Best of 2006

I am going to start with music from this year and maybe expand outward to movies and other stuff... but really I doubt it.

So without further adieu;

Top 25 Albums of 2006:
25)Yellowcard - Lights & Sounds
24)Thursday - A City Divided By The Light
23)Muse - Black Holes & Revelations
22)This Day & Age - The Bell and the Hammer
21)Brand New - The Devil and God are Raging Inside Me
20)Halifax - The Inevitability of a Strange World
19)Saves the Day - Sound the Alarm
18)Men, Women, & Children - Self Titled
17)John Mayer - Continuum
16)Matchbook Romance - Voices
15)The Matches - Decomposer
14)Over It - Step Outside Yourself
13)Senses Fail - Still Searching
12)Taking Back Sunday - Louder Now
11)The Early November - The Mother, The Mechanic, The Path
10)Forgive Durden - Wonderland
9)Gym Class Heroes - As Cruel As School Children
8)Spitalfield - Better Than Knowing Where You Are
7)Zebrahead - Broadcast to the World
6)The Format - Dog Problems
5)+44 - When Your Heart Stops Beating
4)Hit the Lights - This is a Stick Up...
3)Saosin - Saosin
2)New Found Glory - Coming Home
1)Moneen - The Red Tree

A couple honorable mentions to two great EPs:
David Melillo - Talk is Cheap EP
All Time Low -Put Up or Shut Up

TV Shows of the Year:
Arrested Development
24

Wedding of the Year:
The Boyd-Fann Wedding

Road Trip of the Year:
The Road Trip to Saint Louis

Guess Who's Back?

Yep it's me. I won't leave you in suspense anymore. I just got back from the big road trip. It was tons of fun, the wedding was awesome too. I am going to start working on a road trip journal (hopefully with pictures). I want to make it really detailed and with picture captions so it might take awhile. I am toying around with the idea of doing one day at a time and posting it like that so you can sort of travel along with me. It could work.
So keep checking back.
And check out my comedy blog and let me know what you think.

A new little feature I hope to work on

On the suggestion of my friend Matt I have decided to start writing anything funny I come up with so I created a little blog for my comedic ramblings. I posted something this afternoon that hopefully I will continue to work on and I will also post my story, the one I was talking about in my previous post, over there. So check it out and let me know what you think.

Here it is

I didn't realize how long it's been

So, on Saturday I am leaving for a road trip. It is going to be awesome, we are hitting up Cleveland (Rock and Roll HOF), Sandusky OH (Cedar Point Amusement Park), then we are heading down the Louisville area to do some spelunking and then possibly check out the Louisville Slugger Museum before hitting up a winery. Then off to Saint Louis to do some sightseeing, baseball gaming... and oh yeah, Boyd's wedding.

Since I will be gone so long I thought I would make a quick post and update everyone on what's going down. Hopefully when I get back I'll post some sort of road trip diary, it might even include some pictures.

I hope everyone enjoyed my show reviews. I enjoyed writing them.

I didn't pass. If you don't know what that means then oh well.

When I get back I do plan on writing a big long story that happened to me back in March. I have told it exactly three times because it is so long and involved, and people seem to find it funny so I will post that for your reading pleasure.

I guess that is about it for now. I thought I had more to say. See you in a fortnight.

