The Week in Review

Oh, what a week it's been! Everyday there was some writing project going on.

Monday - Tweaked an interview with Will Cullen Hart of Olivia Tremor Control for Blurt. Transcribed an interview with In One Wind leader Angelo Spagnolo (graduate of Pittsburgh CAPA). Interviewed Ben Opie, his former teacher. Nodded off at the laptop.

Tuesday - Woke up early, finished transcribing (always a good feeling; writing an article never has the same burden as transcribing). Had Love Letters practice for the first time in a month. We sounded pretty good for a band who hasn't practiced in that long. Started writing the In One Wind article for City Paper. Nodded off again at the laptop, but not before making some good progress.

Wednesday - Woke up around 5:15 and finished article. Went to baseball game with a bunch of people from work. Good times, bad game. Wrote a CD review for JazzTimes.

Thursday - Wrote another review for JazzTimes. Started getting pissy that I hadn't gotten replies to a set of emailed questions submitted to Kathryn Calder (New Pornographers keyboardist who makes great solo albums). I KNOW she's on tour in Europe, but my deadline is tomorrow, mannnnnn. Went to the Olivia Tremor Control show. Woooooooooooooo! (Specifics to come.)

Friday - Scrambled to write an intro for the Olivia Tremor Control piece for Blurt. Still went over the word count, though not by much. Received Kathryn's answers via email by mid-day, while on break at work. Read them at night. Nodded off while listening to Azita (nothing personal). Listened to it again after waking up.

Saturday - Woke up at 6, and banged out the Calder piece. Worked. Nodded off while listening to St. Vincent, came to a few songs later, wondering, "What CD is on now? What was I listening to before this?" (Note: I was listening to the vinyl version of the album.)

Still have three CD reviews due to Blurt, which I'll work on tomorrow morning before work.

Olivia Tremor Control was awesome. Much like my memory of seeing them in 1999, they played these amazing pop songs that always seemed to be on the brink of collapsing into chaos, under the weight of having eight, and occasionally nine, guys onstage at once. Three guitars (tho Will didn't seen to be playing chords a lot of the time), good ol' Julian Koster bowing a banjo and making it sound like a gypsy violin, keys, drums and trumpet. There was one moment where a song fell apart, but by and large they were pretty tight. And nice guys. On the way out, Peter Erchik spied my newly purchased Dusk at Cubist Castle 2LP under my arm and thanked me for coming, adding how great he thought the turnout was. That was swell. So's the record.