02-25-2008, 02:14 PM
I was turned on to Built to Spill a couple years ago when I was recovering data from a friend's hard drive. Along with the porn and nude pictures of his girlfriend I recovered his MP3 folder.
Inside was an indie rock treasure trove. Enough minor-label bands to fuel KALX for a week!
The following weeks were spent sifting through greatness (The Anniversary) and pretentious, self-indulgent noise (I'm looking at you Queens of the Stone Age).
Built to Spill is one of those wonky guitar bands a la Flaming Lips or My Morning Jacket. The warbling tenor vocal, the slightly-distorted melody and songs about angst and nihilism. In other words, my kind of music.
It was only fair that I offered him first dibs as my date to see the first night of their sold-out 3 night stint at the Fillmore. After a satisfying slice of pizza from Extreme Pizza we sauntered to the show.
The opening band was actually kind of interesting. I wish I had caught their name because it's not listed anywhere on the venue, ticket or LiveNation website.
Meat Puppets have abandoned their punk roots altogether and now perform as a country grunge trio. All they needed was a slide guitar and a fiddle player and I swear you'd think you were at a Charlie Daniels concert. My friend was very put-off (not a country fan I guess).
Built to Spill were just what I expected. 3 balding, bearded guitarists performing fretboard gymnastics with the greatest of ease. Lots of jamming and long tweaked-out solos. Much tuning between each song and little or no audience interaction. The highlight was a frenzied cover of Brian Eno's "Third Uncle".
We stayed till the end and got posters. Yay for posters!
BTW a fucking 12oz beer is now $7!
Inside was an indie rock treasure trove. Enough minor-label bands to fuel KALX for a week!
The following weeks were spent sifting through greatness (The Anniversary) and pretentious, self-indulgent noise (I'm looking at you Queens of the Stone Age).
Built to Spill is one of those wonky guitar bands a la Flaming Lips or My Morning Jacket. The warbling tenor vocal, the slightly-distorted melody and songs about angst and nihilism. In other words, my kind of music.
It was only fair that I offered him first dibs as my date to see the first night of their sold-out 3 night stint at the Fillmore. After a satisfying slice of pizza from Extreme Pizza we sauntered to the show.
The opening band was actually kind of interesting. I wish I had caught their name because it's not listed anywhere on the venue, ticket or LiveNation website.
Meat Puppets have abandoned their punk roots altogether and now perform as a country grunge trio. All they needed was a slide guitar and a fiddle player and I swear you'd think you were at a Charlie Daniels concert. My friend was very put-off (not a country fan I guess).
Built to Spill were just what I expected. 3 balding, bearded guitarists performing fretboard gymnastics with the greatest of ease. Lots of jamming and long tweaked-out solos. Much tuning between each song and little or no audience interaction. The highlight was a frenzied cover of Brian Eno's "Third Uncle".
We stayed till the end and got posters. Yay for posters!
BTW a fucking 12oz beer is now $7!
![[Image: magpie13.gif]](http://imagegen.last.fm/LastfmLiveJournal/recenttracks/magpie13.gif)