Crowded House concert…

On Thursday night, PW and I headed down to the Fillmore to see Crowded House.  The band is fronted by New Zealander Neil Finn, so suffice it to say that my kiwi friends were very excited to get to see these guys.  Paul and I got there early, had a beer at the Cheeky Monk (down the road from the Fillmore) and then got to the show shortly after the doors opened.

The Fillmore looks as if it was an old auditorium, more suited for ballroom dances or proms.  Up at the front, there was a very peculiar band on stage named Paper Bird from Denver.  The group had a guys on standup bass, guitar/banjo, and trombone and was fronted by three girls.  They had a very harmonious sound and reminded me a lot of the sing-a-long movies from the 1930’s and 1940’s.  Thanks to the banjo and trombone they had a very bluegrass feel to them as well, something I wouldn’t have sought out but was happy to get to hear.  They have a song up on their website for free so you can hear for yourself, I found them very interesting and made for an entertaining opening act.

After their set was finished, Paul and I (mostly Paul) struck up a discussion with a middle aged woman who was standing near us to save a place for her daughter.  She explained that this was one of their favorite bands and she always listened to them while she was taking her daughter with her to work as a child.  Needless to say, she was excited and warned us that usually she dances a lot and liked to wave her arms around.  Both statements were true.  She ended up hugging and kissing (on the cheek) both Paul and I before the night was up, and she instigated most of the front rows to dance along to songs.  It was quite the experience.  Paul had some wise comments about how much mothers seem to love me, based on this experience and how much his mom likes me.

The band itself was really great, honestly a lot better than I expected.  I knew several of their songs, most notably “Don’t Dream It’s Over” as I grew up in the 80’s.  Neil Finn was very high energy, I was impressed by his guitar playing.  Since I’ve been interested in guitars for awhile now, I like to spot different guitars.  At several points during the show, Neil was playing a truly strange guitar that I’ve never seen before.  As usual when I can’t figure these things out, I forwarded it to John.  He couldn’t figure it out either.

After the show, I found out that it was an Australian guitar called a Maton Fyrbyrd and only 120 guitars were made between 1965 and 1966.  Follow the link and look at that strange thing!  The headstock is 1/2 classical and 1/2 electric… three magnametle (really?) pickups, Bigsby bridge and weird steampunk-style knobs.  It’s like someone picked out six guitars and photoshopped them all together.  The weird thing is that it sounded GREAT.  I can’t seem to find any for sale to know how much it would cost to get one, but I’m betting I couldn’t afford it anyway. 🙂

The show was great fun and we capped off the night by heading back to the Cheeky Monk so the rest of the group could have a few more drinks (I was driving, so I had water.)  There’s only one more show on the 2010 schedule for me, and that’s Muse in October.  More soon!