TBS/AVA 6.22.06 @ Great Adventure & 6.25.06 @ Tweeter Center

I went to this concert on Thursday at Great Adventure and yesterday in Camden at the Tweeter Center. I wasn't able to get to Great Adventure until late because I had to work a full day so I missed the Subways and Head Automatica, and Head Automatica didn't play on Sunday because of Daryl's illness so they were essentially the same show for me especially since AVA and TBS both played exactly the same set list. The set lists for AVA and TBS will be at the bottom. I think the best way to cover everything in an organized fashion is to discuss each band, then talk about specifics to each show, then the set lists.
The Subways I only caught on Sunday but I was entertained. I had never heard them before but they played some solid rock music. They had a great deal of energy and performed about as well as any opening band could. They definitely set the stage for AVA and TBS well. I don't really know their songs so it is difficult for me to comment on their set beyond that.
AVA came on and led with the first track "Valkyrie Missle". The whole intro to the song was pre-recorded and the band finally came in around the 1:30 mark. The song did sound excellent and is one of my favorite tracks on the album. "It Hurts" followed which is one of the most painful songs to hear ever, especially given the crowd who just ate it up. "Distraction" followed and was heavily pre-programmed. Tom then went into "Down" by Blink which the crowd went crazy for... He only played the first two verses and one chorus then it bled into the beginning of "The Adventure" which was another very solid performance. At this point most of the rest of the set bled together for me. I had already thought that the many of the AVA songs sound very similar on the album and this part of the concert proved it to me. This was until "The War" began. This is my favorite track on the album and it proved to be an amazing set ender. The guitars chugged along and Tom sung his heart out. He took a little break about four minutes in to talk to the crowd about always living your dreams and never having regrets which was solid. Then they closed it out.
Overall I was sort of disappointed. Blink was one of my favorite bands and always put on a crazy and amazing live show and this came nowhere near it. Now, I understand AVA is a different band and have different songs and a different energy but I just couldn't get into it. I was disappointed in the fact that a fair amount of the music was pre-programmed. There was a couple parts during several songs where everyone besides the drummer was standing around doing nothing. I wish they would have just put someone in the corner and given me the illusion of some live programming or sampling. I was surprised by how strong Tom's vocals were, better than I expected and the drumming was also excellent. Not the best set I had ever seen, but definitely not the worst either. I just don't think I would ever go to a show specifically to see AVA.
Now onto the headliners and the big boys, TAKING BACK SUNDAY.
They opened with "What it Feels Like to be a Ghost" to which everyone screamed along especially to a certain chorus part that goes something like the name of their album. The boys were all dressed up in all black shirts and ties and the whole nine. Adam came out in a long sport coat and was sporting a vest also. Adam quickly tossed off the coat as they went into "Bonus Mosh Pit, Part II". The bass line chugged along very strongly. The breaks during this set were few and far between as TBS kept playing the tunes and everyone kept singing along, it was very impressive. The crowd went especially nuts for "Cute Without the 'E'" and "MakeDamnSure". The encore consisted of Adam playing "Divine Intervention" on acoustic guitar while also playing the harmonica. I was amused that everyone seemed to go nuts as he began playing the harmonica like they didn't realize it was there, or what it was until he started playing it. They then closed with everyone's favorite single "A Decade Under the Influence".
All in all it was an excellent set. Adam cut his mic swinging down slightly since the incident and never missed a single note. I know TBS fans have often complained about him worrying more about swinging and less about singing but for the past two months at least (Bamboozle included) this could not be further from the truth. Fred's vocals were smooth and Matt's bass lines were strong and full. Mark's drumming was superb as always. And Adam had all his dance moves working at both shows, he was all over the place playing to everyone in the crowd. Excellent, excellent shows overall.

Thursday @ Great Adventure

• Like I said before, I missed The Subways and Head Automatica because of work.
• The show was in the Northern Star Arena in the far northwestern corner of the park.
• The ticket included admission to the park but since I didn't have any time ... and I have motion sickness and hate roller coasters, I didn't go on any rides.
• Medusa was to the left of the stage in the backdrop which was pretty cool to see as the bands played.
• Tom told a little story during "There Is" about how if you like a girl you should take her out on a date, then walk her to her front door. Then you give her a kiss, and reach up her shirt. At that point she will reach into your pants... and steal your wallet.
  
• Fred's guitar wasn't working for most of "Spin" so the opening guitar riffs were missing as was the solo in the middle. Adam improvised by singing some of the solo. Also, they prefaced by saying this was the hardest song they had ever written.
• During "Divine Intervention" Adam stopped near the end and told a story about how he was sitting in the park a week earlier just hanging out and some kids came over and threw water balloons at him.
  
