Song obsessions are those songs that we listen to on repeat. I noticed that my obsessions are often a week long. I also thought that other people might have similar obsessions. I’ve collected a panel of a few like-minded individuals and gotten their “song obsessions of the week.” Quite often it’s easy to explain why the song is good; it’s much hard to explain why we’re obsessed. Maybe you’ll become obsessed with one of these.

–

Adrian (me):
Bookmiller Shannon – Buffalo Gals (mp3) (buy)

My head is so skittish with all the things related to my upcoming move going through it that nothing stays in it very long. But the other side to the move is finally ripping a lot of stuff I’d let fall by the wayside, including this excellent (really truly excellent, not just some blogger hyperbole) volume of the Alan Lomax Southern Journey series. I was listening through it the other day and this 57 second gem of a banjo track really stuck out. It’s so compelling in its combination of frantic playing and beautiful melody.

–

Keith:
Lilofee – Lock & Key (mp3) (free with purchase @ insound)

Well if you enjoy electro-pop songs with narrators that overtly taunt the listener we’ve got a discovery here. I especially enjoy how the singer layers on a few extra unsettling details after the “watcha gonna do?” line, yet leaves the eventual conclusion of the scenario to our imagination. Considering the balance of the lyrics are a dissertation on the sexual mores of today’s youth I have a feeling plenty of research was done before positing their findings in song form.

–

Dave:
Chad Vangaalen – Clinically Dead (mp3) (buy)

It’s catchy. I mean, it starts off with a great hook and a nice beat. The chorus is the kicker though, I love the fuzzed out keys (or whatever it is). It’s also short, which always adds to obsessibility(sp?).

–

A couple weeks ago, I finished Singing Family of the Cumberlands by Jean Ritchie. It was a recommended book for a class I took in the fall of 2002 and I’m glad I finally decided to read it.

Jean Ritchie was the youngest of thirteen children, growing up in Viper, Kentucky, in the Appalachian Mountains. Her family was well known–and well documented–for singing ballads, in the Anglo-American folk tradition. That is to say, they sang ballads that came over with English, Scottish and Irish settlers and could still be found on both sides of the Atlantic. The best documented of these were the Child Ballads, but that could be a whole other post.

Written in 1955, the book is a memoir of her childhood. As fascinating as her descriptions of growing up in the early part of the 20th century in an isolated part of the Appalachians are–and they are–what really makes this book special is the songs. Interspersed in the book are transcriptions of the ballads. Say there’s a vignette about learning a particular song around a fireplace on Christmas. Well, the song is there in the book, both music and words, if you want to sing along.

The writing is wonderful and evocative, too. She immediately sets quite conversational tone and it feels like she’s telling you her family stories from the armchair next to you. In that sense, it reminds me a lot of Cash by Johnny Cash.

Jean Ritchie – the Merry Golden Tree (mp3)

If you have any interest in Appalachian music or culture, I’d recommend this book.

Jean Ritchie’s still alive and she still does occasional live performances. Her website seems to have expired though, so I’m not sure where to get more info.

You can pick it up at amazon. Buy Jean Ritchie’s music at amazon.

And as a bonus, here’s Jean singing a duet with Emmylou Harris. Gorgeous.

Little girl leads Odem’s Chapel 1949, still from Awake My Soul

I’ve posted a couple times now about Sacred Harp singing.

That discussion got some feedback from a friend of mine: I like that song, where can I get more of it?

So here it is: my four favorite Sacred Harp recordings:

1. Alabama Sacred Harp Singers – Southern Journey, Vol 9: Harp of a Thousand Strings – All Day Singing From the Sacred Harp
2. V/A – Awake My Soul OST
   Henagar-Union Sacred Harp Convention – New Britain, 45t
   
3. V/A – I Belong to This Band: 85 Years of Sacred Harp Recordings
4. Alabama Sacred Harp Singers – Southern Journey, Vol. 10: And Glory Shone Around – More All Day Singing From The Sacred Harp

They’re all pretty good and the recording quality is nice on all of them except some of the older tracks of 85 Years. I don’t think you can go wrong with any of them.

