Eric Mills

Ryan Reardon, a most excellent bass guitarist/composer (and a groomsman in my wedding), has an album out with his newest band “The Afromotive.” It’s available on iTunes here, and you can visit the homepage of Afromotive here.

I’ve always wanted to see Tori Amos live in concert, but this video clip has crystallized my desire. Now I really really want to see a Tori show. Watch from the beginning until about minute 3 or so.

I write a tumblr page, and since it was easier to hit “share on tumblr” than to copy and rewrite the embedded code for Daily Motion videos, I’ll link to my tumblr page for this one:

Concert sauvage dans le métro !

June 26th is the internet radio day of silence, which you can read more about here. Personally, I don’t know how I would live without streaming KCRW.com. Nic Harcourt and his team are responsible for my brilliant taste in music. So if you stream radio via the internets, go join that station as a member now to help offset the ridiculous royalty fees that will be in place shortly.

Point Counterpoint (MP3)

As you may know, I’m a little obsessed with numbers. For example, I’ve just broken over from 999 to 1002 miles on my current bicycle odometer (was reset in April). I have a hard time climbing stairs without counting them, and although I don’t have it as bad as the protagonist from The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, I do pay attention to the makes and models of vehicles on the road.

Last night, as a birthday present, Lisa took me to see Paul Simon. The most salient aspect of the experience in my mind? Numbers.

0 – The number of people sitting down during favorites (which really are all songs that aren’t slow)

1 – Simon and Garfunkel were one of the first acts to use ethnic names as title of their pop group (both Simon and Garfunkel are Jewish names).

2 – The number of songs played from the days of Simon & Garfunkel (an almost unrecognizable version of Mrs. Robinson), which in my opinion, is better than it is with Garfunkel.

3 – The number of times he said something to the audience (like most good performers, he lets his music do the speaking).

4 – Count ‘em, yes, FOUR encores. 1 – Call me Al, 2 – 5 songs 3 – Bridge Over Troubled Water and 3 more , 4th – just Paul and his guitar.

65 – Paul Simon is 65 years old. And he rocks. His voice is still exactly as it sounds on the albums. Exactly as it sounds in The Graduate, and his songs are imbued with life and benefit from a harder edge exemplified on his new album, Surprise.

Paul Simon, live, around the corner from our house, was absolutely the best live music experience of my life.

My very best good friend Ali Ippolito, who by the way sang a marvelous song at our wedding, had her band reviewed in Portland’s other alternative weekly. You will really enjoy listening to some of their stuff by clicking around here.

Don’t drop in on them without being forewarned about the sense of humor:

Do you have a track on the album that would be a good soundtrack for bombing Lebanon?
“One Way In, One Way Out””? It has a good beat and you can dance to it. Also, I in no way endorse dropping the bomb on anything ‘‘cept for a room full of my homies with my dope beats. I don’t have any dope beats. Or homies.

Yours in Hero and Villain-ness,
Eric Mills