Rockstar Supernova - February 19, 2007 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre in Vancouver

Rather then give a usual review, I'm going to tell the story of Lukas Rossi and Yvette.
Dilana

I met Yvette before the show from our exceptional second row (actually more like 6th row) seats. I noticed we were surrounded by these fans with Supernova tee shirts and lanyards with the Rockstar Supernova badges.

I ended up talking to this woman sitting in front of us. She was there with her husband and she had a sign that said "LUKAS 1786 votes"
Toby

She told us that when she saw the show for the very first time she felt a connection with Lukas. She could relate to his hard life and struggles as she'd also had struggles which she had overcome including brain surgery and a kidney transplant. Before the show had aired her husband, Robert, had won 10 computers at an auction. He had five of them set up in their house. Yvette was determined to support Lukas so rallied her husband, brother and friends to all vote for Lukas. Robert helped set up friends with computers so they could vote too. After all the dust had settled they had determined they'd all voted 1786 times.
Dave

During the show, her husband flung the sign onto the stage (almost hitting Lukas on the head btw) like a frisbee and about 20 minutes later, Lukas noticed it and picked it up. He looked at it a bit, and got a bit reflective and said how humbled he was and how he would have been honoured to have any single number of those votes. Of course all this happened WHILE YVETTE WAS AWAY TAKING HER ANTI REJECTION MEDS AND SHE MISSED THE ENTIRE EXCHANGE!

Cut to after the show. Her husband tracked down someone with pull because after explaining that his wife had made the sign and that she had missed seeing Lukas read it, and finding out Lukas wanted to talk to her, they ended up backstage.

She was able to tell Lukas a little of her story but mostly she used the opportunity to personally say thank you to him. I don't know what it was about that particular exchange or that particular time but it clearly moved Lukas in a deep way. He took off his skull ring placing it on her finger while showing her that he had the matching skull on the chain he wears on his belt and that now they would always be bonded together.

Of course, she was blown away. I mean, I must stress that Lukas has no money (yet) so his gesture was a huge deal. In fact, a few minutes later when I was talking to Lukas’s brother Jonas and dragged her over and showed him the ring, Jonas got stern right away. "Where did you get that?" he asked pretty seriously. She told the story to him, and he got all quiet for a bit. Then he told her that Lukas had had that ring specially made and that it had a lot of personal meaning to him. Of course she started to cry, and Jonas just reassured her and told her that he must have had a very good reason to give it to her.

Here are some photos, courtesy of Yvette including one with a photo of Lukas actually wearing it.

Lukas gets a lot of bad press but I have nothing but great things to say about him. Ive never met anyone with so much love and respect for his fans, but this gesture just blew me away.

Gomez - February 16, 2007 at the Commodore in Vancouver

My first and only other time seeing Gomez was in 1999 on their first swing through Vancouver at the Starfish Room. Wow, 1999. Before I had high speed internet and used to buy Q magazine and CMJ for the CD's so I could find new music. It was through one of those CMJ CD's that I first heard Gomez.
Ben Ottewell

I loved "Bring It On", and was really looking forward to the Starfish Room show but ended up being really disappointed because I could barely recogognize a song. They were a jam band, ala Grateful Dead or at least it seemed like it to me at the time. Although that really works for some people, I'm just not that type of girl so I thought that would be it for me and Gomez. Fast forward to the present, and I'm on myspace and happen upon "See The World" on someones player. "How We Operate" became my non stop favourite.
Tom Gray

Despite my lifelong love of music there are many, many reasons why I never tried to become a music critic or writer professionally. An example of one of those reasons is as follows. I thought that there were only two singers in Gomez. I thought the one I liked most just did my favourite and least favourite songs. There are actually three and they are pretty distinct.
Ian Ball

I may not have come to this show had it not been double billed with Ben Kweller, or if Deb had not been so excited about seeing Gomez. It turned out that I'd parked myself in front of my favourite singer, Ian Ball, and he played my favourite song, Hamoa Beach, second song in. He had a fender guitar with stickers of all sorts of life affirming thoughts and phrases. I'm assuming they are not meant ironically due to the lyrical content of his songs. Click here for my flickr photo to see what all the stickers say.


I was especially happy to see that they weren't a jam band. Anymore? Never really were? I don't know. I do know that about halfway through the set they started to loosen up and seem enjoy themselves. Ian seemed especially nervous and tense at first. This could be due to a fake set list that had been distrubuted as a joke.

