12 days- 10 shows

Nothing like getting back into the swing of things with a bang. Currently in the middle of a crazy august run of 10 shows in 2 weeks.

a few interesting highlights....

Two fridays ago Tilly & The Wall returned with super friends Juiceboxxx & Ssion
assisting in the mayhem. Tilly is genuinely one of my favorite bands to have play at The Pabst. This being their 3rd appearance here (one other headline & an opening spot for the 1st Bright Eyes show being the other) I couldn't think of a band that is more fun & likeable. These guys really bring the party in every sense of the word. Beyond just the novelty of the tap dancing percussionist, Tilly never ceases to amaze me with how versatile & more than anything personal they are. Got to check out some of their new material which sees them moving in some pretty interesting directions. they were literally leaving the very next day for a relatively extensive Australian tour & wanted to do the pabst as a warm up gig....we were happy to obige.

One of the more bizarre spectacles of the night besides Mequon Suburban nerd rapper Juiceboxxx climbing to the top of the speaker stack & making us all tremendously nervous for the audience below, was Kansas City group "Ssion" whose theaterical set was unlike anything i'd ever seen an opener do....don't really know how to explain it other than to say....yes there were giant bizarre projections, yes there were costume changes & the last song was called "Gee Whiz Street Jizz".....i rest my case

In any case, it was great to hang with the Tillys again....just a really fun show.


The following night was 80s synth pop originators- Erasure & i have to admit, these guys were pretty amazing live. For a band that i started the day not really caring all that much about, Erasure really turned me. with a HUGE stage set complete with giant shining diamonds hanging for the theater trusses, Erasure was almost more akin to a broadway show. It's sort of a bizarre thing because at least on the scale, the fact that milwaukee had 1000 or so for Erasure versus some of the other markets with a much higher gay/lesbian contingency, we were one of the better sold buildings....anyhoo.....pretty cool show for something i wasn't really all that crazy about.

Later that week we had the 1-2 punch of the Fratellis Tuesday & The Cribs on Thursday. nothing overly remarkable (to me) about either band. one thing that was interesting was the fact that Cribs openers White Rabbits actually seemed to be the main pull for audience what turned out to be a dismal attendance night.... I saw the Cribs for the first time in london at the university opening for all things for Death Cab for Cutie as they were just on the beginning stages of their upswing. A good band, but nothing to write home about... although OnMIlwaukee.com didn't seem to think so with the almost bizarre review of the show available here...

anyway, i'm just packing up Dream Theater at the riverside right now (which i'll tell you all about in the next installment).....