Ramy Youssef: More Feelings @ BAM Howard Gilman Opera House (December 8, 2023)

For the second straight year, Franny surprised me with tickets to a comedy show for my birthday. And once again the show was straight fire. This time it was to see Ramy Youssef, whose TV show Ramy we had enjoyed together. This show/tour, "More Feelings" was a follow-up to his first comedy special "Feelings" (which neither of us had seen until after we saw this show). Like the TV show, the comedy show centered around his experience as an Arab American and practicing Muslim. The recent war between Israel and Hamas provided further inspiration for the new material. As I mentioned before, the show was great; his jokes were funny, and he has mastered his style of delivery even more since the first special.

A couple of additional noteworthy tidbits... His disabled friend Steve, whom we knew from a recurring appearance on the TV show, was the opening act - a pleasant surprise for us. There was also a point during Steve's act where he was describing the concept of "inspiration porn" from a disabled perspective, and asked for audience members to yell out someone who inspires them. On the second asking Fran shouted "my husband", to which I was immediately embarrassed (kinda like when she tries to start the clap after a plane lands). Thankfully Steve's on-stage reply of "Somebody hasn't been f*cked in a while" helped relieve the awkwardness. 😅

Lastly, this performance was a no-phones show (they locked up audience member phones in little bags that they unlocked afterward), so I didn't get a picture.

Kid Cudi @ Kings Theatre (October 13, 2023)

This show was billed as "Kid Cudi Presents: Cudder’s Clubhouse", an intimate and experimental performance for the fans before he goes on a legitimate tour next year. This was one of a few hastily arranged concerts (the announcement and on-sale were the week before the first show) where Cudi would go deep into his catalog, playing some songs for the first time in a while, or ever.

One particularly novel aspect of the performance is that he set up the stage like a living room of sorts, where he eventually hosted 6 fans from the crowd. He stopped at 3 different points during the performance to select the guests based on their energy and enthusiasm. He treated them to booze and weed that was set out on the table; and of course he also partook in the goodies.

The show was very interactive with the rest of the crowd as well. He paused after just about every song to introduce the next one, or tell an anecdote, or explain how he's finally happy in life, or gush about his special guest Chip tha Ripper, or gush about how great his forthcoming album INSANO will be.

Speaking of the new album, he played 3 new songs from it, and I have to agree that they were all bangers. The setlist from the show should be here, but has not been filled in at the time of publication; but the one from the first clubhouse show seems pretty similar (though longer), so you can get an idea of what he played. Some of the songs were only partially performed, so he went through more than would be played in a typical show. He included a few songs from his WZRD and Kids See Ghosts collaborations. Unfortunately I can't say that I'm a fan of most of his rock material. But the rest of it was pretty good. I suspect that I would have preferred a standard Cudi show with a more crowd-pleasing setlist, but it was still nice to hear some deep cuts (some of which I was not up to speed with); "Balmain Jeans" was a highlight for both me and Fran. I also appreciated his showmanship and smooth dance moves on the stage. Overall a solid show which Fran enjoyed as well.

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Rating: 4.0/5

Explosions in the Sky @ Kings Theatre (October 5, 2023)

I think this was my first proper Explosions in the Sky show; of the couple of times I can remember seeing them before, I think one was a festival set, and the other time I missed a significant portion of their performance. It was a nice and efficient 1.5 hour set with no encore. The light design was interesting (though unspectacular) - the illumination came almost entirely from the floor; and there was a lot of fog. In terms of music, they threw in plenty of classics alongside a couple of new cuts (see the setlist here). While my favorite songs of theirs are typically from the early part of their catalog, "It's Never Going to Stop" from the new album (End, which is actually pretty solid) was an unexpected highlight; it had a unique feel compared to their typical fare, and was interesting to see played live. If I could have made any changes, I would have swapped out "Loved Ones" for "Ten Billion People" (both from the new album). In any case, I'm still quite impressed by how cleanly they play their tunes. Strong work from the boys from Texas.