• During "A Decade" some girl was crowd surfing and fell right into the pit where I was. She was obviously very hurt as she landed on her head. At this point everyone stopped, which was good, but everyone also just stood around. I did my best to run and get help but security was useless, finally when the set ended I was able to run up to the barricade and get help from a police officer who could radio EMTs. This really bothered me because everyone just stood around. Kids, if you are at a show and someone hurts themselves don't just stand there, go get help. Make sure to clear some room around the person and get help. I also saw some people trying to move this girl, that is idiotic. If someone lands on their head then you don't move them. Just get help.
  
• As everyone was leaving the park the Cha-Cha Slide or whatever it is called was playing and at least 1/3 of the people leaving took it upon themselves to dance on their way out. This was highly amusing for me.

Sunday @ Tweeter Center

• This was my first show at the Tweeter Center and I was pretty impressed with the venue. It is very similar to the PNC Bank Arts Center and the acoustics were excellent.
• During "There Is" Tom came down off the stage and walked around the crowd. The kiddies went nuts.
• The show was extremely hot and at one point Tom commented he "felt like he was in a wet T-shirt contest". TBS also must have been hot as they were wearing full suits practically. You could see Adam's shirt was soaked through during "Divine Intervention".
• In the middle of TBS's set a female in the pit got on her friend's shoulders and pulled up her shirt. Adam quickly cut in during one of the songs and commented "We aren't those kinds of boys so put those away." She left them out for a good three or four songs.
• Adam once again cut out during "Divine Intervention" and then looked out into the crowd and pointed out two women who were apparently staring at him all show like he was crazy. He then commented that they were awesome mothers for bringing their daughters and that their daughters should appreciate that, everyone then applauded them. It was a nice moment.
• Fred commented how nice it was to be back in Philly and also told us that he missed his friends wedding this past weekend because they were touring. Congrats Billy!
• Serg from TEN was at the show and I saw him early on and was hoping to talk to him about the new triple disc but he was talking with other people so I decided to try and find him later, which I never did.
  

Set List for AVA

1. Valkyrie Missile
2. It Hurts
3. Distraction
4. Down (Blink-182)
5. The Adventure
6. There Is (Boxcar Racer)
7. Do It For Me Now
8. The Machine
9. The Gift
10. The War

Set List for TBS

1. What it Feels Like to be a Ghost
2. Bonus Most Pit, Part 2
3. Bike Scene
4. The Union
5. MakeDamnSure
6. Set Phasers to Stun
7. Twenty-Twenty Surgery
8. You're So Last Summer
9. Spin
10. Timberwolves at New Jersey
11. Liar (It Takes One to Know One)
12. My Blue Heaven
13. Cute Without the 'E' (Cut From the Team)
14. This Photograph is Proof (I Know You Know)

Encore

1. Divine Intervention
2. A Decade Under the Influence

Hope you enjoyed my review.

TBS/AvA/HA

I am going to Great Adventure shortly after getting home from work to see Taking Back Sunday/Angels and Airwaves/Head Automatica... and The Subways are playing too. I am also going to be in Camden on Sunday to check ou the same show. Expect a review for both... or maybe just a joint review. Check back.

Brand New: 6-20-06 @ Starland

Last Thursday after hearing the previously sold-out Brand New show had tickets available on ticketmaster I immediately went to ticketmaster's site and snatched two up. So I made my way to Starland around 730 and made my way to the bar area. The two opening bands (Ultra High Frequency & Colour Revolt) I had never heard of and didn't really have any interest in seeing them so I just chilled in the bar/lounge area. The music was still very clear and there were two TV's showing what was happening on stage so I really didn't miss much. UHF seemed alright, I thought a couple of their songs were decent but nothing special. Colour Revolt, however, I thought was really bad. I ignored most of their set.
About 15 minutes after CR's set I headed down to the main floor to get a good spot for Brand New's set. It took them awhile to set up, about 45 minutes. They finally went on at about 9:35.
Now, I will preface this by saying this was my second time seeing Brand New and the first time I saw them play anything off of Deja Entendu. They might have played one or two new songs when I saw them four years ago but I don't remember them enough to count.
They opened with Tautou which really set the mood for the night. The show was generally a melodic acoustically driven show. After Tautou I expected "Sic Transit.." however Jesse went right into Untitled 8 with full band accompaniment. It sounded excellent and was the first of three new songs that Brand New played on the night. "Okay, I Believe You..." was the next song and again it sounded excellent. For the next two songs BN kicked it up a notch with "The Quiet Things..." and "Jaws Theme Swimming" They followed with "I Will Play..."at which point the show switched back to slower more melodic songs, with the exception of "A Shower Scene". I am not going to comment about each of these individual songs, suffice to say they all sounded superb.
The encore consisted of Untitled 6, Sic Transit Gloria, 70 x 7, and Play Crack the Sky.

