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musicfest, northwest!: day four

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Ah, Saturday. One of two days of the week where work is thrown out the window, where the sunshine can be fully enjoyed, and where, at night, the whores come out. This Saturday was no different, as walking by various clubs can attest to; women in skirts so short they might as well be called shirts, men wearing cologne so powerful it is sure to be on the periodic table of elements soon. And crazy people babbling to themselves as though they were at a bar, when they are really on the corner of a busy intersection. This is a Saturday night in Portland, and it was part of our Saturday night, the final night of MFNW.

Our day started much like Friday started — we did not get into the Wonder Ballroom. We got to the venue around 4:30ish, and the line was already around three blocks. We we to have gotten in, we would’ve seen Ratatat and Les Savy Fav, two bands I barely listen to anyway, but are still somewhat important in the indie register (Les Savy Fav moreso). Either way, we knew we wouldn’t get in and didn’t want to sit around eating ice cream, so we left to head to the Crystal, where we would be spending the entirety of our night. Considering that the first band’s set started at eight, we knew we had some time to kill.

We ended up at Scooters, a bar right around the corner from the Crystal, where we sat and did nothing for a couple of hours. Well, Paul and Christina ate, and Missy drank one Corona and was drunk (I wish I could do that…). I didn’t drink anything; I figure since I’m broke, the last thing anyone wants to do is buy me alcohol, since it takes me forever to get drunk. It’s a waste of money on their part, I think.

So two hours passed and we went into the Crystal, hoping to get balcony seats (of which there are three rows, tightly packed — roughly fifty seats total). We did not get balcony seats. So we carved out a niche with a table and awaited our night of frivolity.

The first band to take the stage was Mimicking Birds, a three-piece fronted by Nate Lacy, who plays mellow guitar and mellow songs. It was an interesting opening to the night. They did not play one rocking song, and I was on the fence on whether or not that was a good idea. They don’t have a CD out, but they did give free CD-Rs at the merch table. I grabbed one — it’s pretty good. Definitely headphones music or music to wash dishes to, that sort of thing. The drummer was being kind of dickish in between songs, in that “I don’t want to play this kind of music” sort of way, which annoyed me, but it was fairly minor. In the end they had a good set which was marred a bit by the loudness of people at the Crystal (though they would be louder the drunker they got…). They are my friends on Myspace now, that’s all that matters.

Next was Blitzen Trapper, a kind of weird folky southern rock kind of band. They were pretty funny, but I wasn’t feeling their music that much. I own Wild Mountain Nation and it’s okay, though I don’t listen to it that much. They played a good set, though, loud and raucous, as it should be.

Then came Fleet Foxes! Fleeeeet Foxes! I must preface this by saying that on our way to Scooters, we passed Robin Pecknold, their lead singer, rolling an amp and carrying a guitar, and I was like, “Holy shit” under my breath but didn’t end up saying anything. I feel weird doing that to band members, even if I did say “Good show” to Sean from Langhorne Slim last night. That was partially because he was right next to me, moving his guitar. It’s cool to be so close to musicians I’ve been listening to for a while now.

Anyway, Fleet Foxes were excellent. Their harmonies were unsurpassed for the entire festival. No one sounded better than them, vocally. Period. And Robin was standing for the first time in a year, after sitting for countless shows because of an accident. What kind of accident, I’m not sure, but he was standing, and that was cool. They sounded fucking great. That’s all that needs to be known. They didn’t play “Ragged Wood”, which seems odd, but that’s okay, because everything was awesome.

After them was Menomena. I was a little worried about this show because I haven’t really gotten into them for a while. I Am the Fun Blame Monster was pretty good, but I don’t listen to Friend and Foe at all and it never grabbed me. Fortunately, though, Menomena puts on an awesome show, and their songs, generally loops or taken from loops on the album, are even better live. Plus I totally loved it when Justin played the baritone sax. It adds an awesome layer to everything. When the songs blew up or went crazy, it was amazing (especially in songs with the sax). I don’t know what else to say really, other than they made me want to listen to Friend and Foe again, cause I feel like I’m missing something.

At this point, by the way, is when people were drunk and being too loud. There was a throng of girls who were just babbling away the whole time, and Christina was cool enough to be like, “Are you guys gonna keep talking? Cause if you are, you should go to the back of the room.” They did end up leaving, though the Hot Menomena Girl left too. She knew all the words to the Menomena songs, and Paul said to me after their set, “That’s the hottest Menomena fan ever.” I agreed. And then she left.

You know what? I’m going to see if she checks Craigslist. Social Experiment #1 begins!

Okay, missed connections posted. We’ll see if she checks it.