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Rating: 4.4/5

 

Mike Birbiglia: The Old Man and the Pool @ Vivian Beaumont Theater (December 10, 2022)

Fran's main birthday gift to me this year was a joint celebration by going to see one of our favorite comedians, Mike Birbiglia (or Mikey B, as we call him), in his new comedy show. The show is currently in the middle of a two month run at the Lincoln Center. His last show "The New One" (which was on Broadway for a few months) centered on his experience becoming a new father. I won't give too much away, but this one continues with themes of family, health, and death. I would highly recommend it if you are a fan of Mikey B's previous work.

I got married yesterday

It was a small civil ceremony on the Mohonk Preserve in upstate New York. We kicked the day off with a helicopter tour of NYC.

There are some pictures from the day here: https://photos.app.goo.gl/raCr15ksSEu6m58A8.

Rage Against the Machine w/ Run the Jewels @ Madison Square Garden (August 14, 2022)

Like many people back in the 1990s and 2000s, I was a fan of Rage Against the Machine. And over the course of my concert-going this was one of the bands that I wished I had gotten a chance to see live. So when their reunion tour got announced for summer of 2020 I jumped at my friend Roger's offer to go with him to see them. Fast forward 2 years, a global pandemic, and two postponements. And then Zack (the frontman) went and (according to a report) tore his Achilles tendon about a month ago - two shows into the tour. The band still powered through this first leg of the tour (ending with 5 sold-out nights at MSG), but have cancelled the European portion later this year so that Zack can heal up. As an aside, I didn't know about the injury until Roger told me in between sets at the show.

Roger got us a couple of general admission tickets on the floor. I figured (especially at Fran's urging) that this would be a good first time wearing ear plugs at a show; it's not quite the same, but I didn't miss much (besides hearing loss). Run the Jewels as the opening act wasn't too spectacular, but wasn't bad at all either. I'm a mild fan of their music, but I still think that most hip-hop performances just don't translate as well live as other genres that involve playing instruments.

When RATM came on, the band members carried their injured singer onto the stage; which was a nice touch. He spent most of the show seated in the middle of the stage, but his limited mobility didn't prevent him from bringing his trademark energy. Similarly, the rest of the band were impressively energetic for being in their 50s. It's amazing to see what Tom can do on the guitar. I also liked the clean and open set design with a big screen and lots of lights.

They played 20 songs over about 1h45m.  Their setlist was loaded with the classics, mostly from their earlier albums; "earlier" being relative, as their last album (which was all covers anyway) was released in 2000. While it was great to see and hear all those iconic songs being performed, I was ready to go by the time the show ended. Maybe my bad back and advancing age can't handle standing for 3+ hours anymore. Or maybe it's also that their music does get a bit repetitive after a while.

In any case, I'm glad that I got to see them live, even without the full spectacle of Zack jumping all over the stage. Perhaps I didn't appreciate it as much as I would have 20 years ago, but it was still pretty good.

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Rating: 4.3/5

Beach House @ Kings Theatre (June 20, 2022)

Beach House have a lot of good songs in their extensive catalog. So many gems that it's still a great show even if they leave out a bunch of my favorites. I had a similar reaction the last time I saw them. And like then, I almost didn't go to the show this time; good thing I snagged a ticket last week.

Unsurprisingly, their setlist was heavy on the new album (Once Twice Melody, which is pretty much a double album), and this wasn't a bad thing. It was good to hear a bunch of the new tunes, most of which were solid. A couple of my favorites from the album were each a book-ending highlight or lowlight: I was excited when they started with "Once Twice Melody", but something about the sound mixing at the beginning (or maybe it's just how the live rendition is?) didn't hit quite the same; and they ended the night with a great performance of "Over and Over" (including a false ending), which is easily the track on the album I've listened to the most. It would have been nice if one of the new songs was "Masquerade", which is probably the most different (and dancy, perhaps) from the others.

