This is a german program with 3 seasons. I just finished season 1. It’s a slow moving tale about missing children in a small town in the woods with an ominous cave. Spoiler: time travel is involved.

It took a little while to get into it, but I’m enjoying the story. I’m finding it a little hard to keep track of the characters, especially across the different timelines, and they keep introducing new characters.

The tone is a bit like Lost, but much of the time, the actors are standing in a downpour without hats or umbrellas. I’m watching the dubbed version with subtitles which don’t match, and I’m not sure which is better. There’s some good music selections on the soundtrack, eg: Agnes Obel.

It just ended on a cliffhanger, but all 3 seasons are available, so I can jump right into the next one.

—tg

KB was there…the rest of you suck…I don’t care if Boston is on the other side of the continent. 

Fun was had…I made a fool of myself doing open mic shenanegans. the guitar player and bass player from spot 1019 were there and played a few spot songs and I even joined them on Chocobox and made a dog’s breakfast of it. 

(Skip to the 7m20s mark: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtyBpBj3a2I&t=7m20s)



I played one of their songs solo after and they gave a thumbs up, so yay! Richard von Busack (former film critic from the SJ Metro and spot 1019 fan) also played a few songs on ukulele.

Coffee Zombie Collective did an acoustic set with lots of energy after…All in all, a fun party.

Doom recommended. Next one should be ~2035

—tg

Shonen Knife are like a Japanese Girl trio version of the ramones. I've seen them before years ago and thought they were fun. I got there around 8:30 and the show hadn't started yet. 9-ish, "The Pack AD" opened...2 girls came out. Drums and guitar. They were tight. BLack Keyes/White Stripes vibe. I was enjoying watching the guitar player tapping all these controls with her feet. she was pretty good. I talked to her a bit after their set. She seems cool. 

After their set, it sook some time to break down everything and set up for the new band. Finally they came out in matching jumpers. The guitarist and bassist look like older moms...the drummer looks much younger. They were tight also, but the drummer impressed me the most. She was aggressive and cheery at the same time. She sang back up on a lot of songs, and lees on a few. She reminded me of the drummer in this clip:



It was fun, but I was tired. They didn't even play tomato head



--tg

Yes, it's that Thomas Dolby, and it's a memoir. The first half, up to the mid 90s and covering his musical heyday is great. In the second half, he moves to the Bay Area and gets into tech, and IMO it's just not that interesting. 
There was a bunch amusing trivia, such as:

• He made a demo to try to get a record deal (with help from Andy Partridge, who refused to be paid). He didn't get a deal, but Mutt Lange heard it and liked the synth sound, so he hired him to play on Foreigner 4. With the money he made, he was able to get the gear to make his first album.
  
• He was in a Band with Trevor Horne in 1979, then was in Lene Lovich's band and he wrote "New Toy" for her.
  
• He produced and played on an album for George Clinton, and was in the band at a James Brown tribute show at the Apollo.
  
• He did the soundtracks for "Howard the Duck" and Ken Russell's "Gothic."
  
• Bob Weir and Jerry Garcia appear on his fourth album, but Jerry was (as he kindly put it) "out of it" and played poorly. But the tape was running while Jerry noodled, so Dolby cut up bits of that and spliced together a part from them.
  

Tix were oroginally going for $100+ but this week they released ‘all in’ tix for $35. I couldn’t find an accomplice so it was a solo flight. And the ‘all in’ implied that parking was included, but it wasn’t - which nearly doubled the price - couldn’t donated to Mo Bay otters & got a retro T instead. I got there at 7:30 but it took forever to get in and Spear started on time, so I missed the opening songs. I hadn’t been to the winery since it remodeled and they changed everything. I was completely disorientated. Got up to the nosebleed seats. Spear was solid but not nearly as good as the last time I saw him from under the stage at SNWMF. He’s slowing down, not nearly as stony as before, more of a roots carousel ride. Good but underwhelming, but my opinion may be tainted from my rough entrance. 

Met some friends at the break, including someone i hadnt seen since the pandemic. It was an odd crowd - way too clean, lots of sharp suburban fashion, too lululemon for my tastes. Such is reggae in Toga at $100+ a seat. Snuck down to an excellent seat right behind soundboard, my fav spot to see any show because it’s got the best sound mix. Befriended some gals next to me who were smoking these flavored spliffs - tobacco wrapped traditionally but with fruitiness added. 

I’ve seen Spear countless times. I’ve seen Ziggy many times too, not countless, I just don’t remember the exact number of times. I saw him at the winery back when RM worked there. I had a private interview with him in Half Moon Bay when he was promoting that doc on his dad. We had just shy of an hour talking about his work, his dad, and Kung Fu. He autographed a CD of Family Time which I gave to Tara - that was one of her first reggae albums - reggae for kids. 

This was the best performance from Ziggy I have ever seen. His band is so tight. 2 guitars, 2 keys, 2 backup singers that dance and rap, drums, bongos, and the almighty bass. They had a huge sharp sound, running through Ziggy’s biggest hits, his most rebellious songs (which all hit home in these dark times), and his dad’s anthems. Get up Stand up got everyone up and dancing. His music is so joyful and positive. Sometimes reggae can be like going to church for me, moving me to irie tears. Preach on Ziggy. Selah!

