Saw Hillary Clinton and author John Grisham speak last night. She's doing a book tour, presented as a discussion. So, Grisham asked questions - mostly about the book - and she gave answers, mostly from the book.

It was ... bracing. She told some good stories about her time as Sec State and about some interesting things she's done since (ex. getting women out of Afghanistan). But because we're so close to the election, a lot of what she talked about was the dangers of Trump. Not that the audience of mostly middle-aged women who paid to see Hillary Clinton were likely to disagree, but she did hammer the point home with everything she had.

Grisham was a gentle and supportive interviewer. He's apparently a family friend of the Clinton family, so it was a friendly chat.

I don't go to political rallies, and this wasn't one - not exactly. But, I do see the appeal now. The energy of thousands of like-minded people who are invested enough to pay to be preached to. Yeah, that's pretty invigorating.

No encore. And she didn't play any songs off her first album.

Beat is a band put together by Adrian Belew to play songs from the three classic 80s King Crimson records: Three Of A Perfect Pair, Beat and Discipline. The band is Adrian Belew, fellow KC alum Tony Levin, along with Steve Vai and drummer Danny Carey (from Tool). Quite a bit of firepower there. It was conceived pre-COVID, but had to wait until this year to get going. And now it's touring.

Playing 'Waiting Man'. Carey is playing a set of melodically-tuned drums for this.

Carey handled original KC drummer Bill Bruford's parts nicely. Dude's got power and technique to spare. Was fun watching him using 80s electronic drum pad triggers to make all those wacky percussive sounds.

Belew and Vai.

Vai had the unenviable job of playing Robert Fripp's parts. And he managed to do it! Yes, he's the great Steve Vai, but Fripp has a unique and formidable technique. Few even try. Vai did adapt some things to fit his own style - ex. using tapping where Fripp would pick. But it sounded great regardless.

"Red". The only song not from the classic 80s lineup.

The great Tony Levin was, unfortunately, out of sight for us. I bought box seats because they're fun. They don't cost any more, but they do, usually, offer great views. So I grab them when they're available. Unfortunately Levin was standing right below us, and didn't move around, so I could only see him if I stood up and leaned over.

They played almost everything I would have picked as a perfect set list from that era, and included many things I wouldn't have picked but were nonetheless fun to see and hear.

Loud as hell.

Twas a nineties night.

Wife and I went out into the summer air to watch a double bill of Toad The Wet Sprocket and the Gin Blossoms, with Vertical Horizon opening.

Toad was tight and polished with those pretty melodies and lush harmonies. Their voices all sound great. Exactly what you would hope they'd be.

Gin Blossoms were a little looser and did a few improvisational bits to start their songs. They also sounded great.

'Twas a nineties night.

As bands like to do these days, the tour is based on playing one particular album in full. So, first they played all of "Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots" (as seen above), then they did a set of songs from other albums.

Maybe it was the fact that the sun was out for all of Yoshimi, so the stage lights and other visuals didn't hit as hard, but the second set felt much more energetic. Once you could really appreciate the lighting, and how it interacted with all of the various inflatable on-stage props, it was a wild time.

The oldest song they played was "She Don't Use Jelly", which started the second set. And that's when they brought out the giant rubber balls for the audience to bounce around. We were in the fourth row, so there was plenty of hectic giant-ball action.

No opener and they played 2.5 hours. Quality.

They've come a long way.

RIP Brenda

I somehow heard Liz Phair was touring, which was pretty incredible. But, even more incredible was that she was playing her entire "Exile In Guyville" album on the tour - 30th anniversary. This is a Big Deal.

She wasn't coming anywhere near Raleigh, so there was going to be travel involved. And since you can't fly anywhere from Raleigh without going through Atlanta first, Atlanta was the obvious choice to see her. Plus, it's only an hour flight.

So...

As advertised , she played all of Exile, in order. It was all very faithful to the originals, though some of the songs got slightly beefier arrangements because she had a full band with her.

It was surreal

, seeing her do that surreal album.

After that, she played a four-song encore of songs from her other albums ("Supernova", "Polyester Bride", etc).

She sounded great. And I don't think she stopped smiling the whole time.

