Queen of Apology

Been awhile, eh, world? Sorry about the hiatus. I got caught up in moving, then working, which had progressed to the point where any time off was fiendishly hoarded as Vegging Time. I can, however, say that I've been doing well.

The most exciting thing I've done recently was attend the Bridge School concert with roomie Myung. It was pretty awesome. Here's a recap for those who missed it.

Pegi Young opened the concert with a long, drawn out speech basically talking about how cool she and her friends are for starting the school 20 years ago. She even read a letter from Bill Graham Presents that outlined how cool she and her friends were. As if this weren't enough stage time, Neil asked her to sing a song with him during the 3 song opening set. I was under the impression "a song" meant one (1) song. No, no. She stayed for the entire set. And she really can't sing very well. It was painful. Especially the part where she tried to name all, like, fifteen of the kids in the school (to show how hands-on she is) and she couldn't remember one of the kids' names. She actually had to ask the parent who was sitting on stage with the kid.

When Devendra Banhart came on to do his set, he brought four friends along. They had never played as a band before, but they impulsively called themselves The Bridge and played a long set that included a song about wet dreams. He was actually really good; I liked him a lot.

Gillian Welch performed next, nearly putting Myung and I to sleep. Country western folk is apparently not our style after sitting for two hours in the heat. It was, however, at this point that we began to notice a trend.

So far, both DB's band and GW had 1) covered a Neil Young song and 2) brought a guest on for their entire set. We were eager to discover how this trend would work out for Trent Reznor. It was to be the true test of Neil Young's musical sway.

Death Cab for Cutie, who were awesome despite the woman in front of us yelling "These guys suck!" over and over again, decided to one up everyone. Their special guests? Everyone who had played before them AND Neil on a cover of a Graham Nash song. They'd thrown down the gauntlet, metaphorically screaming "BEAT THAT Trent Reznor!" And Trent was up to the challenge.

He took the stage with pizazz and cellos. The lead singer of Nine Inch Nails came on stage dressed in a black sweater, black chinos, accompanied by two cellists and his egg shaker. Which he proceeded to mike. At first, we weren't sure if Trent was confused. Did he think that he was at a Poetry Slam? But then we got it.

Other acts came on, played their acoustic guitars, brought on the famous guests and payed their homage to the musical greats. Trent didn't even play an instrument. He was a rebel in the purest form.

Then Foo Fighters came on and treated the audience to their usual caliber performance. Myung and I were convinced that the show wouldn't be able to surpass their set. Neither of us like Brian Wilson or Dave Matthews; I've seen Pearl Jam; and Neil Young's voice kept breaking during his first set. So we decided to leave after Foo Fighters rocked the house.