Thursday, December 09, 2004
Good Times
Speaking of the old days and folks you haven't heard from in awhile, Robert Griffin over at Scat is promising a new double Prisonshake CD next year. One of the best full on rock bands to come out of Cle in the 80's, Prisonshake and MDID exchanged members for a few years, with rhythm section Scott Pickering and Chris Burgess sharing time in P-shake and MDID, and me playing bass for P-Shake for a few shows on tour when Chris broke his finger. (I do believe it was the middle one, about which much hilarity ensued). We even went so far as to release a split tour single, which had MDID doing a version of Prisonshake's Redeye (that ended up on the Shiner CD) and P-shake doing a version of "For Your Trouble". The rhythm section is different now, but Robert and Doug Enkler still form the core of the band.
Also active among the ex MDID'ers.. Doug Gillard has a new solo LP out that is getting some attention. His website's loading a little slow today, but some recent positive press might be the culprit. Doug's pretty well known for being a great guitarist with GBV, but a lot fewer people have heard what a great songwriter he is too. Hopefully this record will get him the props he deserves.
Also a nice review for Uva Ursi (which at one time had 3 ex MDID'ers in it.. now only 1) in the latest Splendid EZine. They are currently working on a 2nd record, which promises to be even stronger than the first, even without my excellent drumming..
Also active among the ex MDID'ers.. Doug Gillard has a new solo LP out that is getting some attention. His website's loading a little slow today, but some recent positive press might be the culprit. Doug's pretty well known for being a great guitarist with GBV, but a lot fewer people have heard what a great songwriter he is too. Hopefully this record will get him the props he deserves.
Also a nice review for Uva Ursi (which at one time had 3 ex MDID'ers in it.. now only 1) in the latest Splendid EZine. They are currently working on a 2nd record, which promises to be even stronger than the first, even without my excellent drumming..
Pixies
In Norfolk Monday to catch the reunion tour. If only Kim had shaved her head also.. I love the Pixies, but the show was bittersweet in some ways for me personally. One, it made me realize it's been FOURTEEN YEARS since our tour with them, an experience I did not fully appreciate at the time. Two, realizing it's been more than SEVEN years now since MDID has done a tour of any kind, and though I often professed to not enjoying live performance all that much, the distance of time can make it all the more appealing. Three, high on my list of regrets is that I have not made the effort to stay in touch with people met during the course of the band's touring years. Four, realizing that despite the attractiveness of the idea of doing a tour, I would not have the strength and stamina to do that kind of road show these days. Just the trip to Norfolk found me sick upon returning, and forced me to cancel a scheduled Cle trip the next day.
As for the show itself, I was somewhat disappointed by the lack of new material, as I have heard rumours of them recording again. The beginning and end of the set were strong, with a lot of recognizable hits, though the middle of the set sounded generic as they pounded through a lot of their "punkier" material, with Charles playing what sounded like a pretty out of tune and generally muddy Telecaster. All in our party seemed to enjoy it though, at least much more than the horrid openers, the Datsuns. (I wondered how many folks had the same thoughts about us when we opened for them all those yrs ago...)
As for the show itself, I was somewhat disappointed by the lack of new material, as I have heard rumours of them recording again. The beginning and end of the set were strong, with a lot of recognizable hits, though the middle of the set sounded generic as they pounded through a lot of their "punkier" material, with Charles playing what sounded like a pretty out of tune and generally muddy Telecaster. All in our party seemed to enjoy it though, at least much more than the horrid openers, the Datsuns. (I wondered how many folks had the same thoughts about us when we opened for them all those yrs ago...)
Techie stuff
A request or two in the comments for RSS feeds.. I must confess to being a total newbie not only at blogging generally but also the concept of blog "syndication". Apparently Blogger's interface only allows Atom formatted feeds, but they recommended a site called feedburner for the RSS format. I've set them both up best as I could figger (links to the left). Those of you who are more well versed in this sort of thing will have to let me know if it works. Now off to find myself an "aggregator", something prior to today had escaped my "existence" radar. I guess I can see how having something like this would make tracking hundreds of your favorite blogs a little easier... (who has time for all this anyway?)