Okay, anyhoo, last but certainly not least was The Helio Sequence, which was made up of a guy on guitar and a guy on drums. Paul called them “pretty” but I saw No Age once again, ready to blast us out with loudness and annoyance. Fortunately, this was not the case. The Helio Sequence truly mesmerized me. I was in awe of their performance. Every song was a perfect little piece of pop music, loud and brilliant. I hadn’t heard of them at all prior to last night, and I am truly glad I did hear them, because they are great. They use a lot of prerecorded electronic music in their songs, which actually mixed excellently with their instruments. At the end of the show they played “Keep Your Eyes Ahead” with the members of Menomena, which apparently was the first time they’ve ever played with a full band. Paul was very excited
to hear this, and Missy got most of it recorded. So, that was awesome.

Their set over, we quickly got out of the Crystal and onto the street, where we went to the car and headed home. Today I had one last lunch with Paul and Missy before Missy boarded the Amtrak for Tacoma. I honestly wouldn’t have been able to attend this festival without Missy and Paul’s help, and they are without a doubt the nicest people I’ve ever met from the internet. Oh, and I can’t forget Christina and her car, which was a godsend and allowed us to actually listen to every show and not worry about the lack of buses or MAX after 1am. I’m glad I got to know a lot of cool people in such a short amount of time.

Now, of course, reality sets in and I have “real world” stuff I have to go — get a job, start an awesome band, make lots of money, etc etc etc. So to Musicfest Northwest, I say: thank you for allowing me to spend my first full week in Portland as though it were a vacation. It was better than I could have ever imagined.

musicfest, northwest!: day one

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It’s incredibly beautiful and sunny out in Portland today, as it has been the last couple of days, and the weather couldn’t be better for MFNW. First, I am very grateful to Paul and Missy from /orate for being kind enough to get me into the whole festival in the first place, being a poor, recently-transported son of a bitch. This was technically my third time ever meeting anyone from the internet, though the first time doesn’t count cause she lived in Boise too. These kinds of meetings always start off weird, but Paul and Missy are very cool and not crazy or weird at all. I think that stigma of internet people being strange and/or socially inept is starting to wane, as it should, since everyone uses the internet these days, and we can’t all be socially inept, right?

Wednesday night was pretty low-key, being the start of the fest and all. After getting a quick bite and wandering around town, doing typical touristy things (Powells, of course), we descended upon Berbati’s (“descended upon” is a literary critic way of describing getting somewhere. never will they say “we walked to Berbati’s”, instead they will say, “we found ourselves in the midst of Berbati’s” or “after dinner we slowly hovered on the wings of angels to Berbati’s,” etc) and waited for the bands to play.

Okay, the bands.

First were The 1900s, who are from Chicago. They were an excellent start off to the night, a good, jangly three-minute pop band with seven members stuffed onto the relatively small stage. They have two female vocalists (i’ll get to them in a second) and one male vocalist who plays guitar and everyone did their job very well. Their sound was tight and crisp and I found myself bobbing my head to most of their song (hipsters, as you well know, are not allowed to dance, with the sole exception of “that girl”, who dances like a maniac by herself in a small circle of room she carves out with wildly flailing arms whose movements are dictated by the amount of ecstacy she has ingested prior to the show).

We were standing beside and slightly behind the stage, which was great because it meant not getting the full blast of the speakers, and also because I could stare at Jeanine O’Toole’s ass all during the set. The 1900s are a seven-piece band (though there’s another girl in the picture I’ve posted … the one on the far left, I don’t know who she is), and three of them are women. Jeanine (girl at the top of that picture) was wearing a halter top and high-rise jeans, a throwback to the 60s, and she was hot. And totally into the music, which is also hot. Anyway, my point is, Jeanine, if you ever read this blog, I think it would be great if we got married. That’s all. Simple ceremony, maybe in my backyard, some friends, cheap beers, that sort of thing. Think about it.

Did Missy get a setlist? Yes.

The second band was Norfolk & Western, which I’ve never been a huge fan of but they pulled off a great set last night. Some of you might know that N&W’s drummer, Rachel (right of the guy in the middle, Adam), used to be the drummer for the Decemberists, but her boyfriend is in Norfolk, so obviously she chose them over the D’s, which is fine. I didn’t like them before because their songs were kind of slow and I just didn’t get into it, but last night they were a little more upbeat, a little more rocking, and Rachel kicked the shit out of those drums. Seriously, I saw shit flying right out of the bass drum, hitting the audience and making them cry out in disgust. She later apologized.

N&W was a four piece last night, with the bassist and keyboardist switching roles almost every other song. Sometimes one would play guitar, too. It was pretty cool, each guy utilizing his own experience with each instrument for each song. Overall, they won me over with a strong setlist.

Did Missy get a setlist? Yes.

We unfortunately had to miss the Old 97s because we had to catch the MAX back home, so our last show of the night was Langhorne Slim. Now, I had never heard of this band before in my life, which just goes to show how un-cool and un-hipster I am (I think I was the only person in the entire room wearing shorts — it was hot that day! I am a warm person!), and Paul was super excited to see him, and I was thinking, “Oh boy, this is going to be one of those soft folk picker types, and I’ll have to sit through five minute songs about the plight of the narwhal.”

