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Gracie Folds (Levitt Pavilion, Steelstacks, Bethlehem, PA, July 16, 2016) [BEN FOLDS w/ yMUSIC]

Posted in Ben Folds, Bethlehem, PA, Gracie Folds, Levitt Pavilion, Regina Spektor, Steelstacks, Tori Amos on July 14, 2016| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: July 14, 2016] Gracie Folds

2016-07-14 19.36.50The Levitt Pavilion Steelstacks in Bethlehem is one of my favorite venues.  Last year I saw Modest Mouse there and this year it was Ben Folds.  I raved to Sarah about the venue last time but I don’t think she realized just how great it would be until we walked onto the grass and walked up to the stage where there were only two people in front of us.  And, if we were pushier, we could have easily gotten up to the fence.

So, yes, we were about three people from the stage.  And just to make it better, the forecast predicted massive thunderstorms all night long, but by the time of the show, the clouds had parted and a cool breeze came in through the field.

As the show started a young girl walked out and sat at her keyboard and told us her name was Gracie.  Anyone who is a fan of Ben Folds knows he has a daughter named Gracie.  But those of us who have no concept of time passing still assume she is like 6 years old.  Well, she is 17 and she opened for her dad.  And that’s pretty awesome. (more…)

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The Flaming Lips (Live at Musikfest, Sands Steel Stage at PNC Plaza, Bethlehem, PA August 7, 2015)

Posted in Bethlehem, PA, CHAPPO, Musikfest, The Flaming Lips on August 9, 2015| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: August 7, 2015] The Flaming Lips

2015-08-07 20.46.40I have been a fan of the Flaming Lips for a pretty long time.  I saw them in 2000 on The Soft Bulletin tour and it was one of the most exciting concerts I had been to.  Wayne Coyne was a stellar frontman, and he spoke of love and happiness and togetherness and it was an amazingly positive experience.  So, when they broke out “She Don’t Use Jelly,” their goofy novelty hit from 1993 (which I was surprised by), and they released hundred of balloons into Irving Plaza, the whole atmosphere was filled with joy.

For that show, it was Wayne on vocals and gong (he played the gong a lot), Michael Ivins on bass and Steven Drozd on everything else.  For a drummer they used a video feed (of I believe Steven).  It was weird but it worked really well.  And even fifteen years later I remember it very fondly.

Well, in fifteen years, the Lips have gotten bigger, technology has gotten cheaper and more portable and Coyne’s ambitions have gotten more psychedelic.  And this was the most fun I have ever had at a concert when the set list was no where near one that I would have put together myself (more on that later).

So for this show, there were giant costumed characters on stage, there was a gigantic wall of video screens, there were confetti guns (mounted as well as hand held) and there were balloons (much bigger balloons than last time).  And yes, Wayne crawled out in the hamster ball. (more…)

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CHAPPO (Live at Musikfest, Sands Steel Stage at PNC Plaza, Bethlehem, PA, August 7, 2015) [THE FLAMING LIPS]

Posted in "Weird Al" Yankovic, Bethlehem, PA, CHAPPO, Musikfest, The Flaming Lips, Voirvoir on August 8, 2015| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: August 7, 2015] CHAPPO

2015-08-07 19.50.02I bought tickets to see the Flaming Lips at Musikfest (opening night headliners!).  By the time the show came around it was announced that there would be two opening acts.  Local Bethlehem band Voirvoir and Brooklyn band CHAPPO.  I had listened to the Voirvoir album streaming and I really liked it.  So I decided to get to the show at 6 to check them out.  Well, I didn’t realize how chaotic Musikfest was.  So between the parking and the shuttle bus and finally finding the venue I got to the band as their final chord rang out.  I didn’t even get to actually see them, just head then end of their last song.

But since I liked the stream I listened to, I bought the album… and it is fantastic.  I will post more about it shortly.  They are also playing again (3 times!) on Saturday at Musikfest, so I may try to bring the family down to check them out.

Since I was then plenty early for CHAPPO (whose music I didn’t stream because I knew I’d be seeing them), I walked around the grounds and checked things out.  And by the time I got back to the seats I was dehydrated and feeling a little unwell.  So even though I was in row H, I sat further back in the shade with a cold water.  And at first I wasn’t too impressed with CHAPPO.  The songs were good but I think the mix may have been off (or, more likely I wasn’t feeling great).

2015-08-07 19.24.10But I was watching the people up front having a great time, and I enjoyed that the singer was throwing things into the audience (turned out to be tubes with confetti (fun!)).  And I enjoyed watching the guitarist use a bow in his guitar (how many times this summer?).  And after a few songs, some water and the shade creeping into my section, I decided to head up to my seat.  And that when CHAPPO won me over. (more…)

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Modest Mouse (Levitt Pavilion, Steelstacks, Bethlehem, PA, July 20, 2015)

Posted in Bethlehem, PA, Gene Ween, Levitt Pavilion, Modest Mouse, Neil Young, Steelstacks, Ugly Casanova on July 22, 2015| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: July 20, 2015] Modest Mouse

2015-07-20 21.06.16Just as I had seen Neil Young less than a year ago, so I had seen Modest Mouse less than a year ago.  The last show I saw with them was a sort of preview of the then unreleased new album.  Now the album is out and there’s a single from it and everything.  This show was announced very quickly and it was in the Levitt Pavillion at Steelstacks, a venue I didn’t know, but which I will certainly return to.

