Over the weekend Elizabeth fell in love with this band, and since they were playing a show, she wanted to go. She asked a bunch of us to come along, and as I got an invite, I said sure. Jane and Ruth were both going to come, but they didn't show up, so we left without them. I was disappointed, since I like hanging out with both of them. Ruth recently complained to me about Jane's behavior, so I wonder if neither of them showed up because they thought the other one might.
We took a cab, which I about never do. We split it four ways, so the good news is that I only owe Miriam five dollars for the night. (I am miserably bad with change, and didn't have any fives or ones to give her.)
The cab driver was totally awful. He sounded totally confused with Claire told him where to go. He kept repeating it as if he'd never heard of it before, and this makes me nervous. What is it with non-native English speakers repeating everything you say to them? It makes me wonder if they aren't understanding, which would be fine, if they would just ask. There's a guy at the caf that does the same thing. When he first started working there, this would really irk me, but now I mostly ignore it.
It took him a while to find it, and then he sort of just left us in the middle of the street. Um, gee, thanks? Claire told me she thought he was "absolute crap." Amen.
The concert was at this hotel. Actually, I'm honestly not sure if it was a hotel, because the ground level was a very dark bar, with all this wood paneling so it looked super fancy and old, like it would be the sort of place Victorian playboys or Edwardian lords or even flapper girls. I hate the phrase "old-timey" but that's what it reminded me of.
We went up these stairs, where everything was painted a kelly green. At the top was this bizarre room. It was a greenhouse on the roof of the building. The floor had hexagonal white and black tiles, like a bathroom (and again, an old bathroom, like something from the fifties) and Victorian streetlamps in the middle of the room. In one corner, the band was setting up. On the side opposite of where we entered, a very large and fancy bar was being set up.
We were early, which was weird, because Elizabeth thought we were going to be late.
No, instead we spent a lot time sitting around waiting.
The music they played while we waited was all very mod, very forgotten bits of the London 60's. I rather liked it. I used to listen to this music a lot as a young girl, but I haven't for ages.
I feel a little badly about admitting this, but I was not happy with the other sorts of people at this gig. There were a lot of women there, and a lot of them were tall and leggy and clearly could be models. I am not a beautiful person; I felt uglier than normal there. There were also a lot of hipsters there, and I could feel myself roll my eyes internally at them.
Claire asked me where I had gotten my outfit, which was the same one I had worn out a few weeks back when I went out with Erin and Carrie. I told her I had mostly gotten it second hand. The dress, belt and pants were all very cheap, and considering how good I looked, I was pretty pleased with this. The sweater was my Mom's, on loan. And the underwear and panties I had on underneath were mine, along with the socks and tennis shoes. (Aren't you glad to hear that?) "I spent about fifteen dollars on this outfit, overall" I told her, which is pretty damn good. She was impressed.
At this point, a man sidled up to us. He was with a girl. He looked Mediterranean, with the dark eyes and hair and beard. Usually, I would find someone like this attractive, but the skin around his eyes was all red and there was something about him that was off.
For some strange reason Claire felt the need to tell him I was a bit rambunctious. He didn't grin but said "Tell me more." Oh ew. Okay, moving on.
The opening act was this young man from a band who was just playing solo. He was okay. He was playing a very country/blues kind of sound, which normally would be fine, but the crowd clearly wanted to party, and here he was, sort of killing the mood with all these sad songs about girls leaving him. He had one about, I kid you not, driving out on New Orleans during Katrina.
How old is this guy? I thought. He looked my age or slightly older. He was near New Orleans during Katrina?
He was also weirdly egotistically. Like, he had this whole thing where he acted as if he was amazing, and although his playing was quite good, there was nothing about him that was memorable (other than maybe his strange self). He seemed to be playing mostly as a way of pushing himself on the audience.
He talked to much, and Claire didn't like him or his music and she didn't like that he was swearing. At one point, she said something under her breath about the swearing, and it was at the perfect moment, because a hush just happened to fall on the audience right then, and everyone heard her. Claire covered her mouth in embarrassment, and I roared with laughter.
The guy continued playing slow songs. There was something about him that was really awkward, but he also seemed really oblivious about it.
"Did you think you were the best I ever had?" he sang. I found myself thinking that if anyone had him at all, he'd be terribly lucky.
Finally, he realized his slow songs were slowly killing everyone, because midway through one he said "Fuck it. I'm going to play something uptempo." And he did and it was surprisingly, mercifully, better than what had been happening.
Afterwards, he announced he was going to send free zip files with full studio albums from his band to all of us, and curious, I signed up for it. Unfortunately, this meant having to go up and talk to him in person, which honestly, I wasn't really interested in doing. He shook my hand and he seemed okay, though still a little full of himself. He talked to me as if I should immediately think he was a genius, and this annoyed me.
