Zebra & Giraffe & Other Animals

Well, that person who writes that Memento Vivere Blog ;-) ordered me to pre-book tickets for Zebra & Giraffe and The Wedding DJ's at The Assembly for Saturday. It was a good thing I did, since they sold out at the door half an hour after opening and we saved 20 bucks a ticket (savings well spent on our drinkies :P).

The last gig I attended at The Assemby was LARK's last performance before they disbanded. I have seen and supported my share of local bands and LARK set the highest standard. In fact, having seen Muse at Cokefest 2008, I would confidently rank LARK alongside them for professionalism, perfectionism, performance and powerful stage presence. It's performance art and fine music in one impeccable package.

Zebra & Giraffe is a remarkably inspired, effectually solo project by the multi-talented Greg Carlin. I saw an interview with Carlin on etv's Frenzy and was wholly impressed by the music video, The Knife. But, since I don't listen to the radio and don't watch much tv, I did not hear very much more of his music. I do plan on getting hold of Collected Memories so I can listen at my leisure.

The gig:
It started off great, although the room with the stage was far more crowded than for the LARK gig. It was packed to capacity plus some. Still, people tried to move into better vantage points using the displacement theory with the tallest and largest built able to impose themselves in front of short people (me) and encroach on my space. It was still ok. Until a group of large, obnoxious fantype pricks bulldozed past me, with one popped collar jockish prick stomping on my little foot and elbowing me forcefully & painfully in the boob to shove me out of the way. So I elbowed him in the back, also protecting my boobs. He seemed not to like it so much. And the look on my face must have shown him exactly how much I cared.

It was shortly after that that I had had enough. I did not find Z&G engaging enough to suffer the smelly beer spilling, cigarette puffing masses. Neither did my other. So we found a quietish enclave and snogged until the end of the gig. Carlin does have an excellent voice and the music quality was decent but just not enough.

As for the wedding dj's, sorry, I am just not retro- meta- cool and ironic enough, I guess. I disliked the pop poop when it was being played on the radio when I was growing up, and have absolutely no affinity for it now. Backstreet Boys/ Tiffany/ Snow induce a spontaneous brain melt which I can almost feel leaking out of my poor abused ears.

I think I preferred The Editors/Queens of the Stone Age/Billy Joel loop they played in between sets.

We bailed during Guns 'n Roses Welcome to the Jungle.

Ultimately, I have outgrown the crowded smokey clubbing and dancing to atrocious "music" & drunkeninity phase.

Moving on...