Transplanting a Seattleite

I had my Dutch lesson.

I walked with M.

T. and I had to go retrieve his forgotten phone at school.

Then we stopped at Whole Foods to get the things I was unable to get earlier at Roche Bros (a turnip, organge blossom water) and agar agar to try to make home made ant farm gel because the ants arrived and I realized I didn’t have any gel for the farm.

In the event, the agar agar didn’t set up properly. When R. unpackaged the ants to put them in the fridge to hopefully slow them down enough to keep them going until we solve this problem, he discovered a packet of gel chemicals. Surprise! Now we just need distilled water.

That all happened while T. and I were at the concert. We missed the very beginning of Kasey Musgreaves because we were in a very long line to buy T. a t-shirt. She did a lovely set, and her performance was flawless.

I didn’t really figure it out at that point, but did realize during Harry Styles that I was listening to the Very Best Sound System I have ever heard. Ever. No exceptions. And this was in TD Garden! Who expects unbelievable sound in TD Garden? Nuance even with massive power and volume. Crystal clear low frequency reproduction. I mean, life altering high quality sound. I’m assuming that Harry Styles is a bit of an audio nerd. Because it’s not like he spent a ton of money on a flashy light show. He _did_ have the BEST video screen I have ever seen. Seats behind the stage were sold, and the video went all the way round. Super high resolution. Very beautiful color. Extremely responsive / real time.

Styles’ drummer and keys are women, and the camera was on the drummer a lot, and the keys 3rd. I think we saw more of the guitar and bass instruments than the muscians. The crowd was the most female dominated crowd I’ve ever seen (and I’ve been to a Demi Lovato concert recently). 95% / 5% at least. At one point, when I was line counting, I counted 37 women before I saw another man. I saw no very young children, but I did see some obvious parent / daughter groups, and one 2 parents / son group.

I accidentally bought seats in the disabled / handicapped / accessible row at the back of Loge 10. I will always do this again if I possibly can. This is the most relaxed and comfortable I have ever been at a concert. Folding chair was more comfortable than the regular seats. As much leg room as you want, and NO ONE behind you. No anxiety about beer being dumped on one, no random touching. I didn’t even _realize_ I had this issue. I was concerned we shouldn’t have bought tickets there, but the staff said they actually get spectrum people in those seats for basically the reasons I just listed. Who knew?

I know the Musgreaves / Styles combo seems a little odd, but both of them are singer-song writers, and both of them love love love doing super awesome covers of fairly similar music. They tell stories with a lot of emotion in them — unlike Lovato, who basically paints a picture of an emotion / set of feelings, or a more trad country singer who tells a story with emotion as a side light (and often over the top humorous / angry / etc.). Listening to Styles cover Break the Chain (which I always think of as a Stevie Nicks song but which is actually Fleetwood Mac) tells you everything you could need to know about why Styles is touring with Musgreaves.

Phenomenal show. Styles fronts almost as well as Dan Reynolds, which is sort of amazing, if you think about the size difference. Super tight, just like Imagine Dragons. Very professional, with intermittent breakthroughs of personality. Very, very, very unlike the Ed Sheeran show. Opposite of that, in every way except the hordes of women screaming I Love You at random intervals.

Oh, and I parked in the South Acton lot. T. misread the schedule, but I got us there in time. It was really nice not having to walk home in the rain, even tho it was really light, at 1 a.m. We missed the 10:40 train since we stayed to the end and through the encore. Long wait for the 12:10 train, but worth it anyway. I opted to not try to get an uber or Lyft — I looked at the pricing and decided I would rather read a book on my phone. I also felt like there was sort of a point to learn about the consequences of deciding to stay to the very end of a concert: only do this when you _really_ want to.

I tried to sleep in. T. wanted to do things. So he read a book out loud and I listened; that was fine. He also wanted me to help him pack a bag for something we are doing later on. I didn't want to do that but eventually succumbed which was a mistake. I should have had breakfast first. Oh well. Next time, T. and I are going to put together a packing list.

R. took T. to a birthday party at Trombetta's Farm. Fortunately the mini golf is mostly covered -- unexpected and very cool!

I took T. to Papa Razzi. He's a little bit of a celebrity there, so we always get great service and people are super friendly and attentive. I had brought a cooler and cold packs for our leftovers, so we could proceed from there to the garden in the car this time (we took the train on Friday). I had pre-bought parking, saving about $4. It's weird, if the train actually charged for T. (they should -- he's 12 now), the parking vs. the cost of the train two ways would be within a few dollars. But they don't charge for him yet. But we drove, because Sunday means traffic is minimal and the schedule on the train is pretty inconvenient (we actually would have missed the last train, in the event).

We got there at doors, so we had to wait in the security line for a while. We got drinks, snack, went to the loo, bought t-shirt and poster. T-shirt lines not nearly as bad, but that may have been because we were there earlier. I had the margarita again (manhattan at dinner).

