raceway in the fall of 2017 as part of a 20-year agreement, OLG said in a release.

    The number of slots are expected to increase to 2,000 from 1,250 and 21 gaming tables will be added.

    Slots

    Hard Rock Casino Ottawa is a partnership between Hard Rock International and Rideau Carleton Raceway. (Jean-Sebastien Marier/Radio-Canada)

     

    Jim Allen, chair of Hard Rock International, revealed details of the "master plan vision" for the raceway at a news conference Monday afternoon.

    The first phase, Allen said, would involve modest renovations to the Albion Road complex, plus the addition of new attractions at the casino by the end of 2017.

    That would be followed by a major expansion of the entertainment options at the raceway — including a hotel, a Hard Rock Café and bar, and a 2,000-seat venue for live music, he said.

     

    The plan also includes building a new entrance to the raceway that would create "a sense of arrival," said Allen.

    Horse racing will remain at the raceway, with Ottawa West-Nepean MPP and provincial infrastructure minister Bob Chiarelli saying the new deal would "ensure the survivability of this iconic sport."

    Prior to Monday's news conference Nepean-Carleton MPP Lisa MacLeod said the announcement was great news for her community, which has suffered from lower attendance at the raceway recently. 

    "I'm looking at $320 million investment into my community that will, I think, drive more growth in the city's south end," she said. "I'm going to see a lot more stability for the horse people, and we're going to see 1900 construction jobs."

  25. Posted · Report reply

    Actually, a Bob Wiseman show at Zaphod's is among my top three concerts ever, and the time I saw Look People there stands as the weirdest night of live music I've ever seen or heard of.  Nostril shrimp diving, two ice cream cones up the drummers butt, and oh, so much more.

    Booche reacted to this
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