She's another one I never thought I'd ever get a chance to see - Sunny Day Real Estate, Peter Gabriel, Liz Phair?! Keep em coming.

Last spring, I learned that Peter Gabriel was on tour in Europe. And I guess I assumed we'd already missed him in the US because we're in a part of the country where people like him always skip - they do NYC, DC and then jump to Atlanta or FL. But, he was in Europe! And so my wife and I got the crazy idea that we would do a spontaneous trip to Europe just to see him in some cool city like Amsterdam or Madrid or Berlin. But, those shows were all either sold out or ridiculously expensive. And there are no direct flights from Raleigh to any of them anyway so getting there would take 12 hours, and cost a fortune , and what about hotels, etc., etc..

But while digging around, we learned that he was coming to the US! Everything on the east coast was already sold out. But Denver wasn't! And there were still decent tickets available. And, my wife has friends and family in the Denver area (including a diehard Gabriel fan we could go with), and there are mountains! So, Denver.

Show was scheduled to start at 8:00PM. While we waited, a screen showed a movie of a man drawing hands on a giant clock face. Every minute, he redrew them.

Show started with Gabriel strolling out onstage by himself, speaking through a headset mic. He talked about time, the birth of earth, the creation of life, water, etc.. Eventually, he sat down near a campfire on stage (which you can see below the clock face, above) and started "Washing Of The Water" (from Us) with a small keyboard on his lap. Bassist Tony Levin, who has been with him from the start, joined him. Then the rest of the band came out for another song ("Growing Up" from Up), taking their places around the fire. Introductions, etc.. After that, they took their normal places on stage and played some new songs I didn't know from his new album which isn't out yet. He did "Digging In The Dirt", three more new songs, and closed out the first set with "Sledgehammer", which blew the place up.

He talked a lot about human rights, environmental issues, justice, etc, but his delivery is so gentle and modest that he never came across as preachy, to me. Given his age, he comes across as a kind and wise professor. He's 73 now. But he can still sing, and he can still perform. He can still get to those high notes when he wants to and his voice still has that remarkable plaintive scratchy quality.

Second set had three more from So: "Don't Give Up", "Red Rain", "Big Time". It was the first of these that really got me. On the album, it was a duet with Kate Bush, so Ayanna Witter, who sang it this tour, had some big shoes to fill; and she absolutely did. It was one of those situations (which I'm having more and more of lately) where I hear a song I've known for years, decades, to which I know all the words and all the sounds, and somehow I find myself understanding it for the first time - the words make sense in a way they hadn't before and the music feels fresher because of it. Odd. Wonderful.

"Red Rain" was beautiful. "Big Time" was fun - he marched around the stage pumping his fist to the beat.

I believe he played all of his new record. It's good. I'll buy it when it comes out. But his first five albums (the four self-titled and then So) will always be my favorites.

The lighting and stage effects were unreal. At one point a transparent stage-width screen came down across the front, a light from behind him cast Gabriel's shadow on the leftmost part of it, while live, but slightly-ever-more delayed, copies of than shadow were projected across the rest - visual echo. Then he started drawing swirls and hearts on the screen in real time with some kind of stick. Every so often he'd give the stick a little flick and the drawings would explode and dissolve outward. Surreal.

Closed out the set with "Solsbury Hill", a song that I've heard so many times that it's amazing I still find it marvelous. It's in 7 and he starts singing each line on 5. It shouldn't sound as effortless as it does. But it just sounds perfect. Seeing him do it live was glorious. They let the crowd handle the "Boom, boom, boom"s. And it was the oldest song he played (first album, second song).

For that song, the rhythm guitar player used the same guitar as one my father just gave me (Fender Acoustasonic Telecaster), which made it seem even more real.

The band was great, of course.

First encore was "In Your Eyes". You can probably imagine how an arena full of Peter Gabriel fans would handle hearing that one.

And then the last song was, as I've heard it always is, "Biko". It's a gut-punch of a song on record. And live, it's twice as hard. It's also the only song he did that has that weird, twitchy, experimental Gabriel sound of the late 70s. This and "Solsbury Hill" were the only songs pre-So.

As the band plays the end of the song, he says "... what happens next is up to you" and walks off stage. One by one the musicians leave

, drummer last, while the crowd sings the "Woah woah woah"s from the end of the song. The lights come up while the crowd is still singing.

