venue: the warfield artist: the shins & viva voce
who: lou
when: 17 april 2007 (tuesday)
doors open at 7p
i've been wanting to see the shins for a while now. every time i found out that they were in town playing, it was always too late as the shows were always sold out. this time, i was keeping a watchful eye out for them.
lou and i met up after work. he works about 10-15 minutes away from me. it's nice because we have lunch sometimes. otherwise, we probably wouldn't see one another much. we got to the city sometime after 6:30p. we had plenty of time so we went to bloomingdale's for a bit. then we went to get a drink at the gold dust lounge. there was a lot of red velvet decor which made me feel like i was anywhere but san francisco. there was a certain charm about the place. we had one drink and chatted for a bit.
we tried an irish bar on the way to the warfield but it was completely packed so we just decided to head straight to the warfield to get more drinks and lou something to eat. we had tix on the balcony. i hadn't been on the balcony in ages. previously, it was all general admission, including their balcony seating. now, there are different prices. i always forget to get balcony tix.
viva voce came on first. the band consists of two members and they are husband and wife, kevin and anita robinson. for some reason, that makes me like them even more. kevin plays the drums and anita plays electric guitar. i didn't see a bass guitar. and they both sing. it makes for a very sweet rock and roll band. in the middle of their set, kevin opens up for a q & a session. that was pretty funny. no one ever does that! there was one guy in the front with his hand up. he had the same question i did. where is the bass guitar? to which kevin responds that the bass was this box to this right and that it was very complex, that a diagram would have to be drawn and we (the audience) shouldn't concern ourselves with it. hahah. their set was very rock. anita totally rocked out with her many electric guitars. at one point, she even busted out a two-headed electric guitar! very impressive.
when the shins came on, i didn't know what to expect. usually, bands don't sound good live. they usually suck live. but the shins were quite different. i was utterly surprised. as lame and cliché as it sounds, i got lost in the music. i was in this bizarre daze. with every song they played, the more love i felt for them. it was the strangest feeling, that was just so overwhelming. i got chills. i couldn't move less do anything but watch them. it made me want to listen to all of their albums again, over and over. all i could think was, WOW, they are absolutely, jaw-dropping, awe-inspiring, unbelievably, fucking fantastic. *big sigh*
afterwards, lou asks me, didn't you think the singer looked like kevin spacey?? james mercer (their singer) had a beard and we were on the balcony floor of the warfield. i could barely see their faces much less be able to tell whether he and kevin spacey shared any sort of resemblance. but the next day, i googled "the shins," and it was true. he looked a lot like kevin spacey. bizarro. but cool because i love kevin spacey!
rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ again & again
