Weekend Update
Friday
Hard to believe the weekend’s come and gone. I suppose I started the runaway roller-coaster on its way Friday. I came home from work, zipped down to the gym for a workout, and got back to the house in time to join several other bloggers in an AIM chatroom to watch the presidential debate. It’s a stimulating way to watch the debate, as others point out things I miss, or give context to issues.
Once the debate ended, we headed up to Capitol Hill (Seattle’s) to hear Antibalas (mentioned below). We had called to see when the band was scheduled, and were told 9:00. While we know that bands don’t usually get started until 10:00 or later, we’ve been surprised once or twice and decided to check in. Sure enough, when we got to Neumo’s, they said the first set (of two!) would start at 10:15. We got into a conversation with the young woman taking tickets at the door (we really were about the first people there), and were startled when she asked us how the last half of the debate went. This is not the usual ice-breaker topic with nightclub personnel. She’s 22 now, and acknowledged that, 4 years ago, she and her friends had little to no interest in the election, but this year they’re having parties to get each other registered and mark their absentee ballots and are much more invested in the outcome. It was a great mood-setter, as we could extrapolate (rightly or wrongly) a whole body of voters that are beneath the radar of traditional pollsters.
We got our wrist stamps and decided to walk around the Hill a little rather than drink ourselves stupid before we even heard a note. We used to go up to that area fairly frequently when the Elysian had live music, but not so much lately, and it was fun to get reacquainted.
The Antibalas show was terrific. They were tight and energetic. You could really feel the “world” aspect of the band, as the lead passed from the Jamaican-sounding lead singer to a Cuban-sounding vocalist, to a Latin-looking keyboard player who channelled pure Ray Manzerak, to the curt New York street staccato of the horn section soloists. We stayed for both sets, and wanted more. There is a “political” angle to their latest cd, Who Is This America, in particular a song called “Indictment”, where they roll out the entire Administration demonology for a “heah Come Da Judge” shoutalong. While this was pretty cathartic on the heels of the debate, it risks consignment to an oddball scrapheap unless it’s particularly acerbic or poignant, which it’s not. We only have to look back to their previous cd, where, in hindsight, the naivete of castigating Bill Clinton and Madeline Albright as “war criminals” evokes a nostalgia for a simpler time when political evil manifested itself as an ant in the sugarbowl rather than as a bloodcurdling growl from the basement of our soul. Still, go hear them. This is a band whose live show consistently delivers.