I’m not a reporter; I’m a fan. Musical experiences are something I take part in primarily, if not solely, because I want to, not from some duty to report back on them. I just want it to be clear that when I do something like below, writing on the experience here is a by-product.

–

Little girl leads Odem’s Chapel 1949, still from Awake My Soul

Monday night I tried my hand at Sacred Harp singing. There are local groups that sing and I went to the one that meets weekly in Berkeley (Mondays from 7:30-9:30pm). I’ve written about Sacred Harp before.

They meet and sing in a small chapel in a theological seminary just north of the UC campus. Pews are moved around to make a square with a couple rows per side: basses are across from trebles, altos are across from tenors. Some started–the first person to lead got up in the center of the square and called out a number–28, I think it was. We all turned our books, the Sacred Harp, 9th Edition to that page. The leader–in this case, but sometimes it was another singer–sang the starting notes. We sang through the song once on “so la fa mi” then through with the words and then the cycle repeated. We repeated this process until the evening was up–perhaps 40 times in total.

I was a bit nervous about giving this a try. I haven’t sung from music in a number of years and even then it was quite briefly, with a lot of voices to hide behind and with a lot of rehearsals to get the notes right. It turned out to be fine, of course. I still can’t sight sing, but I could follow the strong singers in my section just fine. By the end I had even picked up the names of the shape notes. As it turns out, these help a lot–going from “fa” to “fa”, for instance is always either a fifth or an octave.

When it came my time to lead, I said I’d pick one–one of my favorites, “Sherburne”–but didn’t want to lead it. I got cajoled into leading that song with someone else.

Anyway, at this group at least, people sang. And loud. And without any pretensions or adornment in their voices. It was a lot of fun. Just letting your voice go and singing out. And the people in the group were quite welcoming and curious about what lead me to be there. If you have any interest in trying it out, I’d encourage going some week.

Alabama Sacred Harp Convention – Sherburne (mp3)

Song obsessions are those songs that we listen to on repeat. I noticed that my obsessions are often a week long. I also thought that other people might have similar obsessions. I’ve collected a panel of a few like-minded individuals and gotten their “song obsessions of the week.” Quite often it’s easy to explain why the song is good; it’s much hard to explain why we’re obsessed. Maybe you’ll become obsessed with one of these.

–

Adrian (me):
Alabama Sacred Harp Singers – David’s Lamentation (mp3) (buy)

On Monday night I went over to Berkeley to try some Sacred Harp singing (more about that style previously). More about that later.

It turned out to be a lot of fun and we went through a lot of songs in the course of the evening but the one that stuck with me was “David’s Lamentation”, particularly the part that goes: “And as he went, he wept and said ‘Oh my son!’” It was just stuck up my head all week. I think it’s how dramatic that part of the song is–the pause and full dark harmonies right at “Oh my son!”–that got me repeating that over and over.

–

Keith:
Fred Lane & Ron Pate’s Debonairs – White Woman (mp3) (buy)

Well, if oddball is the theme they don’t get more curious than Fred Lane. Shrouded in mystery, Fred’s work magically appeared in re-issue form on the Shimmy Disc label in the mid-80’s, as he mated various 60’s era styles with his unsettling perspective. In this particular song Fred infuses the details of a rather banal event with importance, then tosses in a few more left-field lines to make it even more questionable. If your sense of humour is more conceptual than literal many repeat listens are guaranteed.

–
Rob:
King’s Singers – the Oak and the Ash (mp3) (buy)

This recording was an obsession a few weeks running last month. As always, the King’s Singers carry the arrangement (in this case, Gordon Langford’s) impeccably. I love how the harmonization works to temper an otherwise bombastic short-short-long rhythmic pattern without wholly sanding off its folksy edge.

cred: me

My radio show is live on the air at 3pm. “I once was Canadian” is on the air on KZSU (almost) every Tuesday from 3-5pm Pacific on KZSU 90.1 FM in the Bay Area or you can listen online.