It was awesome being about seven or 8 people away from Isaac to really watch him go nuts.

Modest Mouse can be really catchy, but they are often dissonant and Brock is known for being prickly.  So, imagine starting off your show with the third from the last song from your new album.  And from there, Brock sang and raged and jumped around and was a total maniac.

He seemed to get shocked twice (from sweating a lot?–it was 85 degrees at night) and said “Did you see that?  That hurt so much!”  And man can he yell. (more…)

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Gene Ween (Levitt Pavilion, Steelstacks, Bethlehem, PA, July 20, 2015) [MODEST MOUSE]

Posted in Bethlehem, PA, Gene Ween, Levitt Pavilion, Steelstacks, Ween on July 21, 2015| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: July 20, 2015] Gene Ween

2015-07-20 19.31.35I knew and liked Ween back in college. I stopped following them once they released their country album, so I was surprised to see just how many records they had released and just how respected they had gotten (relatively of course).

Dean and Gene Ween are from New Hope and they released dozens of records as Ween. Gene Ween (real name Aaron Freeman) quit the band in 2012, which basically dissolved the band.

Freeman released a few records under the name Freeman and some under Aaron Freeman and one or two under Gene Ween (not to be confusing or anything).  It seemed like he wanted to dissociate himself from Ween a bit, although since hardly anyone knew his real name, it seemed like a hard thing to do, which explains why he is touring as Gene Ween now.  And given that much of this show was made up of Ween songs, he’s clearly not ashamed of it or anything. (more…)

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Levitt Pavillion, Steelstacks, Bethlehem, PA: an amazing concert venue

Posted in "Weird Al" Yankovic, Bethlehem, PA, Modest Mouse, Steelstacks, The Flaming Lips on July 21, 2015| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: July 20, 2015] The Steelstacks Pavilion

2015-07-20 19.18.38We have been to the Sands Casino stage in Bethlehem three times.  The sound isn’t great, but it’s a close venue and that’s where we saw “Weird Al” from row three, so it will always be awesome to us.

But just a few blocks away there is the Steelstacks venue.  I’ll be seeing the Flaming Lips in the larger venue (I don’t even rally have a sense of where it is) in a few weeks.  But last night I saw Gene Ween and Modest Mouse in the Levitt Pavillion.  And while I’ll talk about the shows, I had to spend a few paragraphs talking about this amazing venue.

After going to Philly and spending $25 for parking that was almost a ten minute walk away, or traipsing to New York City ($14 just for the tunnel), imaging going to a venue and getting free, close parking (I sorta hoped that Modest Mouse would play “Convenient Parking, but they didn’t).  (more…)

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“Weird Al” Yankovic (Sands Bethlehem Event Center, Bethlehem, PA, June 16, 2015)

Posted in "Weird Al" Yankovic, Bethlehem, PA, C., Eminem, Funny (ha ha), Michael Stipe, Sands Bethlehem Event Center, T. on June 17, 2015| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: June 16, 2015] WEIRD AL YANKOVIC-Live at the Sands Bethlehem Event Center.

2015-06-16 19.58.17This is my sixth “Weird Al” concert, and this was the best one yet.  Indeed, this may have been the best concert I’ll ever see because I had third row seats, and I am certain I will never get the like of that again.  It was also T.’s first rock show.  (And C.’s second).  We used the big yellow ear muffs from the Monster Truck show and protected our precious kiddies’ ears.  S. and I opted not to wear plugs.  I decided not to because although it was loud, the sound was much better (and less painful) than when we saw Al in this venue two years ago.

I was supposed to get seats for my friend Matt and his family and I, but when I got the order in, I could only get 4 tickets, so he had to fend for himself.  He wound up getting VIP tickets, so although he was a few rows behind us, he did get a pretty cool pre-show extravaganza.  So we each had a win there. (more…)

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Barenaked Ladies (Sands Bethlehem Event Center, Bethlehem, PA, October 18, 2013)

Posted in Barenaked Ladies, Bethlehem, PA, Daft Punk, Led Zeppelin, Luke Doucet, Melissa McClelland, Sands Bethlehem Event Center, Styx, The Animals, Violent Femmes, Whitehorse on October 27, 2013| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: October 18, 2013] Barenaked Ladies

Sarah and I saw BNL this summer with our friend Megan, and the show was great.  That marked the fourth or fifth time that I’d seen them.  When we found out that they were coming through again (to the close to us and cool Bethlehem Sands) we thought it might be fun to see them again.  Especially with our friends Matt and Marisa who like them but had never seen them.  So we met up and had a very fun time.  We ate at Emeril’s Burgers and More.  The burger was good (although it took an incredibly long time for it to arrive).  The strange thing about the burger was that it was very crispy on the outside (which was good) but rather and odd shade of  pink on the inside (which may have been the lighting, but it was certainly pinker than usual for medium), but it was not juicy/bloody—how is something pink but not juicy?  It was weird.  But still rather tasty.

