Electric Mole Forums - Recent Gigs

Went to Make Music Pasadena yesterday, a free music festival that fortunately put all the acts I cared about seeing on one stage.

The first band I went to see were the Morning Benders, who sounded great, even though I think their bassist Tim left. But after playing "Promises" as their opener, the organizers of the festival told everyone the band couldn't play until people cleared out the fire lane on the right. And apparently hipsters are really bad at following directions because it took a good 15-20 minutes for that to happen and they only got to play about six songs. I hope they give us a new album this year like they promised because the new material was great and the arrangements of the old stuff were crazy good too. They also did a cover of Cyndi Lauper's version of "When You Were Mine" that was pretty awesome.

Next was Best Coast, and since I left to do some shopping during the hour between artists, I came back and got a pretty awful spot. There was way too much weed smoking going on (I don't smoke anything) and it was pretty packed and uncomfortable. So I wasn't expecting much, and yeah, she was pretty boring. I felt like her live show was the same as her album: once you hear one song, you've heard them all. I ended up leaving right after the fourth song to go shopping again. :lol:

And the last band I went to see was Ra Ra Riot, who were PERFECT, except for the sound spazzing out and them having to start over on the first song. I guess I enjoyed this the most since they got 12 songs and I knew every single one, plus people kept leaving since they were the last big act, so my spot kept getting better and better. I'm really glad they did a pretty even mix of stuff off their first and second albums, instead of just focusing on their second. The three best things were probably how Wes hit all those crazy notes (especially the "tonight"s on "Do You Remember", how he kept messing around with the bassist, and how intensely their cellist played.

It was pretty good for a "free" show, and all I ended up paying was a little bit extra in gas since I was close to the area that morning anyway, $7 for parking, and I broke a twenty at Jamba Juice to get cash for the $7 parking. There was also lots of eye candy all over the place so that was a nice added bonus.