From The Back Row

Almost a week since I got back from the ACL Festival. Some really good bands, some crappy bands, some bands I didn’t even see. Lots of walking. Sunday night however, Kramer almost stole the show with two epic performances of “Stranglehold” in back-to-back 6th Street bars. The first was at The Thirsty Nickel:

The second perf was at Maggie Mae’s, which is incidentally right next door. If last call hadn’t been approaching, I’m confident a third performance could have been arranged.

Only 4 hours waiting in line the day after they went onsale. All pictures taken at Apple Store – The Falls here in Miami

well, not Arcadia per se and not really on fire (just brush as of this writing)… but we’re “monitoring” the situation as we’re not in the path but friends perhaps could be

Traveled down the Wilshire Corridor last night to The Black Keys show at the Wiltern. Opener Jay Reatard was solid and in fact I commented “It’s like they can’t help but rock”. They probably aren’t for everyone, including the usual LA poseur crowd that was in attendance (I’m calling them “The Wiltern Subscribers” because they are at every show). The Black Keys were phenomenal, totally blowing my face off. They could’ve played longer and at times I was wishing we were back at the Troubadour since even I had trouble seeing over people’s heads. The new stuff is just as teeth grinding as the old with catchy choruses you can jump in place to (I just bob my head).

Really more “exhibition” than “game”

*Additional photos can be found in my Flickr feed to the right
*Sports TV Production has a writeup