GAYNGS "Affilyated" at First Ave- Six Hours of Doomtree-harmar-deathsquads-megafaun-slapping-solidgold LOVE.

This Sunday night, the best thing ever to hit 69 bpm once again blew the roof off First Avenue, as the mostly-local supergroup, GAYNGS, reunited in Minneapolis for the first time since their debut show, "The Last Prom on Earth," played two nights at First Ave almost a year ago.

Just to see the GAYNGS gang all together again would have been draw enough for the hundreds of people who showed up on Sunday, but the group took it a step further and made the evening into its very own local music showcase:"Affilyated," by opening up the Mainroom, 7th St Entry, and the Record Room to over twenty different acts, all associated (or Affilyated har har har) with GAYNGS in some way.

The show, which held the same title as the recently released Doomtree regrind of GAYNGS' debut album (listen to and download it here), was a definite nod to heavy ties with the Minneapolis hip-hop collective, with solo sets by Dessa, POS, Cecil Otter, Mike Mictlan, and Lazerbeak in the Record Room, and an incredible whole-crew blowout in the mainroom right before GAYNGS finally went on at about 1am.

With shows going on simultaneously in all three First Ave spaces all night, it was impossible to catch every one, but the crew and I made it around to as many as we could, rubbing shoulders with some of the most talented and humble artists the Shiver Cities have ever produced.

 

Stefan Alexander, aka P.O.S.

Yep, he was actually that close... I think all shows should be in the Record Room from now on.

Every man and woman in the room forgot about their boyfriends, girlfriends, husbands, or wives when Dessa came in...

Dessa, killing it.

Even bears in moonboots were welcome at the drumtastic Marijuana Deathsquads show.

Mike Mictlan and Dessa in the Mainroom with the Doomtree crew.

GAYNGS.

Dessa and J. Vernon with GAYNGS.

Har Mar Superstar spent a good portion of the GAYNGS set muggin' it on a speaker... this, of course, was after he came in and sang "One More Try" in a white cape. YES.

I love when a band creates a hand sign that basically encourages you to flip them off all night.

Let's be serious... this was the highlight of my night. DOOMTREE!

I hope you were there too, folks - if not, the next time you hear "GAYNGS" and "First Avenue" in the same sentence, you'd better get it together!

-K

I'm Afraid of Virginia Woolf

Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf, Virginia Woolf, Virginia Woolf? Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf, early in the morning.....

This little ditty, which starts out as an attempt to remember funnier times, becomes, over the course of a few hours, the haunting theme song of some of the most despicable and tragic characters to ever grace the stage. In Edward Albee's seminal play, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, now going on at The Jungle theater in Uptown Minneapolis, the play's three-hour duration simply flies by. Who can think about time, or anything else outside the darkened theater for that matter, when the lives of four people are being eviscerated on the stage in front of you?

It is perhaps the most violent play I've ever seen, and yet there is never a drop of blood spilled. Daggers are thrown verbally between each character, hitting their mark each time, and every highball glass that is strewn around Bain Behlke's fitting set might as well have been one part gin, two parts arsenic, because with every drink the audience can see what is left of Albee's tragic characters slipping away.

It would not suffice to call The Jungle's production "astounding." The magnificent mounting of the play, spearheaded by Bain Behlke and starring Michelle Barber, Stephen Yoakum, Sean Michael Dooley (filling in for Sean Neely, who was sidelined due to a medical emergency), and Jane Froiland, was sickening, and also one of the BEST I've ever had the pleasure of seeing.

The play, written by Albee in 1962, takes place between 2 a.m. and dawn at the home of George (Yoakam) and Martha (Barber), a middle-aged married couple who have invited young newcomers Nick (Dooley) and Honey (Froiland) over for a drink after a faculty mixer put on by Martha's father, the president of the university the men teach at. Over the next few hours, George and Martha succeed in plunging to new lows in their own volatile relationship while pulling Honey and Nick down with them. This is not to say that the rift created between Honey and Nick is solely because of the older couple's actions: in the production, Behlke succeeds in showing the audience that although Nick and Honey seem naive, happy, and fresh-faced when they walk in George and Martha's door, there is almost as much bubbling under the surface of their relationship as there is with the other pair - who spend half the production verbally abusing one another.