The rest of the songs were scattered from their other albums since Teen Dream, which itself only had one song played - good to see them moving on from there, even though it was a fantastic breakthrough album. More standouts included "Dark Spring", "Levitation", and "Lemon Glow", but then again I thought the same last time as well. In general, the live renditions stayed pretty faithful to the album versions, save for Alex's solo on "Space Song" (I think?) - which was one of the rare times that a surprise solo was a pleasant surprise.

Overall a great performance, with little to complain about. Except maybe wishing that Fran was in town to enjoy it by my side.

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Rating: 4.6/5

Sigur Rós @ [Kings Theatre, Beacon Theatre] (June [14, 17], 2022)

The original plan was to go to the Tuesday show, but when we originally made the plan we didn't realize that Fran's school would still be in session this week. We realized this a couple of weeks before the show, so I bought tickets for the Friday show as well, and a work colleague (MaryEileen) was able to take Fran's place for the Tuesday concert.

I'm putting both shows together in one post because they were for the most part the same performance, just in different venues, and with one notable difference that I'll mention shortly. The concert was structured similarly to when I saw them a couple of times a few years ago: broken up into two sections by an intermission, with no opening act. They have played essentially the same setlist at every show on this tour, except for the Tuesday show. On that night Goggi mentioned that it was the 25th anniversary of the release of their first album, so they would do something "a little different" - which was add the song "Syndir Guðs", which they were playing for the first time since 2001. Here are the setlists from Tuesday and Friday. I guess another difference between my experience of the two shows was that on Tuesday we were in the balcony at Kings Theatre, while on Friday we were about 10 rows back on the main floor at Beacon.

Although great, both shows weren't without their, admittedly minor, issues. Tuesday's had a couple of small timing blips: once between the band members on "Heysátan", and once when the lighting tech hit a strobe too early on "Dauðalagið" (though I will say that the effect was really strong when they did get it right - something about the isolation of that drum beat combined with the quick strobe). On Friday Jónsi seemed to have trouble with something (in-ear monitors? complete guess), and left the stage unexpectedly 2 or 3 times (during portions or transitions where he wasn't playing or singing). The timing on "Heysátan" seemed a little better, but I can't blame them for not being completely spot on - that seems really difficult to count out in sync.

As for the highlights... In general the second half was more upbeat (which I preferred) than the first one. That half also included more songs from Takk..., which is easily in my top 10 albums of all time. Though I will mildly complain that the live rendition of "Sæglópur" is a bit too heavy on the drums, thus washing out the rest of the intricate instrumentation. I was pleasantly surprised by "Gold 4" (here's a rendition from another show), which seems to be one of two new songs that they're playing on the tour.

Fran thoroughly enjoyed the show as well, and ranked it above all the other concerts I've dragged her to (above James Blake, Radiohead, and Interpol/Tycho). She thought the songs were beautiful, and seemed to be particularly drawn to the quieter ones (especially when they got into "the huddle" on the left side of the stage for a couple of songs, her favorite being Untitled #3 ("Samskeyti")); and in contrast she complained of a couple of the loudest moments hurting her ears. She appreciated the many instruments that the various band members were able to play. She did comment that she could have done without the visuals on the backing screen for the most part, but did appreciate them during a couple of the songs (one with birds on a wire, and another panning up a rock face).

In any case, here are a couple of pics from Tuesday...

And from Friday...

Rating: 4.5/5

Interpol + Tycho @ Kings Theatre (May 14, 2022)

For some reason I forgot before the show that Tycho has a live drummer and guitars during their performances; so it was a bit of a pleasant surprise that it wasn't just him pushing buttons and playing a keyboard. They also seem to be making good use of the larger space on stage (even as an opener) compared to previous venues that I've seen them. As usual they had the video projection thing going on. Their set was pretty solid, and perhaps more consistently enjoyable than Interpol's.