During my show you’ll be able to follow along online with my playlist.

Update: Here’s the playlist

• Alabama Sacred Harp Convention – David’s Lamentation
  —
• Silian Rail – Awake
  —
• Elvis Perkins in Dearland – Weeping Pilgrim, 417
• Johnny Flynn – Ghost of O’Donahue
• Jay Jay Pistolet – Oh Caroline
• Crooked Fingers – Sweet Marie
  —
• Sufjan Stevens – Lord God Bird
• J Tillman – Crooked Roof
• Bon Iver & Sarah Siskind – Lovin’s for Fools
• Donovan – Catch the Wind
  —
• Gary Lewis and the Playboys – This Diamond Ring
• The Associations – Windy
• The Foundations – Baby, Now that I’ve Found You
• the Supremes – Run, Run, Run
  —
• Ames Harris Desert Water Bag Co. – Checking Myself
• Raphael Saadiq – Seven
• the Kinks – A Well Respected Man
• Beach Boys – Why Do Fools Fall in Love
• Dorothy Berry – You’re So Fine
  —
• Laura Marling – Ghosts
• Horse Feathers – Curs In The Weeds
• Lewis & Clarke – Be The Air We Breathe
• Fleet Foxes – White Winter Hymnal
  —
• Jason Isbell – Dress Blues
• David Bazan – Please, Baby, Please (demo)
• Bishop Allen – the Same Fire
• Jens Lekman – The Opposite of Hallelujah
  —
• Early Day Miners – Summer Ends

Song obsessions are those songs that we listen to on repeat. I noticed that my obsessions are often a week long. I also thought that other people might have similar obsessions. I’ve collected a panel of a few like-minded individuals and gotten their “song obsessions of the week.” Quite often it’s easy to explain why the song is good; it’s much hard to explain why we’re obsessed. Maybe you’ll become obsessed with one of these.

–

Adrian (me):
Almeda Riddle – Bury Me Beneath the Willow (mp3) (buy)

Coming home from work today I just felt like hearing this beautiful song by one of the best voices of the American South, Almeda Riddle three or five times. It’s on of my all time favorite songs. It’s just so pretty and melancholy.

–
Natalie:
Tilly and the Wall – The Freest Man (mp3) (buy)

I pretty much forgot this song existed until a friend put it on at a party last weekend. And then I remembered that I loved it.

Gospel singing might bring about a number of images to mind: modern mass choirs, fiery vintage small group gospel, Mahalia Jackson, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, James Brown (and Rev. James Cleveland) in Blues Brothers, old Southern gospel, or spiritual bluegrass. I think very few people would immediately think of Sacred Harp singing.

Alabama Sacred Harp Convention – Sherburne (mp3, recorded 1959, from Southern Journey, V. 9: Harp of a Thousand Strings, All Day Singing From the Sacred Harp)

Sacred Harp is a form of shape note singing, which was developed as a form of notating music such that four shapes on either a line or a space indicate the eight notes of the scale, allowing easier sight-singing than standard notation. (See the scale graphic below.) Sacred Harp was a hymn book written using shape notes in 1850s. It’s been sung in pretty much the same way since that time, largely in the American South. If you’re curious on more of the details, check out this page on how Sacred Harp is sung.

public domain

Alabama Sacred Harp Convention – Ocean (mp3, recorded 1959, from Southern Journey, V. 10: And Glory Shone Around, More All Day Singing From the Sacred Harp)

I like the music and I like the idea of the music. Usually there is a different conductor for each song, conducting in the center of singers lining four sides of a box. The singers run through the melody tune once on solfege before running through the song once. They then move right on to the next conductor and the next song. There’s no practicing or rehearsing songs. My favorite idiosyncrasy in the style are that the singers just sing. There are usually no pretenses of being polished.

