One great thing about Christmas...

Best nog ever. Tastes almost like a vanilla milkshake.

Serial Lady Killer

Last night in Toronto, I saw 25% of the greatest band in the world.

Not only did Rhett Miller put on an amazing show, but he did it without the rest of the Old 97's. I didn't expect anything but a first-rate performance from one of my favorite songwriters of all-time, but I was blown away.

The real surprise was that Rhett managed to rock. I was expecting "An evening with Rhett Miller" - a laid back set of innocuous pop a la The Instigator, lots of plaintive slow songs, etc. - but things were much more intense than that. Simply put, Rhett got into it. He literally assaulted his guitar, flailing away with reckless abandon, playing nothing but chords with a minimum of bloated riffage and not a trace of subtlety. He didn't shy away from the fast stuff, belting out classics like "Doreen" and "Time Bomb" with the same aplomb as when the entire band is behind him. Rhett was all over the stage, retaining his signature "moves" and his loose, unfettered vocal delivery. During a particularly spirited rendition of "Big Brown Eyes", Rhett screamed at the top of his lungs...

What did I expeeeeeect!!!!

I've heard him sing this line in exactly this way at countless Old 97's shows, but hearing him do it alone, with just an acoustic to back him...wow.

Who knew losing what's left of your mind could sound this good?

Highlights:

• Lots of 97s tunes and very few from The Instigator
• Cover of California Stars (!!!!!)
• Pixies cover
• "Question" alternating between French and English
• Rhett singing both parts on "Fireflies"
• Songs from new (!!!) Old 97's album

Sesame Street

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJlkplvYdgA

One of my favorite bits. The show was brilliant in its heyday.

Not everyone agrees, though:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/18/magazine/18wwln-medium-t.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

I don't care much for the "new" Sesame Street or its safe, toothless segments. The gentrified (there's a goddamn coffee shop now!) street - once a wonderfully quirky avenue of irreverent diversity - has become a parody of itself, a touchy-feely world where characters and conflict are innocuous and dull. The most complex and entertaining muppets have become more generically cute, and now suffer from a stifling sameness that robs the show of all the youthful energy that made it so great.

I miss when skits would end in pandemonium for no apparent reason. I miss when Oscar was truly grouchy, bordering on misanthropic. I miss when Snuffleupagus was merely a figment of Big Bird's imagination. I miss Kermit's disenchanted smirk, and his slightly condescending attitude towards the other muppets. But most of all, I miss the old Cookie Monster: a loud, boisterous cookie junkie whose one-track mind could think of nothing but eating. Child's First Addict, indeed. His very existence reflected the nature of the show back then; Sesame Street taught kids plenty, but every skit didn't have to be a "lesson", or even make any sense at all.

It's still a clever show, but it's not the eccentric bunch of weirdos it once was.

more food

In honor of an upcoming road trip, I made these for dinner tonight. Mmm.

Now I'm thinking about working out...it's the thought that counts, right?

I'm hungry...

...so it's time to blog about food.

Not long ago, I had the pleasure of eating (for the first time in a couple years) at Detroit's Geneva Burger, a legendary late night haven with the tastiest sliders imaginable. A "slider" - essentially a small, greasy onion burger on a steamed bun - can be had all around the Motor City, but no one does it better than Geneva. The smell of grilled onions that hits your nose upon walking through the door is sublime, especially after a few bowls of loudmouth soup.

Geneva is the epitome what Jane and Michael Stern call "roadfood":

"Great regional meals along highways, in small towns and in city neighborhoods...sleeves-up food made by cooks, bakers, pitmasters, and sandwich-makers who are America’s culinary folk artists. Roadfood is almost always informal and inexpensive, and the best Roadfood restaurants are colorful places enjoyed by locals (and savvy travelers) for their character as well as their menu."

"Sleeves-up food"...yes, that's the stuff. Like Lafayette Coney Island (another veritable classic), Geneva is a quintessential Detroit eatery - simple, no-nonsense grub for chain-weary diners. In a world where faceless, homogenized fast food is fast becoming our only culinary option, it's comforting to me that such places exist.

I realize some people only eat for sustinence. To them, food is utilitarian, a means to an end. They get hungry - they eat - and they're not hungry anymore.

I am not one of those people. Eating watered-down, generic cuisine is, to me, every bit as frustrating as listening to bland music. To put it in musical terms, let's say you sit down and order some tasty tunes: "I'll have the first Ramones album with a side of Johnny Cash, please." If someone then proceeds to serve you a steaming pile of the Huntingtons with a side of Toby Keith, you're going to be pissed, right?

As long as places like Geneva exist, I'll always savour the eating experience for all its worth.

room for nothing

Playing live can be the most exhilirating thing in the world. There comes a point, when a band is hitting on all cylinders, that you stop thinking and doing. Everything becomes a feeling, and you're absorbed by the music and songs. Life is narrowed to a singular purpose: all you have to do is rock. Beautiful, cathartic simplicity. One momentary blast of inspired rock n' roll and all the quotidian minutiae just melts away.

There is no context for something like that. At that precise moment, nothing really matters except the moment itself.

Last Thursday, I was still getting over a cold. I was sick, tired, and basically miserable. During our set, just about everything that could have gone wrong did. Blown fuses, short-circuiting microphones, faulty cables...

But we (the Hat) managed to rock. It felt right.

I tend to be more global than specific in my thought processes, engaging in ongoing (but futile) attempts to determine if my everyday experiences mean anything holistically. So far as I can tell, there are only two things that can momentarily halt the overly active brain, allowing me to feel "centered":

1) Really intense shows
2) Really intense sex

There are (obviously) better, more important things in life, but only these two provide an intensity acute enough to actually clear some space in my head. These moments function as abstractions. I don't need to fit them into anything. I need more of these moments, if only because I greatly prefer this to this.

So...London...was it good for you?