minireview: Vienna Teng

First, I've been to a lot of concerts over the years (most of them more like six-ten years ago), and I've never seen an opening act that was so fucking awful. Ever. Even DRILL was better, and Drill were nothing but obnoxious noise.

Josh R-something spent his entire set playing the same song over and over (apparently, he did a song for Grey's Anatomy. This is not surprising, he does the correct kind of music for that show) and over and over--the only thing that made the music even vaguely interesting was the back-up singer, Priscilla Ahn (who has her own lp coming out, apparently). Now, HER voice was quite lovely and interesting.

I missed the last two songs to go put more money on the car meter. And, thank god. I think I might have killed someone if I'd been forced to listen to that crap any longer.

And this guy has fans. I weep for my generation, which seems to want nothing but mindless pap when it comes to music.

I came back to find that half the crowd had dispersed (seriously, that's sad, people. Because Vienna is actually a talented musician).

Vienna's set was lovely. She played stuff I'm not fond of (Shasta, Harbor, Momentum...), but I cold ignore the irritation and focus on things like the violinist who was superb (dude, I know how hard it is to do some of the stuff she was doing). She played new stuff (Blue Caravan, City Hall, Recessional, and others).

Sidenote: violinist and cello player were lovely.

Lots of good music, a small amount of chatter (she seemed a little tired, which, given that she did a set earlier, and it was late...).

Also, she played some stuff other people had written, which kind of bored me. I don't wanted to hear other peoples' music, I wanted to hear HERS.

Sadly, there was no My Medea or Gravity or Between. sigh.

But still, had fun, she was a blast, even if my feet and legs were killing me by the end of the show.

And now, it is off to run around Chicagooooo.....