Guest Blog

As I was the only idiot of my crew to NOT skip work this morning, and am semi-exhausted as fuck, my lovely significant other has granted me permission to re-print her LiveJournal entry regarding our adventures last night. Thus while I snooze, Ieave you in the more than capable hands of Ms. Bradish:

"I love Greg Dulli. The guy just rocks.

At first glance, he's an everyman. Overweight and middle aged. And yet, when he walks onto a stage, he oozes charm and sexuality. It's all that rock and roll. He belts, he croons, he screams and he sings straight from the heart and after a minute it's all you see. I can't name anyone else who can make anthemic original songs and an album of covers so distinctive they are almost indistinguishible from their originals. Taking a Bjork song to task is no mean feat, and Dulli achieves this romantically and respectably, in a traditional rock and roll fashion.

In Philly last night, he played to the most motley crew I have seen at a single show. Moms, hardcore kids, frat boys and sorority girls, and a particularly annoying poser douche who was trying to impress two fuckwit college girls by saying things about New York like "Chelsea is so central to everything! I go there all the time." From Staten Island. Riiiiight. One idiot actually tried to ask the guys I came with if she could stand in front because she was a girl and she was short. No lie. She actually said "It's not fair. I'm shorter than you guys, you should let me stand in front of you." F's best friend G, who is actually the quietest of the bunch, said to her "But she already is" and pointed to me standing behind her, waiting to get by. And a head taller. Love it. I thank god every day I am not short.

And all this after a long day and longer week. Work is becoming increasingly less tolerable, the impending holiday aside, and I find myself less motivated to do anything once I leave work. Being that I have tickets to the twilight Singers show on Saturday across the street, I wasn't sure travelling two hours in a car riding bitch in the backseat with four guys who tend to become retards in each others company was the best idea. Yes, I had the next day off, but I wanted to relax. I eventually threw my shit into a bag and hit the road with F, G, the Kidd and Lurch. Yes, these are the names we actually call them on a daily basis. My leg started to cramp only when we hit the Ben Franklin Bridge and I only worried a few times about the Kidd's driving and Lurch's directions. Can't complain.

The bouncer at the door is wearing a Terror hoodie when we get there. I am thinking at this point, it can go either way. Crappy venue with reluctant staff or mixed bag with open minds. Turns out, it was the latter for the most part. The North Star Bar is on the corner of a not so nice area of Philly--which I have been lost in several time in misguided attempts to find the Electric Factory, which is on the other side of town--and split in two. Bar and pool tables on one side, narrow hall for a venue with tiny stage in front and bar in back on the other. There's a tiny lounge on a balcony above the middle of the venue side that provides a nice view of the stage when there aren't eighteen spacehogs and fat girls blocking it. I began to notice here that people in Philly seem to be weird about personal space. It's natural at a show to be crowded and in increasingly close quarters when one gets closer to a the stage. If I got closer than an foot to a person to peer over the balcony, people would start twitching and jerking. Even on the floor, people of the various types mentioned before were quite verbal about the lack of space, despite gaps visible on the main floor and generous elbow room. This is all making me sorry I came and ruining the pleasant vibe of the car ride.

But Dulli makes everything better. The band opened with Teenage Wristband and the crowd just mellowed. People stopped bitching, started moving and singing along. I was worried the stage was too small for the band, as I've always seen them on stages with generous space. But Dulli was nonchalant about the cramped quarters and the sound was surprisingly crisp. I suppose he is very comfortable in his own skin, and by proxy always at ease on stage. He has become less and less intoxicated with every show I see him play and more and more pleasant to watch. Dulli's love of the music is always apparent, and the relationship with his band is palatable and plays into his relationship with the audience. The mean drunk has been replaced by a man who moves you. The next hour and a half flew by save the one minute he spent singing the first verse of Def Leppard's "Photograph" he introduced as the song "from the year most of you were born."

I love this man.

In my love for Dulli I cannot ignore his band. Dulli surrounds himself with talented and flamboyant people who complement his unique disposition. They are described on his website as such:

greg dulli- certo
jon skibic- tesoro
bobby macintyre- pazzo
michael sullivan- carissimo
manuel agnelli- figo

No capital letters. In order, they mean "sure, treasure, crazy, and most expensive." I have no idea what figo means. His drummer, Bobby Macintyre, is insane. The man is looks like a French lothario with tight polyester pants, billowing silk shirts and a scarf ALWAYS knotted at his neck. He is only missing a beret, which would hide the long curly locks that seem to be thinning. He goes from feverishly banging on his drums to hitting a tambourine with what seems to be the entire force of his body. All the while, his outfit becomes soaked, clings to his skin and the sweat that has drenched his hair flies from him with every punctuated move. His new keyboard player is an Italian man, Manuel Agnelli, from the band After Hours that Dulli is producing. We had the pleasure of being introduced to him in London and he has since replaced that touring band member. He, too, has a distinctive fashion sense--what would seem to be uncomfortably tight synthetic fiber pants, a dress shirt, the ugliest tie I have ever seen and another mop of wavy hair what seems to be coming away from the front--that only accents his talent. It was obvious he was excited and nervous to be playing with the band, and sometimes looked like he would rock himself off his little bench. He even hit his head on a low hanging speaker after the first encore. His guitar and bass players are less descript in their fashion but amazingly talented. Jon Skibic is best known for his work with the famed Gigolo Aunts of the late 90's and touring with Juliana hatfield of all people. On stage with Dulli, though, he stands alone and quiet with a Gibson SG and an impressive pedal board, decidely comfortable in his proficiency. But he resembles Benjamin Weinman of Dillinger Escape plan, so his calm might only appear that way to me by the stark comparison. Michael Sullivan, too, is only a lingering stage presence. Mostly because on the tiny stage he was hidden behind Manuel, but in London, too, he seemed content to play his Fender and let everyone else take the spotlight. Dulli, by the way, was in the Afghan Whigs.

The Twilight Singers only get beter every time I see them, and Saturday promises to be impressive."



PS: You can tell if we ever have kids they too will be able to write the longest blog entries ever. EVER.

F