It was a long line to get out but I was grateful for the line of cars coming off the mountain because that is such a tortuous road.

I don't know why they don't call it prog rock...

I've never been to The Cats before. I got there about 7:15pm. They started at 7pm, but since this is prog rock, I only missed one song: Scatterbrain by Jeff Beck. I used to be able to play that one a long time ago. I remember is was in some gnarly time signature. Sad to have missed it. I did catch the middle of some Allan Holdsworth song. This band is very tight. All reading sheet music. They had no singer and instead relied on a very good violin player to cover the vocal melody. They reminded me a bit of a high school jazz band. It was all very complicated stuff and tended towards the Jazz side of things which I like less, but they did play a medley that started with Firth of Fifth by Genesis and then ended up in a Rush medley. They played some Yes, some ELP, and some King Crimson. 

When I got there, the place was packed with diners and I had to stand for about 30min. I finally got a table and ordered some pulled pork tacos (meh) and a drink. The staff was very nice. The bartenders were a couple of cute young girls and I have to say I've never seen anybody dancing to prog rock (Red & 21st Century Schizoid Man) before...

https://www.jazzrockrevue.com

--tg

last minute show...someone at work got two tix for $50, but then couldn't go and was selling them for $40. I got them and then tried to rally someone to go with me. Ended up going with the guy that hosts the Wed nite open mics in San Jose. 

I haven't been to Shoreline in ages...maybe a decade...traffic after crossing over 101 was pretty slow, but the general parking area was free and not hard to get to. A short walk to the entrance, security was painless. Found a spot on the lawn below one of the giant screens. We should have moved back slightly so we weren't looking up so much, but it was mostly a decent spot. I had no idea Lena Lovitch was on the bill. She is now a very large, pear-shaped old lady and wearing all her rags, looked a bit witchy. She sounds the same, but her band wasn't very cohesive and didn't seem into it. 

B-52s came on next. Lots of fun. Fred is looking very old. The gals still have their pipes. The bass player and drummer were great, and the guy in guitar, John Andrews did a fine job. I'm really glad to have seen them, I think this might be their last tour.

After they finished, about 1/2 of the audience left the amphitheater. 

Next up was DEVO. I wasn't particularly excited about seeing them, but they came out swinging. mark M was great, and the band was surprisingly tight...really tight, like an army.

Very cool show, and bunch of esoteric material with hits peppers in.

They are like a less-sterile version of Kraftwork.

All in all, a good time was had.

--tg

Mahony is a young man in Dublin, who grew up in the orphanage. He gets a letter that tells him his mother's name and the town she's from, in County Mayo. He goes there to find out what happened to her. In the house where he gets a room, he meets an old woman who was a theater actress, and puts on an annual play. She decides to help him. When he gets there, something happens to him that hasn't happened for years: he starts seeing ghosts. And sometimes they talk to him. There are other supernatural happenings as well. Town secrets are revealed, and they find the truth in the end.
It was a bit leisurely, but picked up speed towards the end. Characters were pretty well drawn I thought. The writing was good. Possibly the mystery aspect would be weak to Greg, although he might enjoy the Irish setting. (The author is from Mayo.) The Yeti might enjoy the magical realist bits.

This was included alongside the Mr. Vampire & Chinese Ghost Story franchises in Criterion's Hong Kong horror selections. That confused me because I never saw it and thought it was a romance. I remember when this came out - it was a big blockbuster and captured many noms & awards. It stars Anita Mui, who I've never been that much of a fan of, and Leslie Cheung, the queen & king of cantopop at the time (a music genre that I wasn't into at all). Cheung died of suicide - leapt from a building - I was in Shaolin when it happened and remember discussing it with locals. They were fascinated because he was gay and that was still very taboo back in 2003 in PRC. 

Well, it is a romance - a bittersweet and tragic one at that. Mui plays the ghost of a 1930s prostitute who returns from spending 50 years in hell to find her lover (Cheung) because they had a suicide love pact but he didn't show. Mui is amazing in the role and totally reframed my perception of her. There's no special effects, no spooky cheesy ghost stuff. Mui skips back and forth between her memories of the opulent brothel where she was a top whore, and modern (80s) Hong Kong where the brothel was replaced by a kindergarten. When her qi fades, she goes without make up, making for a raw authentic performance, full of longing and melancholy. The 'rouge' is a poetic device - Cheung gifts Mui a rouge locket, and there's focus upon how she can appear differently, being what her clients want, and when she's a ghost and her qi is depleting, she uses it to hide her weakness. It's a well played device. There's a lot of opium smoking, and the pacing of this film is slow, as if in an opium haze, yet beautiful. I get why this caught the attention of critics and Criterion. It's a singular work, richly layered, and oh so tragically romantic. 

Not D00M recommended because you guys have no sense of romance (and tQ, who allegedly is addicted to romance novels, can't stand subtitles).

I worked KISS many years ago, at the shark tank in San Jo, back when Rock Med covered that venue. That was the only time I saw them. It was a good show - Simmons being suspended from wires floating maybe 40 feet above the stage dropping bass chords with wild pyro going off around him stuck out in my mind. When I toured Mexico as a teen with my grandpa, KISS was on tour there and a lot of people asked me what that meant. I didn't really have an answer. Nevertheless I respect what they became and that film about them at the fairground was great.