The play is scathingly funny, and despite the relationship bloodbath that is in progress, the talented actors managed to draw a laugh out of the audience whenever Albee's intelligent dialogue called for it. Speaking of the talent of the play's cast, it would be wholly unfair not to recognize what REALLY had me on the edge of my seat for three hours: Stephen Yoakam and Michelle Barber. I have never had the pleasure of seeing either of these Twin Cities mainstays in action before, and after seeing their work in Virginia Woolf, I feel I have been cheating myself from the best of what our fair cities have to offer. Barber was both frail and vulnerable and a legitimate ball-crusher at many times throughout the play. Where many actors would have failed at their attempt to exude Martha's scathing wit and callousness, Barber was able to use her physical presence and vocal authority to bring each and every verbal bitch-slap to life. She was as believable as they come - which she was able to do in no small part because of the believability that Albee infused into the play's intense and never-ending dialogue. The characters speak as if they were having a real conversation - something that may seem obvious, but that few scripts or screenplays are able to actually accomplish.

As George, Stephen Yoakam was able to transition perfectly and timely through each and every phase his character visits throughout the night. It is difficult to play one character, much less several throughout a play - and although George remained George, Yoakam was sure to keep his portrayal of the washed-up historian in exactly the spot he needed to be at exactly the right time. If ever someone had a perfect voice for the stage, it is Yoakam. If at any point in the show I became distracted, it was because I was concentrating too hard on how Yoakam delivered his lines - to someone with a musical affinity like mine, it was a joy to listen to.

Not to call out the two lead actors specifically, because Sean Dooley and Jane Froiland did a fantastic job in their own right. Dooley played Nick as the curious youngster - attracted to Martha, nay, anything with breasts, while both physically shunning his own wife and being hyper-aware of anything that came out of her mouth at the same time. Dooley shone in the part, and his natural affinity with Albee's lines and their directed delivery (lines he had less than one week to learn, mind you) was impressive.  Although Froiland occasionally became cartoonish in her portrayal of Honey, she succeeded beautifully in following Honey through the many stages her character visits after she has a few glasses of brandy and the ugly side of her relationship with Nick. Although Albee only hints at it in his dialogue, Froiland also succeeds in bringing attention to a dimension of Honey that many Virginia Woolf audiences never get to see - her probable history of sexual abuse, when, wide-eyed and fear-stricken, Honey drunkenly believes she is somewhere else, in a memory where she screams "I don't want to anymore, get away."

The Jungle's production of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf is theater at its best, and the entire cast, crew, and the production staff deserve the credit they clearly worked very hard for. I encourage everyone to go see it for themselves - and to leave some time after the play for decompression and thought about this pivotal work in American theater, done, I believe, how Edward Albee would have wished.

For more information, and tickets, go to The Jungle's website.

-K

When Local Music Made Love: GAYNGS

Ear-Candy Cocktail

This year is certainly turning out to be a bright one musically. The most recent addition to this spring's music goodness is a new project by, well, a s#*t ton of local and regional artists (and some out-staters), called GAYNGS. The project, which will be releasing their first album, Relayted, on May 11, includes members of Bon Iver, Megafaun, Lookbook, and Solid Gold, as well as P.O.S., Dessa, Michael Lewis (Andrew Bird's sax player), and many more. The hype alone could sell their record, but as happenstance would have it, the music always brings it home, and no matter how many pretty faces have shown up to be a part of Gayngs, the sound coming out of their first two released tracks, "The Gaudy Side of Town," and "Faded High," is what will have me lining up at the record store in a few weeks.

Additionally, they will be playing two shows at (surprise surprise) First Avenue on May 14, one at 5pm and one at 10. 

Here's a first listen of the two released tracks on Myspace.

-K

Head's Up!: Basilica Block Party

Summer is almost here! Well, sort of- it is certainly in sight, anyways. With summer comes a wealth of opportunity and, if you're lucky enough to live here in the Twin Cities, it means it is outdoor concert season.