First opener was K.Flay. I have no recollection of listening to her before; she was fine, energetic, used the (shorter) T to good effect.

Second opener was Grouplove. I like Grouplove. I might have gone to see them (in a smaller venue) as the main band. They are goofy and fun, and currently have green hair. They had costumed characters also with green hair come out as one of their bits. Some new material. Great inflatable props that look like teeth (teeth with grouplove spelled out up high, and a smaller batch of teeth on the stage). The woman was wearing a leopard print leotard and she is _very_ energetic. Nice set.

Main band was Imagine Dragons. This is the only band I've done the "verified fan" purchase, not because I'm a hard core fan but because I'd been buying resale and figured I'd put in some effort to try to get the presale code. It was worth it, in terms of the overall cost being lower for comparable quality of tickets. Obviously, Imagine Dragons is poppy and I like poppy rock so I've heard a lot of them, and I made a point of listening to Evolve in particular several times over the last few weeks. That said, I was stunned at how good the show was. They started late (after 9 p.m.) and ran until almost midnight (no encore -- they just ran the clock out). Fantastic light show -- at one point, there were bubbles, confetti, lasers all at once (with video, and those weird light pyramids). There were giant balloons that Reynolds was popping with the ubiquitous drum sticks. Oh, the drums! I knew this was a drum happy band -- I liked that about them -- but wow, there are moments where all four are merrily drumming away. It's like some weird Bumbershoot drum circle thing, only with excellent production. Another bit where the guitars were up front on the T, Reynolds was standing on his toes on the front of the drum platform, sharing the drums with the drummer. Fun stuff! Reynolds' presentation is tent revivalist / televangelist level grab the audience and mesmerize them into reverence. I hadn't expected that at all -- lots of could have been corny but were instead charismatic descriptive gestures. Big arms, and lots of other emphatic gestures which worked as a conductor of the band. The band itself is amazing -- super, super tight, and with Reynolds' doing his thing not as cold as on the album, but converts the audience into another participant in the band. The time just flew by, and T. decided to leave one song early to beat the rush (and he was tired) and I was a little sad.

While the t was short compared to FOB, there was second stage at the far end of the garden. They played a more intimate set including Tom Petty's Stand My Ground from that end of the arena. A Berklee music teacher of many of the band members was in the audience, and they got lights and video on him, which was a really sweet bit. They walked through the stadium to and from the small stage, including a lap around my section (unfortunately, T.'s and my seats were in the middle of my section). Sort of like what Bastille does, but with security looking a lot more nervous tagging along.

K.Flay came out to do a song with them towards the end of the show. K.Flay's style is very similar to Imagine Dragons, but wow, the scale is so different -- in every way. Reynold's is a tall guy, and that just emphasizes how tiny K.Flay is. And Imagine Dragons lyrics are really carefully designed to be performable in an arena _and understood_, which is a _rare_ thing. K.Flay's are not. But it worked well, and felt really nice.

Reynolds' talked a little bit about Las Vegas and Boston and the importance of unity and not letting people divide us. He also spent a while talking about the stigma of depression and anxiety and encouraging anyone with anything like that to have a therapist and described his own therapist as his best friend. It fits in well with his presentation as frontman -- very tent revival type of rock opera spirituality.

I was worried going into this weekend -- 6 bands in 3 days is a lot, especially with two different kid parties to go with. But I really enjoyed it (even with a migraine on the day in between). Fortunately, the horse canceled due to weather, which simplified the day a lot. I would not avoid seeing any of the bands again, and I would happily pay to see Grouplove, FOB or Imagine Dragons again as the main draw.

ETA: I canceled my iphone X order, because I have been unable to reach customer service or otherwise correct the incorrect shipping address on the order. I tried calling and chatting as soon as I placed the order last week, but they weren't taking calls or chats. I tried calling and chatting again on Sunday, spent a half hour on hold before giving up. I was able to link the order and thus finally get access to cancel it. I still don't understand what went wrong, but I'll eventually get around to re-ordering. I tried to reorder, but failed because the canceled needed to percolate through to my carrier.

R. and I got out of the house pretty quick to go to Tiles Plus More in Natick. We picked out some tile for the shower renovation that, in theory, will start in the middle of July. I don't really believe contractor timelines, but we've never worked with this one before so you never really know. Figured we should probably at least have all the materials available. Sometimes another job develops a hiccup that allows things to move up and I'd sure hate to be the reason for delay.

As with pretty much every major decision (where to live, how many kids to have, house to buy, decorating that house, etc.) we had no major disagreements. He had stronger opinions than me, and I was happy with what he picked out. Fingers crossed it will look good with the rest of the bathroom, because there's no reason to be redoing anything but the shower.

M. and I headed out for a walk at 2, just in time for the only rain of the day to dump on us. Oh well. We made it to the top of the hill on Tuttle, turned around and scuttled back to my house.

