Live-micro-blogging the MSI show

I’m kind of behind on this whole Web 2.0 social thingy, mostly because I’m bad at keeping up with the friends I have, I do not need a whole slew of internet friends to ignore. However, a friend of mine has convinced me to sign up for a Twitter account (that’s where the mini-updates in the sidebar come from) and I’m kind of enjoying it.

I will be Twittering the MSI show at The Wiltern tonight – I take notes on my phone anyway, so I might as well publish them, right? If you’re interested in seeing what’s going on as it happens, you can subscribe to the RSS feed over there in the sidebar, or if you’re on Twitter, you can follow me by searching for Aeirlys.

This not an album review.

Two things:

• It is awesome to be back. Thanks for sticking around through the hiatus. I promise not to do that again any time soon.
• The Gay Blades are participating in the New York AIDS Walk, a fundraiser for AIDS research and education. If you’re in New York, go participate yourself. If you’re not, you can still help out by donating at the website below. If more artists did this stuff the world would be a better place. Donations are tax deductible.
  aidswalknewyork2008.kintera.org/gayblades

Thanks.

Overload

It’s going to be quiet around here next week. I’ll be out of town on a full-blown non-bloggy vacation. I’ll make it up to you, though. Bamboozle Left is next weekend and I imagine I’ll be writing about that one for a while. You can view the full line-up here, schedules go up on Monday.

Who should I make a point not to miss? A bazillion bands are playing this show and I’m familiar with a lot of them, but not all. Who plays a must-see set?

MCR, obviously. Play something off Bullets for me, guys. It’s been forever.

Jimmy, of course. (Jimmy’s riding on banked goodwill – the last time I saw them they played like they were on Valium. Step it up, guys. You’re not off the hook just because you defined the genre.)

But who else? Charlotte Sometimes has been on my radar for a while, but I haven’t really investigated yet. Same goes for Automatic Loveletter.

I’m a huge AFI fan, but never really got all that interested in Blaqk Audio. Anyone seen them live? Any good? If I’ve been an AFI fan since Black Sails will I be disappointed?

Breathe Carolina fans (and there are a lot of you out there), this is your chance to tell me how wrong I am about them, again. I might wander by – maybe they’re an acquired taste.

I’ve been mildly obsessed with Foxy Shazam and Zox for weeks, so expect posts about their sets, schedules willing.

Take The Crown is a name that’s been popping up around here for a while (I think they’re localish). Any good?

Did I miss someone? I tried to hunt a lot of these bands down on eMusic and Myspace, but I won’t get around to all of them. Who’s worth paying attention to? More important, who do you want to read about?

No album review today, sorry.

As previously noted, I have the flu from hell and can’t muster enthusiasm for anything other than going back to bed. I can’t even turn this into an amusing rant, and I was going to try. I’ll be back tomorrow, I promise.

Rant: Coachella can suck it.

I live approximately halfway between Los Angeles and Palm Springs (which is why I call my location LA-ish. I mostly play in LA, I don’t actually live there), so I’m generally super excited about the Coachella Music Festival. It’s right in my backyard. But this year, oh my god does the lineup suck. Coachella’s lineup is usually a little quirky, but this year it’s terrible. Your headliners are Jack Johnson (WTF?!), Portishead (known for defining 90s trip-hop), and Roger Waters – who will be playing the entire Dark Side Of The Moon. That’s a great album, no question, but after 35 years it’s a bit played out. There are a couple bands in there that I wouldn’t mind seeing, Tegan & Sara, the Raconteurs, Death Cab For Cutie and Minus the Bear spring to mind, but it’s just not worth it.

Coachella isn’t worth it because there are huge logistical problems associated with the festival. To start, it’s in Indio, which is the middle of kabumfuck-nowhere (this is coming from a girl that is content to live in normal-nowhere). It’s scorching hot, no matter when they schedule it, because Indio has a climate so similar to the Middle East that its biggest industry is date farming. Tickets are god-awful expensive and you better plan on spending $300 on top of those for a hotel room that will be (at best) 20 miles away from the fair grounds.

So this year, instead of trekking out to Coachella to kick off the summer festival season, I will be attending Bamboozle Left in lovely, temperate Irvine. The bands are more to my taste (The All American Rejects and My Chemical Romance are headlining, and several of the openers are new obsessions of mine – Danger Radio, The Maine, Pierce The Veil). Two day passes are $75 and on sale at the festival website, single day passes are $39.50 and go on sale Feb. 2nd. The festival is April 5-6 at the Verizon Wireless Ampitheater.