Music weekend

Went to see Glen Phillips (formerly of Toad the Wet Sprocket) at the Cactus Cafe Friday. We always enjoy Glen, he's a great songwriter and singer. His stuff is melodically beautiful and the lyrics are though-provoking. He always has a lot of left-wing political comments thrown in here and there in the banter, and some of his music has somewhat political themes. Usually the atmosphere at the Cactus is very well-behaved and reverent toward the music (even the bartenders clink quietly), but this time there was one guy who voiced very loudly a rude and mean-spirited comment, "It's not the government's job to take care of poor people!", followed by a round of "boos". Glen responded with "then why HAVE a government? Oh yeah, so it can go to war and kill people". It was a stunningly rude heckle and very surprising, I wouldn't think that Glen's music would attract ultra-right-wingers. Of course, anything is possible when it comes to music, and it's more likely that the guy got dragged there by a date or a wife, and decided it was OK to ruin the experience for others just because maybe he wasn't having the best time of his life. Asshole.

Well, the Cactus is not known for bar fights, so the show continued, and it was a really good. Glen comes here several times a year and we see him maybe twice. Check out Glen sometime.

Saturday it was Del Castillo at Antone's.  Del Castillo is about the best live band in the world. They are just stunningly good, and this was an exceptionally good show even for them. It got really crazy there at the end. Usually Mark and Rick stand up on their folding chairs and play, and Mark adds the "behind the head" feat to this, but this time the tech hoisted Rick up on his shoulders, so I was glad we didn't have to catch all those people! They were videotaping it for some future use, and there was a camera on me most of the night. I expect to get about one second of screen time out of it. They love to film the novelty dancing old ladies, there are all ages of hard-core fans there but I seem to attract attention and end up in people's videos. Could it be because of being front and center? Ohhhh, maybe that's it. DC is going to be doing a House of Blues tour around the country with Styx (of all people, weird combo but not something to turn down at this point)!

Sunday (today) Eric Johnson had a DVD and CD signing over at Borders so we went over and said Hi and got our new ACL disks signed. Look for some Electromagnets Reunion shows in February. More about those when it's closer to time. The weather has turned perfect again as though the ice never existed.

I'm tired today and should be working on my freelance work and here I am putting up concert pics and blogging! Sheesh. I'm worthless.

- Music - Austin - Del Castillo - Glen Phillips -