Saturday night I tore myself away from my study materials (sweet relief!) and Shane and I headed over to Capitol Hill to enjoy an evening of live music. We bought tickets a few weeks ago for the “Hotel Cafe Tour” solely because we are both big fans of Rachel Yamagata, but we were pleasantly surprised to find that the four other artists on tour with her were extremely (though not equally) talented. Meiko opened the show and was charming and beautiful, with her incredibly sweet voice. She makes strumming the guitar look deceivingly effortless. Emily Wells has this very cool hip-hop/violin/live-mixing-chamber thing going on. With the use of a recorder and some fancy equipment, she layers her vocals over her violin over a deep hip-hop beat to create this fascinating “one person symphony”. I was entranced. Lenka was good, though quite bubbly, and possibly a little too Feist-like. I like Feist, but I also like originality. Thao Nguyen was so much fun to watch, with the way she bopped around stage with her guitar. She reminded me a little of Bjork, but still had her own thing gong on. She’s one of those singers that can “scream” and still make it sound musical. And then there was Rachel Yamagata. This woman blows me away. She can sit at a piano and woo you with her deep, bluesy voice, and then stand up and rock out on her guitar like the bad-ass that she is. All in all, a very good show. And it was nice to see something in a small venue like Chop Suey – we weren’t more than 15 feet from the stage. The performer-audience interaction that comes with such a small space adds a lot to the experience.
All of that said, I have a confession: I am not perfectly cut out for this whole hip live music scene. After two hours of standing in the middle of the crowd on the beer-splashed concrete floor, my feet began to hurt, my back began to ache, and I became increasingly irritated by all of the concert-goers around me. I was annoyed by the guy standing next to me who keep swaying to the music and bumping into my shoulder. This dude in front of me with the biggest hair ever kept blocking my view of the stage. I started to wish that I’d worn shoes that were more orthopedically supportive, rather than my cute little ballet flats. And I was hot, desperately wanting some fresh air, but not wanting to give up my spot so close to the stage. Tiredness set in around 11:30, and I was trying to hide the fact that I couldn’t help yawning every 10 minutes. Is it possible that at the young age of 27, I have become so un-hip that I can’t thoroughly enjoy a two and a half-hour set? Are Shane and I resigned to a lifetime of spending Saturday nights at home, eating ice cream in our pj’s? Hopefully not (though I do love our weekend pajama parties…). I’ll pretend I’m cool for at least another couple of years.