Aside from The Current's Rock the Garden show (lineup not announced yet, sorry folks!), there are countless other gigs happening this summer that have been announced already, including the amazing Basilica Block Party over at the Basilica of St. Mary in Loring neighborhood.

The Block Party is heading into its 16th year, and they are doing it with a little help from some very talented friends, including Spoon, Weezer, The Avett Brothers, and Ingrid Michaelson, to name a few. I find it incredibly amusing that I rave about Spoon's show last weekend as First Ave and recommend that everyone try and see them if they get the chance because, well, here's your chance! The lineup isn't even finalized yet, but those are the headliners, with more band slots to be filled soon. I had a feeling Spoon would come back soon - we gave them a damn good showing last Friday and Saturday at First Ave, and they gave us some damn good concerts in return.

The block party spans over two days, July 9 and 10, and tickets go on sale this Saturday at 10am at Electric Fetus or on Ticketmaster. For more info, click this link.

Hope to see you there!

-K

A Love Rekindled: Spoon Plays MPLS at First Ave

Minneapolis is special. I've always known this deep down in my heart-of-hearts, but when the band that was literally once named "top overall artist of the decade" decides to play two back-to-back shows in our dear city, one on the 40th anniversary of First Avenue, we've really got something to smile about. Best yet, I was lucky enough to have snagged a pair of tickets to see Spoon in their 21+ performance at First Ave last night (tonight's gig is 18+, also sold out, sorry folks!).

All I can say is "WOW." Spoon is a truly fantastic group. I've had an ongoing love affair with their music for many years, but there is really nothing to rekindle your devotion to a band's sound like seeing them live, hoping they play the songs you love, and screaming for them to come back for more once they have finally left the stage. I had to laugh because the girl standing near me at the show kept saying, dumbfounded over the music, "I can't believe it, they sound just like their recordings!" I wanted to tell her that unless a band sounds just as good as their album or better, they really aren't worth seeing, but I decided against it, figuring by her look of sheer delight, she already knew that she'd spent her money well, and so had I.

Despite running into the abysmal traffic situation that was the downtown area on the first night the Twins played at the new Target Field (cue me cursing loudly when we turned onto 1st Ave and right into traffic cops and road blockades), we managed to get to First Ave early enough to get a good spot in line. In another fortuitous turn of events, I also managed to snag a spot right up against the stage due to the people in front of me in line's inability to prioritize (standing spot first, then hit the bar) and I got to ogle Britt Daniel from two feet away and catch a glimpse of the set list at his feet (a set list that I later got to take home!)

It was an incredibly fulfilling show - the way concerts should be. The band's energy was high, the audience was involved but not invasive to the music, and between the show and the two encores of three songs each the band ended up playing (yeah, I screamed long and hard for those, even as others were giving up, damn straight) all of my favorite Spoon songs, even some of the more obscure, were played at peak performance. The sound was great, whoever did their lighting design was a genius, and Spoon held true to their tradition of creating a wholistic album by creating a nicely-planned concert in songs they chose to play, which spanned their entire career but seemed to all fit together perfectly. My personal favorite performance was "The Ghost of You Lingers" which had an almost eighties-esque Annie Lennox vibe that never would have come across on a recording, and it sounded great.

If any of you were at the show, give me a shout out, and for those of you who weren't, watch for another chance to see Spoon live, I promise it'll be worth it.

Britt, after it got too hot to wear leather anymore

More Britt, as I was right in front of him, it was

hard to get a good shot of many of the other band members!

The setlist, main show on the left, 

with encore options upside-down on the right.

-K

Happy Birthday Current!

The Crowd from above

Q: So what does spending almost an entire Friday in front of a computer hitting the "refresh" button get you?

A: Four member pre-sale tickets to 89.3 The Current's 5th Birthday Party at First Avenue.

WIN.

After being one of the hundreds of MPR members who helped crash First Ave's ticket-buying server during the member pre-sale, I persevered and basically sat by the computer all day to finally get my four glorious ($6 a piece) tickets to the local-music studded party that happened last week at First Avenue, celebrating five years of truly great music for the Twin Cities.