But back to the show.  Our seats were in Row 20, which was much better than our seats this summer. The pictures here are mine taken with my phone—they’re blurrier than I’d like, but not terrible.

And this show was a ton of fun and full of surprises.  They started with “Limits” an unexpected song from their new album.  And then they jumped into “Never is Enough” a surprise old song.  Ed always does an introductory rap (which no one ever includes in the setlists online for some reason).  This one, while not as good as the PNC Bank Center one was enjoyable.  Ed explained that he ran a half marathon that day on the Sands grounds.  Well, actually he ran a block but did cross the finish line (the band played along with Da Don’t Run Run).  It was very funny.  “Pinch Me” is the new crowd favorite.  Whereas they used to throw Mac and Cheese during $1,000,000, now they throw underwear.  And much hilarity ensues. (more…)

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Whitehorse (Sands Bethlehem Event Center, Bethlehem, PA, October 18, 2013) [BARENAKED LADIES]

Posted in Barenaked Ladies, Bethlehem, PA, Luke Doucet, Melissa McClelland, Rock duo, Sands Bethlehem Event Center, Whitehorse on October 26, 2013| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: October 18, 2013] Whitehorse

Whitehorse opened for Barenaked Ladies at the Bethlehem Sands (our new favorite slightly larger venue–even if the acoustics aren’t great, the seating is good and the prices reasonable–we were in the 20th row for this set, which was really perfect).

I had never heard of Whitehorse, so when I saw that they were opening for Barenaked Ladies, I wanted to see what they were all about.  I found a concert from Mountain Stage which was enjoyable but which I felt pigeonholed the band as a kind of country folk duo.  They weren’t exactly what I imagined when I thought of an opening band for BNL.  I actually wondered if BNL’s show would be more mellow in general, too.

Well, Whitehorse absolutely blew me away on stage.

They opened as I expected, with Luke Doucet and Melissa McClelland (who were solo performers and recently got married) playing guitars and singing into one microphone (that last part I didn’t expect).  They sounded great together.  And the song (“No Glamour in the Hammer”) was very nice—mellow folk with a hint of country.  And then things got really interesting.  They each moved to a different microphone.  McClelland switched to a bass, Doucet switched to an electric guitar.  And then they started playing some percussion—Doucet played a bass drum with his foot while playing the guitar.  Then he picked up some random percussion objects—small drums, maracas, even pots and pans—and hit them a few times.  And that’s when I realized they were looping the percussion and building the rest of the song from that.  McClelland played some keyboard and, at one point, she began singing into a distorted microphone to create some cool vocals which she also looped.  A video camera closeup revealed that the “microphone” was actually an old-fashioned telephone.  The first song went on for a pretty long time, building and growing and expanding  And by the end of the song the crowd was hooked.

What was completely evident was just how much fun they were having.  Both of them were smiling all the way through the set, in between singing of course.  They looked at each other and shared moments, thanked us and BNL and told good stories to lead up to the songs.  (more…)

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“Weird Al” Yankovic (Sands Bethlehem Event Center, Bethlehem, PA, June 4, 2013)

Posted in "Weird Al" Yankovic, Bethlehem, PA, Sands Bethlehem Event Center on June 11, 2013| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: June 4, 2103] “WEIRD AL” YANKOVIC-Live at the Sands Bethlehem Event Center

I’ve seen “Weird Al” live four times now and I have never been disappointed by the show.  The first year my friend Matt and I waited out by the bus and got the bands’ (minus Al’s) autograph.  The second time we waited even longer and Al had an autograph (and picture taking) session in the theater after the show (how cool is that?).  Two years ago Sarah and I went together (her first Al experience) and now for this show, Matt and his wife and son and Sarah and Clark and I all went together.  And we had 8th row seats.  Matt and his family hung around afterwards and got to meet him, but we took off (with a tired youngster).  But next time… we’ll wait the extra 30 minutes.

I was marveling that when Sarah and I saw him in 2011, he had just started this tour (Alpocalypse had not yet come out).  Here he is over two years later still touring this album.  And, good for him.  He changed the set list around a little bit (I’ve never understood how bands could play the exact same songs night after night) but the biggies are all there.

Comparing the sets, it’s cool to see how many different older songs he threw in the mix, and of course the great cover of “Radio Radio” (Elvis Costello).  This was a totally faithful cover of the song and I just learned from Wikipedia that he plays this as a tribute to Costello’s 1977 appearance on Saturday Night Live (it’s a long but fairly interesting story).  It turns out that whenever Al has a computer malfunction he says, “I’m sorry ladies and gentlemen there’s no reason to do this song here.  “Radio Radio” (watch the Elvis video here). (more…)

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