The Jay Porks Experience

Phish at Madison Square Garden 12/28/11

2011-12-29T03:42:00.001-05:00

Tis the season for giving, and if you're this writer, receiving. When given the opportunity to be bought into Phish tonight for their first of a 4 night New Years Eve at Madison Square Garden, how could I pass it up? Before anything goes further we must slurp the Revered Justito, who gifts me with this ticket to the show tonight (and note that his holiday gift is to be mailed shortly), gifts me with the chance to see Phish. I've heard a lot of Phish-surprisingly enough not much of their music. I know several 'Phans' who speak of the band is Christ-like proportions. To give you an idea, the night before the show and throughout the morning I was reading tweets hashtagged with stuff like #OccupyMSG, and #YEMSG. Some folks were camped out all night-and they HAVE tickets. So there's that side of the fence. Then I also have ran into a few friends who behave like, for lack of a better term here, “Haters”, when the band is mentioned. These people would compare a Phish concert to nothing more than a traveling circus of hacky sack and drugs. I chose to walk into this one with a non-bias attitude. I didn't study up on the Phish catalog days leading up to the show-I didn't read blogs or set lists. I'm a fan of spontaneity, that's what the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series is all about; so here I bring you the 63rd installment, from the (newly renovated) World's Most Famous Arena-Madison Square Garden in the heart of New York City, for 1st night of the Phish 4 night New Years Eve 2011-2012 run.

I get off the train around 630ish, and literally all I see is a sea of people standing in front of the Garden all holding up their index finger screaming "one?!?-who's got one for tonight?" . Usually I'm at the show with extra tickets and I can't give them away. All sorts of signs suggesting trades-I seriously considered a sign that was a two for one offer with me giving up tonight's ticket for 2 tomorrow night. But I'm already here, so I'm sticking with it.

So a little after 7 I made it up to section 404, row G, seat 9. Holy crap- they sold out the seats behind the stage too ? I've never seen that before done at any arena. Usually they cut that area off the to public. If every seat gets filled(which it should be because it's sold out), we'll have at least 20,000 people here tonight.

At 8:07 We kicked off the night with "Free", "Glide", "Possum", "Cities" and "The Ballard of Curtis Loew".. It didn't even take more than the first half of "Free" for me to begin enjoying myself. What would drive people to hate this? I mean, I guess if you don't like musicians jamming out to groovy tunes then I could see your dilemma. But then you look around and realize this place is packed to gils-not an ass in a seat throughout the place..

The lights are something I've never seen before-how do the lights colors change mid-beam? How do you make the lights look like smoke rings? Haven't seen a light show like this this side of Roger Waters.. And at the beginning of certain songs glow sticks are tossed by hundreds from the 400 sections raining down on the people in the lower levels. An arena wide celebration was what this night was about. My section was getting me a contact high before the set even began(thanks for sharing by the way #Sarcasm), people walking past me behind me asking each other "is that real?" referring to the wall. And I still don't understand how many glow sticks needed to be purchased for the raining to still be going on an hour into the set.

"Stash" and "Contact"(a song the Rev Justito hasn't seen live in 24 Phish shows) followed by "Sample in a Jar", "Kill Devil Falls" and "Bathtub Gin" finished out what was to be Set 1.

So is this an intermission at 9:33? I would assume so considering nobody has left. If I was on a lower level, I'd duck out for a second for a cigarette since there's a Nazi event staff guy who threatened to throw me out if he caught smoking again. So that's right folks, the only person in this building not indulging in illegal drugs is the one who gets his shoulder tapped. Do I have a sign on my back that says "hey event staff please bother me at every show I attend in life!". What the hell man, there is smoke EVERYWHERE, I mean everywhere. There's probably more pot in this arena then I've ever smoked in my life and yet, my cigarette is causing a disturbance to this asshole stuck in a menial service position.

"Birds of a Feather" kicked off set number two at 10:02... And everyone is back to standing up. I tried to tape a couple a songs throughout the evening, but theres like a ceiling a few feet up, so I can't exactly hold my camera above the swaying bodies in front of me. After Birds of a Feather it was "Carini" time, which was followed by "Tweezer" for the foreseeable future-they are jammin' on this one.. This had to have gone over ten minutes (like most of the evening's songs)n"My Friend My Friend" was up next. Isn't the internet a wonderful thing? Without knowing the name of one song coming into this The setlist is being tweeted song by song. Now if only I could get this many web savvy people into the Meat Puppets, then I'd be doing my job as a social media assistant.

Then, wait a second I know this song-a cover of the Velvet Underground's "Rock N' Roll"! Hell freaking yes! This is my FAVORITE Velvet underground song-had I got my camera out quick enough I would've been rolling film. "NICU", "Bouncing Around the Room","Harry Hood", and "Bug" all checked in before it was encore time..

"Tube", "Rocky Top" and "Tweezer Reprise" served as a healthy encore for a "Phuphilling" night of Phish. The night came to an official end at 11:35pm. That leaves us with set one clocking in at an hour and twenty six minutes, and set two was an hour and thirty three minutes. I've seen bands not even play that long for ONE set, Phish come through MSG fries hearts and minds. Walking down the steps on the way out, I couldn't help but overhear two buddies talking about how this was an "old school type of show". As a first timer, I can't tell you if that's accurate or not-the Phans will judge by the setlist.

If you made it this far down, then you've probably enjoyed my first Phish experience, and I've enjoyed having you. Now I bid my readers a goodnight, because as I post this I have less then 2 hours to nap and get to my day job. Life and times of social media rockstar journalism. Again, huge thanks to the Reverend for giving me the chance to attend. Feels good to be baptized in the Phamily... LATE.

SETLIST: Set I: Free, Glide, Possum, Cities, The Ballad Of Curtis Loew, Stash, Contact, Sample In A Jar, Kill Devil Falls, Bathtub Gin

Set II: Birds Of A Feather, Carini > Tweezer > My Friend, My Friend, Rock & Roll > NICU, Bouncing Around The Room, Harry Hood, Bug

Encore: Tube, Rocky Top, Tweezer Reprise

Notes: I have a note to share about the show tonight. If there was one thing I could've done without, it would've been the intermission from 9:33-10:02. I'm not saying it took away from time that could've been spent playing songs-they do this every year I'm sure they can go as long as they want (especially with the Knicks are on a west coast swing)-I just don't understand what was getting done in that half hour. It's not like we can go grab some air here- it's takes like 20 minutes to exit the building. Maybe if I was with Phriends I would've have something to do during that half hour. Oh well, there'll always be next time.

Joseph Arthur, James Maddock Bowery Electric 12/17/11

2011-12-18T03:05:00.001-05:00

The 62nd Edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series is a special one indeed for a couple of reasons. One, we're heading out to the Bowery Electric (Joey Ramone Pl & 3rd St) down in the East Village for a charity event benefiting the Toys for Tots Foundation( ) featuring the musical styling of Joseph Arthur (and opener James Maddock). Never a bad thing to gain some good karma. Second reason this is special, it's because I've officially taken a semester off of school to pursue my dreams: doing this...fighting on the front lines of the social media takeover of traditional rock journalism as we know it. Anyway, should be a fun night. Doors are at 8PM, show at 8:45PM. I'm off work on little ol' Staten Island at 4, giving me plenty of time to pick up some last minute holiday gifts in Times Square.

Walking downstairs into the Bowery Electric, I enter a room about the size of the one I sleep every night-equipped with a stage. There's a floor that's gonna hold maybe 20 of us, with steps leading up to a bar in the back-theres a railing when you get up there-considering changing my spot when the music comes on. There's a sign that says "Occupancy by more than 108 persons is dangerous and unlawful". Obviously the fire Marshall hasn't been here in a while-hope they're counting heads at the door we're about to eclipse that occupancy.

Everyone I spoke to at the bar and in the room were all here for James Maddock, so when he fronted the 3 piece that took the stage at 8:50, it was to a gracious applause. I taped the first song-Maddock is strumming an acoustic guitar, with a bass player and drummer keeping pace, almost quietly. I've given up my seat and headed to the front of the room to the far left of the stage-now I'm too close. But this bluesy bastard has got me into it! Harmonica hanging from his neck, singing folky tunes sounding so much like Bon Dylan- if Bob Dylan's song were recognizable live. Heads are nodding to a song I'm gonna take a guess is called "When the Stars Align".. They turned me into a fan, and went off around 9:40..

All cards on the table, I didn't know anything about Joseph Arthur until I started contributing to Concert Confessions. Only through the ceaseless praise from Reverend Justito was this show even on my radar. After finding out I was attending a few weeks ago I started listening to all the available stuff on YouTube. Trying to familiarize myself with some of the work, listening to the songs didn't give me any indication that I made the wrong decision here; if anything got me more excited.

At 10:17, Joseph Arthur took the stage with band. And here I thought we were in for a night of slow jams-don't let the wine goblets fool you-roof is about to come off. The girl next to me(who took a bus down from Toronto specifically for this show) says she's never seen him with a band and that it's usually him alone with like a million pedals. He's a got a drummer channeling his inner Keith Moon, and a guy playing an acoustic guitar as he plays a very weathered electric guitar.

Every song, even the softer slower building tunes- had a crazy little effects box jam out portion of it. I taped a few songs, and I noticed them all going over six minutes. Hopefully the girls chatting it up to the right of me don't show up on video. Bout 3 songs in, Arthur addresses the crowd and says "happy toys for tots day". Then he's like "this one is inspired spefically by Toys for Tots.. song's called 'Even Though'"-And before even strumming a chord he smirks and says "yea this has nothing to do with that at all..you totally caught me".

Parts jammy and bluesy-parts distorted pedal busting madness; this night was nothing short of a win. Then, just when I start to really relax and enjoy myself he asks for the time. It was 10:57. He's like "we only have 15 more minutes". Due to venue restrictions, show has to end by 11:15... People in the crowd screamed "Occupy Bowery Electric!"-which was awesome. He played a few more. One being "Fistful of Mercy", and the final of the night being a song about the Occupy movements-which he needed to reach to his iPad for assistance with the lyrics (awesome). After the song, it was like 11:20 and they said goodnight. Couldn't have been more than 12, maybe14 songs at the length they were going. Yet with the sheer epicness in which they were delivered, I felt so fulfilled.

Here's something you don't see everyday: once the guitars were unplugged some guy was screaming stuff toward Joseph Arthur-all I heard was "mother fucker" and the phrase "Toby Keith" repeated as he stormed out the venue doors. Joseph, who is walking right by me as he's exiting stage, looks at me and my Toronto friend and is like "what was he saying?" and I was like "he was screaming something about Toby Keith". He headed off stage. Toby Keith? What the hell was that?? We just had ourselves an awesome night here, and some idiot gets drunk and starts shouting names of terrible artists. I'm so bewildered, I just can't put it together. Hope Joseph Arthur and his band know that there was only one moron in the crowd, the rest of us were extremely satisfied with an evening of good tunes.

NOTES:
-Joseph Arthur plays City Winery on January 1st. The trooper from Toronto-who I hopefully learn her name by then-says she'll be at that show too.

-I like how they named the street Joey Ramone Place. And by like I mean I think it's stupid. This whole “The Ramones created punk” mystic is idiotoc-bands like the Stoogies and MC5 were playing that kinda music in Detroit 5 years before The Ramones ever took the stage.

-What's up with all these “Rock” venues having performers needing to get off at 11 o clock or even 10 o clock sometimes for “Dance Parties”? There's tons of places in NYC to find a nice dance floor where all the 19 year old girls can go, sniff Percocet and get slutty. Stop taking over the little cool dingy places I'm trying to attend shows-you are f#%king with my sh!t.

The Band Touring as "Guns N' Roses" at Izod Center 11/17/11

2011-11-18T06:25:00.006-05:00

The band currently touring under the moniker of Guns N' Roses hits the Izod Center at the Meadowlands Sports Complex in Dirty Jersey tonight for the 61^st edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series. The Izod Center: Home of the... well, actually no pro sports teams play here anymore since the Devils moved to Newark and the Nets are moving to Brooklyn (when the NBA Players Association caves and takes that deal). So upon walking in after 8PM the banner hanging from the ceiling was commemorating Bruce Springstein's 50 consecutive sold out shows. It's New Jersey, that banner should say “Will be sold out for the rest of life”. Anyway, you may have noticed my “touring under the moniker” pun back there. We all know the story, I shall not bore you with it once more. Axl is touring, performing the hits of Guns N' Roses with no Guns, and the lone Rose being himself. The only remaining member of the band besides Rose is Keyboardist Dizzy Reed-or who I like to call “The Man Who Killed Rock & Roll”. Doors were at 7PM, and show was listed at 8PM We got to our seats in section 206 Row 20-and let's look on the bright side, at least we weren't in the last row! (we were 5 rows away from it). Those steep steps were a killer. But finally at our seats little after 8, let's do this-it should be interesting to say the least.

It was brought to my attention via Twitter en route to Izod Center that a band called “Asking Alexandria” was to open tonight. Found some post that mentioned the band was “Handpicked 24 hours prior to the show by Guns N' Roses”. Not for nothing, the Axl Rose interview on That Metal Show-whatever show they were at had Buckcherry opening, we get saddled with some band from England I've never heard of.