This is, in many ways, truly American music: democratic, individualistic and unpretentious. This is (usually) not music done for performance, not something practiced to death. People sing because they want to create the music, not because they want to be perfect. And the singers usually sing in their natural voices, not trying particularly hard to blend in perfectly with the group. That said, beautiful music comes out of Sacred Harp conventions and groups.

Henagar-Union Sacred Harp Convention – Invocation (mp3, recorded 2006, from I Belong to This Band: 85 Years of Sacred Harp Recordings)

If you want more information, I’d encourage picking up any of the CDs I’ve plucked tracks from here. They’re all worthwhile, with my favorite being the first, Southern Journey, Vol. 9. There was also recently a documentary, Awake My Soul: the Story of the Sacred Harp that came out two years ago. I haven’t seen it yet, but from the trailer (below), it looks really interesting.

Lee Wells & His Jasper Alabama Sacred Harp Singers – North Point (mp3, recorded 1930, from I Belong to This Band: 85 Years of Sacred Harp Recordings)

trailer for Awake My Soul: the Story of the Sacred Harp

For those that aren’t content just listening to the music, Sacred Harp singings still happen all over the country and right here in the Bay Area where you can join in singing. You can still buy the Sacred Harp book either at some of the singings or from the publisher.

And, as if that’s not enough proof that this music is still out there, there’s a compilation, Help Me to Sing of current artists coverings songs from the Sacred Harp. It will includes Elvis Perkins doing a version of “Weeping Pilgrim” which Perkins has been doing for a while (and that I’ve been previously impressed with). That compilation comes out October 14.

Update: For a limited time, you can watch Awake My Soul on Pitchfork.tv.

2007 saw the release of the first, and possibly only, live Woody Guthrie recording, The Live Wire: Woody Guthrie in Performance 1949. A wire recording that had sat in a closet for 50+ years arrived at the Guthrie Archives in 2001. It took years to restore; it was finally released in 2007 and won a Grammy in 2008.

The most interesting part to me, is the restoration process. There’s a great article in Science New about it. Be sure to listen to the before and after sound clips. It’s pretty amazing what one can do with a computer algorithms and some math.

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass is on and I think many of us may be in that Americana/ bluegrass/ old-timey sort of mood.

Hacktone Records is releasing Heartworn Highways a never-before-released soundtrack-of-sorts to the 1975 Americana documentary of the same name. It features Steve Earle, John Hiatt, Rodney Crowell, Guy Clark, Townes Van Zandt, Steve Young, and David Allan Coe.

A couple well-worth-your-while vintage Americana tunes are available from Hacktone. “Mercenary Song” is a lively upbeat song performed lived with many people joining in at the chorus.
Steve Earle – Mercenary Song (live)

“Desperadoes Waiting for a Train” is as stark, as stripped-down as a song can get. It’s got that lonesome sound. In many ways it’s the archetypal song of the guy-and-a-guitar-singing-a-lonesome song sort.

Guy Clark – Desperadoes Waiting for a Train

Steve Earle plays tomorrow (Saturday) at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass from 6-7pm on the Banjo stage.

Speaking of which, here (pdf, or < a href="http://www.strictlybluegrass.com/2007/artists.shtml">here in html) is the full schedule. They’ve managed to schedule another weekend packed with stars and up-and-comers.

Here are my picks for the weekend:
Saturday, October 6:
11-11:30 Fionn Regan [Rooster Stage]
11:50-12:30 Laurie Lewis and the Right Hands [Banjo Stage]
12:45-1:15 New Lost City Ramblers [Banjo Stage]
3:20-4:20 Ricky Skaggs & Bruce Hornsby with Kentucky Thunder [Banjo Stage]
4:10-5:10 Bela Fleck and the Flecktones [Star Stage]
4:40-5:40 Gillian Welch
5:20-6:20 T Bone Burnett [Arrow Stage]
6-7pm Steve Earle [Banjo Stage]

Sunday, October 7:
12:20-1:20 Hazel Di:ckens [Banjo Stage]
2:05-2:50 Mekons [Star Stage]
2:15-3 Bill Callahan (former smog) [Porch Stage]
2:55-3:55 Earl Scruggs [Banjo Stage]
4:15-5:15 Doc Watson [Banjo Stage]
5-6:15 Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit [Arrow Stage]
5:45-7 Emmylou Harris [Banjo Stage]
6-7 Del McCoury [Star Stage]

Did I miss any?