General comments about the show as a whole: The sound was excellent. It sounded tight and fine tuned throughout. Jesse's vocals which I was very unimpressed with the last time I saw them have greatly improved. I was amazed at the emotion he carried through his voice in every word. I was actually amazed at how the whole band was able to fill the room with such sweeping sounds and emotion. This was one of the best shows I had ever been too.

Quick Notes:

• Before they played "A Shower Scene" Jesse announced that this was the first song they had ever written as a band.
• I am not sure exactly when but at some point around the 4th-7th song Jesse commented that they had just finished recording the album the day before and that "this was the best welcome home he could have imagined, thanks for staying with us."
• During "Untitled 7" in the encore it looked and sounded like Jesse was playing a slide guitar. I really couldn't see though and I heard someone else say he was holding/playing an effects pedal which is definitely more probable. (edit: He was holding an effects pedal)
  
• This is totally unconfirmed but I read from someone else's comments about the show that before they played "70x7" in the encore Jesse turned to Vinnie as they were debating which song to play and said "this is the last time" so perhaps that was it for "70x7". (edit: It seems that Vinnie wanted to stop playing and Jesse was convincing him to play one more song)
  

Set List

1. Tautou
2. Untitled 8 (Yeah)
3. Okay, I Believe You, But My Tommy Gun Don't
4. The Quiet Things No One Ever Knows
5. Jaws Theme Swimming
6. I Will Play The Game Beneath the Spin Light
7. The Boy Who Blocked His Own Shot
8. Untitled 7
9. The Shower Scene
10. Me vs. Maradona vs. Elvis
11. No Seatbelt Song
12. Soco Amaretto Lime

Encore

1. Untitled 6
2. Sic Transit Gloria... Glory Fades
3. Seventy Times Seven
4. Play Crack the Sky
   

Long Week

While I celebrated my spring break this week by working all five days. Yeah, I know.
I know some of you may have been anxiously awaiting my journal about the Memory Championships, well I did not make the afternoon so it would not have been very interesting. I will post more details when I can but I have been actually very busy this week and really haven't had the time to post. I wanted to put something up though. Hopefully next week I can post up a couple things. I also have a very interesting story that made me laugh out loud as I was telling it. It is quite embarresing but it is too good not to post. I will post that soon.
But for now I am heading down to AC for St. Patty's Day party and gambling tomorrow. I am very excited. The clock can't tick the last half hour of my day away fast enough. So check back next week for more updates.

Things of Note

So this Saturday is the USA Memory Championships. I have to be there at 8AM and hopefully will be competing till around 5:30PM. I previously said it would be broadcast live on HDnet which is owned by Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban. However, I was just informed due to some satillite issues they will be taping the event and running the tape on April 11th. I will keep everyone updated on that as I find out what is going on.
All that being said I plan on keeping some kind of running journal of the event and will post it up here if I find it to be mildly interesting. So look for that.

An interesting story: I got a call yesterday and the first thing I heard was "This is not a sales call; don't hang up" so this intrigued me and I stayed on the line for a couple more seconds at which point I realized it was a sales call. At this point I said, "You are a liar, this is a sales call." The caller responded "No it's not a sales call, don't hang up." And I hung up.
Not amused? While I am, of course I am very easily amused.