But Interpol was who most people came to see. The crowd went crazy for the old hits, but were much less subdued for the brand new music - they played about 4 new-to-me songs, a couple of which I later found out have been released as singles and a couple yet unreleased (I didn't even know they had a new album coming out). Daniel played keyboards (instead of his usual guitar) on a couple of the new tracks, which was just as surprising as the fact that those two songs (Toni and Something Changed) were "piano" heavy. Of the new songs, my favorite was easily Into the Night (video from a different show); it was the only one I took to immediately. The other noteworthy thing about their performance was the light show, for a couple of reasons: (1) the band members were backlit for pretty much the entire show, so we couldn't see their faces - I don't remember previous shows being like that; (2) they went waaaaay over the top on the strobe lights - I remarked to Fran at one point that I felt like I was being assaulted by the lights.

Rating: 4.4/5

Tame Impala @ Barclays Center (3/14/2022)

 

A Tame Impala show is a weird mix of stoner rock and semi-danceable bangers; with crazy lights, lasers, and confetti thrown in. I didn't "prep" much for this show, so most of the songs that were top of mind going in were off their/his latest album, The Slow Rush. Though that album was solid, the show reminded me how many good songs were on Currents. The older songs tended to be not as well received by the audience, as their appreciation skewed more toward the newer and more poppy cuts; and the people definitely went crazy for the big hits. Most songs seemed to have the percussion and bass turned up compared the album version. And I was a bit surprised that they played a couple of "interlude" tracks. In contrast to the wild visuals, Kevin & co's showmanship was much less dynamic; and he only left his spot in the middle of the stage a couple of times. An interesting observation (from the big screen, as I was way too far and high up to make out any detail) was that at least a couple of band members appeared to be wearing (pandemic) masks.

Setlist here.

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4.4/5

 

James Blake @ Radio City Music Hall (10/9/2021)

 

This was my first concert since the pandemic started, and I took Fran along with me. It was also my first show using the continuously refreshing ticket barcodes from the Ticketmaster app - seems like a solid strategy to combat ticket scams, but time will tell how effective it is (and there are probably downsides that I'm ignoring, like requiring a smartphone).

Notable points include:

• Personal favorites "Life Round Here", "Mile High", and "Retrograde" were played, though I would have liked a couple more. The "Retrograde" hum part was live looped, and each time it played you could hear the crowd's wild reaction upon recognizing the song at the beginning.
• The live performances helped me dig a couple of tunes off the just released (the day before) new album even more - "Famous Last Words", "Foot Forward", "Life is not the Same".
• There was a bit of a dance party interlude for a couple of songs. Fran really appreciated the opportunity to get up and dance. In general she really liked the show, and enjoyed that many of the songs threw in unexpected aspects.
• James had nice banter with some good humor and showed a lot of appreciation for the crowd.

Setlist here.

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Rating: 4.4/5

Top albums of 2020

As I write this, I realize that the last time I posted to this (or any) blog was the top albums list a year ago. I guess 2020 killed the 2 things that I still blog about these days - concerts and trips. 2020 was also not a great year in music listening for me. While I listened to more music than in 2019 (total # tracks up 101%), my new music discovery rate was much lower (down ~45%, depending on the metric used; and last.fm has some great metrics for this). I think this is because a significant percentage of my listens were from my "Running" playlist, which includes a lot of my favorite songs that I play on shuffle - I tried to take on running (really, short slow jogging) this year since I didn't have soccer leagues to keep me active.

 

As I did for 2018, I'm not going to rank the albums this year. This will just be a list of notable albums I enjoyed that were released this year.