Fionn, Gillian Welch and Emmylou would be on my not-to-be-missed list. Other kings like Earl Scruggs and Doc Watson would be up there too.

The line up for this year’s Hardly Strictly Bluegrass has been announced. If you don’t know, it’s a FREE bluegrass/ country/ song-writer festival held every year in Golden Gate Park (in and around Speedway Meadow).

The details for this year’s event:
Hardly Strictly Bluegrass 2007
Friday October 5 (3-6pm)
Saturday October 6 (11am-7pm)
Sunday October 7 (11am-7pm)

This year’s line up includes old favorites like Gillian Welch, Emmylou Harris, Ricky Skaggs, Doc Watson, Earl Scruggs, T Bone Burnett, New Lost City Ramblers, Laurie Lewis. It also includes a handful of great indie and younger songwriters, like Jeff Tweedy, Bill Callahan (formerly (smog)), ipickmynose favorite Fionn Regan, the Mekons, and Jason Isbell (ex-Drive By Truckers).

Full line up below the break.

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Jon Wilde at the Guardian throws down and challenges you to come up with your favorite 10 songs in 60 seconds, no pre-thought or cheating. I thought I’d give it a try.

Actually, this took me about 3.5 minutes, so I guess I lose; I simply couldn’t think quickly enough to get down 10 songs in 60 seconds. Also, I’m not sure this would be my final order or even final song list if I had a lot longer to think about it, but I’m not allowing any revisionism or second guessing.

All descriptions came after the original list was down and time was up.

10. Beatles “For No One” This has long been my favorite Beatles song: it’s a simple song with interesting instrumentation (piano/ harpsichord/ french horn) and a nice melody.

9. Horton Barker “Two Sisters” This is a field recording of an Anglo-American ballad from Tennessee (I believe). One thing about these hundreds-of-year-old tunes is that the melodies have been honed down to near perfection. This version of “Twa Sisters” has a lovely refrain and Horton Barker has a very pure voice.

8. Beirut “Postcards from Italy” I can’t help but smile when I hear this song. It’s the song that made people love this band, it’s the song that made me love this band.

7. Mark Kozelek “Bad Boy Boogie” (from Rock N Roll Singer) I’ve honestly never heard the AC/DC version, but Mark Kozelek makes this song amazing—a crushingly beautiful ballad.

6. Sigur Ros “Njosnavelin (Nothing Song)” I’d heard Sigur Ros before this song but I never really got them until I heard this song. I’m still not sure how I’m so enamored with vocals in a made up language.

5. Sufjan Stevens “Romulus” This is just amazing songwriting—putting in exactly all the right details with a compelling melody and good instrumentation.

4. Amelda Riddle “Bury Me Beneath the Willow” This is another field recording of melancholy ballad from the American South (see #9). Amelda Riddle is sort of an iconic voice for songs like this and the melody (like #9) seems like it couldn’t be better, while the story seems as melancholy as it can be without being cheesy.

3. Sam Cooke “Cupid” Sam Cooke’s voice is among my favorites ever and this is among my favorites of his songs. No one could sing the word “Cupid” better.

2. Bob Dylan “Girl from North Country” A classic sounding song with roots back to traditional British ballads (via Martin McCarthy’s version of Scarborough Faire). Great melody and a compelling story line.

1. Smokey Robinson & the Miracles “Tracks of My Tears” I heard this song again for the first time a couple years ago and I’ve been in love with it since. As I said then: “I don’t think I’ve heard another song from that era with as much tortured-soul emotion in it.” Smokey’s voice is a wail, a cry during this song.

