Headed up to Sacramento Saturday night for the Electronic Music Festival at Townhouse Lounge. The lounge has two levels, two bars, $3 beer before 11. Got in some trouble in the artist lounge… some dude pulled out a taser and failed to slam the door in anger. haha. And a big downside…. the place has awful sounds system, or the person running it sucks. And especially during an electro show… you need a good sound system, disappointing.
Some guy was finger painting on the wall while DJ’s did sets. Was semi interesting.
Caught some of Paper Pistols which was electro with a drummer, and from what I heard I enjoyed it. Next was Sister Crayon, who remind me of old Portishead, Bird and the Bee, and Blonde Redhead. They have a very unique sound. The singer has an incredible voice, rad keyboards and the drummer is amazing. Check out their songs “Here We Never Die” and ‘Souls of Gold” my fave. This band is going to be huge… now if they can just play at a venue that has a decent sound system and someone who knows how to use it.
Sister Crayon
Keyboards (Sister Crayon)
Tycho
Tycho was INCREDIBLE! I have been obsessed with his CD for weeks. It reminds me somewhat of Cut Copy (without the lyrics) and The Radio Department. And so worth seeing live, his visuals on the background screen with clip of the ocean and Antarctic are beautiful. Not to mention Scott Hansen (Tycho) is as beautiful as his music and art. Check out the CD Past is Prologue. I love the tracks “Send and Receive” both versions and ” A Circular Reeducation”. Also he has a blog called ISO50 and is an artist who does graphic design. Check out his stuff.
Saturday night at Hotel Utah to watch my cousins band The Murkins. I love the Utah, they have amazing food! Their homemade vegan burger is soooo gooood, comes with fries and is $9. $5 beer on tap, although I was dissapointed that they got rid of their yummy Hebrew beer. As far as venues go, this place is awesome for little acoustic shows, they have a house piano. The stage is decent sized and although there’s not a lot of room for standing there are plenty of places to sit and an upstairs balcony to watch from.
Hesperian
First band up was Hesperian, a kind of metal/noise/ rock band, I enjoyed them actually. Their drummer was the highlight I thought. Took a few songs for me to get into them but thought the music got a little repetitive. Half way through their set the cops showed up outside and provided some pretty rad lighting through the saloon window. Haha, They’re playing a show at the Hemlock later this month.
Murkins
Cousin B
Murkins came on and the place was friggin packed. I really appreciated their sleek appearance, I think men need to bring back the vest… nothing classier than a man in a vest. But seriously they were amazing. Everyone commented on my cousin B’s skills on guitar. And their cover of the Beatles was my favorite of the night, I haven’t heard a good Beatles cover live…. ever. The Bowie closer was a perfect ending. I can’t get their song Reverb Flood outta my head (I’m a sucker for distortion). Anyway stoked for their next show!
Lunch at Imperial Tea Court in the Fairy Building on Saturday. Sooooooo gooooood!!! go there and eat, right now go! They serve all kinds of amazing exotic teas. My favorite being the Lychee Black… amazing with a hint of lavender. they also serve vegan dim sum and hot spicy soup. Apparently the place is a smaller version of the Powell Street original. They are also located in Berkeley. The decor is kinda lame but I bet the one in Berkeley is better. The owner (Mr. Fong) is an ordained Daoist priest and tea expert who directs tea tours in China. They offer tea classes at the Berkeley location. I’m for sure checking out the Berkeley store soon.
Picket up some macaroons at Miette, the lady got my order wrong so i was kinda disappointed. There is an outside ice skating rink across from the Fairy Building. It’s open to the public from 10a.m. to 10 p.m. and is $9.50 and $3.50 for skate rental. I have to admit I’ve never been ice skating and always wanted to try it. Slightly fearful of falling and getting a concussion. So we ended up walking up to North Beach to check out City Lights Bookstore and Vesuvio, the famous beat poet hangout. Sadly we didn’t have time for a drank, that’s o.k. thought, last time I was there a drunk waitress was throwing empty beer bottles at my girlfriend. Good times.
Saw Japandroids play at the Rickshaw Stop (one of my favorite venues) on Sunday. Surfer Blood opened the show and were actually worth watching. I’d download their music. Japandroids were pretty good, a punk/rock drum guitarist duo from Washington. The drummer is really good. The guitarist/singer is…strange. He had a fan on stage blowing his hair around and maybe spent too much time in LA, haha. Fun show though.