Further from the truth.

The bass player, Paul, looked like a frat boy yet played an upright bass, the drummer, Malachi, was approximately 98% too cool for school, and the lead singer, Sean, wore a golfer cap and slightly nautical looking pants, and the crowd went wild, and they started playing and it was like a more Americana Flogging Molly, and it was awesome. Langhorne Slim is a lot more diverse, musically, than Flogging Molly, which made it a whole lot nicer. The energy was 110%, loud and raucous, each song two minutes or so, except for a couple of songs stretched or medley’d together. There wasn’t one dull moment in the entire show. Their set was short (they even had to play an extra song at the end) but it was intense and amazing. I’m glad I saw them.

Did Missy get a setlist? No, cause they didn’t have one.

Overall, day one was a success, a lot of fun, and especially good to hang out with people who were very cool and tons of fun. This weekend should be a blast.

job hunting; the ongoing struggle

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This is my “looking for work” face.

The advent of the Internet has created a huge dilemma in networking today. It has, in effect, destroyed the interpersonal connections needed in order to get a good job. This creates a strange effect in which employers use sites like craigslist and careerbuilder to send out a mass request for workers, and yet they cannot discern if the people who reply are actually cool or not. All they can do is look at a resume.

This contrasts with the traditional job hunt because people everywhere will tell you, “Get your foot in the door,” to make yourself known to your potential manager or hiring manager. To look presentable. To shake hands, maintain eye contact. To, in essence, be a human being (leaning towards being yourself, but not necessary).

Everyone thinks that the Internet is the new hip place for finding work. There are hundreds of job sites and resume building sites out there, and there are also thousands of potential employers hunched over their computers typing out the latest position they need filled. Craigslist alone has tons of ads for work, and people who surf craigslist are just as eager to get the job they’re looking for. But there’s always a catch.

Right now I’m looking for work. I’ve tried both sides: the traditional path of walking to a location, filling out an application, and handing it to the appropriate person (or, at the very least, talking to them on the telephone), and I have also tried the Internet sites. The former option could be more successful in showcasing myself (and dim down the fact that I have shit for work experience), but the latter is just more quantity, and easier to apply for, that the appeal outweighs the risks. You mean all I have to do is hit “apply” and my pre-loaded resume and cover letter will just be sent to them? Or that I have to e-mail someone and attach my resume? From the comfort of my home? Done and done!

It shouldn’t surprise you that 95% of the jobs listed on craigslist are entry-level or worse. General labor. Housecleaning. Babysitting. Why should they be anything else? What CEO of a major corporation is going to go to craigslist looking for his next VP? What jewelry store owner is going to consult a faceless Internet crowd of hooligans for their next manager, the man or woman who will hold the keys to millions of dollars of jewelry?

There isn’t, nor will there ever be, a way to properly network yourself on the Internet. Until the day Facebook fully incorporates business into their profiles (which seems like it would cause a lawsuit), all you will be when searching/applying for a job is a Name and a Resume. In a way it highlights the resume like never before. Now is the time for fancy fonts and creative exaggeration. If only business resumes were like acting resumes, where at the very least you got to see the person’s face…

I’ve gotten a couple of responses via the Internet job postings. The quickest one came from Quiznos. No surprise there. It was like the instant I hit the send button I got a reply — “Can we get an interview tomorrow?” and all that. You’d think a food service place would be the first to try to get some solid information about a person before they up and hired them. I guess that’s what the interview portion is for, but still. I’m only going because I’m desperate; I hate the food service industry and because of it’s strict laws on food handling, coupled with the finicky nature of most people these days regarding their meals, it makes me totally nervous. “You only wanted one tomato? Well this sandwich has two, so … okay, okay, one tomato, got it. No need to yell.” That sort of thing.

The perfect job for me would be a data entry job where I could type out shit for 45 minutes if I was guaranteed 15 minutes to browse the Internet. That would be awesome. That plus a lunch break and free sodas would make me the happiest person alive. Alternately, the exact opposite would also be great — some kind of outside job where I got to hangglide or something. Wrestle bears. Spelunk. Too bad I don’t have any experience with any of that.

I forgot to mention the other stupid part of the Internet job-hunting sites: spam. In a way I like it because it forces me to study the ads closer so that I don’t, you know, get twenty viruses on my computer or something.

In truth, I’m partially terrified because if I don’t get a job quick, I’m not going to have rent money, and that would be bad. On the other hand, I can’t be too worried or else it’ll fuck me up in other ways, like lack of sleep and headaches and all that. I hate that. Plus I know if I can’t make rent I can always live with my parents, but that would be shitty for my roommates. And I don’t want to live with my parents.

Somehow things always seem to work out for me in the end. Let’s hope that luck continues until the end of the month.

And that, my friends, is that.