For a limited time, I’ve put up all the songs as a zip file:

Download my top 10 (in 60 seconds) songs (rapidshare link with zip file)

Give it a try. What are your 10? You have 60 seconds starting…now.

This place is in the middle of nowhere. I was convinced that I had the directions wrong at every turn. There weren’t any other cars going the way I was going and I was just passing houses as I wound up the road into the hills. Then, I saw the sign…

Last Wednesday, in between hosting the Morning Benders and Beatbeat Whisper, I noticed that there was still a staff ticket to Brian Wilson at the Mountain Winery. Yeah, there are perks to being famous. Yeah, last Wednesday was a pretty good day…

the view from my crappy phone camera; that’s Brian a little right and down from the percussionist

I finally saw some other cars as I pulled into the parking lot. Comp tickets are always a bit hit or miss, but after I got my ticket and walked down, I realized two things: a) whereas I was expecting a Shoreline-size (22000 seat) venue, it was much smaller, even much smaller than the Greek Theatre (by my count. b) My comp ticket was in the “premium” floor area. Boom! Winner!

The concert area is built next to a hill side, not really into a hillside like a greek-style theater. That is the performers face parallel to the ridge of the hill and all the spectators on the hill, sitting on built-in wooden benches, face his left side. There is then a floor area and a small set of bleacher on stage right. I ended up being in row N, about 60 feet from Brian, not much further than I am from the stage on a typical night at the Fillmore.

Anyway, I made my way to my seat during his second song; it was not a hit and now that I think about it, I think it was a cover. Brian was seated at, but not playing, a keyboard. His arms were at his sides. The 64 year old looked a bit haggard, with a glazed look in his eyes and his grey hair splaying every which way. He was wearing a non-descript white long-sleeved shirt and a blue and red-striped nylon track jacket. They launched into one of their better known songs and that’s when I noticed something: he was staring into a screen mounted above and to the right of his keyboard. He had a teleprompter. He continued to stare at this for most of most songs. “God Only Knows”? Yup, used a teleprompter. “Wouldn’t it Be Nice”? Teleprompter. “I Get Around”, “California Girls”, “Surfer Girl”? Teleprompter. I enjoyed the idea of Brian Wilson watching a bouncing ball bounce across the words on the screen. He was doing karaoke to his own songs.

After about 45 minutes of music there was some craziness. As they were finishing “Sloop John B” Brian got off of his stool and went down onto his stomach. I thought he might just be acting strange (it’s not like he doesn’t have a history of that), but his band mates seemed genuinely concerned when he stood back up. Brian got on the mic and said that he’d been having fainting spells and might not be able to finish the concert.

Cleveland Simmons Group – Histe Up the John B.’s Sails (Sloop John B.) (mp3) (buy)

(I just like to remind everyone that Sloop John B is actually a traditional tune from Bahamas/ West Indies.)

For about 15 minutes it looked like the show might end there and some people started leaving, but eventually the band and Brian came back on stage and immediately launched into “God Only Knows” and “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” but not before everyone overheard Al Jardine (guitar, vocals) tell Brian “Let’s do a good show, Brian.”

I wanted to elaborate a bit further on Brian’s role in the concert. He had a keyboard in front of him but didn’t play it, save the intro of one song. He sang some lead vocals but left plenty of them to Al and left all of the falsetto leads/ harmonies to one of his band members. During the encore, someone put a bass on him and he appeared to be playing it, but the more animated bass lines were obviously coming from the regular bass player. He started the show hardly saying anything but became more engaged and engaging as the show went on, even playing to the crowd later in the show.

His band and their sound were pretty good. The band was pretty tight and the vocal blend was pretty solid, though not much will top the Beach Boys recordings. The bass end vocals seemed a little too percussive, like they were honked. The musicians, in the basic set up were: 2 keyboardists, 4 guitarists (including Jardine), two percussionists, bass player, misc woodwinds, backup singer and Brian. One of the guitarists also played trumpet and french horn (and “theremin”, they called it, though he definitely touched it, so I think it was probably a portamento strip on a synth). It’s cool that they cover important parts in the songs when they come up, but let’s be honest, a guy playing one french horn line a day isn’t going to beat someone like Alan Robinson who played all day every day for a living.