This could also have been due to the monitors being located up high as opposed to on the stage where they usually are. I witnessed a little pantomine between Ian and Ben that seemed to indicate a wish to rip them off the ceiling and put them on the floor.

Highlights of the two hour show include an almost a capella version of "How We Operate" which was hauntingly gorgeous and a Happy Birthday song sung by the crowd to a crew member that was giddily silly.

Ben Kweller - February 16, 2007 at the Commodore in Vancouver

This was a double bill with Gomez so I'll break it up into two parts.
First up was Ben Kweller.

I've actually seen both Gomez and Ben Kweller before. Ben Kweller was about three years ago at Richards on Richards in support of "On My Way".

That was a great show. I love that album, and there was an element of danger due to the precarious balancing of the keyboard on the speaker. It felt like at any second that Kweller played the keyboard that he could tumble 4 feet to the floor.

This show was more stripped down with Kweller touring with just a bassist and drummer. Kweller arrived on stage with his eyes almost completely covered by the brim of his cap. The stage was set with a lovely Ben Kweller banner.

Highlights included a fun cover of an old timer Texas tune, the name of which I can't remember, but seemed to be on the set list as Chugg. (?) and an impromptu performance of the Nintendo Supermario game song.

Okay, real highlights were "Penny On The Train Track" and "I Gotta Move" from the new Ben Kweller self titled album and of course "Wasted And Ready". I was really sad he didn't play my favourite song from the new album, "This Is War".


One of the other things I love is when artists come out after the show to say hello and meet the fans. Happily, Kweller was amazingly nice while I rattled on and on as I am want to do.

Pete Yorn - February 8, 2007. The Commodore Ballroom, Vancouver

The last time I saw Pete Yorn was 4 years ago when he was touring in support of "Day I Forgot". According to him, the last time he was actually through Vancouver was as the opening act for the Foo Fighters, which is a double bill I just don't get.

Yorn did tell an interesting anecdote about that trip. As he was leaving a sushi restaurant he was overcome by a crowd of people swarming the streets in celebration. He asked what was going on, and it turned out that the Canucks had won a semi final game. "You've got to admire a city that celebrates the first game, of the first series.

The opening acts were Charlotte Martin, who had the most beautiful stage setup consisting of twisted christmas lights arranged to look like candelabras, and Aqualung.

Aqualung is Matt Hales, a Winston lookalike/soundalike from the UK who also sounds a lot like Travis. He sounds so much like Travis in fact that I had to google him when I got home to see if it was actually the Travis lead singer gone solo. Having these kinds of thoughtful distractions coupled with the fact that he was hidden on the side of the stage playing a grand piano out of my eyeline meant that I pretty much thought his set was pretty much forgettable. I say pretty much because he does have one remarkable song called "Better Then Sunshine" which I know I've heard but can't remember where.

Pete Yorn took the stage to great fanfare. The crowd was surprizingly mixed since the last time I'd seen him the crowd was probably 80% girls. This time was pretty even although his status as a sex symbol has not diminished judging by the amount of lingerie that was tossed his way.

His backing band is actually a band I well and truly love called Minibar. In Yorn's previous west coast tour, Minibar was the opening act as well as backing band, and I would have loved to see that, alas they only played as close as Seattle. Most memorable moments for Minibar would have to be the incredibly energetic drummer, Malcolm Cross, pictured above, and the multitalented bassist Sid Jordan who managed to 1) play bass 2) smoke a joint, all while 3) singing back up vocals! I wish I had gotten a photo of that.

Since I'm not a writer, and have a crappy memory, I'll just mention some thoughts and highlights about the actual show.

He had this gorgeous old decorated acoustic guitar that had it's strap held on with duct tape. I love to see things like that.

He told of how he'd awoken to hear that Anna Nicole Smith had been hospitalized and after he had finished showering heard that she'd died. He dedicated "Bandstand In The Sky" to her. A sample lyric is ...

You can take my life but I'll never die.
You can tell that's the way I'll survive.
Heading for the bandstand in the sky.

He also told about the soft spot he had in his heart for "Life On A Chain" because it was the song that got him his record contract. "Sing along if you know it" and sing along the crowd did. Sang along to pretty much everything in fact.

Particularly lovely was an almost acoustic version of "Come Back Home" played at 2/3 speed giving it a nice intimacy and a totally acoustic cover of the Grateful Dead song "Friend of the Devil".

The other cover he played was "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out" by The Smiths. Pete had just seen Morrissey in L.A. and I guess he was a big influence on him.

I'm sure I forgot a lot but I can say it was a great show. Love him, not JUST because he's cute.