Went to dinner at Noodle Theory in the Marina Friday night. Delicious! They have all types of noodle dishes and soups, and most things can be made vegetarian and a few vegan. The waitress was really nice when I asked her about vegan options. I had the Tofu and Veggie Garlic Noodle. The sauce was rich and amazing, the tofu was perfect and the noodles were large like soba.
After we stopped by Miette, on Chestnut, it’s my favorite patisserie in the city. They make these amazing macarons with wild flavors like rose and lavender. They never have the rose pastels anymore, which sucks. But the store itself is to chic and beautiful.
We went and saw New Moon after, and it was soooo gooood! If you’re a Twilight fan go see it! otherwise, you’re missing out. Seeing Taylor Lautner half naked the entire film is enough reason…. every girl in the theatre was screaming when he was on the screen. haha.
The Mountain Goats played Saturday night at The Fillmore. Final Fantasy a.k.a Owen Pallet opened the show. He was amazing, great voice+ violin= hella good musak. I was late for the show so we only caught the last two songs of his set but he was soooo good! He played a few songs with The Mountain Goats too. Check him out though, I would totally see him play again.
Hiked Alamere Falls in Bolinas Saturday Morning. Tried to get up there early enough but didn’t start the hike till 11 a.m.. It’s a relatively easy hike with moderate uphill parts, in the sun and in the trees, I’d say bring hiking boots, and a swimsuit!!
First Lake
About a half hour into the hike there is a small lake you can swim in with a small field nearby to eat/drink/sleep on. You pass by two other lakes on the way to the falls. The last part of the hike gets tricky. You walk through a tunnel of brush with about two feet of passage. Poison oak too, so I bathed in tecnu when i got home.
Lower Falls
Looking down the cliff
You also have to climb down a small cliff to get to the beach, it’s all slate too that’s crumbling, so it’s kinda sketch but soooo worth it! The lowest part of the falls hits the beach.
The beach is amazing, there are a ton of tide pools to check out the sea stars and sea anemones. And At the very end of the beach by the cliffs there is a hot spring coming straight out of the ocean floor, the water is hot and smells like rotten eggs, kinda crazy.
Tide pools!
Sea Stars!
sea anemones!
Ocean hot spring
So we headed out the hike out is nearly all uphill. The views are amazing, beautiful day!
Went down to Santa Cruz to watch Vampire Weekend at The Catalyst Sunday night. The venue is really chill and reminds me of The Great American in SF with the balconies around the stage. For some insane reason though their door security sucks. They make you wait in lines according to gender and it’s a pain cause it takes forever! Also they won’t let you drink on the floor while watching the bands play, suck!
The show was amazing though it started at 9 and ended at 10:15… shortest set I’ve ever seen! But Vampire Weekend are hella good live. Kind of like Island/Punk/Ska music. The drummer is sooo good! They played a lot from the new album Horchata (the new stuff is hella good!) and a lot of old stuff like Mansard Roof, Oxford Comma, Walcott and A-Punk…. kinda bummed they didn’t play Bryn.
Sea Lions
After the show we went down to the warf, I had no idea you could drive onto it. We watched the sea lions bite and yell at each other and the waves were pretty massive against the cliffs. I love Santa Cruz.
Headed out to Mighty for the Boys Noize show Saturday night. Got there about midnight and there was a line around the building of people hoping to get last minute tickets. Mighty is a pretty awesome club, except the pillars all over the room make it really hard to see, the bartenders are fast, but the drinks aren’t that strong, DNA lounge is better, their drinks are cheap/strong and the bartenders are fast.
So we caught the last hour of dJ Nisus, who was really good, kinda jungle/electro. But Boys Noize killed it. We danced hella hard. The bass during Boys Noize went through my whole body it was ridiculous! He played a lot of the new stuff from Power, highlight of which was Starter. He played a lot of older stuff too like OH!, I- robots. the highlight of the show for me was when he played My Moon My Man, people went nuts. I’m always impressed when DJ’s re-mix their stuff for live shows so it’s not repetitive. Amazing show!
I have to make a post about the epicness of Boys Noize and how damn excited I am to see them next month at Mighty. I danced so hard during their set at Coachella I nearly fainted… they’re that good! New album is INCREDIBLE! check it out!
