Some Good Shit Happened in 2008!

I realize it's a little "late in the season" to be reminiscing on 2008. Most "Year in Review" type things normally happen in late December or early January. However, recently I found myself thinking over the events of this past year and how much good shit went down. There were little things, like drunken moments of euphoric bliss while rocking out at a show. Others were more significant like exciting vacations, and age milestones. It's actually pretty difficult to do, but I mentally scanned through some of "best of" moments of the year and came up with a little list. I encourage you to do the same, and leave me a comment on your 2008 highlights!

Some highlights from 2008 (In no particular order):

* Going on cruise down to Cabo San Lucas

* The election of a transformative individual that has offered me a lot of hope and enthusiasm for the future of our country.

* Turning 30 in a weekend of drunken debauchery with good friends and family in Vegas

* Spending Thanksgiving with an incredible group of friends

* Acquiring a new buddy in my pet hamster "Fire Chief Emily"

* Watching live music by Subtle, Stephen Malkmus, Why?, and all of the bands at Bumbershoot

* Enjoying the holidays down in "Ball-Sacramento" with my Mom and brothers

* Playing music with good friends in a band I'm extremely excited about

* Hosting a blow-out, wild ass Halloween party featuring the annual performance of Bear Driving Car

* The Why? album being released and given the opportunity to interview front man Yoni Wolf. Seriously. (I realize I'm obsessed).

* Winning the 5th Annual Mandarin Gate Open Karaoke Championships. This didn't really happen, but you can imagine what it would be like if it had!

Andy on NPR!

My brother Andy was featured on a recent NPR story about crab fisherman in Northern California. There's some cool video, photos, and the whole audio story here:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=98788991

(sorry the link doesn't work, I still can't figure out how the hell to make that happen on here)

The story is entitled, "Fishermen Make Mad Dash For Dungeness Crab." That statement is completely true. It's like the wild, wild west with no regulation. The season opens, and fisherman scramble like hell to catch as much crab as possible. As far as I know, there's no limitation to the number of crab pots you can use, the number of crab caught, or the time you can spend crabbing. It seems the larger boats have a bit of an advantage, but I'm not sure I believe in a socialistic/communistic (is that word?) approach where crabbing would be limited by the government. Maybe the fisherman should figure it out for themselves?



I worked on a small Dungeness Crab boat for two seasons down in beautiful Crescent City, CA. It was a great, educational experience. It's difficult work, and I personally wouldn't want to make it my career, but I see why people do. It was also fun to tell people about when I came back to Seattle and they hadn't seen me in a while. "Ben, what have you been up to?" "Oh, I've been in a small town catching crabs." That statement might, in fact have come true if I had spent more time at C.C. nightspot "Everette's."

Excellent Headline I Saw Today

Man accused of selling daughter for cash, beer
Police say father tried to get 14-year-old back after plan fell apart

GREENFIELD, Calif. - Police have arrested a Greenfield man for allegedly arranging to sell his 14-year-old daughter into marriage in exchange for $16,000, 100 cases of beer and several cases of meat.

After reading this, one thing ran through my mind: "I can't wait to have kids, I can only imagine how much meat and beer I'll be able to trade them for!"

Also, this is my 5th blog of the day, which I believe is a new record. Since I started slacking at the end of last year, my goal for this year was to write one to three blogs a week, and look at this - five in one day!

Best Interpretation Video Ever

This is the video that made me obsessed with metal interpretation. It's done to a song by a band called "Trivium" that I know nothing about. As you may have seen a while back on this very blog, I made my own interpretation video to one of my roomate's songs. It was titled, "Feel the Touch of Distant Goats." Anyway, watch this, it's one of my favorite things in the whole world. "BOAT, RUDDER, STRANGE MOUNTAIN!!!"

My Band is Playing This Weekend

Just as the title says, my band, "The Vague Prophets" is playing this weekend. The show is Saturday at Goofy's in Crown Hill. I don't know how effective of a promotional "tool" my blog is, mostly I just wanted to post the cool flyer my drummer made. Nice work, Joey!

Best Albums of 2008

I had to come up with my "top 5" albums of 2008 for a website I do some freelance writing on. My editor wrote a great piece about how overall, 2008 was lacking in any true "masterpieces." He made the point that as critics, we're happy to argue the importance of albums over drinks with other music dorks (I've done this very thing with Vampire Weekend's album on numerous occasions), but there wasn't anything phenomenal released this last year. I almost agreed with him, except for the Why? record. I stand by my statement that it will be recognized in the future as a landmark recording. By the way, I've been seeing "Alopecia" on numerous "best of 2008" lists. Here's my list (not in order) of the top 5 records of the year:



1. WHY? - Alopeica
Hands down the best album of the year.



2. Howlin Rain - Magnificent Fiend
Former Comets on Fire guy gets signed by Rick Rubin's American Recordings, refines his stoney hippie jam rock, and releases a stunner of an LP.