I kept an open mind up until about they went on after 9-then I heard their songs. Oklahoma got Hinder as an opener-now that's pretty bad, but halfway through this second song I'd kill for Hinder right now rather than this craptastic fiasco. I don't understand a word this dude is saying besides his greeting to the crowd, which me and Pam interpreted as “Hello New York”. I sure hope we heard that wrong. Anyway, with all the screaming the lyrics were incomprehensible. I don't get the whole deep voiced screamer lead singer thing that's become a trend in bands people surround me enjoy. Just vocal wise let's take Mastodon for instance, (not comparing their sound other than the screaming)Mastodon I'm not into because they're a little on the heavy side for me. But Mastodon opened for Alice In Chains and Deftones-Mastodon opened for Soundgarden at the Gorge in an inconceivable for that band sandwiched between the Meat Puppets and QOTSA. Shit , Reverend Justito and even Cris Kirkwood for that matter speak highly of the band. They have acclaim critically and socially. What does Asking Alexandria have? Axl Rose likes them?? If this is what Axl is into then I never wanna get a hold of his iPod. Pam and I discussed if Axl picked a band this band to ensure that his band looks good. But that can't be, the “GNR” reviews from this tour have all been positive. To make a long, really horrific story short-Asking Alexandria, I can make better music than your band. If this was a Tweet, I'd add a hashtag right before the word 'fact' to end that last sentence.

They went off a little before 10 and now we have the wait... the infamous “Will Axl come out?”. The ambiance of this band is it's tendency for the unexpected. They were once labeled the world's most dangerous band.. then they (Guns N' Roses) morphed into He(Axl) and he became a recluse spending 15 years on a secret album with 2 good songs on it after all that. Who knows if this lunatic loses a contact lens before the show and freaks out or something? What if he looks in the mirror on his way out to stage and says “Holy Sh!t I'm Kid Rock” and lights himself on fire? It was an interesting HOUR, but at 11PM the lights went down and it was time to see what we had on our hands-ladies and gentleman, the band currently touring as GUNS N' ROSES!

They had some AWESOME pyrotechnics going on.. and a stage equipped with this staircase... Kicked it off with “Chinese Democracy” which is the title track from the latest effort(the one that took 15 years to make) and its one of the two songs I like, so I taped. Next was “Welcome to the Jungle”, which I purposely wasn't in record-mode for because I wanted to experience this one hands free, you know, like a regular person(besides I know video will turn up- there's a guy a row in front of me with a camcorder-not a little camera, I'm talking screen folded out and all. And he's not even using the hat on his head to block!). Now I don't know if it's the acoustics in the spot I was sitting, or maybe the three guitar onslaught is just overwhelming-but I wasn't hearing his vocals that loud. I hear the band loud and clear-and hey give em credit, no one ever called them bad musicians.. they rocked that sucker out... when they jumped into “Mr. Brownstone” after “It's So Easy”, I was taping and growing frustrated, I hear myself turn to Pam and say “I can't hear this mother f#%ker!”. They got into “Sorry”, and continuing into the next two I'm watching this band like “Wow these guys are tight as hell” then looking over at Axl Rose thinking “What a douchebag”. Then it occurred to me, I probably only like 6 or 7 “Guns N' Roses” songs.. what the hell am I doing here? I'm no die-hard. I was hoping for a train wreck-and they're not complying with my expectations. I think I'm more of an oddball than Axl at this point, being upset about being impressed by the guitar work of “BubbleFuck” and DJ Ashba(shouldn't it be Guitarist Ashba?). But as technically impressive as anyone can be-hell, you could put Eddie Van Halen and Clapton up there-just stop calling it Guns N' Roses. And I don't want to do this..do the whole “it's not GNR without Slash and Duff”.. but if I'm going to get lectures on Sublime w/Rome not being real Sublime and Alice In Chains w/ Duvall not being the real Alice In Chains-then EFF all you people I'm gonna give that same lecture when given the chance-especially when those two bands have more original members in them then the current band I'm watching. The essence of “cool” that is Slash cannot be matched by “Bucketfoot” or whoever you bring in there.

“Better” is also off the new record, and the other one of the two that I like from it (so technically this new Axl band is two for two on stuff they recorded tonight). I taped it, and at this point of the night I really think it's me being a mile away in the 200 section causing harm to the vocal acoustics, because it is skewed as hell up here-and everyone's tweeting about an awesome time. It has to be me. I mean I loved “Rocket Queen”.. but these little instrumental jams they do with each individual band member leading into some cover of another song does nothing for me. I got an idea Mr. W. Axl Rose, why don't you come out and sing “My Generation” instead of Stintson? Do that little “hey-hey-hey-yea-ya” thing you do, you know, the one you ruined “Knockin' On Heaven's Door” with. Dizzy Reed on keys doing leading “Baba O' Reilly”? Imagine Axl screaming the lyric “Out here in the fields!” in that Axl Rose voice-wouldn't that have been awesome? But no, instead this is sort of killing time while Rose continuously runs off stage to change cowboy hats. He had two white ones and two black ones at least.

I mean, they didn't go off til 1:20AM or something, that's 2 hours and 20 solid minutes before the encore, which neither Pam nor I were interested in. So yes, most likely pushed a 3 hour set there-but everyone on stage is a professional musician who I had no doubt would make it through the show, everyone besides Axl. If they would've played 20 minutes it would've been marked as a Win. Axl Joked midway through the set “Yea, I know how you feel I was hoping I'd make it here too” or something to that effect. That's funny? Tell that to the 10 thousand plus fans with tickets starring at them all day hoping you don't freak out and move to South America in search of 'yage' or something. I thought there was no chance this tour made it to the tri-state area, a miracle in it's own right.

Tonight at Izod Center was an absolutely amazing night for Die-Hard Axl Rose fans. You know, women in their 50's plastered up with make-up attempting to hold on to their youth with their Harley riding husbands right by there side. And hey I'm glad to have say I at least saw it.. so I know to like.. make sure not to go next time.

LATE

Meat Puppets @ Mexicali Live Teaneck, NJ 11/6/11

2011-11-07T05:43:00.009-05:00

It would've been Doug Sahm's 70^th Birthday today, and what better place to start the 60^th edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series the trekking out Teaneck, NJ and Mexicali Live for another shot of the Meat Puppets! They fried hearts and minds this past Friday at Le Poisson Rouge in the city, and upon purchasing the tickets I figured this venue was a lot closer than it was-so how can I turn up this up? 15 bucks? Then to sweeten the deal, my father (Call him anything besides Sr. Porks-he'll kill you) offers to drive me up to the place, bout an hour from my house. PLUS with have Pam(sans van) meeting me here to take in the epic madness that is this band, and she offered to drive me home afterward. Although I've yet to find a cool name (like Pam-Van) for the new Volkswagen Jetta, but I'm sure one will come to me. Anyway, doors are at 6PM, show's at 8, I roll up front around 7-it is party time my friends.

I don't know where they found this place, hidden in the depths of northern New Jersey lays this really cozy, cool music venue/bar/restaurant. I mean, even though I don't plan on eating, as a fat guy it's good to know food is at least available. The have tables set up where you can order dinner and watch from there, but the standing room in front of it would kill your view. Upstairs had a few tables and looked like it could've been a sweet spot to film from, but again you need to order stuff to sit at a table-pshht, please. Saw Elmo Kirkwood at the merch table, had to go over and compliment him on the fine performance I got to witness on Friday.. Shandon passed by, I patted him on the back as I ran out to meet Pam-Curt and Cris where down the block by the van.. In time I'll make it there, in time.

We settled in and actually decided to see what this first band 'Jounce' was all about. Their twitter page describes them as “Not unlike Kings Of Leon”.. Well, that would explain me not exactly being blown away, I mean they were tight and all-lead singer was playing bass.. They played from like 8:03 to 8:49.. but the more interesting part came outside afterward while I was smoking a cig talking Puppets with fellow fans, this dude in the group upon google search says “Hey man you know who the lead singer of Jounce is? It's that kid from the show 'The Adventures of Pete and Pete' that used to be on Nickelodeon in the 90s”.. Now that's hilarious-I mean in good way. I liked that show, and maybe had I known this previously I would've cared a little more about their set! Danny Tamberelli. Wasn't he in those Mighty Ducks movies too? Now he's opening for the Meat Puppets-not a bad deal at all.

Next up was Black Box Revolution, going with the 2 man line-up just drums and guitar. The lead singer had this voice that sounded exactly like Iggy Pop to me-maybe I'm crazy. And during their set I saw someone who was in the posse of laughter outside that was the Pete and Pete discovery standing near by-I leaning in and said “So what-is the dude in this band from the show 'Are You Afraid of The Dark' or something?”. ZING. A timely punchline is one of my strong points. Anyway, these guys played from like 9:09 to 9:50ish..

Main event time: At 10:04 out stroll the legends themselves, THE MEAT PUPPETS!

This whole set had a different feel, even with a lot of the same songs from the other night. I mean, maybe it's Mexicali Live in the air-because after “I'm a Mindless Idiot” and “Coming Down”-we had ourselves a good old fashioned ho-down going to the right of me and Pam. We had a nice spot along the wall so I could take video from way closer than the other night-maybe a bit too close but at least tall people didn't dominate the front row. And I'm right in front of Elmo, who jams out with Cris on this side of the stage. Every time I'm in front of Curt I leave not being able to hear for days, figured a new method should be employed here.

I'm pissed I didn't get it on film, but that had to be a plus 10 minute version of “Up On the Sun”.. it was crazy, it just kept blasting off into space. See that's the thing about this band-every show, every song, every time Curt backs away from the mic and lets loose it's like we blast off into space.. I've never taken LSD, but I'm pretty sure the psychedelic euphoria I experienced tonight is up to par as far as intensity. With no ceiling tonight, they can really get jam out for extended periods on songs. Clocked an 8 minute version of “Backwater” later on in the set. Even with the same group of songs all of this is new to me, and this is my 9^th Meat Puppets show.. Guessed I'm hooked on that drug called good music.

Pam was amazed at my ability to hold a camera and type songs down on my iPod trying to get the whole set list. “Sam” got hectic-this dude was really getting down with his bad self over there, and after the song he looked at me and recited the lyric “That's the way Sam plays around”. Rock on brother-it's all good times. “Where Does a Little Tear Come From”, (which people are crediting to George Jones, but he had just as much input writing the song as did Perry Como-so it's your decision on that one. Great song either way went into, again, on of my favorites they've been playing on this tour- “Open Wide”. When “Sloop John B” started, I turned to Pam and said “it's this right into Lake of Fire”-which is exactly what it was. Lake of Fire had this siren-like guitar effect going at the beginning, which I screaming 'Mind Boggling!' to. Clocked it at 10 minutes and 10 seconds-they rock that bitch out. And here's one thing I find amazing, Curt throughout the show was walking over to Cris and Elmo, while playing and having like, conversations with them. I can't hear myself think, these guys are flying us full speed into outer space while discussing things. I could barely talk and walk at the same time! Genius's. They ducked off at 11:45.

Came back out a few minutes later, and Curt announced that it was(would have been) Doug Sahm's 70^th Birthday today to a load roar of the crowd, as anyone with Wikipedia knows that the drummer of the Meat Puppets, Shandon Sahm is the son of Doug. So they played another fav of mine-”Hey Baby Que Paso” before Curt went over to the drums and was talking to Shandon before giving him a hand wave and walking away to the mic saying “Let's get Shandon to sing one!” and everyone in the building was on board. So out comes Shandon from behind the drums where Curt takes over after handing his guitar off to him. Awesome, this should be fun. Never seen Shandon sing before-if anything this could be kinda goofy. Goofy it was NOT. Wow! Shandon went totally IN on “She's About a Mover”, a Sir Douglas Quintet song, one of the many Doug Sahm projects. And Curt held his own behind the drums as Shandon destroys it over there in Curts spot. When it's solo time he screams “Play some solo Elmo!” to which Elmo shreds for a few. Listen to that video I posted one time and tell me that's not in your head all day. Shandon says “That was for Pop!” and Curt comes out and says goodnight to us.. Great song, great end to an amazing night.. it was about Midnight.

I got what I'm calling a partial set list because I think I'm missing one or two here that I didn't write down... And I have video of what I think was “Going to Graceland” that I kept rolling into “Wasted Days and Wasted Nights”, but I'll need to upload it and have some troll correct me just to be sure. What a two show stretch.. Wish there was another show in town I could catch-I could do this every night of my life!

Partial Set List missing a song or two probably

I'm a mindless idiot
Coming down
The monkey and the snake
Up on the sun
Touchdown king
Plateau
Lantern
Sam
Lost
Where does a little Tear Come From
Open wide
Oh me
Backwater
Seal Whales
Orange
-Going to Graceland(?)
Wasted days and wasted nights
Sloop John b
Lake of fire

Encore:
Hey Baby Que Paso

She's About A Mover (Shandon sings/guitar, Curt on drums)

Puppets Take Manhattan! Meat Puppets 11/4/11 @ Le Poisson Rouge

2011-11-05T06:29:00.009-04:00

The Meat Puppets return to NYC in this edition( the 59th) of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series which takes us to "Le Poisson Rouge" at 158 Bleecker St. Doors are at 6:30- show's suppose to start at 7. The deal is, there is a "dance party" scheduled at this same venue at 11PM. Lets see how this plays out.

Never been to this venue before. Found the place at almost 7 and headed in to check the room out. You walk in and the stage is immediately at the door to your left. Bar along the back, nice cozy room here. There are tables, but those are at a 2 drink minimum-and at this place that means $24. Seats not worth that much- especially with the 11pm party-it's already 730. I've stood for way longer than this before-this day in history-fat guy passed on seat.

Chatted with Elmo Kirkwood, Curt's son, outside the place before his friends showed up. Elmo used to have a band called Kirkwood-Dellinger that broke up and for this leg of the tour, he's with the Meat Puppets as a 2nd guitarist...as I told him- " to add a little extra oomph to this party".. I went to hang by the merch table after that, chat with some fans and hopefully run into some of the 100000 people I've been telling about this show for weeks. Noticed Curt walking around outside having a conversation with someone, and Cris also walked by me outside.