We had two sitters and tickets to see the Reverend Horton Heat (with Flat Duo Jets playing a very short but excellent initial set, and Agent Orange doing a solid set after them). R. staked out a spot by the speakers to the left of the stage (stage right, to be confusing). I hung out for part of the first set, found a chair on the side for Agent Orange (they are the definition of Not Danceable), and then rejoined him right after they left the stage to stand through the set up and tune time and for all but the last song of the encore of the Rev. I had to remove one woman who attempted to perky herself in between R. and me, and I wound up having to bodily move a second woman who was tall enough to think that wasn't going to work on her. Women in particular really underestimate how committed I will be to retaining my location in a crowd. No moshing to speak of, and the few times people got excited it was enough to just reposition so they bounced off me. I didn't even wear appropriate footwear and I never took my glasses off. We're all old and even the drunk and/or younger people just aren't as prone to physical assault as we were back in the 90s. Truly, it's a better world.

The Rev limited himself to one major story, the tale of how they wound up in Seattle playing their first gig their at the Vogue, and Jimbo bleeding all over himself and getting signed by Subpop. I would say those were the days, but I wasn't going to clubs yet at that point in time so I don't feel I have a right. It really is a pleasure hearing him spin a yarn, however.

We bailed out during the encore and walked out as the encore was ending. We wound up parking not too far from where we had parked for dinner, because you really cannot park on Highland Ave anymore, and you haven't been able to park on the side streets for a long time. Dinner (before the show) was at Tony Maws Kirkland Tap and Trotter. That is a _very_ dairy-allergy friendly menu. We got the crispy fried ribs, the chicken thigh kebab, the sweet potato. Bread (three slices and it was good). Two drinks (he had the Scottish Ale; I had a rye manhattan and they do have Luxardo's; Overholt for the whisky). And we even had dessert: olive oil chocolate mousse with cocoa nibs on top. Yum. It wasn't very much food (3 ribs, a single thigh, probably one potato) but it was satisfying -- we were not hungry when we got home, altho we did each get a drink at Once.

A while back we got the tasting dinner at Craigie on Main. Tap and Trotter is really different, but equally good. The servers at Trotter are now using Toast supplied tablets / IT, so the place has been basically de-papered (the order is placed by the server on the device, and they run your card on the device, and then hand it to you to add tip and sign -- and they have good button defaults for the tip, which go up to 25%). As with other stores that let you pay on device, you have the option of an emailed receipt.

The AJR album is out and it is fine.

A mildly appalling song by Pitbull and Enrique Yglesias is in light rotation on SiriusXM's Hits channel. It includes a snippet from (or likely a rerecording of part of) REO Speedwagon's "Take it on the Run" off of _Hi Infidelity_. My memory is a sieve, so I cannot tell you if I never owned that REO Speedwagon album, co-owned it on vinyl with my sister C., or owned it on cassette. But I sure never re-bought it on CD, thus I do not have it in iTunes Match.

After listening to Pitbull and Yglesias violate this tune in some detail, I thought to myself, Self, you used to totes love REO Speedwagon. And ya know, Dan England [ETA: This is exactly the word finding/word swapping that is driving me nuts. It is England Dan. *sigh*] and John Ford Coley turned out to be pretty cool, so why not give this a try again. Don't wait for a member of the band to die; just buy it now on iTunes and give it a listen.

I'm not sure what I was expecting from a 1980's Arena Rock masterpiece, but it is even more amazeballs than I remember. I was T.'s age when this came out (perhaps a few months older), and I loved, loved, loved it. I suspect I _did_ own it at some point, because I know all the songs -- play a few bars and I am singing along. What I in no way expected was how adult the lyrics turn out to be. Yeah, sure, I kinda memorized them as a child, but I didn't have any real understanding of what was really going on in these songs back then, and I sort of wish I'd been listening to this stuff in my early 30s when it might have done some good.

If you have _any_ tolerance for late 70s/early 80s arena rock, you owe it to your over 30 self to give this a listen. It is wonderful, wonderful music and we completely failed to appreciate it at the time, clumping it in with Air Supply and Journey and goddess knows what else. Don't let this turn into something mined by millenials and otherwise forgotten.

Like everyone else on the planet exposed to current music, I'd been hearing a couple songs off the album for a little while, but until I was sitting at Applebee's for Sunday lunch with T. recently and thinking how much "Take Me to Church" sounded like Elton John, I hadn't bothered to track down the artist. Once we realized we knew other songs on the album, I got the whole thing and we've been listening to it (me while walking, both of us in the car) more or less since.

T. and I agree on a lot of music, but only occasionally do we both go nuts over something at the same time (Fun., wow, did we LOVE Fun., and I continue to be a huge Nate Ruess fan). I don't know what it means when a 10 year old boy and a 46 year old woman like the same music at the same time, but if that sounds promising to you, give it a try.