WHAT A TEMPER!: PRETENDING TO BE IN TWO PLACES AT ONCE

The week ended on a downer, events at wthe office making me wonder whether the people who we work with are on our side or not. Problems arising both internal to the organization as well as from outside. But looking forward to a weekend of drudgery working on the house effectively pushed all that nonsense aside. Ha, ha, ha... Especially since it was Friday night and music was in the air!

The bright spot was that after an agonizing time trying to say yes or no, I took the plunge, finally deciding to go to Liverpool.

As has been the case for some time, two shows were planned for this cool evening. The first was with The Pretenders, appearing live at Glastonbury on June 25, 1994. An excellent audience recording. I'm not sure what it was but the sound during the first half of the show seemed to lack the crisp, sharp edges of the guitars so characteristic of their sound, making me wonder whether it was due to the other performers on stage with Chrissie. Wikipedia says:

By 1993, Hynde had teamed with ex-Katydids guitarist Adam Seymour to form a new version of the Pretenders. The team of Hynde and Seymour then hired a number of session musicians to record Last of the Independents that year (released May 10, 1994), including ex-Smiths bassist Andy Rourke. But by the end of the album sessions (and for the subsequent tour) the official band line-up was Hynde, Seymour, bassist Andy Hobson, and returning drummer Martin Chambers.

So the peculiar sound may have attributable to the band's lineup at that time.

An endless parade

Soldiers on the TV screen

Faces of the dead

Tossing and turning

Pursued by his fevered dreams

Jumps off the minds edge

A love so precious

Inhabiting our small lives

Saddened by the loss

Download it here:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=QVHPJKZD

Next up were Echo & The Bunnymen appearing live at the SXSW festival on March 21, 2009 at the Bat Bar in Austin, TX. An excellent soundboard recording, or close to it. They all perform flawlessly, putting on a great performance. Ian's voice sounded really good considering its 2009. During his stage banter with the audience, when you can understand it, he mentions that they were asked to perform for 42 minutes. "Can ya make it 42 minutes long? What else is 42 minutes long? Ah, oh, ah."

Mario Tarradell of The Dallas Morning News wrote:

Certainly much of the arty nonchalance, the elegant despair and the graceful melancholy at the heart of Echo & the Bunnymen can be credited to lead singer-songwriter Ian McCulloch. Onstage Saturday afternoon at the Bat Bar inside the Austin Convention Center, McCulloch led his four Bunnymen cohorts through an hour's worth of familiar songs during the band's return engagement to South by Southwest. The SXSW Live taping - yes, large cameras took up valuable space in an already overcrowded room - encapsulated the Bunnymen magic. McCulloch, dressed in black with dark sunglasses, epitomized the new romantic British movement from which the band emerged. Angst, psychedelia, new wave and anthem rock played into cheered-on staples "Seven Seas," "Bring On the Dancing Horses," "Nothing Lasts Forever," "The Killing Moon" and of course "Lips Like Sugar." McCulloch, an expert at brooding resignation, can now be definitely seen as one of the architects of the sound that would influence big bands of today such as Coldplay, the Killers and Radiohead.