Found drummer Shandon Sahm inside. We got to talking a bit before he went backstage. Then Cris came out and was taking pictures with a few folks. I didn't wanna go over there at first because I remember the first time I met him-and I woulda been pissed if someone who's already met him several times came over and ruined my glory. So when the smoke cleared I walked over, we got to talking. The show at the Gorge was brought up, and Cris says to me “You know what band I was really diggin? Mastodon!”. Where ever I go, Mastodon will follow me. So he heads backstage, and is holding the door open for me, like to come in. REALLY?!?! Is this real life right now? So I head back there to see a relaxed Curt smoking a cig, Cris goes to pluck his bass around and Curt was saying how they had to go on asap after Dex Romweber Duo(the opening act I missed, but had SEVERAL people on the line tell me that Dex was the greatest thing since sliced bread, so Sunday I'll pay attention) because they had to be off by 10. Noticed Curt's Les Paul behind me-this will be the first time I've seen them live on the east coast where he isn't using the teal Strat. Interesting. Dex came backstage as he was finished, it was a little past 8 and I told the boys to have a good set as I was to run out for a smoke before they kicked things off. Before I left, I ran into Sean Yseult, The original Bass player from White Zombie. Cool chick too.

Anyway time for the main event as around 8:30 out come the legendary Meat Puppets! Led off with “I'm a Mindless Idiot”, “Touchdown King”, “Plateau”, “The Monkey and the Snake”.. This place is rocking-the sound in here is amazing, I'm all the way in the back(of this tiny room) taping with the coat check guy behind me, who has already stated he doesn't care what the hell I film. Great. I didn't catch “Coming Down” in time to get but after that they kicked into a triple shot of “Sam”, “Lantern”(from the new record Lollipop) and a cover of “Wasted Days Wasted Nights”(Freddy Fender) -all of which are uploading to YouTube as I type these word. Lantern is a great track-glad they're playing it on this tour. And I'm so pumped about hearing Wasted Days Wasted Nights live. That was freaking amazing.

“Oh, Me” was even extra powerful with the filthy licks of Elmo Kirkwood filling out guitar parts to just let his father shred. I present example A as the 8 minute version of “Up On The Sun”, which towards the middle always gets crazy regardless, now has an added twang to it. This is my 8th time seeing the band and they get more intense every time. Lyrics get screamed louder, guitars get louder, songs get heavier-and every single second of it is magic. To go from “Up On The Sun” to “Seal Whales” seamlessly may seem somewhat challenging to the laymen yet the legends Kirkwood(and Sahm) make it look easy.

Here comes my favorite moment of the night: “Hey Baby Que Paso”...another Freddy Fender classic, and a song I've been singing to the kitchen staff a work since I saw video of them doing it at SXSW. Love that damn song. Taped it, followed by “Light” and “Open Wide”. Open Wide was insanity. Then, I was able to be the first to have a 'Live' version of the song “Orange”(off of Lollipop) on to YouTube. I'm a mad genius at work taping mad geniuses at work. “The Whistling Song” and “Shave It”-another newbie but goodie followed.

Closing in on 10PM now, and what else to do now but bust out the Perry Como? Yea that's right, my grandmother would be proud she loved Perry Como. Anyway, the song is “Where Does a Little Tear Come From?” and it's awesome. And afterward they had a little blues jam going for like a minute, and recognizing the time, and the chords sort of, I knew it was 'Backwater'- a face stomping version of Backwater finishing off at precisely 10PM. But wait, Curt puts his glasses on at this point, and we're jumping into another tune past curfew. Not one, but TWO no less. It was the Beach Boys “Sloop John B” which lead right into a blow your mind version of “Lake of Fire”, to end the night at roughly 10:10.

The mother fudging Meat Puppets-changing my life every time I see them. I don't even know how I can improve my state of mind any more than I did tonight by seeing the boys tear down NYC yet again. Wait, I know the perfect thing to top this off-How bout I see them again Sunday in Teaneck,NJ at Mexicali Live?? Two words: Hell yes.

Catch you early Monday morning-LATE!

Ween @ Hammerstein Ballroom 10/31/11

2011-11-01T04:58:00.005-04:00

Happy HalloWEEN!! The greatest night to walk around in New York City-people in costumes everywhere; Lions and tigers and bears oh my. And most importantly, the female version of every Halloween costume-something straight out of the Victoria's Secret catalog. Wasn't a hard decision at all to make the 58th edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending concert series “An Evening with Ween” at Manhattan Center's Hammerstein Ballroom. The “An Evening” billing means there are no openers for me to offend, so it's straight up doors at 6:30- show at 8 o clock. Pumped would be an understatement.

The line to get in already had stragglers on it at 5:30 when I got off the train. With a Quiznos across the street, I grabbed a sandwich (which was terrible-but this isn't Fast Food Confessions) and headed over towards the line. Figured I'd chat with my fellow Ween fans while we wait for doors to open since I'm not usually around people who know what bands I'm talking about. Everyone's got a different song they want to hear, or a different story about a past epic experience(like last year a Central Park). We share the common bond of acting like giddy little girls waiting to get in. One girl (who's was in a 'Where's Waldo costume NOT Harry Potter like every passer by thought she was) said she's had a boner for this show for weeks. Me too. . At about 6:45 they let us in, and I made my way to Section 103: Row D, Seat 5 and surveyed my view. There's pillars at the end of each row blocking the view of event staff, and the seats elevate every two rows so if I keep my camera close to my chest, I shouldn't have any incidents like at the Beacon

Shortly after 8 here comes Ween, walking out on stage in skimpy sailor outfits. It took me a couple of songs to get settled in, but "Homo Rainbow" was 2nd or 3rd- and it took me right back to Chef-Aid from South Park. I say "took time to settle in" because section 103 is being taken over by the crowd like a prison riot. The seats were like, individual(as oppose to movie theater style), so the first few minutes of the set we all were stacking up the chairs in each row creating a standing room only mezzanine section boarded off by towers of chairs. It was insane-the ushers have disappeared. It was like school with no teacher, like work when your boss is away, like inmates in a prison with no Warden.

The scent of pot is everywhere, and I'm looking around for where it's coming from. The couple next to me pretended it wasn't there's , although I watched them lighting bowls. It's cool, welcome to the "Jay Porks Hates You" club-you've joined a large group.

The place was crazy. Everyone jiving to the likes of "Mr Richard Smoker", "Transdermal Celebration" A bunch of us including me screaming for 'Put that Coke on My Dick', as I hear one guy telling his friend “That's my mom's favorite Ween song! It's gross” .Then after "Fat Lenny", just when I thought this place couldn't get any more rowdy, it was time for the roof to come off: "Touch My Tooter". Hell freaking yes!

I swear they must has ran through almost every song I knew the name of before 10 o clock. I couldn't even believe how on fire I was til for a while there. Dean sang us "Piss up a Rope".. And "Buckingham Green" with the green lights bouncing off smoke surrounding the Deaner-man am I glad that went down. they played "Bananas and Blow", which was good for the group 5 people with a costume theme: 4 bananas and one guy as a big bag of Cocaine-Halloween brilliance right there.

“With My Own Bare Hands” preceded “Spinal Meningitis” then “Your Party”. I've got to say, Ween throws some awesome parties-especially when I get to hear them cover Bowie's “Let's Dance”. Then caught by surprise with “Voodoo Lady” following, glad I still had my camera up and ready. Is it always a 10+ minute version of the song? Because my camera has it clocked at 12 minutes 8 seconds. Mind you that it's like, not even 10 o clock at this point.

After “Stroker Ace”, I went four straight songs I either didn't know the name of or I was just too overwhelmed (in a good way) to remember what the name of the song was. After that “Mollusk”, “Scrap the Mucas off my Brain” and “Push Th' Little Daisy's” brought me back to the realm of songs I can sing along too. Another song sneaked in before we got into “Roses are Free”, and they went off stage at 10:47. Wow, an Evening with Ween.. unbelievable.

Wait a second-ENCORE?! Hell freaking yes. Central Park last year they didn't encore due to park regulations-but non such elements here at Hammerstein. And besides, I honestly believe chairs would've been thrown off the mezzanine if they didn't come back on. These were some intense folk-the prison riot analogy was half kidding, but after a night of 'Ween and Other Drugs' (you love my puns), sh!t could've gotten dangerous up in Section 103. I believe it was a 3 song encore, the one I was really into and remembered was “She Fucks Me”. At 11:07 they bowed and officially said goodnight.

On Halloween 2011, Ween came to town and played a three hour set. It's 4:30AM as I write this sentence, and I'm still putting the pieces of my face back together that were melted off during the duration of this show. I got plenty of videos, and they'll be uploading to my YouTube page tonight and tomorrow. The audio is good. Check up for that.

Now we turn the page to November folks, and if I wasn't already moist you'll never believe what's on deck for the weekend. The legends, the one and only, THE MEAT PUPPETS! This Friday at Le Poisson Rouge 158 Bleecker St in the city and then I check them again Sunday with my friend Pam in Teaneck, NJ at a place called Mexicali Live. I will have more content from that weekend than I can even envision right now, but what I really envision is a nap before I have to head to work at Noon tomorrow. This was fun-check you soon. LATE

Weird Al Yankovic Rocks the Beacon Theater 10/23/11

2011-10-24T03:03:00.016-04:00

If the purchase of these tickets didn't give way the fact that aside from music played at high volume with guitars I'm an avid fan of comedy, well there it is. And Music, Comedy AND seats? How could the 57th installment of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series land us anywhere but the Beacon Theater tonight to witness Weird Al Yankovic on the Apocalypse tour? How can you pass up a night of parodied hits? Wouldn't be able to live with myself starring at that Amish Paradise CD that sits on my shelf.. Doors are at 6pm and the show is at 7pm. I was sent an email from "Madison Square Garden Events" (MSG owns the Beacon) with the 'show info'. Whenever I look up set times online they're never right- but since they specifically sent me this email alerting me that there's no opening act and the show starts at 7, I'll try my hand at slipping out of work early(if not for any reason but to hang Meat Puppets “Lollipop” posters up in Manhattan and on the ferry before I get in... This should be fun times- I never been to the Beacon before- let's pop this venues cherry...

So walking in at 6, I was greeted at least three times on my way in. "Hello sir, Welcome to the Beacon". Usually it's like 'sir let's pat you down then talk'- I didn't even get searched, and I got this big roll of scotch tape hanging out of my pocket. Anyway, so I stood by the door to my seat (Loge seating), and even tho I'm inside- the "house " doors don't open til 6:30..

This place is vintage, much like"Town Hall" except bigger ..Got my eye on that Jack Daniels behind the bar before I head 'in'.

7:03 I'm making some observations here: No. 1 This place is half empty I really hope it fills out. And No.2 it's 7: 03 and the lights aren't even flickering on and off indicating that the show is started. If we're going on after 7, don't send me an email that says to be in my seat by 7 is all I'm saying. But gazing around,

I have to say this place is second to only Radio City Music Hall in classiness-I'm usually at dives like the Mercury Lounge or Gramercy.. I feel under dressed here (besides the kid outside with his parent wearing the "That's what she said" shirt on.

I got the shoulder tap during "Polka Face", the first song of the night. You have got to be freaking kidding me. I've seen video on YouTube from every Weird Al show, last I checked that was a choice made by the performer; and I didn't see any signs.

The evening went on.. With the various costume changes, I knew that the big video screen up there would be put to good use. With every wardrobe change brought us another humorous video, whether it was an old snippet from MTV with Weird Al "interviewing" the likes of Eminem, Jessica Simpson, Keith Richards, Celine Dion, etc. Or clips from old TV shows and movies where he's referenced or appeared (which was way more than I expected). Also a mock trailer for a bio pic titled “Weird”, in which I saw “Funny Or Die” in the credits-this guy gets around.

What's not comedy is the "Loge" section (under the balcony but a level up from the floor) being half empty. Not the first time my fellow New Yorkers have disappointed me.

Later on, a suited up Weird Al is rocking out to "Party in the CIA", then "CNR", a parody 'in the style' of the White Stripes, not a song specifically. It's hilarious, and about Match Game resident panelist Charles Nelson Reilly. I honestly found myself laughing out loud a number of times tonight.. "Canadian Idiot"? Now that's comedy. I seriously would've tweeted out an “LOL” like a 5 year old if my phone wasn't dying by that time..

At some points the videos would set up the songs, like from the Simpsons when Homer (portrayed as a Kurt Cobian-like character in this specific episode) says "he who is tired of Weird Al is tired of life". That's when I took another stab at recording, with "Smells like Nirvana". It was early at this point, figured I had a few more warning taps before this staffer starting getting serious. So I was able to get it. I mean what's this guy gonna do, throw me out?

I'm not a fan of mashing a bunch of songs into one, which is the only "on stage" occurrence tonight I was disappointed with. We went from an 'Eye of the Tiger' parody called “Theme From Rocky XIII{Rye or the Kaiser}parody right into "Spam"(REM-Stand) into "My Bologna"(The Knack-My Sharona) into"Spiderman"(Billy Joel-Piano Man) into "Lasagna"-probably missing one or two there that I didn't catch, but each of those songs lasted no more than a verse and a chorus.

Then another run backstage and some new gear-this time a tight red leather jacket for "Eat It"(Micheal Jackson-Beat It) then the lights go down again and some more video is shown, leading us into the title track from the only Weird Al Yankovic record I have- Amish Paradise(Coolio-Gangsters Paradise, coincidentally I also have the Coolio album that song is on). With the music video in the background, and the crowd going wild- I had to make another attempt at recording..

