Nerd Movie Reviews

A night of live music and air guitar in San Francisco

This title should be “Dave tries to get a life.”  As any regular reader knows, I’m not one of those bloggers who tells you what I did every day and then shares my shopping list with everyone in some misapprehension that the universe is fascinated by the mundane details of my life.  However, last night a friend of mine invited me to see her band play in SF and I was impressed enough by the two bands I saw to write about it, but I am taking it from the concept of reviewing the music I saw.

Before I do that let me stroke my ego a bit by telling you some of the fascinating mundane details of my life as they relate to live music.  When I lived in LA I used to go see bands all the time.  When I moved to Oakland I was so busy that I really didn’t have time to find the places to go and some new friends who like live music to go out with, so last night was a refreshing blast from the past.  It was 1996 all over again, complete with me forgetting my ear plugs, a super hot girl driving me crazy with her loser boyfriend, someone spilling beer all over the place, a tiny cramped club, a bathroom I wouldn’t wish upon my filthiest enemy, and a decor developed by the “flea market meets free crap from beer vendors” school of decorating.

One thing has changed since 1996, however.  I don’t know if audiences are lamer, or I have somehow gotten cooler (or more delusional), but as I looked around the room I come to the realization that I was one of the coolest guys in the club.  The only exceptions seemed to be actually performers and a good friend of mine, but most of them were pretty lame.  Good for my ego, I guess.

Enough of that.  Let’s talk about the performers I saw.  My friend is in a band called Deeper.  She is the lead singer.  I had not heard her sing before, and was really impressed.  She has a great voice.  The band is indie/punk.  Kind of Riot Grrrl-ish with a couple of Y chromosomes.  Really good, and worth listening too.  Unfortunately I was late and missed seeing my friend trip and take a header into the drum kit, but I got the story later on.

The second band was called Thumper, and I liked them a lot too.  I am not a fan of hip hop in almost all it’s forms, but Thumper is a really cool fusion of indie rock and hip hop.  It’s not some lame mash up or rap with a guitar.  It is honest to god rock with rap-ish lyrics.  Really cool, and they sell t-shirts so they are near and dear to my heart.  I talked to the drummer (electric drums, which you don’t see a lot anymore, but sounded really good) after the show and he seemed like a cool dude, so I decided I would talk about them as well.  I think I will look around and see where else they are playing.  I think they are out of Fairfield, which is more or less BFE as far as the Bay Area goes, but maybe when they come back to SF.

I wasn’t going to stay for the last band, and so thought my evening was more or less done.  How wrong I was.  At that point they had an extra special showing of the San Fransisco Air Guitar Regional Champion Matthew “Cold Steel Renegade” Feldstein.  I have to say I have never been more impressed by a man in silver spandex and no shirt before.  He was amazing and hilarious.  Apparently Air Guitar is a highly competitive sport (?) that requires some kind of nickname to become a participant.  Check out the US Air Guitar Rankings.

I kind of wish I were joking and had made all that up, but I’m also kind of happy that I didn’t and it’s all true.

(Huge in Japan image courtesy of the novelty t shirt category).

Not sure what I am going to do tomorrow.  I’m torn between completing my review of the Expendables or doing some more cheap date ideas.  If you have a preference let me know.

P.S. I did stop at the grocery store on the way home from the show, and my shopping list was yogurt, grapes, cheese, tortillas, salami, cucumber, and apples.  Who says I am not a hypocrite?

Tags: Deeper the band, funny t shirts