South Side Works, Pittsburgh, PA.... New American Music Union festival The festival was two days long, featuring a lot more bands than listed above, but due to childcare these four were the only ones I was able to see. Of them Gnarls Barkley and Spoon were terrific. The Raconteurs and Bob Dylan not so much. Gnarls Barkley was already on stage when Betsy and I arrived, running through their great cover of Violent Femmes' "Gone Daddy Gone." Danger Mouse and Cee-Lo were wearing tan jackets over a white uniform (Cee-Lo quickly removed his, due to the summer heat) and their band all had maroon-looking vests over their dress whites (the drummer gussied up his uniform with a bowtie). Other highlights were "Run," a set-closing "Smiley Faces," and even their ballad (which I'm not as into on record) "Who's Gonna Save My Soul." Naturally, "Crazy" was great to hear live, but I was a little surprised that the crowd didn't go, well, c...
State Theater, New Brunswick, NJ Sheik performed with a second guitarist, a bass player, and a percussionist. The sound mix was terrific. Very mellow, yet you could hear every note... As a sidebar, here's a 1996 interview I did with Sheik on his birthday (11/18): Mike: One of the things I love about your album is it's not just great music--songs, I mean--but also it's such a great sonic environment. Was that the kind of thing you heard in your head when you were composing the songs, or was this something that evolved in the studio? Duncan: Well, definitely my aesthetic comes from people like Brian Eno or David Sylvian or the later Talk Talk records. Whether they're electronically produced or they're acoustic-instrument produced, I still like these things that sound really organic and moody and have their own kind of darkness. That's always been a really important part of creating recordings for me. Mike: So when you have something like in "Reasons For Livin...
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