Then after another round of the lights going down, the band came out to perform "Craigslist" (Doors Parody).. I gotta say Weird Al was in"channel" mode up there doing his Jim Morrison , with the jerky movements and looking like he's sobbing into the microphone. Then Al runs off stage and comes back out in a peacock outfit(with long wings and everything) as they played "Perform this Way"(Lady Gaga-Born This Way).. A song later he introduced the band, who jammed out for like 2 mins after Al introduced them.. Said goodnight- it was about 9..

Lights are off, crowd is chanting "We want more! We want more!".. I've seen chants for encores before but I think this is the first time everyone in a venue agreed to a common phrase..usually it's just walls of noise til they come out. Encore? Weird Al? I'm not too sure about that one..

And I wasn't- because they did come out for a few more. Here comes the Segway! We're getting "White N' Nerdy" up in here, and it's awesome( if I said I tried to tape it and got tapped on the shoulder again by that same guy would I be getting repetitive? Buddy, what don't you get? You should Google search "Social Media" you waste of life.. I don't get why these guys just can't look the other way-people are trying to run (and contribute to) websites here!). Then he changed into a fat suit for "Fat"(Micheal Jackson-Bad) before it became Star Wars time, ending the night with "Yoda" at 9:18..

I left this show a little more fulfilled then I thought I would. But I needed answers, on my way out the door, so I found the staff guy who kept tapping me telling me to stop taking video. I wasn't an asshole about it(like I would normally be), I just said “hey man I didn't see any signs and I Weird Al was posing for the cameras up front so what's the deal? Is it a venue policy or something like that-I know you don't make the rules I'm not trying to harp on you or anything”. His reply was simple as we walked, “No not at all its not a policy, but you know it's kinda tacky sitting there taking video” and just as my head is about to explode I realize he's not walking WITH me he's walking me to the door, and before I could reply he nudged me out the door and headed back inside.

Sorry but can I rant in caps for a second? WHAT?!?!? It's NOT a venue policy and it's OKAYED by the artist but I was tapped on the shoulder based on the PERSONAL OPINIONS of an employee of the Beacon Theater? YOU THOUGHT IT WAS TACKY???? IF I WASN'T SO AFRAID OF POLICE AND GETTING ARRESTED, YOUR TEETH WOULD'VE BEEN DROPPING TO THE FLOOR LIKE TIC-TACKEYS. You schmuck. Look, I understand this concert video recording stuff is borderline and everything, with the changing media times.. but if your boss gave you no instructions to stop people from recording-then why don't you just let me do my job here. I'm running out of words, the video saves me endless paragraphs...

Anyway, I usually don't rant at the end, my bad. But besides that moron who worked there, the rest of the night was far better times then I've had in a while. Weird Al Yankovic has combined two of my three favorite things: Music and Comedy. And obviously by the decades of putting out albums, I'm not the only one who thinks he's awesomeness in a can.

Hey do any of you have Halloween plans? How bout you come out to Hammerstein Ballroom to see the epicness that is Ween with Jay Porks? Oh wait, it's sold out. Shucks. Well, you can ride shotgun with me reading that review hours after the show. An Evening With Ween.. get the humus ready.

Lemonheads @ Bowery Ballroom 10/10/11

2011-10-10T02:17:00.013-04:00

There is a HUGE side bar to tonights 56th edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series taking place in the Bowery, actually at the Bowery Ballroom to be precise . It's the second of a back to back stint here for the Lemonheads, who are touring performing “It's a Shame About Ray”. The aforementioned side bar being that of Evan Dando. In the past week or two since this tour kicked off it's been nothing but terrible reviews. Ranging from a show at the Mercy Lounge(where my buddies the Meat Puppets played a few nights prior) in Nashville , TN all the way up to the Twitter-verse going nuts with #Lemonheads hash-tagged comments reading of people walking out on last nights set at the Bowery Ballroom, with the band not coming on til “way after 11PM” and “they were getting booed”. Wow.. This could be interesting. I mean, it's not like I've read or seen one positive thing about this current “It's a Shame About Ray” tour. Of course that only really gives me two angles to take. I could be the author of the first positive words about the Lemonheads this year, or I could climb aboard that bandwagon of disappointed people wondering what kinda drugs is Evan Dando on these days.. The performance will dictate this of course, but I do plan on showing up early to grab some first come first serve seats sometimes offered at this venue upstairs (like where I sat for Mudhoney last year.), so there WILL be video of whatever fate the band chooses for themselves tonight. I'll have beer in hand cocked to chuck at Dando if he behaves like the complete fool I've been reading about. Let's get this party started....

What better to do on this Columbus Day 2011 then celebrate Christopher Columbus( who came to America and turned the Native Americans into slaves, claiming he discovered the land) then head to the "Sold Out" Bowery Ballroom to as I continue to inadvertently live up to my Mr.90's mantra?

I got out of a cab at 7PM, I'm the only one here besides the dude at the door who's only job is to tell people "doors are at 8PM". Sweet, I was hungry anyway. Grabbed a slice a few blocks away (although I Tweeted I was heading for Chinese, since the Bowery is basically Chinatown. There's nothing over there food wise). Got back there around 7:20- Met some cool peeps on line heading in, one dude who was there from last night. He said it was terrible: "Dando couldn't put two words together". There was a couple there who were cool too who just listened to to album on the way over (all 29 minutes of it) and the other chick who was at the Dando & Juliana Hatfield shows earlier this year(If they're reading I'm trying to shout you guys out but I've never been to good with names!) . So the let us in a little before 8 but these are just the door to the downstairs bar. At 8:20 the finally let us into the main floor where we raced upstairs to snag seats at a table with the rest of the posse up there with us. Grabbed a table with my buddy who was here last night, love comparing notes. Sat next to two women from Melbourne. One of the two women said she saw Dando on some street one time and asked if he wanted a ride and he accepted due to the fact he spent all his money on booze. I am so freaking ready.

At 8:43 the 1st opener 'New York Rivals' came on. The traditional 4 piece with the lead singer

doubling on guitar. The lead singer dude says that they've "Only been a band 6 weeks" and " 2 months ago I was on the couch watching Netflix" . They weren't bad for a band not so seasoned. About three songs in they had me in head nod mode and I have never even heard of these guys.. I've seen a lot worse openers (maybe I'm about to see a worse one follow them!) 9:13 was their ceiling, as they headed off to make room for Shining Twins

They're setting up this big drum set up where the mic stand for the lead vocalist is. I turn to my bud and I'm like "what the F#%k is going on here??). He says to me, "I don't want to ruin it for you" with this grin on his face. Emphasis on 'ruin'.

The Shining Twins hit the stage at 9:35. Apparently we have ourselves a stand up drummer( a chick, dueling as lead vocalist with the bass player), Odd... I'll keep an open mind. Besides, two out of the three in this band are chicks. ..The girl playing bass said it was hot on stage as they were tuning, so OF COURSE I shouted out(didn't even shout,but said loudly) "so take off your shirt then!".. She was like "did someone really just say that? Even in new York?" in this obnoxious sort of tone, like as if that's something sacrilegious to say at a concert. I think "take your shirt off" is second to "Freebird" in consistent things shouted at concerts. If you don't want me to say sh!t like that then don't set me up so wonderfully(and don't be moderately attractive).. After a few songs into their set I'm trying to nail down who they sound like, then it hit me like a Anti-Pleasure Dissertation : they sound like a really bad version of the band Bikini Kill. The way the girls had the harmonies going. Losing alot without the drummer being at a natural kit. But then I see the guitar player is left handed and playing an upside-down Fender Jaguar(think it was a Jag) a la Kurt Cobain, that was the topping on this sh!tty cake for me. This whole act had such a poser type feel to it of that's possible.. They went off at 9:53PM

Now the wait begins, the countdown til what could be the most epic of fails. We chatted with the women from Melbourne for a while, trading concert war stories.

10:45ish, here come the Lemonheads! They came out and blasted into "Rockin Stroll". From the first chord, first verse you can tell things seem to have fallen in line . There was no fumbling around on stage before starting, no looks of confusion on the face of Dando. My bud who's here from last night turned quickly after the song and said "Like night and day!", commenting on Dando's lucidness, and ability of the band to play the music compared to the previous night(and all other nights of this tour).

Last night they didn't perform the entirety of "It's a Shame About Ray", even tho that's what the bill said. That's what was so different about this-I didn't have any expectations for good until they began doing the songs in order off the album with no glitches . Confetti was awesome, and after the first chord of "It's a Shame about Ray" Dando stops like he messed up or something, and then says "Nah, I'm kidding!"

and they rocked that sh!t out . That's whenI knew they weren't going to have one of those shows I've been reading about. I mean, even tho Dando's sentences didn't make a whole lot of sense, it at least looked as if HE knew what he was talking about. He was conversing with fans, between songs and between amp checks..

They played the whole album before the band left the stage leaving just Evan and an acoustic guitar to play solo. He never left the stage through the duration of the night, he played what was basically an entire acoustic set after finishing the album . If I had one complaint about the album

portion of the show, it would have to be inviting a fan up on stage to sing the lyrics to "Mrs. Robinson". What's up with that? Her voice isn't really projecting through the mic, it's almost like an instrumental.. When Dando asked if someone in the crowd could sing it, we were shouting from balcony "how bout YOU sing it Evan??!?" ... He didn't go near the mic for that one.

After the acoustic goings on the band came back on stage and they jumped into a little audience request portion of the evening. We're passing Midnight and these guys look like they could go all night. We were screaming "If I could talk I'd tell you!!!" and Dando gave us a look and a nod but never ended up playing it. "Big Gay Heart" was awesome, I Heart that song.

Counting all these videos I'm uploading, we may have gotten to 30 songs here tonight-seriously. Ended the night with "Into Your Arms" at 12:22AM and sent a sold out crowd home extremely satisfied. Total curve ball from what I went in there expecting. Bravo Mr. Dando, hats off to you for keeping it together the night I came into the building. All the folks at Concert Confessions and the 7 people who visit The Jay Porks Experience site will be very appreciative. Great show... I mean, besides The Shining Twins.. whose bassist can't take a joke..

If you made it to the end of this, you're awesome and I hope you enjoyed, I'll surely be back soon with tales of epic experiences as next up October 23rd is Weird Al Yankovic of all people, at the Beacon Theater of all places.. That could be something very epic indeed. Catch ya then! Late

Elvis Costello & The Imposters 10/1/11 United Palace Theater

2011-10-02T04:40:00.009-04:00

Welcome friends to the 55^th edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series. Tonight we're in for a treat, as we have Elvis Costello and The Imposters on the “Revolver” tour United Palace theater is the place to be(at what I THOUGHT was) 125^th and Broadway. United Palace is a seated venue, and just like with Charlie Sheen at Radio City back in April, I snagged tickets in row A in whatever section I'm in. So again, unless the alphabet has changed, I should snag some pretty good shots and hopefully some video. I figure since Harlem, they're looking for guns not cameras. Who knows. And guess what? I got the Blazer with me, got that “pseudo journalist” look going tonight. And as for the “Revolver” tour; they are not playing the Bealtes. “Revolver” makes Revolving wheel placed on stage in which songs are listed in each slot, and whatever it lands on they play. Sweet for numerous reasons, but for one I'm walking outta here knowing the set list tonight that's for one, and I wont have to rant about how dude didn't play the songs I wanted to hear-it's a wheel. Random. Fun; Let's roll

The Village voice ad I read about this show said this place was at Broadway and 125th street, which would be the furthest uptown I have ever been to hit a show. Harlem was the neighborhood I THOUGHT I was going to... until I googled this place minutes before leaving my house, it's actually 175th street and Broadway. I'm no math wiz, but that's 50 blocks off where I thought I was going. I wouldn't have even bought the ticket had I know I'd be in Washington Heights near midnight waiting for a train in fear of my life. Not that I'm pissed, but I know I'm crazy and all but the ad in that paper said 125th-I hope I can find it in my room somewhere to prove it.

On to the show which starts at 8, running late after re-figuring my route there, I walked in at 8:32 right in the midst of "Watching the Detectives". Dammit! I mean at least I got some of it but I love that song!. So I tapped dude to my left and told me all I missed was "Alison"(another 'Dammit!' moment).. but the first thing I'm eying this evening is the wheel with all the songs on it, looking for my favorites. “Veronica” my all time Elvis Costello favorite song hands down, is not even on the wheel. Shucks...

Moving along to the circus-like atmosphere....This place is like a Rock N' Roll carnival from outer space...we have dancers, a big flashing wheel and a guy in a top hat(Mr. Costello of course).. The theater was like a cathedral too(they actually may still use it for religious services on required days but I'm not looking it up), been up since the 1930's, it's got that Radio City/Town Hall type of "old style movie theater" set up. Very snazzy. And again, Row 'A' , so a place to lean my arms while taking video-which I was steadily rocking all night taking. So thank you United Palace for not hiring event staff who take their jobs too seriously.

"Everyday I write the book" was the first full one I got, after I sat back a minute and enjoyed the songs of my childhood. Well not MY childhood really, but my Dad driving me to school in 1st grade all I was raised on was Elvis Costello (til he came home one day with this CD that had a naked baby on it).

"Waiting for the End of the World, "New Laced Sleeves", "Monkey to Man",-Classics. And it's all good times here; didn't think I'd be having this much fun.. and random fans(maybe contest winners) are being brought up to stage to spin the wheel to pick the next few songs.

Hey there's someone who looks sorta familiar.. Oh, that's Mary Louise Parker from the Showtime hit 'Weeds'. She's on stage to spin the wheel. The crowd of course goes bananas- and she gets in the birdcage thing set up on stage where all the hot chicks(I guess she's a hot too) of the evening are dancing, and she jammed out. It was awesome, and one of the few early parts of the evening the crowd was on their feet.