Torres - Silver Tongue

String Orchestra of Brooklyn - afterimage

Tame Impala - The Slow Rush

Grimes - Miss Anthropocene

Moses Sumney - græ

Phantogram - Ceremony

Kangstof - The Noise You Make is Silent

The-Dream - SXTP4

dvsn - A Muse In Her Feelings

Other Lives - For Their Love

NNAMDÏ - BRAT

I Break Horses - Warnings

Sufjan Stevens - The Ascension

Fleet Foxes - Shore

Kid Cudi - Man on the Moon III: The Chosen

Top albums of 2019 (plus top albums of 2010s)

I continue to listen to less and less music...  But that doesn't mean that I can't still put together a year-end top albums list.  Unlike last year, when I threw my arms up and made no attempt to order the list, I'll at least try to rank the albums this year (despite not giving them an adequate amount of listens).  When I first began compiling these lists (and up until a couple of years ago), I used spreadsheets to tally up points to create the rankings; ain't nobody got time for that these days.  But here's a rough cut (with links to some of my favorite songs from some of the albums)...

1. Jenny Hval - The Practice of Love
2. James Blake - Assume Form
3. Buke & Gase - Scholars
4. Davido - A Good Time
5. Joseph - Good Luck, Kid
6. The New Pornographers - In the Morse Code of Brake Lights
7. Foals - Everything Not saved Will Be Lost Part 1
8. Tool - Fear Inoculum
9. Lower Dens - The Competition
10. elbow - Giants of All Sizes
11. Somos - Prison on a Hill
12. Tycho - Weather
13. Sharon Van Etten - Remind Me Tomorrow
14. Sudan Archives - Athena
15. Tender - Fear of Falling Asleep
16. Clams Casino - Moon Trip Radio
17. Thom Yorke - Anima
18. Foals - Everything Not saved Will Be Lost Part 2
19. Lillie Mae - Other Girls
20. Burna Boy - African Giant

As a bonus, here's a list compiled because my good friend Tom asked what my top albums of the decade are.  I combed through the lists from 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018, and came up with this...

1. Foals - Total Life Forever
2. Beach House - Depression Cherry
3. James Blake - Overgrown
4. Other Lives - Rituals
5. Moderat - III
6. Bear in Heaven - I Love You, It's Cool
7. Panda Bear - Tomboy
8. The Range - Potential
9. Jenny Hval - The Practice of Love
10. Sigur Rós - Kveikur
11. Alt-J - This is All Yours
12. Hundred Waters - The Moon Rang Like a Bell
13. Jónsi - Go
14. Crystal Castles - (III)
15. Grizzly Bear - Painted Ruins

Tool @ Barclays Center (11/19/2019)

I almost didn't include the picture above, because Tool has a "strict" no-camera policy at their shows (though sneaking a couple of pictures in would have been easy).  But then Maynard "allowed" cameras for the last song, which was dedicated to the artist who does their artwork (a special guest that night).  This at least gives an idea of the general stage setup, but doesn't include the lasers, LEDs, or transparent curtain that they had in front of them for most of the show.

Good stuff about the show:

• I intentionally skipped the opener (Killing Joke) and got to my seat right as Tool was taking the stage; perfect timing.
• It's a Tool concert, so of course there's going to be good music played well.  They mixed in a good amount of old and new.  Setlist here.
• They played my favorite song from the new album, "Pneuma".
• The stage setup, lighting, and effects were cool.
• They had a 12 minute (laser projected) countdown clock between the main set and the encore.  They don't do the "let's keep them clapping for an unknown while" thing.
• I met up with high school friends Eric and Cam in front of the venue after the show.  We had previously discussed attending the show together, but they initially didn't think they could make it - so I bought a solo ticket.  Obviously, they ended up going at the last minute.

Bad stuff:

• My left shoulder was still recovering from surgery 3.5 weeks prior, and was slightly uncomfortable for brief portions of the concert.
• The view from my seat was not the greatest.  As you can see from the photo, the left speakers block a good portion of the view, in particular one of the platforms where Maynard hung out in the back.
• People who stand up in front of you in the nosebleed seats.
• When I stood up to see over the people standing in front of me, I kept my coat on my seat.  It ended up falling to the floor and somehow getting some liquid (I'm guessing beer?) all over it.
• I don't have too many complaints about the actual content of the show, despite not thinking the latest album was as good as the previous three.  However, Danny's "Chocolate Chip Trip" percussion wankery was garbage and a complete waste of 10 minutes.

