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Post by Tex on Sept 8, 2009 7:08:52 GMT -6
We took in the Beach Boys Thursday night at Carlos N Charlies on Lake Travis. (We might not have much water down there these days, but there is still plenty of beer).
I had seen the Beach Boys in Austin back in the eighties. They still had the talent and I thought it shitty when the Austin paper called them "over the hill" and I thought it poetic justice when the group came out with the hit Kokomo a few months later.
Now, they are truly over the hill. There are 3 of the originals left in the group, but the bass player was the only one still at the top of his game. They had several young guys playing along with them and some expert help from the sound trailer which assured that the sound was good, but it was 15% from the original Beach Boys and the remainder from younger musicians and good technology.
It wasn't to the point of Weekend at Bernie's but it won't be long before they are down to one of the originals. Fifty years is a pretty good run for rock and rollers.
The show was about what I expected, more history than music, but everyone had a good time and it fit a pleasant Labor Day evening on the big sand beach at the lake.
We saw several other bands this long weekend and my oldest son was chatting with the guitarists at every break about what type of saddle, what type of pickups etc. on their electric guitars. Austin was very pleasant for the Labor Day weekend.
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Post by Chicago Jake on Sept 8, 2009 9:25:32 GMT -6
Sounds like fun. But it's probably time for them to replace "Boys" with a more appropriate term.
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Post by ♥ COVID-19♥ on Sept 8, 2009 9:34:32 GMT -6
Or maybe replace "Beach" with "Bukkake".
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Post by Tex on Sept 8, 2009 9:48:17 GMT -6
Or maybe replace "Beach" with "Bukkake". The water is so low that the "beach" might have been more bukkake than beach.
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Post by dean on Sept 26, 2009 18:54:05 GMT -6
We recently saw the BB at a small Central Illinois theater. It was a fun show but the quality was not there. It was fun to introduce my kids to the Beach Boys for them to hear some classic sounds. If you don't expect much it's easy to have fun, but they are well past their prime sound.
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Post by Chicago Jake on Sept 28, 2009 12:33:31 GMT -6
I used to have trouble remembering which Beach Boy was dead. But then I learned a fun mnemonic:
"Drowned, drowned, Dennis drowned, Dennis got drowned!!"
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Post by Tex on Sept 28, 2009 20:51:48 GMT -6
I believe Al Jardine is dead also.
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Post by Tex on Sept 28, 2009 20:53:26 GMT -6
"Al Jardine sleeps with the sardines."
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Post by Chicago Jake on Sept 28, 2009 23:31:15 GMT -6
Really? El Jardin is a great Mexican restaurant on Clark Street. I'd hate to think it had expired.
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Post by IE on Oct 5, 2009 1:22:52 GMT -6
I think someone named Harvey is dead as well.
Tex, I had a ticket to that show too, but due to difficulties in New Orleans (which was primarily my difficulty in getting out of the bed) I didn't make it. And I didn't mind. At their best they were a bit before my time. And it's a bit like a current "Pink Floyd" show, or Led Zeppelin. You get whoever won the right to use the name and a bunch of whosits playing the equivalent of Guitar Hero.
A few years ago I had the opportunity to see the Who, with Robert Plant as the opening act. I'm shamed to say that we didn't even leave the VIP tent until Robert was done. We had cocktails and food, and big screen view. OMG, the huge man-tits, in purple velour -- ieeww. WAY different from when I saw Led Zeppelin in 1976.
I think maybe leaving our memories alone might be better then trying to find the vibe again. Amazingly, our heros are as old, or older then we are. Some things are better left alone.
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Post by IE on Oct 5, 2009 1:39:12 GMT -6
Tex, re the drought. It's been fucking raining since I moved here a month ago!!!! I spent the past week in Grand Cayman, where it pissed rain every day, then back home, to more rain. I'm happy though, as even me, an outsider, can see how low Lake Travis is. And each day that it doesn't rain but is cloudy is a day where our water isn't evaporating. It's weird though. From last October until I left 30 June, there was NO rain, but once. I'm like WTF? There's water falling out of the sky??? Can we call someone to fix that? To think of the rain that I used to slog through for days on end in the NY streets daily -- hot summer rains, freezing cold winter rains -- I am SO over it!!
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Post by Tex on Oct 5, 2009 10:26:24 GMT -6
We just drove back from Austin last night. Over the weekend, there was a good amount of rain. We drove to San Antonio Saturday and there was some road flooding around San Marcos. The cotton and corn land east of Austin has been plowed under but the fields are looking much better. IE, Lake Travis hasn't looked like Lake Travis in a couple of years and it will take quite of bit of rain to get it back to normal. If you look at the shoreline, the edge of the trees is about the full level and the break between the gray limestone and the white limestone is about the usual summer low. We have a lot that connects us with Comanche Trail planted with Texas Highway Department grass, which is a hardy bermuda/buffalo grass. It doesn't need much water, but was brown and would crunch under your foot a month ago. It is green and needs mowing again.
Lake Travis takes up the slack for the lower Colorado basin and sometimes they have to release large amounts of water for various reasons such as the large water needs of the rice farmers well downstream around Wharton and El Campo.
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