Seemed like it went so fast when 10 o clock rolled around and he said goodnight, right after "Chelsea" and "Pump it up" (which went straight into “Heart of the City”).. but they came back out with like a 40 minute encore.. Awesome lost tune for me “Joanna” was in there, "Radio Radio" and then just to give the Reverend Justito a boner of his own-We got into some Prince with "Purple Rain", and it's one of the many I recorded(Here's hoping for a 'Lunchtime Jam of the Day' this week), "(What's so funny) bout peace love and understanding".. was in there towards the end they may have squeezed one in there after that, but at 10:45 we were done kicking out the jams, and I felt extremely fulfilled.

Below I have a list of the songs I was trying to type into my iPod touch while holding the camera still so people don't comment on my videos “get a tripod!” (which was in my pocket by the way). I missed a few song names that while when uploaded should be fixed within a matter of hours. So here's most of the setlist:

|-Alison-Watching the Detectives-The Judgment-Everyday I write the book-Cash-Monkey to Man-Waiting for the End of the World-You Little Fool-New Laced Sleeves-Time-Chelsea-Pump It Up-Heart of the City-Joanna-Radio Radio-Purple Rain-(What's so funny)Bout Peace Love and Understanding.|

What a fun night.. I mean, besides risking my life at the 168^th Street train station near midnight in Washington Heights. I kid around a little with the risking of life, but it is a pretty reckless part of the city and all my friends who are a lot tougher than me said were all in “be careful” mode. But totally the opposite inside the doors of the glorious United Palace-I mean, it's a trek and all-but that's a venue I'd take the trek for if another artist that suited my fancy was there.

But in the meantime, they'll be a lot of Jay Porks here in the coming weeks as Oct 10^th we get The Lemonheads at Bowery Ballroom “Performing 'It's a Shame About Ray'”.. I plan on showing up ridiculously earlier so I can grab those first come-first serve seats on the balcony, capturing video circa my Mudhoney vids from last year. Anyway, thanks for tuning in, and you can read me most likely next Tuesday morning with my Lemonheads Experience. Til then, LATE

Willie Nelson Northern Quest Casino & Resort 7/31/11

2011-10-01T09:07:00.004-04:00

The 54th installment of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series is an interesting one, considering it's the one I didn't write personally(well, besides this little opening blurb). The review is up at Concert Confessions, but you might want to read the previous post here about the Gorge Amphitheater so you're not lost. This is the second half of my excursion to the great state of Washington this summer....

For those of you wondering why I'm posting this here even tho it's been up for months already, is because I liked the picture of the field at the Gorge to be my little opening shot when people came to the website with such a gap between shows. And for continuity purposes. So below will be the link to yet another Jay Porks Experience, the Mr. Sparkly edition!

Willie Nelson & Family at Northern Quest Casino & Resort In Spokane, WA

exclusively at ConcertConfessions.com

Soundgarden, QOTSA, Mastodon & The Meat Puppets 7/30/11 Gorge Amphitheater

2011-08-02T05:49:00.017-04:00

Spent much of this weekend just staring around in amazement, repeating the phrase “Holy freaking God” over and over again. This is a special 53rd installment of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series as it takes us to Newark Airport where I hopped on a plane and came out to Washington State(Home of the Cougs) to meet up with some of the Northwest chapter of Concert Confessions: thenaturalstoner ,Mr Sparkly and maybe more of us, since my count is five of us who will be in attendance enjoying the epic bill of Soundgarden, Queens of the Stone Age, Mastodon, and The Meat Puppets on a awesome summer Saturday at the Gorge Amphitheater in George, WA... Had NOOOO idea what I was getting myself into..

'We're not at PNC Bank Arts Center anymore' is the thought in my head as we start to drive into the campground.. yea that's right I said it, campground. A sea of tents pitched everywhere, people getting wasted everywhere; and I know I've written similar sentences to the last two in previous show experiences, but this place was about 1000 times the size of ANY venue I've ever been to in my homeland on the Least coast. If I was at this show by myself, there's no way camping out all night would've even been a thought in my head. We don't camp in NYC, we take sweaty train rides home after shows and get home at 2AM... but there I was after the show sleeping on a folding chair outside the tent using a sleeping bag as a blanket (its been HOT in New York, couldn't let that freezing cold overnight go to waste-I've been sweating for months).

So we pitch a tent, camp out and pre-funk for a little while.. we decide to head down to the box office and claim the photo passes that were left for us through me via Meat Puppets personnel.. To not run off on a tangent here, lets just send out thanks over to those retards(Livenation) that run the box office at this place for fucking that photo pass experience up for me. If I wasn't walking over this hill and seeing heaven on the other side, I'd be super pissed-as opposed to just really pissed.

So after several up hill climbs through the scorching hot sun (Yea, I came to Washington State and didn't see one drop of rain, not one CLOUD my entire time here! False advertisement right there-I thought I was escaping the heat), we finally make it to the the gigantic mountainside that is The Gorge Amphitheater.. I've been to venues with lawn based seating, but this is ONLY lawn seating and the hill is a hell of a lot of steep then the one at PNC and that similar, bigger venue in Camden, NJ.. and it's not a polluted highway behind the stage, it's a freaking river. It's like this piece of land split in half causing a canyon to open-and they placed a stage in the middle. I know I sound a little too blown away by seeing the Northwest -but I'm from the city, this is all new to me. A one mile stretch without a cement building is something I've never seen before-let alone a valley.

Meat Puppets come out at 6PM with the guns blazing. I knew it was gonna be “Oh, Me” by the sound of the guitar jingles.. but I didn't know they were going to come out that intense with it. I was thrilled to see as many people down on the cement area in front of the stage(every part of this place is general admission-lawn tickets get you everywhere here) can walk down to the front and get rocking out.. Because I know a lot of people are missing them right now, and that sucks. Jumped into “Sam”, the lyrical demonstration that it is..moving faster than R.E.M.'s “It's the end of the world as we know it”.. Then “Plateau”, which was fitting considering we hiked many hills and plateau's to arrive where we are. Except there was way more “nothing at the top but a bucket and a mop”, there was the freaking Meat Puppets right in front of me for the seventh time. It was the first time I've ever seen Curt Kirkwood use his Les Paul live with my own eyes before, the six times on the east coast I've seen them he played his teal Fender Strat.. That's a query I need answered: Is it a coastal thing? Not like they sound any different, it's just something that's been in the back of my mind for a while. “Backwater” followed, the one Meat Puppets song I was able to get played on the radio when I was the in-studio guest at my local college radio station a week ago(88.9 WSIA or www.WSIA.fm), so we were diggin our heels in, and again I loved the people up front so into it. That one time I caught the Pups as a first opener there was like 30 of us there at a 3500+ capacity venue.. so glad I'm in WA. When they followed Backwater with “Sloop John B” (Beach Boys cover) I started getting really excited. Not for Sloop John B so much as for the fact that I was completely sold on the fact they would play “Hey Baby Que Paso”, I've been going over the lyrics to the song with the kitchen staff at my day job for months. Then I recognize the little lead in that's about to be “Lake of Fire”.. as much as I love that freakin' song, it was like a stab in the chest because I knew the set was ending in a little over 7 minutes when the end this song.. Damn, I figured this venue would give them at least 40 mins, they got a half hour, if not less. Again I'm not exactly from around these parts, but I know for a fact that the Meat Puppets didn't request to only play six songs. I think doors should've opened earlier and had longer sets for the bands. It's not like we're in a residential area here-we're all camping here all night.. I don't see why they needed to squeeze in a 4^th band if they were just going to give them the “Sublime w/ Rome treatment” from my experience 2 weeks ago... they were done at 6:30

Which brings me to my next point: If there's one band to remove from this bill to make this a full out amazing Ménage à trois of great bands playing long sets, which one would it be? Who's the odd man out here? Then at 6:48 when Mastodon came out and we started to make our way back up the lawn, that was the question wondered aloud. And lets not take this as a shot at Mastodon, they do what they do and judging by the herds of people heading down for their set-they do it well. Caught them on the BlackDiamondSkye tour at it's Madison Square Garden stop ...so as they plowed through their 40 minutes set while we were walking up the mammoth lawn; it wasn't like they weren't loud enough where we'd hear the entire set no matter where inside the Gorge we were

Another wild card to the evening, what is Queens of the Stone Age going to play? They've been on a album-themed tour, playing their first record in it's entirety.. and we just had a 30 minute set followed by a 40 minute set. It's 7:53 when they came out, there is a lot of show left tonight.

Not recognizing the first four songs was the indicator that this first album thing was going down. First song I recognized was “Giveth then take it away”.. a little while later we had Josh Homme, who is the man by the way, saying “everyone's waiting for it to get dark so they could do all those things they can't do in the light” … introduced a song called “Make It Wit-Chu”, saying it was a song for the ladies. Then suddenly out of no where we turn and two people just got engaged during the song-now obviously that guy was aware of what the set list was going to be, we should've found him... from that guy popping the question and onward was magic.. my eyes are drawn to the left, as I notice the sun is beginning to set. I know it's happens everyday, but man during those last three songs “Little Sister”, “Go with the Flow” and “No One Knows” with the sun setting and beams of light bouncing off the river and silhouetting the people on the lawn.. man that 8 minutes right there may have been the greatest moment of my life (well, besides Jen Cartiglia of course). They went off at 8:43.. epicness

So it's coming up on 9 and Soundgarden is on deck.. Little note to keep in mind for the duration of Soundgarden's set-I hate Eddie Vedder, and I hate Pearl Jam-personal preference, lets not muddy this up. Anyway, being the last show on Soundgarden's tour and being in their backyard(even though Eddie Vedder is from California,he wears flannel so he can say he's from there) combined with my luck I had a bad feeling we'd be having a Temple of the Dog section of the set and me in tears during everyone's glee. All the awesome stuff I've seen over here in Washington, this gorgeous venue, this epic adventure can easily be turned into another Jay Porks Bogus Journey. I hate to be the one guy in the building praying for it not to happen(no I don't), but I think I'm the only one in the building who traveled 3000+ miles for this. If would be the equivalent to finding out the hottest girl you know has a penis.

Save the suspense, as we can read in Jakob's review, there was no PJ sighting, no Vedder appearances, no Hunger Strike or whatever non sense it is that they do(Also in Jakob's review he mentions the bootleg tee shirts they were selling outside the venue.. it had all four bands listed on it. Not only did it have the wrong Meat Puppets drummer on it in the picture, but above the words Queens of the Stone Age was a picture of Pearl Jam. Vedder staring right at me, didn't notice it til the next day.. I can't get away from this guy). So besides that, I'm also thinking “How is Soundgarden going to top this? Seriously, what are they going to do, play a 2 hour set of nothing but there best?”

To answer the question in my last paragraph-Hell yes. It's exactly what Soundgarden did. The sky was still a bit pink as the sun was behind the mountains. I don't care how far away I was the sound if freaking golden on some of these videos I got.. 9:10 was the official first riff. And speaking of video“Spoonman” was the 2^nd song in.. “Gun” followed-this place is rocking like I've never seen a place rock before. And I got to see “Jesus Christ Pose”! For that girl screaming it in the row in front of me at Town Hall a few weeks back for Cornell's Acoustic Songbook tour. See 2 years ago when Soundgarden said they were getting back together, I didn't think I'd have to wait this long to see them-I thought they'd do some heavy touring-they never did. So these guys were going to have to earn it blowing me away tonight.. and when “Blow up the Outside” smacked me in the face, I knew they were doing just that. Seeing Cornell acoustic songbook tour gave me a reminder that I needed to see this band live, one day, some how. Blow up the Outside at Town Hall just didn't pack the punch that I needed it too-now here, it's laying heavy fists to my face repeatedly..

What's up with the little slowed down version of “Black Hole Sun”? I need that song to blow up in my face not be kinda toned down a bit-but that's my only complaint about that set, and its minor. But really though, is that like, left over from the songbook tour or something? He's screaming like hell on every other song so it's not like he's voice is out.. And then it was only 10:18 when it ended.. which begs the question: So when do they start packing up here? I'm not used to seeing bands just keep playing awesome songs for hours .. everyone else had short sets, who knows.. And keep in mind Vedder walking around the back of my head, me thinking I was going to have to walk out and meet the group at the campground.. Out of no where, Chris Cornell, in one of the more humorous displays I've seen, got pissed off that the NBA took Seattle's basketball team. I don't know what got him, maybe he spotted a Sean Kemp jersey in the crowd- but he starts saying “Man, they fucking too away our team-It's fucking bullshit to take away a basketball team!”

Fell on Black Days, My Wave..-they're still kicking out the fucking jams. During “Burden in my Hand” I asked thenaturalstoner if the lyrics were actually “I shot my load today”.. then around 10:40 he turns and is like “Pretty Noose and I'm good”.. Freaking psychic is what he is, and I forgot how much I love that song. Played “Rusty Cage” and “Head Down” right before it....By now I'm playing with house money, I had stopped taking pictures(or little video snippets) for a while to just sit back and enjoy this.. I'm in the Pacific Northwest watching Soundgarden tear the place apart. We kept saying to each other (Mr Sparkly by now is down front and apparently found Phish Beard) “So what else you think they got?, what else can they play?”

Well they could play , “Head Down”“Outshined”, “Superunknown” before ducking off at 10:52, only to come back out at 10:56 and rock three more songs (which are believed to be new ones, since all five of us Concert Confessions brethren can't name any of them.. actually that's a lie one is called “Room 1000 years wide”, but only knew it because Cornell told us).. on the last song they rocked out and eventually drifted into a pure feedback orgy.. it made me want to cream my pants. They distorted sounds from 11:13 to 11:20, and that's when the sound was turned down.. it was over.