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Rating: 4.4/5

Massive Attack @ Radio City Music Hall (9/26/2019)

This show was part of Massive Attack's tour to commemorate 20 years (well, 21) since the release of their landmark album Mezzanine.  The show had actually been rescheduled from the original date in March.  A pre-show email advised guests to arrive when the doors opened 60 minutes before the 8pm "strict" start time, as there would be no opener and the security lines would likely be long.  Well, they were right about the long lines, but it only took about 10 minutes to get through.  I was at my seat a few minutes before 8pm, but waited about an hour before Massive Attack took the stage a couple of minutes before 9pm.  It was somewhat understandable since the (sold out) seats weren't even half filled at 8pm, but still annoying to arrive on time and then have to wait an hour.

And the show itself was, to be honest, somewhat disappointing.  I figured that they would play all the songs off Mezzanine (they did), but also assumed that they would include a variety of songs from their other albums.  Instead, they played a bunch of covers that I didn't care much for.  So basically...half the show was good, and half of it wasn't.

I will give them props for including the major original guest vocalists from Mezzanine: Horace Andy and Elizabeth Fraser.  Also, the backing band (two drummers and all) did a pretty solid of recreating the (likely mostly originally electronic) music live; though they did overindulge in some wankery a few times.  I think 3D was the only one (besides the backing band) who stayed on stage the whole time; Daddy G and the guest vocalists seemed to be only out there when they needed to be.  The light show and screens were impressive, though often overly strobe-y.  The videos had a techno-dystopia theme in addition to being unabashedly anti right-wing politics (and Trump).  The show ended somewhat abruptly with no encore after a little more than 90 minutes.  The highlight of the show for me was clearly "Teardrop" with Elizabeth on vocals.

Overall, I'm glad I saw them live at least once.  But I wish they played more Massive Attack tunes.

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Rating: 4.0/5

Best Man Speech for Chike & Rachel

This is the pre-written version of the Best Man speech that I gave at Chike & Rachel's wedding last Saturday (6/8/19).  This does not include a few minor hand-written edits that I made that morning, nor a couple of lines that I ad-libbed during the actual speech.

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Before I start, I want to express my sincere thanks to everyone who was able to make it here today for this event.  My family and I are very happy to be able to share this day with you.

Chike

I want to start off by talking just a little bit about my dear brother Chike.  I apologize to those of you who are wanting to hear some funny stories about Chike as a kid, because I don’t really have any of those today - my memory isn’t exactly the greatest.  I will assert, though, that as the oldest brother, there definitely was a time that I could beat Chike up...I think...those days are long gone.  Or maybe it was just because I fought dirty as a kid.  Even with my hazy memory, I know that there was definitely a time when I was about 6 or 7 that I kicked Chike in the groin and made him pee blood.  Sooo...I’m hoping that he hasn’t been secretly plotting his revenge for 30 years.

But that is not to say that I ever worry about Chike hurting me.  As all of you know, he is a gentle giant.  Every time someone has realized that we were brothers, they have had nothing but the nicest things to say about Chike.  And it is all well deserved.

Growing up, I was a bit protective of both of my brothers, Chike and Nedu...in spite of a kick or two in the groin.  And I think this oldest-sibling-syndrome kept me from realizing for a long time just how remarkable a person that Chike is.  I knew he was a talented artist, but I was in denial for a long time that he could be as smart as I was when it comes to computers and technology.  But these days I am proud beyond words of how much success he has had in his career as a UX designer - already ascending to the ranks of director at (WWT) Asynchrony Labs.

On a personal level, I’m also happy with the relationship that Chike and I have.  We don’t need to say all that much to each other, but we have an understanding.  Although...there was this one time about 8 or 9 years ago when we were living together, and we both showed up to a mutual friend’s birthday party without knowing that the other person was going to be there.  Hmmm...perhaps we need to work on our communication just a little, tiny bit.

