Japan Nite 2009
The evening started with me trying to pick up Kristen at Union Station. I parked my car (meters are $2 an hour - who has 8 quarters for an hour?) and headed in to the concourse to wait for her. Except her Union Station was not my Union Station. My Union Station was at Jackson and Canal and her Union Station at Madison and Canal - 3 blocks North. Were they the same union station only she headed north after exiting the trains where I would normally head south? Probably. Still it was funny walking outside in the rain asking "what are you wearing?" "You see which bank?" and "What streets are you at?"
A quick trip up 90/94 and we were at the Empty Bottle by 7:15. The first band wasn't on until 8:00 so we grabbed something to eat at Bite next door. We had appetizers: the buffalo tofu (fried tofu in buffalo sauce with slivers of celery) and a Thai chicken on skewers with a red cabbage relish and a peanut sauce that wasn't so much a sauce but ground peanuts. Neither of us understood how to eat the chicken so we ate everything separately. I really think they missed a small bowl with some actual liquid for us to dip.
We missed the first song for Flip. They were raw, unpolished rock but fun not anywhere near as mainstream/pop Ashley had painted them to be. Flip was followed by Omodaka who was a solo artist. His performance was video game themed and a lot of his sampled sounds were from classic nintendo games. He had computers and various devices including a Nintendo DS with the Korg DS-10 module. He played a techno-ey version of Bach's "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" on it and was the most fun show of the evening. He was poppy and his act was a little pretentious in concept and execution but he really won me over.
{edit: tracked down his version of the Jesu thing. Awesome!}
Next up was Sparta Locals - an average rock band. They were fine but nothing to make them stand out. SA was the second to last band. SA is short for Samurai Attack though during the show we guessed it was a Japanese version of the spanish slang "esse." They were old school punk and had tremendous energy.
Detroit 7 was last and they were a favorite from last year.
For the show I met up with Pat and his friend Jen
and Kristen met up with her friend Greta. (Kristen's on the right. I'd say the drunk one but...)
Pat bought the new D7 release and I bought everything else. 5 singles at $10 each though SA"s "single" had 21 songs! Not much after, I gave Kristen a ride back to Wheaton and got back home around 1:30-2am. Pat was probably still awake.
BTW: You didn't think I'd put pictures of me up did you?
The evening started with me trying to pick up Kristen at Union Station. I parked my car (meters are $2 an hour - who has 8 quarters for an hour?) and headed in to the concourse to wait for her. Except her Union Station was not my Union Station. My Union Station was at Jackson and Canal and her Union Station at Madison and Canal - 3 blocks North. Were they the same union station only she headed north after exiting the trains where I would normally head south? Probably. Still it was funny walking outside in the rain asking "what are you wearing?" "You see which bank?" and "What streets are you at?"
A quick trip up 90/94 and we were at the Empty Bottle by 7:15. The first band wasn't on until 8:00 so we grabbed something to eat at Bite next door. We had appetizers: the buffalo tofu (fried tofu in buffalo sauce with slivers of celery) and a Thai chicken on skewers with a red cabbage relish and a peanut sauce that wasn't so much a sauce but ground peanuts. Neither of us understood how to eat the chicken so we ate everything separately. I really think they missed a small bowl with some actual liquid for us to dip.
We missed the first song for Flip. They were raw, unpolished rock but fun not anywhere near as mainstream/pop Ashley had painted them to be. Flip was followed by Omodaka who was a solo artist. His performance was video game themed and a lot of his sampled sounds were from classic nintendo games. He had computers and various devices including a Nintendo DS with the Korg DS-10 module. He played a techno-ey version of Bach's "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" on it and was the most fun show of the evening. He was poppy and his act was a little pretentious in concept and execution but he really won me over.
{edit: tracked down his version of the Jesu thing. Awesome!}
Next up was Sparta Locals - an average rock band. They were fine but nothing to make them stand out. SA was the second to last band. SA is short for Samurai Attack though during the show we guessed it was a Japanese version of the spanish slang "esse." They were old school punk and had tremendous energy.
Detroit 7 was last and they were a favorite from last year.
For the show I met up with Pat and his friend Jen
and Kristen met up with her friend Greta. (Kristen's on the right. I'd say the drunk one but...)
Pat bought the new D7 release and I bought everything else. 5 singles at $10 each though SA"s "single" had 21 songs! Not much after, I gave Kristen a ride back to Wheaton and got back home around 1:30-2am. Pat was probably still awake.
BTW: You didn't think I'd put pictures of me up did you?