This is usually the time where I gloat about catching whatever scheduled train I need.. but not the case tonight.. we're climbing back up the hill and all the way down back to the campsite, where we will spend the night in the tent.. not for nothing, NYC's been sweltering the last few weeks.. and here, unlike home, when the sun goes down it actually cools off significantly.. I had an extremely comfortable folding chair, plenty of bud and brews-”fuck it ,I'm sleeping outside the tent.. pass my sleeping bag over it's now a blanket”. After the show while we're (Me, thenaturalstoner, Mr Sparkly) discussing the nights proceedings (so glad to be at a show with these dudes, usually when I'm telling a random cab driver or some stranger about an epic night, I spend most of the discussion explaining to them who the bands are. NY is so lame).. main topic is Sparkly being quote “Underwhelmed”.. we would've been able to have a better time had those dickheads camped out next to us hadn't showed up and annoyed the crap out of us. All of a sudden the drummer has a mouth. These dudes say they're in a band that “sounds like NOFX and Blink 182” named after some actor I can't remember the name of now. Anyway, your band sounds like NOFX/Blink 182? Yea, that's just about the time we called it a night.

A side note, my alarm on my phone set to 930 eastern time woke us, and the rest of the surrounding campers up.. seems I'm the only one who didn't hear it until I was awoken.. So we packed up, and headed into Spokane to catch Willie Nelson at the Northern Quest Casino and Resort before I fly home Monday... Awesomeness.

Flaming Lips & Weezer PNC Bank Arts Center NJ 7/28/11

2011-07-31T16:58:00.012-04:00

Better a few days late than never, The 52nd edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series takes us back to the PNC Bank Arts Center in Homdel, NJ-the very same place we were 7 days ago, only tonight we're here for The Flaming Lips & Weezer to put on a set in which they are sharing the bill. By sharing the bill, I mean I read that both bands will be setting their gear up on stage at the same time and each band will take turns playing a handful of songs. Read a quote that Rivers Cuomo asked Wayne Coyne if he has an extra bubble he can ride around in. Now this is something different. It refreshing to see bands trying new things, I wonder who's going to encore? Will they play songs together? This has the makings for an eventful few hours. Having said that-lets not count our chickens before they hatch, doors open at 7:30PM and Yeasayer are the first openers. Planning an earlier arrival than last week, which means two things: Not gonna miss any of the sets we planned to see and two, most time to get wasted. And I tend to let the criticism fly more loosely when intoxicated, and I have a feeling these New Jersey folk are gonna get to me tonight after last week.. We shall see....

We pulled into the parking lot around 6, not pulling any punches today-lets not miss anything in case they decide to go on early....We parked in a lot that wasn't miles away from the venue, so we were able to camp out til about 8 or so, when we headed in right after Yeasayer had finished. Grabbed our lawn spot (rented chairs for $5 a pop, why stand all night?). I notice the stage is already being set up, and its not far past 8...

Wayne Coyne comes out, and explains to the crowd how this is the first time they've done a show like this.. he tells us “Rivers needs you guys to help him out with the bubble when he gets in it”.. and Wayne also mentioned that “if our strobe lights are little too intense for anyone-then just don't look at them. Simple solution”... then he said they'd be back as he ducked off stage for a little while....

So around 8:30-8:45 we have The Flaming Lips intro, where they come out of the big screen and walk down the ramp as two bubble inflate with Wayne Coyne in one and Rivers Cuomo in the other one. Smoke filling the stage, graphics hitting the screen. This is cool. Wayne and Rivers take to the crowd in their bubbles, as both bands on stage play a cover of Black Sabbath's "Sweet Leaf", which was an awesome start considering I'm hanging with a girl who's primarily death metal and dragged to the Weezer show. Didn't take Rivers long to fall down and have to be rolled back towards the stage by the crowd he's rolling on.. then he busted out of if and The Flaming Lips jumped in three songs Worm Mountain , Silver Trembling Hands and Yeah Yeah Yeah Song... - At one point Wayne sat on a gorilla's shoulders … they do those three songs and he says “Alright we'll be back-Weezer everybody!”

Weezer comes out and kicks things off with “Hashpipe”, “El Scorcho” and “Perfect Situation”.. Whoa, what is this did Weezer finally get the memo to start playing their good songs live? Awesome. Girl I'm with turns to me and says “Oh I know this song from the Deftones” during “El Scorcho”.. I said “Really?” and returning home upon YouTube search, the Deftones do cover it... sweet. After Perfect Situation, they head off for the Flaming Lips to come back on..

Out comes Wayne and Co. again, this time to rock it out harder with “Is David Bowie Dying?”, “See the Leaves” and then we got into a little Laser Hands Jam, where the Gigantic hands come on.. lights bouncing off the disco ball thing into the lawn.. damn I wish I had a good enough camera to tape that shit.. And the Flaming Lips also have a whole bunch of chicks in outfits resembling Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz bouncing up and down.. awesomeness

So back out comes Weezer, and they play “My Name is Jonas”, “Suzanne” and one of my personal favs of the Weezer catalog “The Good Life”... Again, I'm still amazed at the fact that Weezer is playing good songs-this is like the set I've always wanted to see when I saw Weezer headline a show.. now for 25 bucks I'm on a lawn chair enjoying all those hits I thought I'd enjoy on days I spent 50+ dollars to see them. So far this was a great investment.
Now back to the Flaming Lips, as we seem to be grooving to 3 songs a clip before switching... As if this night couldn't improve, it's “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Part 1” time. Yes! Love that freaking song, and the half filled PNC Bank Arts Center loved it too.. can't believe more people weren't at this show.. “Ego's Last Stand” and “Pompeii Am Gotterdammerung” followed... as we shift back to the Weezer.

Island in the Sun.. it's becoming redundant.. can't believe I'm at the one good Weezer set to come to the tri state area... “You Gave Your Love to Me Softly” (B-Side from 'El Scorcho') followed. Then Rivers says “ Here's a song we used to listen to when we were growing up, then jumps into a cover Radiohead's Paranoid Android.. I didn't like it when I first heard it watching the vid on YouTube but experiencing it live actually made it quite enjoyable.. one of the more listenable Radiohead songs of the past decade of so.. and apparently the 14 year old kids that surround us everywhere are loving the Radiohead. I'm on board..

Then the Flaming Lips came out for “What is the Light?” and "The Observer".. I noticed Wayne has had a cool looking fur scarf on for the duration of the show.. Is he not the man?

back out for 'Pork and Beans', 'Tired of Sex', and 'Say it ain't so'.. So I guess Weezer is closing out this show-especially afterward when they played “(If your wondering if I want you to) I want you to”. They were trading off three for three, now Flaming Lips did two and Weezer did four?

So then the Flaming Lips come back out for “Do You Realize”...with full confetti and lights going I said to myself: Okay, so the Flaming Lips are closing this show...

That's when Weezer came back out (stop confusing me guys!) for “Buddy Holly” and “Only In Dreams”.. which was making me think we've witnessed a Flaming Lips set minus “She Don't Use Jelly”.. but Weezer stayed on stage as the Flaming Lips came back on to play it with them-Weezer and The Flaming Lips doing “She Don't Use Jelly” with Rivers singing lyrics on the 2nd and 3rd verses. Awesomeness. And then “Undone- The Sweater Song” with both bands remaining on stage was a perfect end to a very

cool evening. The Jay Porks Pre-Flight extravaganza

. Perfect send off to Washington! The Gorge Saturday: Soundgarden, Meat Puppets, Queens of the Stone Age and Mastodon.. the Willie Nelson on Sunday.. let the insanity begin!

Unity Tour 2011: 311 & Sublime w/ Rome..Homdel,NJ 7/21/11

2011-07-22T02:57:00.009-04:00

Well THAT was an ordeal! The schlep that is the 51^st edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series takes us to Homedel, NJ and the PNC Bank Arts Center to see Untity Tour 2011: 311 with special guests Sublime W/ Rome.. how could this not be fun? It's summertime, we have a scorcher out there today getting near 100 at several occasions today(and not cooling off as the sun went down). One of the few days I bust out the shorts, met Lex at my job and waited for the rest of the posse, Pam and Ray.. cold beers in trunk.. Doors at 6:30PM, and I'm sure there has to be some third band on this bill, so we figured there was no rush.

Got to the parking lot before 7PM(with the guys in the parking lot selling tee shirts for $20, I got one after the show for $10 #Winning)....we had a nice 'on the grass' spot so we can have less cops walking around. All working out well, we start drinking, and we don't head in until we see everyone around us walking in.. so instead of walk beside people going into the same place we are, I look left and see the venue, just over the grassy hill over there. The genius I am, we head towards it only to find none other than the Garden State Parkway waiting for us there... it's not like a street, this is a highway with very tight gaps between cars. I still don't know how we made it across, like the nut jobs we are we dodged across making it to the other side.. that's where we found AGAIN, the Garden State Parkway(this end going south I guess)-so another deathly mission, but using the Jedi force we made it and walked all the way up more parking lots finally making it inside..

Couldn't be to much past 8PM, maybe 8:30 but we get to the lawn and take our place in a sea of pot smoke.. Ray and Pam head off to grab drinks and stuff, upon coming back they told us they were hearing that Sublime had gone on and off already.. No freaking way this can be true, when did they go on 7:30? We didn't hear this from the parking lot? Guy next to us turns and says “yea they went on and played for like 20 minutes”... What?!? it's still light outside.. so what's happening now 311 is gonna come on at 9PM and play 2 hours? I just accidentally missed an opener? An opener I WANTED to see no less-I'm one of the 27 people who's into the new singer, and I missed it drinking Heineken Light in the parking lot? We could chalk that one up in the Fail column for me.. dammit.

So it's cool tho, 311 is still gonna come out here and play an awesome set, right? They didn't disappoint me the last two times I saw them so I figured the odds were in our favor.. Ray is Mr. Optimistic over here saying “It sucks, but I mean we still got 311!”.. then about 5 songs in (they came on at 9PM almost on the dot) I turn around and see Pam and Ray looking at each other puzzled.. I look at Lex and she gives me this puzzled look too-then I realize I feel a little puzzled myself. What songs are these? Obviously I'm aware that they have the new record out.. and I know bands like to sprinkle new stuff into their set when they first release it.. but I mean, after kicking off with 'Beautiful Disaster' and throwing 'All Mixed Up' into the first few songs, I went for what felt like the longest time before another song I knew, “Amber” was played. 'Jackpot' was in there too-but I don't know that song on its own merit just know it from the last time I saw them.. This was beginning to get really disappointing... Can I get “Love Song”? Can you do me that favor?

Now at 9:42PM here comes the drum solo part, where the whole band bangs on bongo drums for a few minutes-not sure if its just a jam or an actual song but either way, it's another few minutes of us looking at each other waiting for the good part. It's not like I'm by myself, and I can totally fluff this piece up by focusing on all the scathingly clad chicks walking around-I'm with my friends here, one of whom will be voicing her own thoughts on this on Concert Confessions herself.. How dare you shove that new record down my throat like that, in front of my friends no less.

New Jersey is full of odd girls man.. I mean, lets start with this random chick who asks me for a cigarette. Back story: I had like 3 cigs left in my pack, Lex was supporting my habits all night under the condition that I'd give her back a few later(Which I forgot to do).. so this chick walks up and asks for a cigarette after seeing me get handed a bust down from Lex, gave me that “pretty please!” facial expression. So while grimacing I reach to give her one and I'm like “If you had a penis, I wouldn't even consider this” and I hand it over. She of course needs a light (Want me to smoke it for you too?), then she walks away back to hang with her boyfriend or whatever. I spent the next 20 minutes trying to get a picture of this broad. I tweeted “To the girl who just grubbed a cig off me, welcome to the blog”. And with this pic I snatched, I stand by my tweet.

Fed up, and inhaling the second hand of all the awesome smelling weed that's going around, I loudly state “Does anyone have weed? I have money!” just taking a shot in the dark, and wouldn't you know it, there's typical “I sell pot at rock concerts” guy standing over there calling me over.. hell, we're at a 311 show what's a guy to do.. hands me a 20 sack fatter than Snooki.. some nice smelling stuff too. But guess what, we don't have any paper to roll in.. serious FML status going on all night long. So Ray is off into a sea of people through the darkness of this epic lawn and emerges with paper. Amazing. A God amongst men, but while that was happening, I asked these two girls if they had any paper on them who were standing close by.. she's like “No we don't have papers-do you have weed?” (No, I just want the paper because my notepad is out of sheets you moron) I reply with yes and the girl looks at me and is like “Alright when you find some paper come by and we'll blaze”... I nodded and walked away. Balls. Seriously? What are you like Cameron Diaz in Bad Teacher? Give me a nugget I'll smoke it in the car like.. At least the shallow girls I run into in NY will pretend to be into you for the five minutes they want to take advantage of your stash. There weren't even any guys with them, I promise if that girl woulda touched my freaking wrist she would been smoking with us.. come back when you get paper.. sure. And I get laid often..

But suddenly as we're pouring the weed into the paper(Members of my family are probably loving all this getting high discussion right now-cannot compromise the truth, wouldn't be fair to my any of the readers) I hear the “Come Original” riff starting.. Ray is doing the pouring, so I'm screaming at him “Don't jump up! Please do not jump up!”.. we survived, and started burning a little herb.. impressive bud too-and then they played “Down”.. so like, as soon as I found some pot this night took a sharp left turn... they ducked off for a sec, came back to play “Who's got the Herb”, and as a matter a fact we did! Played “Creatures for a while” and set was over like 10:40ish.. I mean, when you have til 11, you'd think they'd get close to it.