Kidding aside, I’m so happy and proud to have you, Chike, as a brother.  And I’m thankful that you have been able to step up to fill my absence since I moved to New York.  I know you’re definitely better at providing mom emotional support than I am, and I suspect perhaps also at tech support.

Rachel

There was always something about Chike and Rachel’s relationship that led me to believe that it would work.  Rachel has always been there for Chike, and the rest of us, both in good times and in bad.  The same can be said for her mom, Patricia, who has graciously hosted not just Chike, but myself and my mom at their holiday gatherings.  When my dad died, Rachel and her family showed up for every memorial event that we had.  It’s inarguable to say that Rachel comes through in the clutch.  A couple of years ago when Chike was setting up the smart thermostat in their house, he ran into some trouble with some wiring in a very tight space in their furnace.  Needless to say, Rachel put aside her bemusement with his technological antics, and came through with a slender, but quite literal, helping hand.

But, in seriousness, it’s been clear to many of us that this wedding was inevitable.  I remember, on the day of my dad’s funeral, talking with some family members from out of town who were impressed by how much support Rachel and her family had shown during that time.  I particularly remember my Uncle Ezy who made it absolutely clear that he knew that Rachel was the one for Chike.  After describing his observations, he summed it up by saying: “Chike, that woman is an Orjih.”  And I couldn’t agree more.

Toast

Finally...I want to wrap this up by proposing a toast.  But before I do that I cannot forget to express my gratitude for perhaps the most important thing about this wedding.  Chike...I want to thank you...for taking the pressure off me...to make my mom a mother-in-law and a grandmother.  Here’s to Chike and Rachel, and their beautiful babies.

Foals @ Brooklyn Steel (4/14/2019)

Preamble rant...  Seeing shows in NYC is kind of a pain.  Brooklyn Steel is less than 5 miles from my apartment, but it takes about an hour to get there via public transportation...especially when the MTA changes the subway routes/schedules due to weekend work.  Between that and my poorly picked spot in the crowd standing behind a group of giant (plausible basketball or volleyball player) dudes and next to a couple of groups of pot-smokers, the show started off with me feeling that I was getting too old for this concert-going business.

But after a good show and a fairly breezy journey home (pretty good timing on the subway, which was running the normal route by then), my mood has improved.  But not enough for a lengthy post - it's still pretty late.

I will give props to Foals for playing a lot of their older classics (though only one of my favorites) along with most of the new album (which is pretty strong, though a bit of a change in style).  Speaking of which, the new songs came off well.  They had lots of energy, and I think an extra couple of performers on stage.  Good stuff.

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Rating: 4.5/5

Top Albums of 2018

Following a previous down year, 2018 was the downest of years in music for me.  According to my Last.fm statistics, I listened to less music in 2018 than I had in any other year since I joined the service in 2007.  These days my commutes are dominated by podcasts (I keep adding new ones, and have a hard time keeping up with the stream of episodes), and I can't really get into listening to music while at work.  So my music listening is mostly relegated to a bit of the time spent on my computer at home or on the weekends.  I still try to keep up with some of my usual avenues of discovering new music, but I seem destined to be stuck in the past in terms of music appreciation; who knows whether that will change at all this year.

Therefore...  In lieu of a meticulously considered ranking of favorite albums from last year, I will instead simply list some that I found noteworthy.  With no indication of which I thought were better than others.  I simply didn't listen to them enough to really form a decent opinion.  My main purpose in making these lists is to be able to look back in the future to get a sense of what I was really into in terms of music; maybe this will still be helpful in that regard.  I should note that having quantitative stats from Last.fm is also really good for retrospecting.  Anyway, here's the "list":

Mimicking Birds - Layers of Us
Yamantaka // Sonic Titan - Dirt
Exitmusic - The Recognitions
Hearts Hearts - Goods/Gods
Beach House - 7
Big Red Machine - Big Red Machine
Low - Double Negative
Lupe Fiasco - DROGAS WAVE
Rubblebucket - Sun Machine
Mirah - Understanding
Mumford & Sons - Delta
Jacob Banks - Village
Foxing - Nearer My God

