Saturday, August 14, 2010

That Fresh Feeling - The Eels



I just came back from The Eels concert, and I have to say, it was pretty cool. The warm up bands were not that great -- first some lady with puppets came out (I missed her because I was in the t-shirt line) and then the second lady just wasn't very good. But The Eels were lots of fun. They even played Mr E's Beautiful Blues, which is one of my favorite songs. They were very different playing live though; the music was a lot faster and more rock oriented than their albums are. For example, they played It's a Beautiful Day to the Twist and Shout background music.

They also did a really great version of Summertime, which included some incredible vocals by E. In the middle of the song, he threw out ice creams and popsicles to the entire crowd! We were standing too far back and didn't catch any though.

On the way home, my coworker was telling me about the Pearl Jam concert she attended earlier this year. I said we didn't get too many bands like that in Alaska. Which is true, but The Moose's Tooth (our pizza restaurant and brewery) used to get some cool acts. I told her about the Cake concert I attended at the Moose's Tooth three summers ago. They played for 2 1/2 hours, played all my favorite songs, and did an absolutely ripping rendition of Black Sabbath's War Pigs. Hands down one of my top concerts of all time. The Eels were good, but Cake was absolutely phenomenal.

What's the best concert you've ever been to? What made it so great -- was it the band, or the people you were with?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I've been to a few shows in my day and one of the best was a performance by Ris Paul Ric, the singer of Q and not U. It was him on a really dark stage, with a hoodie on, standing on a little stool. he had a guitar and maybe there was a drum machine. but some sort of electronic device below him had a bright blue light that cast up on him from below. It was super eerie but his performance was absolutely amazing. totally captivating. One of the best shows I've been to.

The energy of the band does a lot for me as well. I'm not a big Rainer Maria fan but the guitarist's energy at the show was really high and it made you get into the music.

The sound quality can do a lot for me as well. I saw the Editors at 9:30 club in DC and they sounded fantastic. the vocals were just as good live as on the album.

L said...

Well, you have managed to mention a bunch of bands I've never heard of. I've spent way too long in a small town, I think.

I agree with you on the sound -- more from the aspect that a bad sound can just absolutely ruin a concert.