On the way out, we're trying to figure out when Sublime w/Rome exactly went on, and all these people look like they're the walking dead filled with Oxycontin I swear-I mean, we got wrecked before the show but on the walk out it was like amateur night here-ambulances and shit.. it's called moderation people! But back to asking people, I got a lot of interesting replies. Went up to a group of girls by a car and asked when Sublime w/Rome went on (I specifically said the 'with Rome' part so I wouldn't have to hear a lecture).. one girl says “They went on before 311”.. Wow, and the award for best zinger in a sHit-com series goes to.. They went on to say that it was early, but they don't remember now(again, moderation)..The one chick says to me “Dude you're old enough to be wearing a Sonic Youth tee shirt-you should know this isn't the real Sublime”... As a matter of fact I did know that believe it or not. You see because I know the “real Sublime” could have had so many more great albums if Brad wasn't such a junk box-I mean but what do I know, I wear the tee shirt of 'ART' ROCK band Sonic Youth. I must be clueless. And why are you here anyway? It's like the people who go to Hole concerts hoping and praying Courtney Love falls down face plant style (everyone reading this nods saying “yea, that's me”).. I don't know people, maybe it's me. Maybe Pam, Lex, Ray and I are old fogies.. felt like we were being starred at the whole time.. maybe we're out of touch with music or something, and for me that's fine. I'd rather sit alone and listen to music I like they be surround by people listening to the crap these people want today. Still reminiscing over Bradley-get over it. Like it, or shut the hell up. I hate people like that women I encountered in the parking lot. She's giving me a lecture? Obviously hasn't googled me.. But if you wanna do that go get a blog or something.. all these people have opinions and no one will document them publicly.. I mean, ended up an overall fun night for some reason, maybe my ranting throughout the parking lot on the way back to the car that, if you know me, is always a can't miss. I'm the most humorous when I'm pissed. All of you New Jersey folk make me need to take a shower when I got home to wash off the stank of pretentiousness. Cargo shorts, no shirts looking like they've had heroin shot into their eyeballs.. You people make me sick

Having said all that, I'll be in the exact same place this time next week watching the Flaming Lips and Weezer share a stage.. Rivers asked Wayne if he has an extra bubble he can ride around in.. should be fun. I HAVE AN EXTRA TICKET, was going to give it away Friday afternoon between the hours of 4-7PM because I'll be the in-studio guest on 88.9 WSIA-FM (WWW.WSIA.FM), my local college radio station, talking all things Jay Porks Experience, and the world domination of Concert Confessions.. just basically me giving the verbal experience of all these shows I've been to and hopefully I'll get to pick some songs... But we've been told that I'm not permitted to give away the ticket on air due to promotional complications-even tho it's MY ticket, I'm just really looking to get a ride out of the deal. Anyway, I'll catch all my faithful next week right here same bat time, same bat channel. Thanks for reading. LATE

Dinosaur Jr, Henry Rollins, OFF! and Fucked Up..6/23/11 @Terminal 5

2011-06-24T04:34:00.012-04:00

The 50th installment of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series takes us back to the famed Terminal 5 (610 West 56th street 11th ave in NYC) to see a special Dinosaur Jr show tonight.. Well of course all Dinosaur Jr shows are special, but the band isn't really on a tour right now-they're playing a handful of dates, one of them happens to be tonight.. opening bands are 'Fucked Up' and 'OFF!' (a new Keith Morris outfit) along with another added treat as according to Brooklyn Vegan, Henry Rollins will be interviewing Dinosaur Jr live on stage. I've seen Dinosaur Jr twice before, once here on a bill with the Meat Puppets and Built to Spill and a crazy set at the Brooklyn Bowl that left me deafened..Been a while since I was this excited for a show.. anyway, the plan is to head straight out to the venue after a 4 o clock exit from the day job, with hopes of getting there around 6 and being on of the first few people on line-I need that spot along the railing on the third floor I had for PJ Harvey.. that spot was insane. Place is huge (capacity 3000+), so fingers crossed as we head out for the latest Jay Porks Experience..

So I showed up early enough where the doors were open but technically not open, as all of us who are here pre-6:30 are being shuffled up flights of steps to the roof top smoke deck thing to await the official 6:30 doors. "Early doors" is what they're calling that, I call it: “Instead of these kids flooding the street, lets flood them towards somewhere we can sell stuff”... So at about 635 event staffers begin to wave us in. As people dart passed me(one girl even busted her ass on the steps) racing for their lives to get down near the stage, I calmly walk myself over to the spot I've been dreaming of for weeks...and I got it. Third floor , left side along the railing WITH an ottoman pulled up that I'll sit on until this show gets on the road and inbetween sets. Look at all those schmucks down there squeezing in to try and get really really close..it's Dinosaur Jr for christ sake, I'm going to be deaf from up here on the top floor.. so have fun hearing for the next month....saw a sign behind the bar that said "OFF!" goes on at 7:30, Fucked Up at 8:30, Henry Rollins will interview at 9:30, and Dinosaur Jr will go on at 10 playing 'Bug' in its entirety, hopefully along with some other hits..

Quick random question: playing "Bug" in it's entirety, why is the backdrop of the stage a picture of their latest album" Farm"? Maybe they're just going with that as the default thing.. As 7 rolls around I start to wonder how this interview is gonna go down, doesn't look like they left much room on stage..

“OFF!” is Keith Morris's latest vehicle (Circle Jerks/Black Flag)., and sticking with these speedy hardcore punk roots, OFF! has a set list 3 pages long, and they are running through songs at a ferocious pace. .. Like I wonder if any of these clock in over a minute.. Did anyone tell Keith that the dreads with the receding hairline is not a great look..he looks like a hobo I'd see on the train.. 56 years old and still gives off that angry at life with his music-I envy that.... There's a whole area of the floor section circled off with slam dancers... Jesus they are getting rowdy down there... They went off at 7:57.. Thanked us for coming out early repeated, and for all we know ran through 37 songs in the last 25 minutes. Awesome.

“Fucked Up” hails from Toronto, and they've been much the buzz every time they come to town.. plus, a former professor of mine Brian Cogan (Who's book you can purchase here ) says that Fucked Up is a “brilliant band with a great sense for the absurd”.. Well, I consider myself a fan of the absurd, but only NOW I get the full meaning of the word.. Fucked Up gave us a three guitar onslaught of heavy riffs topped off with a gigantic jolly front man who isn't afraid to take his shirt off..first song in he's in the crowd.. he's screaming these lyrics as the microphone cord is like endless feet long so this dude just walks through the crowd hugging members of the pit..And it's not like he got back on stage any time soon...the bass player is a chick,which always peaks interest of mine.. Nice little bass player cleavage... This band is pretty odd..and pretty cool.. Over thick, raspy screamed lyrics the other members of the band provide a little vocal harmony... it's like a lot of these acts labeled “hardcore punk”.. it's an interesting sound if there wasn't all the screaming.. still a band I'd recommend.. I guess this is how they do things in Toronto, eh?

So I need to bring this up, and I really don't care if this person reads it or not ( every time I mention a random fan in a blog they find me).. In-between Fucked Up and Dino, there was this girl who tapped me on the shoulder and said "excuse me, can I like sit on the floor in front of you.. like down there?(pointing to the spot) You can kick me if you want.".. First off, I've been here in this same spot since 630, now you wanna come and sit in front of me so you can see? I got up for work today at 9AM, came straight from there in my dorky white button down shirt and took a bus to a train to a ferry to a train and walked 10 blocks just to get THIS spot. I would love if you didn't come and try and Bogart that .. How bout you get here early enough to grab some prime real estate?.. Furthermore, let me get all male chauvinist pig here(I am Porks after all) for a second- Note to ANY girls in the future who want to tap me on the shoulder and ask me for something at a show, you better have something to bring to the table.. A make out at least.. something! Don't use that "I'm a girl" bullshit to get whatever you want, this isn't the 40's anymore- we're all equal here.. That said, my reply to her was "Do what you want"..

Safe to say I went hoping Rollins can squeeze in a few minutes of his humorous spoken word stuff that I missed out on March 2010..So about 9:30 they set up four chairs on stage as we wait for this interview to go down.. About 9:45, Henry Rollins came out to a resounding ovation-now all of a sudden this place is packed.. Instead of transcribing the interview and give my two cents, you can view the video at this link: ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWK_RjXVSx0&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL )

We were all set up when the interview ended, so the band headed off to return in a few minutes- and at around 10:15 they hit the stage.. J Mascis says playing "Bug" straight through the last few nights was "a little weird", so they kicked off the set with "In A Jar" and "Off the Wagon".. Absolutely electric-and not just due to the fact they're plugged in. For the first time ever, I'm getting to hear JM's vocals; previous two times I saw them I was inches away and I couldn't hear a damn thing, I figured it was customary for them with the noise they make..place me a good two floors up it's all sounding so crystal clear to me now- this is incredible..

"Freak Scene" and the rest of the tunes as we got through "Bug" put some insane guitar work on display by our platinum haired compadre downstairs.. His pedal board looks like something out of Star Trek, colors and buttons everywhere.. And a light show, who knew? Green and purple beams bounce off the walls and crowd.. And as I look around I think to myself: " I was lucky enough to accidentally be introduced to Dino Jr a few years back that's how I know them.... how are all these 17 year old kids chapter and verse on a record that came out in 1988?" The first song of the encore I didn't recognize, but the room did.. I taped it I'll find out..

Towards the end of the set songs got more and more intense.. For the last song on the album "Don't", We had a guest screamer on the mic.. See, bassist Lou Barlow blew his voice box out while cutting the track for the album- and he says he did the same first night of this tour, so they enlisted a fan (With a stellar afro) to come up and sing it..it clocked over ten minutes as it was about 11:15 when they went off for the encore..

They came back out a few minutes later and played a song before "Feel the Pain" started playing and my camera was tapped out of battery.. so I started to head closer to an exit, maybe check some other views of the room to finish off this set.. It's gonna take me 4 songs to get outta this place anyway... 1st floor was terrible, as on stage Dino invited the lead singer of "Fucked Up" out to help them finish off the last song of the evening-which wasn't "Just Like Heaven", much to my chagrin...

Love to get my money's worth, especially on our 50^th installment.. fun night, plus that fact that I caught all the trains and boats with good timing on the way home, so I can queue up all this video to upload tonight... Sweet times... Thanks for hanging out for a few, and stay tuned..

Joe Budden @Irving Plaza 6/17/2011

2011-06-18T22:29:00.007-04:00

I always wondered what it would be like when I saw that show I was extremely unfulfilled with. I've never left a show thinking “I'm gonna trash the sh*t out of this thing”.. Well, let me try not to give away the ending here as the 49^th edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending concert series is sort of a continuation from where we left off last time. A few weeks ago we endured Slaughterhouse (Joe Budden, Joell Ortiz, Royce Da 5'9'', Crooked I) at SOB's in the city. Tonight is the alleged main event, as Joe Budden headlines Irving Plaza in Union Square. We came to these tickets like this, have you ever tried to set yourself up for a good birthday present? Well, that's what I tried to do as this was my representation for my friend Chach's birthday present, in hopes that when December rolls around they'll be some awesome show I'll get bought in to. And as previously mentioned here, Joe Budden's music and the ears of Jay Porks usually get along very well.

Before we left for the city, I had tweeted something like “never been so unenthusiastic headed to a show before” and tagged Joe Budden in it, not thinking anything of it. What happened after that is completely out of my hands as sh*t got real and all of a sudden I had a way more powerful voice that I thought I did. So Joe Budden decides to tweet back at me, asking me why I paid for tickets if I'm not enthused. Here's the back and forth via twitter:

-Jay Porks: me and @oneshotchach headed out to this @JoeBudden show with LOW expectations... I don't remember being this unenthusiastic for a show b4.

-JoeBudden: @JayPorks then y exactly are yall paying to come ?

-Jay Porks: @JoeBudden It's this little thing fans do. You know, where they like your music and come out to show support...

-Joe Budden: @JayPorks u ever been to 1 of my shows ?

-Jay Porks: @JoeBudden 2night's the 1st time I get the exclusive Joe showcase.. was at SOB's a few weeks ago. I wrote this: tinyurl.com/5tcj4wp

-Joe Budden: @JayPorks I read that b4.. All of it leads me to ask.. Y so unenthused about tonight ?

-Jay Porks: @JoeBudden If I had more than 140 characters, I'd have added "unenthusiastic due to in-climate weather and a trek from Staten"

First of all I'd like to thank Joe for walking directly into my trap by being so annoyed by my lack of enthusiasm he felt the need to Re-tweet(RT) it to all of his almost 296,000 followers. And I owe dude another thank you, as it was the perfect lead in to link him up to the review I wrote of the Slaughterhouse show. And of course the key line in all of this being “I read that b4”, now that is awesome-an admitted fan of my work... By the time all this is going down I still haven't left my house, I'm up like 10 Twitter followers-the 'mentions' are out of control. NOW this night just got interesting. Too bad this would be the peak of this evenings surprises.

Me and Chach aren't pulling any punches-we showed up after 9 (doors opened at 8:30).. last Hip Hop show I attended I sat through 27 opening acts before my headliner did a whole 40 minutes give or take; was not taking that chance this time. I've heard stories about (and could've sworn I read tweets directly from the horses mouth about) three hour Joe Budden sets. Which I wouldn't mind-just would like to skip the additional 2 hours of standing before that. Irving Plaza, much like a lot of these NYC venues, if you're not one of the first 15 people on the line and you don't get a spot up against the stage-your standing place is going to suck balls anyway if you're under 6 foot 2, so why rush there in the rain. And besides if doors don't open til 8:30, I don't expect to see this dude hit the stage pre-10:30.