Mike Birbiglia's The New One @ Cort Theatre (1/12/2019)

Mike Birbiglia's new comedy special has a 3+ month long stint on Broadway - a pretty amazing accomplishment.  And I think the show is deserving of it.  I didn't know anything about the show going into it, and I'm not sure if that made it fresher or not.  You can read reviews about it online (e.g., this one) if you want to know more, but that may (or may not) spoil a couple of the surprises.  I'll just say that Mike really hits his stride doing his trademark autobiographical story-telling with plenty of funny anecdotes and a couple of profound moments mixed in.  I really enjoyed it, and Fran was in stitches the whole time.

Language and Progress - A Conversation with Steven Pinker and John McWhorter @ The Anne L. Bernstein Theater (12/6/2018)

Since moving to New York, I have had the chance to attend a few talks by thinkers that I greatly admire - Sam Harris & Lawrence Krauss, Richard Dawkins & Brian Green.  It wasn't until this morning (in anticipation of tonight's event) that I considered that it might be worthwhile to blog about these types of events.  (I should perhaps also mention a Neil deGrasse Tyson talk that I saw a few years ago in St. Louis as another blog-worthy event.)

Tonight's event actually had a bit of a backstory.  It was originally supposed to be a conversation between Steven Pinker and Matt Dillahunty, and was promoted by Pangburn Philosophy.  However, that company folded about a month ago, so the event was cancelled along with several others.  Everything I have read and heard on the matter thus far indicates that Travis Pangburn was a fraudster who swindled both speakers that he had recruited and customers who had bought tickets for the events.  I should note, though, that although I knew about Pangburn ceasing operations, I didn't actually realize until last week that this specific event had been cancelled - it seems Pangburn didn't send out a notice to ticket-holders who had acquired tickets through his site.  And of course he wasn't providing refunds - the purchase confirmation notice says "No Refunds & No Exchanges. All Sales Are Final.".  Luckily, I saw Steven Pinker's retweet last week of this make-up event, with tickets being made available for *free*; so I jumped at the chance.

The event was held in a small theater on Broadway - I would guess it seated about a couple hundred people (though I'm terrible at these sorts of estimates), in contrast to the ~1500 at the originally scheduled venue.  Prior to the start, I noticed Steven and John chatting right next to the audience, and attempted to go say hello (as it seemed that a couple of other people just had); but the organizer (Jay Shapiro) stepped in, saying that there would be time for that afterward, as they were about to begin.

The talk was moderated by Shapiro, and consisted of about 30 minutes on linguistics, maybe 30 more on progress denial, and then another 45-ish more on audience questions.  Steven and John are both obviously brilliant guys, and pretty much agreed on everything that was discussed.  I can't say that I have any familiarity with linguistics, but some of the discussion on that topic was pretty interesting.  They dished on theories of the relationship between language and human thinking, a bit of what Chomsky got right and wrong, and other things that I can't remember.  Unfortunately, though, I also don't remember either of the couple insights that I found particularly interesting at the time.  After Jay transitioned them to ideas on progress and its denial, they discussed Steven's books on the subject, as well as John's categorization of many social justice proponents on the left as adhering to a religion.  I found that last bit particularly interesting (the rough outline is that such social justice proponents react strongly against reasonable arguments that don't adhere to their worldview in a dogmatic way similar to religion), and will try to spend some more time with his thoughts on that matter.

After the talk, I hung around a bit to take advantage of the intimate setting and try to meet the speakers.  I was fortunate enough to separately briefly chat with John, Steven, Jay, and Coleman Hughes (who was in attendance and had the first audience question).  I delivered a message from Fran to Steven telling him to keep up the good work and that she thought that his curls were almost as awesome as hers - he was happy to hear that last part.  I also got a little more background from Jay and John about how they hurriedly put the event together at the last minute.  All in all, it was a pretty cool event, and a nice way to end a birthday.