Howlin Rain not only released one of my favorite records of the year, but also my favorite album cover. A song off the album contains the line, "One you were a magnificent fiend, Eyes like electric eels." I'm not sure if this is a Hunter S. Thompson reference or not, but it's bad ass either way!



3. Grand Archives - The Grand Archives
"The Archives" debut is full of sunny pop hooks, delicate vocal harmonies and excellent post-folk.



4. Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend
They were called many things this year. Derivative, over-hyped, Ivy League snobs, etc. When you get pass all of that, Vampire Weekend released a record of insanely catchy, accessible indie pop. What's so wrong with that?



5. Radiohead - In Rainbows
The sound of Radiohead becoming comfortable with themselves and releasing exactly the album they should at this point in their career.

Sub Pop is a Good Record Label

I'm finding more and more of my album purchases have been from Seattle's own Sub Pop label. The first album from the label I bought (like many people) was Nirvana's Bleach, which also happens to be their only platinum record.

This last Summer the label celebrated their 20th birthday. There was a two day festival out at Marymoor Park, and I attended one of the days courtesy of my friend Julie. It was amazing to see Wolf Parade, Green River, Foals, Grand Archives, Comets on Fire (most likely their last show!) and Kinski all in one day.

The label has continually found innovative music from all over the world. From the electro-pop of The Postal Service to the new "post-folk" movement that seems to be going on with bands like Fleet Foxes, Grand Archives, Iron & Wine, etc., Sub Pop keep things fresh without restricting themselves to one genre.



I once referred to Sub Pop as, "a music critic's wet dream." None of their artists (with the exception of Nirvana, The Postal Service and The Shins) will sell millions of records, but they continue to have credibility and remain relevant.

Here's a list of some of their albums I've bought in the last two years that I've especially enjoyed:

Band of Horses - Cease to Begin
Grand Archives - The Grand Archives
Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes
Foals - Antidotes
Iron and Wine - The Shepherd's Dog
Comets on Fire - Avatar
Kinski - Down Below It's Chaos

PURE COUNTRY GOLD

Pure Country Gold is a two-piece garage rock band from Portland. They are also, "arguably Portland's best bluesman. . ."

I've known Patrick (guitar/vocals) for probably about 8 years. He played in a few bands around Arcata including "Petey and the Associates" and "ScoPac." They play Seattle on a fairly regular basis, and our house has become their "Seattle home." Patrick was upset (jokingly) when Chuck moved into the house and "took over his room." Their music is fun, danceable, and very entertaning to see live.

It's been cool to see their progression musically and their popularity level grow. I now hear their songs on the radio and watch fans sing along at their shows.



Jake is without a doubt one of my favorite drummers to see live. He plays hard, consistent and is technical while playing what is appropriate for the song. He's also fun to drink with. One of my favorite quotes of his was, "let's go back to your house, drink a lot of beer and stay up late!"



Here's Patrick relaxing at the house this last weekend with my hamster "Fire Chief Emily." I wish I would have stayed up a little later, as I understand he fell asleep in the chair and started snoring while wearing the turkey hat!

P.C.G.'s self titled album on Empty Records made my top 10 list for 2007. Check that out, or go to their website to learn more:

www.purecountrygold.com

www.myspace.com/purecountrygold

New Year's Eve!

My friend Michelle was nice enough to put me on the guest list and get me a "Backstage V.I.P." pass for a show at The Paramount on New Years. I wasn't too excited to see The Presidents of the United States of America, but wanted to see Monotonix (Michelle is their booking agent) and hang out with some old friends from Humboldt. Rather than write a long, drawn out story about the night, I've decided to post photos with captions. . .



This is Ami, the singer from Monotonix doing a little "crowd surfing" on a drum, which he also somehow managed to play. Monotonix is a 3 piece "garage rock" band from Tel Aviv, Israel. They've been receiving a lot of attention lately for their over the top, chaotic live performances. I overheard the drummer from The Presidents telling them how he was a huge fan and had seen them play at The Comet Tavern before. Monotonix got flown out from Tel Aviv, and received a "generous" amount of money for their single show at The Paramount.



This is how I arranged the food in The President's green room while they were playing. I hope they liked it!



I got to stand right on the side of the stage for The President's set, a pretty sweet spot! For some reason, the balloons didn't come down right at midnight, which Jake (Michelle's roomate in New York) said was a "bad sign" for the New Year. They actually came down sometime around 1:00 AM. Strange.



This is Michelle and my friend Ryan Carlisle. They were both very involved in the music "scene" in Humboldt, and I've stayed in touch with them over the years.



Leigh (Ryan's friend from Portland) Ryan and I



This is the mandatory, "I'm drunk and posing with the guitarist from P.U.S.A." shot. They actually were nice guys, and for some reason had no complaints about our "crew" hanging out in the green room, drinking their booze for about two hours.

After leaving The Paramount we went to a house party of some friend of Leigh's. I finally made it home around 5:30 AM. It was a pretty amazing night overall, I met a lot of people, got to see Monotonix for the first time, and of course got silly drunk.

One More "Snoto"

This was what our house looked like on Christmas Eve. . .by far the most snow I've seen in Seattle!