The lineup was The Twilight Hours, Lookbook, Mason Jennings, POS, and Solid Gold, all local acts that have been able, much in part because of the Current, to make it big outside the Cities. My favorites initially were Mason Jennings and POS, but I also really enjoyed Lookbook's synth-pop airyness and their singer's visceral wails, which I'm sure reminded most people there, myself included, of Karen O's signature sound-offs in the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. 

Here are some pics of the shindig, which also featured free catered food from Red Stag Supper Club (free oysters, I kid you not), Solera, and other TC foodie staples.

Nick and Jane with their "Mason Jennings is on stage!" faces on

Mason!

POS

    

Mayors RT Rybak and Chris Coleman showed up

Here's to you, Current!  -K

Concert Night: Saul Williams and the Afropunk Tour at the Varsity Theater

Only in America can beat poets become hip-hop gods. Well, if they're Saul Williams they can...

Williams, an American poet, writer, actor and musician known for his blend of poetry and alternative hip hop and for his leading role in the 1998 independent film Slam was kind enough to grace Minneapolis with his magnanimous presence last night at the Varsity Theater as the headliner of the Afropunk Tour. The tour, which also featured Dearling Physique, No Bird Sing, and American Fangs in this stretch, has been a huge success in every city it has stopped in so far.

Williams' purple peacock look.

Williams' set included songs off of his 2007 collaboration with Trent Reznor, The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of NiggyTardust!, his self-titled debut album, as well as the incredible spoken-word that first made him famous including the intro to The Dead Emcee Scrolls, his most recent undertaking.

It was a high-powered, chest-pounding show that, as any good small-venue should, left you throughly deaf afterwards.

Some of the evening's highlights were the most unanticipated moments, including:

Williams, pre-tackle...

-a tiny 5-foot nothing white girl dancing awkwardly and then eventually tackling Saul Williams when he came down into the crowd by trying to hug his legs.

-the tour's Budweiser and Converse sponsorship, which led to random outbursts of "Budweiser!" by performers throughout the night, including the emcee's assertion that they were cool enough to sponsor the tour, so the least we could f---ing do was "drink Bud and wear Chucks."

-Williams, in his second song after the encore, forgetting the lyrics and instead singing, on perfect pitch and timing: "To forget all the lyrics you ever f---ing wrote, trying to remember the lyrics to this song that nobody f---ing knows"

It was a great show, and yes, Saul, some of your fans do know your insane lyrics well enough to know when some are out of place... but we love you anyways.

A Few Videos I managed to crappily record at the show:

Love from this city,

K

Weirdness Wednesday: Free Bacon Night at the Triple Rock- Plus WHY?

So what are YOU doing tonight? If your answer is "nothing special" or simply "nothing" maybe you should haul ass over to Cedar-Riverside for Free Bacon Wednesdays at the Triple Rock Social Club.

What is it? Free bacon.

Why? Because its free bacon.

Literally, it is just free bacon, just because, from 9-11pm or until all the bacon is gone. Also, for your listening pleasure at the Triple Rock this evening is one of my personal favorite bands, a quirktastic, crooked-dark pop outfit from the Bay area known as WHY? If you're familiar with WHY? then you already know that their sound is dark, funny, and morbidly addictive, and if not, head to the Triple Rock tonight anyways for great new music and free bacon.

The Triple Rock Social Club is located at 629 Cedar Avenue on the West Bank in Minneapolis.

Little Dream on the Prairie, Or "The Night I Peed By A Church in Downtown St. Paul and Sang Reggae with Garrison Keillor"

The moon was out, the sky was clear, and a little over a thousand people were crowded into the street outside the Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul. Meatloaf, potatoes, and Summit EPA abounded, and everywhere you turned people who bolstered the "Minnesota Nice" platitude were spread out on blankets or camp chairs.

This backdrop of the annual Prairie Home Companion Street Dance, although unassuming, would soon play host to the dream of a twenty-something Minnesota-loving young woman: to sing a love duet with a 67 year-old man in front of her family and friends.

