Two Great Shows Back to Back – Joseph Arthur El Rey, The Pogues The Wiltern

Update: Joseph Arthur and the Lonely Astronauts at the Troubadour November 9, 2006.

Made it over to LA in good time both nights, arriving at 7:30 in front of the El Rey

to see Joseph Arthur. Doors were supposed to be open at 7 so figured we wouldn’t be standing up at the stage, but doors didn’t open until 8:30 and David while talking to our friend Jack captured incredibly the spot right at the stage, where Joseph chose later that night to stand right above us. Gotta say I felt a bit uncomfortable being up so close – my ears were still ringing from our experience with Mew and Bloc Party. Ages varied around us, some seemed as old as us, but most of the people around us were definitely younger. Doesn’t matter if you love someone’s music. We both really have a thing for Joseph’s music and lyrics, incredibly touching brooding optimistic sounds. The vantage point we had gave us a different perspective of the stage, my initial scan of the stage was fascinated with the cords and assorted pieces of instruments scattered about the stage, some of them decorated by Joseph’s alien art, and attached to the organ to the right of the stage an album cover from the 60’s Miss Pat Collins the Hip Hypnotist “

taking me down a nostalgic road of seeing her on Mike Douglas, the Lucy Show, etc.“ that crazy hair, and hypnotism, what did it have to do with Joseph was my question? The opening act Annie Stela wasn’t my cup of tea, not that she and her band weren’t good, I just couldn’t get into her music, I was struck by these absurd thoughts from my vantage point I could see her shoes stomping out the beat as she sat in front of the Roland 3000 she was playing, and I could see her upper torso from about mid upper arm and my head kept thinking she was without arms, just singing in front of the organ – it wasn’t until she stood up to sing next to last song did I notice she had hands to play the organ – great song though – the drummer and bass player really were excellent musicians – just couldn’t get into the music/lyrics and the kind of folksy moved here from Michigan, wrote this wedding song for a friend thing – even to point where some unattached voice from behind us asked the singer if the couple were still married. Curtain closes, polite applause.

Sat around waiting for Joseph until 10 when he finally came out with his band that we had seen a few nights before on David Letterman. Of course David and I and probably everybody else thought they were going to have a nostalgic performance of all of our favorite songs by Joseph but from the very start you knew you were going to be treated to a whole set of music, hard rocking ballads with a hard edged band backing him up, some of the band members as well as Joseph were dressed up in particularly funky costumes, Joseph had this great orange looked like leisure suit thing with embroidery of some of his art, going well with his acoustic guitar that was covered with his drawings and small plastic dinosaurs glued onto the front panel of the guitar, and at the top of the fret board a plastic worm or snake, the guitarist behind him dressed in an aerobics suit from the seventies, fish net stockings fashionably torn at the buttocks, sweat band and impish smile, the drummer had the throwback look of a young Monkeys look alike and the organ player/guitarist to our right was dressed rather plainly – but he could play that guitar. Joseph was in fine form – up close we lost some of the finer points of the music, but it was great having him stand right above us, Dave A was a bit intimidated by having him stand directly over him, but no matter he really enjoyed the entire performance. Josephs and crew were recording the concert and sold Cds of the live performance after the show. The third piece of music Enough To Get Away/Slide Away was very evocative, Joseph towards the end of the song climbed above the drums and sang a howling dirge that was highlighted by the lights and smoke in the theater – really sent chills down my spine. At the end of the concert Dave A jumped up on to the stage and grabbed the set list off the floor of the stage:

Of course this is not the set list he actually played: here is the set list as far as I can tell from listening over and over to the live recording we bought
Too Much To Hide
Black Lexus
Enough To Get Away/Slide Away
Cocaine Feet
Electrical Storm
Devil’s Broom
September Song
Precious One
Good Life
Honey and the Moon
Famous Friends Along The Coast
Mercedes
In The Sun
Miss You

The new CD Nuclear Daydream is definitely worth purchasing. Joseph is supposed to play the Troubadour Nov. 9th.

Friday we raced over to the Wiltern so see The Pogues with Dirty Pretty Things, instead of Dirty Pretty Things, we got to see two unknown groups to us, Angel City Outlaws and Ollin, Angel City Outlaws were incredibly loud for an empty hall – it was early and LA audiences being who they are didn’t really show up until late into the Ollin set, but ACO were very good, kind of Clash meets up with 50s rock, lively set, enjoyed it a lot, and then the boys from East LA Ollin came out and did an incredible set, their Mexican Irish bent on the music was exciting and fun, everybody around us was rocking to their sound and they had the entire audience by the end of their performance in their hands – these guys are up and comers. The Pogues have not aged well looks wise, of course so have we – Shawn and crew had lost their hair, grown heavy or wiry, but boy did they put on a show, good solid Irish rock, lots of emotions, unfortunately I haven’t listened to them enough as of late, so words were not in my head to remember during the songs so I felt a bit off in keeping up with the emotions those around me were feeling. There was a lot of booze flowing around, lots of beer and whiskey, and there was shoving going on around us, as the show progressed everybody was feeling the emotions, by the time they went off the first time, the crowd had been banging around, pushing us up against the rail, by the time Fairytale in New York happened it was a full on jump dancing enjoyment, it isn’t often you get the crowd so wound up, last time we saw it was Bloc Party at the Palladium. Had a great sweaty time and I spent all day yesterday listening once again to Peace and Love and Hell’s Ditch.