In fact, musically, it was good. It was fun, but it wasn’t the records. Pet Sounds is so meticulously perfect—it’s as simple as that—no live performance is going to beat that one pure musical basis.

For the encore, everyone was standing: “Johnny B. Goode”, “Fun Fun Fun”, “Barbara Ann” (and one other, I think). There was a second encore which was “Love and Mercy”.

With Brian Wilson and Al Jardine (and Billy Hinsche but he hardly counts) are there, it makes me wonder: why is Mike Love’s group still going by the “Beach Boys” when this group has more original members? I know it’s legal reasons, but the law is dumb.

The crowd there was mostly older people, but there were a few younger people sprinkled in there, the ones that are hip to the old stuff and the ones either dragged there by their parents or the one whose only common ground is the Beach Boys.

A funny conversation during the fainting break:
Daughter: “His voice is really good.”
Mom: “Do you recognize the music?”
Daughter: “Yeah”
Dad: “Isn’t this great??”

(I’m really amused by the idea that anyone could possibly not recognize at least a handful of Beach Boys tunes.)

(And before we move on I wanted to at least mention the two guys front-left who were giving standing ovations after each and every song at least for the first hour of the show.)

The crowd got me thinking about what coolfer pointed out a while ago: only 2% of Americans go to 3 or more shows a year. I was seeing the 98% there tonight. They were out in full force. It seems ridiculous to me to pay $50 or $150 for a ticket to an event (let alone if you are bringing a spouse or the whole family), but I guess if this is your show, or one of two for the year, shelling out multiple hundreds of dollars isn’t all that bad. And instead of standing in a crowded, hot room uncomfortably close to tons of sweaty hipsters watching a band that a few hundred or thousand people in the world know while your back is hurting and your knees aching and hoping you’re going to see something amazing, you get to sit fairly comfortably in a fresh-air venue at a reasonable distance from reasonably smelling, reasonably dressed rich people, seeing one of the best-known songwriters in the world, knowing you’re probably going to see a good (but not amazing) concert. There are trade-offs there, definitely.

The run-down-summary:
Show: good; that is, fun.
Music: fine, doesn’t beat the records
Venue: surprisingly good and intimate. Good place to see the Brian Wilsons of the world
Crowd: odd, interesting.

Yesterday, I went to Musee Mechanique for the first time. It’s on Pier 45, right at the end of all those piers by Fishermen’s Wharf.

I know this is only marginally related to music, but, in my defense: a) Neutral Milk Hotel went there and, from what I remember of the 33 1/3 book on In the Aeroplane Over the Sea they liked it a lot. b) there are a lot of mechanical music boxes, player pianos, mechanized orchestras and whatnot, to the extent that they’ve recorded, I believe, three CDs of the music of Musee Mechanique for purchase at their gift shop.

Musee Mechanique is a collection of coin-operated devices: penny arcade games, photo booths, flip-card movie machines (“Mutoscopes”), fortune tellers, moving dioramas and music boxes and other music machines. The collection has items from the late 1800s up until probably the 1990s, but most of them probably come from the first half of the 20th century.

It’s an amazing collection. More importantly, it’s a lot of a fun. In my other life I’m a mechanical geek (”noo! not possible” I know you’re saying), so the intricate mechanical ones are really cool to me. It’s pretty cheap: free admission and the games are 25 or 50 cents each for the most part, so for $5 or $10 you can play a lot of them.

An ancient and gorgeous sounding disc music box

more photos after the jump.

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If you didn’t know, Steve Martin’s a serious picker. The other night he, Bela Fleck and Tony Truschka were on Letterman all playing banjo on a tune Martin wrote for Tony’s last album. I was pretty blown away by it. Those three and the flat-pickig guitar player all do great solos, but Bela Fleck’s is even a notch up.