Talking Heads' Jerry Harrison, and the guest guitarist on that album, Adrian Belew, are on the road with a tour highlighting the Heads' awesome 1980 album, Remain In Light. It's an eleven member band, seven of whom are themselves the band Cool, Cool, Cool. The others are Harrison, Belew, longtime Belew collaborationist bassist Julie Slick, and percussionist Yahuba Garcia-Torres.

I wasn't sure what to expect - were they going to just walk out and play the whole album? Would they throw some other stuff in? What about the fact that the last three of the eight songs are very slow, atmospheric things (co-producer Brian Eno's influence is strong), and one of them is about a middle eastern terrorist blowing up westerners with his homemade bombs ? [1980 was a different time]

They solved that problem by playing only the first five songs from Remain In Light, with a bunch of Talking Heads' classics (Psycho Killer, Slippery People, Take Me To The River, etc), a Jerry Harrison solo tune (Rev It Up), and Thela Hun Ginjeet from Belew-era King Crimson, mixed-in. On the Heads' songs, Belew, Harrison, the baritone saxophone player, and the two female singers all took turns doing lead vocals.

It was nice to see Jerry Harrison. Probably the only time I'll see a Head. And the rest of the band was sizzling. But honestly, the two women singers kinda stole the show. They were so good, and those Heads songs have such great backing/counterpoint parts. If you've ever seen the Stop Making Sense movie, you probably noticed how important the two female singers are.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyDb4szpWmc

Good show. Les Claypool's Fearless Flying Frog Brigade was the headliner that night, but we weren't up for it.

They're playing in Asheville tonight, and I was tempted to drive out there to catch it, but the show is sold out. Oh well.

At the Orange Peel in Asheville NC.

A show I never thought would happen. Not only did they postpone it after the singer's voice went out, two weeks ago, they have pretty much been on hiatus for the last dozen years or so. I've heard interviews where members loathed other members. Two of the original members went on to play with the Foo Fighters for a while. there were solo records. Seemed like SDRE was done.

But, things came together and three of the original four members, with two new members, went on tour.

SDRE's first album takes me right back to a very specific place and time. When I hear it I almost feel like they only existed in the mid 90s, in my green Hynudai Excel, sitting in Mt Hope cemetery, on Sunday afternoons, Rochester NY. Being 24. The other albums are all very good. But that first album ... it's golden.

Show was originally scheduled for two weeks ago, so Mrs and I planned a whole vacation around it. Asheville is a fun town and friends of ours own a BnB there. So, we did it up right. And the day of the show, last day of our trip, we got an email that the singer had lost his voice so they had to reschedule.

Two weeks later, another road trip and another night at the BnB, it all worked out. Mrs skipped. Like most people, she'd never heard of them and wasn't up for the four hour drive then standing for four hours in one spot, in a loud crowded club, listening to music she didn't know.

They've only put out one new song in the last 14 years, so everything they played was a classic. Loud as hell. Tight. And they seemed very appreciative of the fact that so many people came out to see them. Which was nice.

The Appleseed Cast opened. I'd never heard them and happily, they were amazing- noisy in a great way.

Cathedral Bells opened for them. They were fun.

So, all in all it was worth the 500 miles.

Our first show since the Before Time was Spoon, at a nifty little 1,200 seat outdoor amphitheater in Wilmington NC.

They were pretty great, much more interesting than the last time I saw them. Being right up front instead of all the way in the back probably helped. But they seemed more into it, too.

They have ten albums out now, so I wasn't expecting many songs from their older records. But, as with the 2008 show, I was a bit bummed that they played nothing from Girls Can Tell (their third) - or from anything before it. And only two from Kill The Moonlight (their fourth). Oh well. What they picked from the other six albums was all good, though.

Great band. Great show. Hope I don't get COVID.

I didn't take this video, but I'm in it.

RIP Charlie Watts.

Here are the Stones in late September 1989, Syracuse NY. A bunch of us from my dorm floor made the trip from Rochester to Syracuse to see this. We were as far away from that stage as the arena would allow.

There's an album called Steel Wheels Live, recorded a few weeks later on this tour, that is really great (hat-tip M-Lo).