Couple Music Related Notes

Some music news and other related music stuff that probably only interests me:

I went to Best Buy yesterday and picked up 2 CDs. Strangely enough, both were re-issues. I picked up the re-issue of Say Anything's "... is a Real Boy." It is the original release with a bonus disc "...was a Real Boy." The bonus disc has seven fairly solid songs. I haven't given all of them a full listen yet, but it starts off with an amazing song "Wow, I Can Be Sexual Too." It is a song about phone sex, and it is damn catchy. And on top of all that goodness it was produced by Ariel Rechtshaid of the now defunct band "The Hippos". It was only 12 bucks for 20 songs, great deal, I strongly suggest it.
The second CD I picked up was Streetlight Manifesto's interpretation of "Keasbey Nights". Some of you may know that the band Catch-22 released "Keasbey Nights" in 1998. Well after the release of that classic album the band mostly disintegrated. I am not sure of the whole story, but the members that left Catch-22 formed a new super-ska band Streetlight Manifesto. And apparently SM had often been asked to play songs from "Keasbey Nights" and they would always decline however they finally put out the album. It sounds very similar to Catch-22's original release, especially because it is the same singer. Some of the verses changed slightly as well as the guitar work. The drums are amazingly stellar. However, it is extremely similar to the original release. If you are a big fan of Catch-22 or Streetlight Manifesto I would suggest picking it up otherwise just listen to the original.

In other news, I just found out that The Early November's upcoming triple disc "The Mother, the Mark, the Path" is going to be delayed... and perhaps delayed a long time. TEN did suggest it is possible an "accidental leak" could happen soon.
Also, I got my hands on the new Taking Back Sunday 4-song sampler and I am very excited for the new album. April 25th can't come soon enough.

That is it for now I think. I got a couple more updates coming so keep checking back.

Things On My Mind

I have some stuff on my mind, and felt like posting, so here I am.

"Crash" won best picture last night. I have been saying all along that Crash is not as good as the hype and I still feel this way. I felt the racism issue was definitely too forced. There was some excellent scenes, and amazing acting but the movie as a whole left me, well, feeling like it wasn't that good of a movie. I feel that people have become fascinated with the movies utilizing non-linear storylines and the intermingling of a multitude of them. Then at the end it all ties together and the audience feels like they just watched a very deep and thoughtful movie and they understood everything. In reality, the way it is done in Crash is shoddy with an over the top message being beaten into our skulls. All in all, I thought Crash was okay, but definitely not Oscar-worthy.

In other news, Pat Tillman's death is being re-investigated. Some higher level officials feel that Tillman's death was a result of negligent homicide. Now, I have two feelings about this, first off, when I heard that it was friendly fire that killed Pat Tillman the first thing I thought was "Isn't that negligent homicide?". And secondly, and by no means to I mean to demean the death of a brave American hero, who sacrificed a lifestyle that many dream of to defend this nation, but if this was any other soldier, would the American public be making such a big deal? In my opinion to keep the investigation going is a waste of resources.

Some other things that might only interest me:
1) I managed to spill my drink before, but somehow the only place that got wet, was a small spot on my forehead. I am not sure how this is even physically possible.

2) I was processing an application for a person who's name was Andrew Jackson. I was than saddened to see a personal check attached instead of a wad of twenty dollar bills.

3) I picked up Coke's new soda "Vault". I was curious and I am still drinking it. It tastes very similar to "Surge" which was released several years ago and tastes very similar to Mountain Dew. It is supposed to kick like an energy drink, but I don't feel energized at all. And there are no ingredients from energy drinks in here, I think they just kicked up the caffeine levels.

4) And lastly, at least for now: Arrested Development is getting closer to getting picked up by Showtime. It was reported by several media outlets that the show was in fact picked up, but it is just rumors at this point, I will report any updates as I come across them.

Bonus: 5) Two hours of 24 tonight. I am excited. Last week's episode was very intense.


And if there is anybody out there reading and wants me to write about anything just leave me a comment.