ilgato.com

So, we will finally get to join one of my heroes, Garrison Keillor, on the radio Saturday night. We have been added to KALX Live! this Saturday night, April 12, 2008. KALX is an excellent radio program coming out of UC-Berkeley which has eclectic and interesting music. In fact, it was working in a college bookstore when I first moved out here in 2001 that I first heard Cat Power and The Moldy Peaches on KALX. This show will feature the talents of the Prairie Home Companions (Howie Cockrill on violin, mandolin and drums, and perhaps others).

Current Musical Obsessions:

* Fleet Foxes solo as part of the Backstage Sessions

* Bon Iver : For Emma, Forever Ago (achingly gorgeous)

I know there is already an unreasonable amount of these, but I also know why there are so many is because they are sooo much fun.

Top Moments of 2007

* Seeing the drastic propulsion of a couple of my favorite local acts… Port O’brien and The Dodos. I could now say I saw these acts when they were first getting started, when they were raw and explosive. I could actually even say I was the one who randomly talked to Matt Ward (who was there because he heard of them from someone in Australia) who was thinking of leaving because he was tired and convinced him to stay and watch them. i could even say this was all because I was outside of The Make-Out Room to drink some lemon-cayenne-maple syrup concoction because I was on the MasterCleanse. Talk about random. But talk about them within 2 months opening for Modest Mouse in England. I love (and am mortally terrified) of how random the whole music world is. Not that they are not both excellent bands who were heading in some grand direction based on the strength of their songs, but it seems the music world in so many ways is about one having to get out there and believe in yourself and maybe you will meet who you need to meet when you need to meet them. Well, that, or make an amazing album and know who to send it to, or have tremendous perseverance.

* Of course, Radiohead and their casual brilliance. I think their whole digital approach will be good for music, and I know I love “In Rainbows”, from the children yelling “Hey!” in “15 Step” to the subtle elegance that is “Reckoner”. A must-read article for me combined two of my musical idols: Thom Yorke and David Byrne in conversation about the state of music and such. I believe the article was in Wired, but regardless it had a compendium of David Byrne’s attached, titled “David Byrne’s Survival Guide for Emerging Artists - and Megastars”. Actually, an idea I have that I beg someone to steal is to make a T-shirt which says, W.W.D.B.D. (What Would David Byrne Do). Please make one and sell it to me, capitalistic society!

* The gorgeously, ethereal Sigur Ros’s string section, Amiina, put out an album all their own, “Kurr”. A gorgeous, plaintiff, seriously underlooked album that finally provided me with the indie rock Enya album I have been waiting on a long time (the aching beauty of The Dirty Three was getting lonely). I am in no way kidding: Enya, one of the top 5 all time selling women artists. Then their concert (with Peter & The Wolf, another fine band, as the opener) was a thing of beauty. In the majestic Swedish American Music Hall in San Francisco, these 4 women played zithers, violins, glockenspiels, calibrated wine glasses, saws, and everything under the sun. It was a gorgeous affair. I am also seriously looking forward to hearing the stripped-down half of the Sigur Ros album.

* The Arcade Fire’s sets in the lobbies and centers of those grand English theaters were a spectacle worth seeing. Especially the amazingly captured black + white performance of The Clash’s “Guns of Brixton”. The Arcade Fire sure know how to melodicize fighting words. Thanks.

* I also recently saw a performance by Annie Clark of St. Vincent at a record store which was a thing of beauty. And she named her album “Marry Me” off of a line in Arrested Development. Annie Clark rocks.

* I gotta mention the fact that il gato legitimately entered the lexicon of the performing San Franciscan world. Scary, but exciting.

* My minor obsessions with Grizzly Bear. Their stripped-down record store performances were even some of the highlights I have heard this year.

* Feist, whom I have loved since I heard her first “Ba ba ba” from “One Evening” off of “Let It Die” on KCRW’s Morning Becomes Eclectic a couple years ago, made an equally impressive album and entered the mainstream world. More power to you, Leslie. And her producers, Chili Gonzales and others, are some of the top peoples’ I would love to record an album with.

* Beirut did something special at an opera hall.

* Jeff Tweedy, seen at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, is one of the finest songwriters around.

* Some of the eclectic, yet fascinating performances, Ship/Ribbons put on. Besides being such sincere guys, Frank and Dave really know how to stretch the limit of a show: The Mountain Show, The Tunnel Show, etc. Thanks, guys.

* And everybody was all ga-ga about Panda Bear because he makes futuristic pop music. Not because its got synthesizers or sounds ‘futuristic’, but because it is the time capsule the oft-compared Beach Boys are. The sound will help define a decade.

* I got to be face-to-face with my favorite director (Paul Thomas Anderson), who directed my favorite movie of all time (”Magnolia”) at his San Francisco premier of “There Will Be Blood”, which though the not the best all-around movie I saw this past year (that goes to “No Country For Old Men”), some of the most superior, emotionally-complex scenes I have scene this year. It is a shame if Daniel Day Lewis and Javier Bardem don’t win any of the important awards (not you, Oscars!).

