The City Veins

Yeah you, go see live music. I realize that it is more than a little self serving that I write this, but let me implore you to go out and see more live music. I am not referring to whoever is at the 930 club, or Verizon Center, or whatever, but I want more people to take a chance and just head to the Velvet Lounge, or DC9, or the Red and the Black without knowing who is playing.

For example, when this band first started, Aaron and Adam and I went to DC9 on a whim. We had no idea who was playing and we just wanted to get back into the music scene, get the feeling of hanging out in small rock clubs again. On that night we happened to catch Prabir and the Substitutes, a band that we have become pretty big fans of, have played with, and hope to play with again in the future.

I went and saw my friend Joe’s band Inner Loop on Friday at the Red and the Black and unfortunately there were not a lot of people there, which is a shame. They put on a really good show, a lot of loops and samples, combined with some serious Jazz improvisation. More to the point, I caught the opener, The Vampire Monkeys. They do a similar jazz looping thing. What was fun was that because there were not many people there, the band just decided to go real experimental, and it was pretty exciting.

Also, the guitarist in The Vampire Monkeys, John Lee, might just be the best guitarist in DC right now. I don’t really get into guitar solos, but John really had me floored at certain points in his set. What impressed me more was that he joined Inner Loop, and did an excellent job of fitting in and accenting the music. There are not a lot of guitarists who can play both the lead and supporting role as well as John did.

Finally, I caught Corn Mo’s last song at the Palace of Wonders on Saturday, and was sufficiently impressed that I regretted missing the whole set. My friends and I decided that his music is a mixture of Meatloaf and Axl Rose, except more awesome than you imagine right now.

So these are the highlights from my recent random concert experiences. There will be plenty of disappointments along the way, lord knows that I have seen some sets that are so band you have to wonder if you are watching performance art. But if you take a chance, I bet you are more likely to be surprised and impressed than not. There are a lot of great musicians in this town. Worse comes to worse, you are out $8.00 or so. So go see live music.