By dixie
…but I’m running out of words, and the last slew of words I finished off was kind of crappy.
I went to see Jonathan Coulton last night with a friend whose arm had to be mightily twisted to go. We all had a good time, from the people who knew every word of every song to those of us with mild familiarity but a taste for good lyrics and tight harmony.
(Most links are to YouTube and involve music, some of which has salty language. If you get fired for clicking it’s your problem, not mine.)
I even enjoyed the opening band, Paul and Storm, who opened with a song called…”Opening band.” They showed up later for the songs I ended up liking the best, including “My Monkey” which went so well they were speechless afterwards. (Apparently it’s usually a train wreck.) I was fascinated with the Lite Brite whatsit, but there are clearly other interesting bits to the song.
The concert had several odd elements. It was in the House of Blues with chairs set up on the dance floor, and the audience remained seated for the entire performance. I don’t think I’ve ever been to anything at HoB like that. It was freezing (and we weren’t standing or dancing, which didn’t help). There was the nakedness. And unlike most Coulton gigs (to the fans’ great dismay), there was no taping allowed. (HoB rules; everything Coulton does is released under Creative Commons.)
We did get rickrolled. And he did do First of May. (Also, the guy you hear saying “oh yeah” at the beginning of that clip is one of our group. No, that clip is not from last night’s concert.)
20th of May, 2008
I like Jonathan Coulton’s brand of music. It’s not exceptional, but the music is of high quality and the lyrics are good even after the joke has passed.
The lite brite thing is apparently a Tenori-On.
20th of May, 2008
I’d argue that consistently high quality music is indeed exceptional, as are good lyrics. Coulton occupies a niche and therefore won’t appeal to everyone, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t doing what he does preternaturally well.
23rd of May, 2008
I went to see Jonathan Coulton last night with a friend whose arm had to be mightily twisted to go.
> Mightily twisted is, I think, a strong exaggeration.
> “Oh, you actually bought the tickets? We’ll, lets do it” I think was the conversation.
There was the nakedness.
>Aye.
And unlike most Coulton gigs (to the fans’ great dismay), there was no taping allowed. (HoB rules; everything Coulton does is released under Creative Commons.)
> As if HoB would have actually caught us with devices in our pockets — but yeah, I’d imagine if we setup a mic on a stand, they might have objected.
We did get rickrolled. And he did do First of May. (Also, the guy you hear saying “oh yeah” at the beginning of that clip is one of our group. No, that clip is not from last night’s concert.)
> Laugh
-Glad we went, rk
23rd of May, 2008
Yes, there was the “oh, you bought tickets?” conversation, which followed the “Yeah, I’m interested,” conversation but preceded the two or three “So, are you still interested in going to JoCo?” conversations.
I’m glad we went too, but as I stated at the time, that’s the last time I buy tickets for us for anything. :)