* And to bring it all together, seeing the music of The Valerie Project with the surrealist, sexy Czech film “Valerie and her Week of Wonders” was something extraordinary, and led me to finding out about the screening for “There Will Be Blood”.

* Hey, and to any and all who have come out and support il gato this year. It is hard work trying to be a musician and it is many ways your support which inspires me. Thanks innumerabalably (that’s for you, american The Office).

so, the show as part of City Sessions at Club Wazeima was good times. i forgot some lyrics to a song but floated and made up some up and kept the mood going. it is a funny part of growing as a musician. initially i was all nervous about playing my songs at all for people, regardless of level of intimacy (parents, strangers, partners) — it was all the same and all a challenge. now that i have performed a number of shows, i am still extremely scared of playing in public, but now i’ve advanced to the next level of anxiety and am allowed to stress out about making sure i remember all the words.

that is something that amazes me about music. people can forget their keys, not remember their account numbers, but some people know the words to 500+ songs. i always complain about how i don’t remember words to songs, but that is only partially true. i have written a large amount of songs and can remember songs i haven’t played for 5 years. however, there inevitably become times when i forgot words from a song written 3 months ago.

anyways, i do feel growth and it feels nice. music is losing some of the mystique i attached to it before i started making it a large portion of my life, but now i guess come the “marriage” portion, where i get to relate and appreciate it in a much more ‘average’, yet no less fulfilling, way.

but, enough of the sidenotes of the sidenotes, City Sessions was alot of fun and the other bands were both mighty impressive. The Scarecrowes play a The Band influenced down-home folk which i am always a sucker for. they had a male and female vocalist, a banjo, stand-up bass and alot of pretty harmonies. Dave Hanley was an amazing guitar player, performing leads and fills to the max within his already complicated strumming patterns. extremely impressive and amazingly difficult. and we pulled it together by the end and are in the process of figuring out where “chocolate lemonade” wants to live and reside. i think we are almost there, but it is a new form of song for me, one i probably wouldn’t have come to without the process of playing with the band. new vantage points are always beneficial.

and a picture of our no-holds barred scrabble game. no rules! total anarchy! as long as you provide a definition for the word you just made up that sounds reasonable the word counts. and you can go over to the other side of the board if there is not enough room. crazy times ladies and gentlemen, the life of a rock star is far more lurid than you could ever envision.

Benjamin Winter
il gato (7:30)
The Make-Out Room
Friday, November 23rd
$6

The show will be from 7:30 - 9:30, with il gato on at 7:30. Afterwards…Thanksgiving dance party.

Please come!

Latest musical obsessions:

“Gang Bang Suicide” by Broken Social Scene presents Kevin Drew - I swore it was Feist at first

“Reckonner” by Radiohead - Thom Yorke does something to me, one of the most gorgeous falsettos around

Actually, the entirety of Thom Yorke’s Bridge School Benefit set from a number of years ago at the best Bridge School I have been to (Neil Young, Thom Yorke, Ryan Adams, James Taylor, Jack Johnson, Tenacious D, etc.), which includes “After The Gold Rush” solo on piano. Gorgeous.

Hello, sorry such a long time. I got added to the wonderful Outta Sight hosted by the equally wonderful Nathan Moomaw. This show will be a solo/holiday show. So, each performer is allowed to perform one of their own songs and then one holiday song (personally penned or otherwise). I am way excited about this opportunity because I finally get a topical chance to write my thanksgiving song, tentatively titled “You’re my Turkey”. References to cranberry sauce, Native Americans and casserole abound.

Please come down and check out the show.

Outta Sight
Edinburgh Castle (950 Geary Street, in the Tenderloin)
Wednesday, November 21st
9pm

Additionally, I will have a support slot at the Make-Out Room on Friday, November 23rd. The Make-Out Room has now nixed local music out of their line-up throughout the week and now have early shows (7:30 - 9:30) on the weekends. I heard it was renovated so please come down and check out the show and the headliner, Benjamin Winter.

upcoming show in gainesville, florida. a homecoming of sorts with a myriad of special guests. this will most definitely be a family affair.

please come and join us for a most excellent night of music with Clide vs. Crocodiles .

i am back to being alive.

i have played a few shows and have a few more coming up:

1. Friday, April 20th
2. Simple Pleasures Cafe
3. il gato (CD release party) / Clide vs. Crocodiles
4. 7:30pm
5. Balboa and 36th, San Francisco

i also just bought my first albums in a long time:

Bruce Springsteen: Nebraska (there is some type of weird Bruce Springsteen Renaissance going on, witness - The Arcade Fire, Bright Eyes, The Killers, etc.)

Smog: Red Apple Falls

Mazzy Star: She Hangs Brightly