Let's not be mistaken, this wasn't just any 67 year-old man. This was the man in the red shoes, the voice of Norwegian Lutherans, the host and creator of A Prairie Home Companion: Garrison Keillor.

Little did I know when I decided to start this little "all things Twin Cities" blog that I would have my own personal Twin Cities fairytale to begin with. I'm fairly certain that I'm an odd bird, and this is further confirmed by the fact that there is no sound in nature more soothing to me than Garrison Keillor's voice. You may call me a freak, but having been a displaced Minnesotan for much of my life, that droll, melodic voice was a constant connection back to the North Country and, I believe, one of the reasons I returned. Consequently, it was also how I ended up at the family-fun Street Dance last Saturday night.

At the beginning of the evening, as my parents and I and our family friends sat and ate our mashed potatoes, an announcement was made that there would be contests taking place throughout the night, many of which were goofy: "Best Loon Call and " "Best Bank RobberVoice," and some that were more traditional: "Best Kid Singer," and "Best Swing Dancers." While all these seemed fun (I convinced my boyfriend to do his Heath Ledger-esque Joker voice for the bank robber bit), nothing was really up my alley. Having not heard anything that appealed to me, I sat back, excited to spend my night watching others humiliate themselves in front of thousands. Just then, another contest was announced: "Duets" which, the audience soon learned, would consist of women coming up and singing a love song with Garrison. My mother, tactful as she is, looked at me, wide-eyed, and yelled "Oh my GOD K, you should do it!!!"

Somewhere in a past life I was a singer, and I'm not saying that the thought hadn't crossed my mind when "Duets" was announced, but it had been a long time since the term "singer" had applied to anything outside of my shower, much less in front of a couple thousand people. So, despite my mother's insistence, I refused, figuring I wouldn't even get a chance to try and that I wouldn't know the song anyways...

A few Summit EPAs and much parental cajoling later, I was standing in a line with seven other people, waiting my turn to get up on stage and sing Elvis' "I Can't Help Falling in Love With You" with Mr. Keillor himself. However, thanks to those yummy, courage-inducing Summits, there was a wrench in the works: I really, really had to pee.

Having scoped out the port-o-potty situation earlier, I realized that for the thousands of people present, there were five toliets, and from where I was standing on the opposite side of the stage, I could see the lines stretching for ages. It was then that I made a choice: I left my place in line, pushed through the crowd, sprinted towards the side of an adjacent Presbyterian church, found a grassy spot behind a low wall, and dropped trou. Being a wilderness-guide during the summer, I'm used to "creating a bathroom everywhere," but at the moment, the idea of an arrest warrant including anything about "public urination in proximity to thousands of NPR-listening Minnesotans on the side of a downtown church" was horrifying. Needless to say, I peed quickly.

A few minutes later, I was on stage, the third contestant to have a turn. After introductions, Garrison asked if there was anything other than "I Can't Help Falling in Love With You" I'd like to sing, and I was a bit shocked. I don't improv well, and my only solace in the whole thing was that I knew the song, and had been mentally preparing myself for it while I waited to go on - I wasn't sure what to do. It was here that things just got nuts, I still can't remember exactly how it all happened, but what follows is a rough rundown of how our on-stage conversation went:

GK: "This song again? How about something new? What do you know by heart?"

Me: "Guuuhhhhh..... this song?"

GK: "Really? You know this one by heart?" (a look of bordeom on his face)

Me: "Yeah, (and here is the moment where my brain stopped working in a logical way) but do you know the Reggae version of it?"

The Audience: "Woooooooooooooo!!!!!" **clap clap clap**

The Band: **Reggae intro to UB40 version of the song**

My Brain: $&;%#!!!

The rest is history. After all was said and done, the shellshock passed, and I became the twenty-something white girl who danced with Garrison Keillor, sang the Reggae version of "Can't Help Falling in Love With You" in front of thousands of middle-aged NPR listeners and lost all self-respect, but who walked away with the first-place prize and a stupid grin on her face. Strange? Hell yes.

Pre-Reggae banter with GK.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Minnesota.

The First of Many from the Shiver Cities,

K