Like I said it was after 9 when we walked in, and there on stage is a funny dude known as “Low Key” (Twitter @LowKeyUHTN) who is serving as the MC for the evening before the acts hit the stage. They're spinning records, getting the crowd pumped and all that. It feels like a “club” in here, and it's PACKED. People are already out the doors into the hallways packing into every inch of this place. The most full I've ever seen a place that wasn't listed as “Sold Out” . And wait a second, there is an opener who is yet to go on stage, his name is Drue Hudson (I was calling him Dru Holiday all night, but Chach had to inform me I was thinking of a basketball player). Anyway he came on and played from 10PM to 10:10PM.. not a typo, that's ten minutes and promptly after that Low Key handed off the mic to someone who said he was going to be our MC for the remainder of the evening, his name is “Killa BH” of “Is it the Shoes?” fame.. Joe Budden walked onto the stage at about 10:20, maybe a tad after, and jumped right into things with a song called “Real Estate” followed by a TEASE of a song called “Walk With Me” off his only major label release. What I mean by tease, is that the beat was played, everyone got excited and then as soon as it was time for the lyrics to kick it they flipped to another song immediately. There were a lot of times tonight I felt as if I was listening to HOT97 or something the way a beat would be teased only to not hear the song. How is that gratifying at all? And throughout the night the same “time killing” non sense would go down as it did at SOB's a few weeks ago. We have fans being invited up on stage to see if they can rap the verses from a random Joe Budden song they throw on. First fan killed it on a song called “Calm Down”, completely nailed it. He won himself a free “Joe Budden related” tattoo from Joe's personal tattoo artist. But that sucks, because that's one of my favorites and another from that first(only) record that we're now obviously not going to experience for real tonight. And not to say there weren't full songs played(or almost full), because there were like: “Downfall”, “Side Tracked”, “Black Cloud” and inbetween there his biggest hit to date “Pump it up” was played about mid way through the set.

Am I missing something here? Think about this for a second, the artist I'm here to see has ONE album that you can buy in a store-the rest of his work has come on mixtapes. I mean, Pump it Up is not one of my favorites at all, but it's his highest charting single, I would think that you save that song for close to the end, no? I know artists don't like to be defined by one song, or one album of their career-but with such scarce depth of songs to reach too,don't you think you should spend, I don't know, maybe 20 minutes of this set and run though some of that for us really quick? Maybe play “Stand Up Nucca”, “Calm Down” or even “10 Minutes”-just to bring the night full circle you know. Promote all the new material too, but damn man I'd kill for a classic right now as I hear you accapella your verse from “Microphone” or a piece of “Never Sober Up”.. And as the night moves on, I keep hearing Joe say how “We're pressed for time here tonight”... WHAT? It's Friday night in New York City at a real deal concert venue and we're already hinting about an early exit? At least add some commentary to that like “the VENUE is giving us a ceiling on time” or something. Especially when I've seen plenty of bands like Mudhoney and the Meat Puppets play into the 1AM hour and we're dropping curfew hints at 11:23? This is making me feel like Esther Baxter isn't the only one with the “So what? attitude/coming off arrogant” to quote a line from “Ordinary Love Shit Part 3”, which was actually one of tonight's highlights.

Coming up on midnight closing this set down, Emanny was brought out to do a song called “Dreamers” as me and Chach decided it was time to see if we can catch that 12:30 ferry(which we didn't) and got the hell out of there. So after being interrogated over Twitter and in not so many words being dared not to be blown away by this show-I walk away unblown, and my back is freaking killing me. I mean I've been to over 50 concerts, if any artists I'm going to see need tips on how to make a set list out or something, just send me over an email I'm always here to help. Had more fun at SOB's than I did at this show-more intimate, more interesting, more energized...They say don't knock it til you try it, well....Knock Knock.

Slaughterhouse sets SOB's on FIRE...May 25th 2011

2011-05-28T02:03:00.001-04:00

Well, we decided to do something a little different here for the 48th installment of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series-we're going rouge on this one. We're headed out to a club called SOB's in the SoHo neighborhood of New York City teetering on the borderlines of the Lower East Side, catching an “impromptu” show featuring the Hip Hop super-group known as “Slaughterhouse”(recently signed to Eminem's Shady Records label), consisting of rappers 'Joe Budden', 'Joel Ortiz', 'Royce Da 5'9'' and 'Crooked I'.. As previous mentioned in a post here, “Budden is one of the handful of Hip Hop artists I'd go see. The lyrics on songs from his debut album way back when helped me get out of a bad time of my life ”. And that said, when the members started tweeting the night before about an “impromptu” show at SOB's the next night, a night that was billed for just Crooked I with opening acts “CMR” and Emilio Rojas. Doors at 7, show at 9. So I texted my buddy Chach(who you can follow on twitter @OneShotChach) and told him the news on Tuesday night, and we said why not check this out for 15 bucks? Being that I turned Chach into an avid concert goer (taking him to STP and Filter 5/31/08 now he goes to Summerjam and saw Jay-Z and Eminem at Yankee Stadium last year), I figured it could be fun to be rolling with him as oppose to him rolling with me; besides the fact I'd had a rough Monday and Tuesday sitting in my house bored as hell with the school semester being over and everything. So I ask everyone to open their minds here, and prepare to get weird...

Great to have the feeling of the welfare line while waiting to get into SOB's, it adds to the ambiance of this night sort of. We were there at 7 and we waited, and waited for what felt like forever and they finally opened the doors at like 730-745 and we entered this so called dinner club..

We were on line early, but not early enough as the space leaning on the stage was taken by the 6 people on line before us so we were regulated to being a head or two back. Standing room only-besides a seated section left of the stage that had signs reading “$25 minimum to sit”..If I knew I could sit for dinner during the show, I wouldn't have made that McDonalds pit stop beforehand. That said, those tables lined up over there looked so out of place, and who knows if they'd let us sit there all night; so lets stand here, I can get some good pictures from here.

There was an MC for the evenings proceedings.. funny dude too called “Low Key”(Twitter: @LowKeyUHTN).. who introduced all the acts and stuff, inbetween mixing in the roll call of the boroughs i.e. “Is ______ in the house?” and gaging the rooms reactions. This place only fits about 350-400 people, so when it started filling out I'm happy to report we did eventually have more than the two of us representing Staten Island “in the house”.

After 9, we began the parade of opening acts BEFORE the opening acts. I can't even begin to tell you how many acts went on that I have no recollection of. It was frustrating looking at our watches and it's creeping past 10 and no one on the bill has came on yet. To put it in perspective, we were on line at 7PM-Joe Budden tweeted that he was leaving his house(in NJ) at 7:23. Looking like we're in for a long night..

Eventually the first official listed opener came on, and man was it worth it. Emilio Rojas. This dude was, how do you say, 'a beast on the mic'. Had more than a few clever punchlines, the room went “Ohhhhh!” often during his almost 20 minute set in which the highlight was an accapella verse of lyrical genius. Speeding up and slowing down his flow, throwing out punchlines to die for, my favorite being something to the effect of “My mother didn't want me/no stranger to wire hangers”. Awesomeness. I got a pic of him and Chach when he got off stage. Check him out on YouTube, he killed it.

After the next listed opener CMR came on and went off, up on the stage came 4 dudes from the West Coast called COB(Circle of Bosses) came on stage and got crazy for a few minutes. This is another crew that Crooked I rolls with, so they basically led into him coming up on stage and doing a few of his own numbers.. we're at 11:30 right now.

Finally we look to our right and there is Royce Da 5'9'' standing in the crowd waiting to walk up on stage. As soon as everyone realized the show had officially started-some dude 4 people to my left sparked up one of the fattest blunts I've ever scene, with the “yea I'm smoking-so what?” look-he was texting and everything. Event staffers? That's a negative. I figured that was the green light for cigarette smoking.

Royce was introduced, shortly followed by Joel Ortiz and finally my man Joe Budden. When they all eventually made it up there, they jumped into a song called “Sound Off”.. once this night got started, I can really say it was awesome. Watching the crowd bounce up and down-Chach included. Watching the excitement unfold-having forgotten my SD card at home I wasn't taking constant video so I was able to get into these songs that I hardly know, opening up my mind and enjoying the evening.. They did “2.0 Boyz” and “Microphone” as the night rolled along. At one point Joe Budden picked three members of the crowd to come up on stage and rap a verse of whatever Slaughterhouse song they drop a beat to. It was an awkward spot-and they all failed at it. It was part funny, part sad, part “I feel like you guys are killing time on stage”ish.

Two biggest highlights of tonight was Royce teasing a song off a project with Eminem called “Bad Meets Evil”. Song called “Fast Lane”. You hear that and you look up on stage and you're like “damn, I remember hearing Royce rap with Eminem on the Slim Shady LP when I was in like 8^th grade”. We're in the room with a veteran here.

But the number one thing to take from this night is Joe Budden doing his latest hit (with us fans at least) “Ordinary Love Shit Part 3”. It's a song that gets in depth describing a relationship with a girl named Esther Baxter who apparently was having sexual relations with NFL running back Derrick Ward-taken from the line “why's ol' girl sucking off Derrick Ward for?”. And I'm telling you this was like the proof of Joe Buddens massive following as most of the crowd rapped along with every verse. Funny social networking references in the song too like “You won't Skype, won' G-mail chat, won't OovoO!” and “You said the WiFi was down in the telly/you ain't say you was at hotel his house” The song is so real, as most of Buddens songs it covers not the glamor and glitz of money cars and hoes of hip hop life but sticks to stuff people like me can relate to-shitty times, being sad, dumped, addicted to things and helpless. And I'm so glad some professional has a video of it from that nights show on YouTube already-I'll try to put it in the post..

and this guy filming is like right behind me because this feels like where I was watching from. The group continued to rock the stage after that and they didn't go off til about 12:35AM . Felt like longer than an hour. Awesome night.

So we did something a little different and it paid off so far. I mean, I enjoyed my night I hope you all stuck with me on this one. It's not like I went to see some garbage like Kayne West, or Puff Daddy or freakin Solider Boy-this was a team of lyrical assassins we saw here tonight. Being sort of a word smith myself, I tend to appreciate the intellect and honesty that comes across in the lyrics of these four artists I saw tonight. Fun times at SOB's.. just wish I had a chair..

Next time we're out and about should be June 11^th for Coheed and Cambria's free show at the Williamsburg Waterfront in Brooklyn.. I work til four, and I doubt there's a max capacity so we should be in there... lets hope we're not too far back. Thanks for staying tuned.. LATE

Social Distortion 5/14/11 Stone Pony SummerStage Asbury Park,NJ

2011-05-15T03:44:00.011-04:00

Now that's what I call a punk rock show-It's just continuous awesomeness for the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series, in which the 47^th installment brings us out to Asbury Park, NJ to the Stone Pony “SummerStage” for Social Distortion, a band I've been dying to see forever, but especially since I missed them last year. And since I'm rolling with Pam, the “Pam-Van” is in full effect picking me up from work and headed out to the show after a supermarket/liquor store stop to grab a 6 pack of Heineken light, bottle of Jack and a bottle of Captain . That's how we roll. Doors open at 5:30-that's not a typo, 5:30 doors. Let's get down to business shall we?

After parking and trying to pregame as much as possible while keeping our bladders in tact, We rolled in at 6:30. On the walk over, I heard some security dude telling this chick “if you're alone you should stand on this side of the street cause it's a real shady neighborhood down that block”. Awesome, because you know how much I love danger and everything. We found the entrance and got in after I was searched to the maximum. Felling every pocket every item and stuff. Sucks that there's something they didn't find that was there-moving on. When we got in one of the openers, 'Sharks' was in full swing on stage.. Focus on the band for a second: These guys looked like they were straight out of a time capsule from England circa 1971. The leather was in full effect, pins on the jackets, the tight pants-all of it. Looked like a girly Sex Pistols. We're scouting out standing spots, we notice the “21 and Over Section” sign, and head through there towards the bar area.. That's when Sharks finally caught my attention by covering the Replacements “Can't Hardly Wait”, which was pretty cool. They played their last song at 6:55PM

So as people file in-this is what I call a punk rock show. Holy God, I have never seen so many mo-hawks and chain wallets in my life. Skin heads to people draped in leather. Everyone is a character I swear, whether it's army fatigues and knee high boots or green hair-this is what I wish I would've seen last week at Bad Religion/Rise Against. I'm standing outdoors surrounded by many people who wouldn't mind breaking my face-the perfect desired atmosphere.

We headed inside for a little bit, grabbed some drinks as Chuck Ragan was on in between Sharks and Social D-but walking around the actual 'Stone Pony' venue where the bars and stuff are, I started to check out the walls that had signed guitars all over the place. So I'm checking these things out, signatures from bands of the likes of State Radio and Govt Mule.. until I found my way around to the back door and there in the corner hanging was a signed Gene Ween guitar.. took me all that time to find some taste around here..slow working bartender is keeping us inside long than desired I must say, but at least some dude bought Pam a drink.

Let me get on a pedestal for a second and rant: This preconceived notion that we can place a stage in the middle of any random parking lot-esque open area and call it a rock venue is completely ridiculous. I know I seem like I complain about every single venue, but venues like this(and Williamsburg Waterfront) make me SICK. You can't just take a parking lot and put a stage there and hype it up to be a “Summerstage”. Sounds so fancy, it's actually gross. Besides me being a huge proponent of size order at standing room only shows-maybe if you guy built the stage, I don't know, two feet higher maybe we'd be able to see what going on. It was like a blind show, the only pictures I got was my arm held as high in the air as possible. I mean, if you had like a tilt effect, a slight downward hill thing going on where people were able to see as they got further away; maybe even some ascending levels or something, anything! Sound was loud as hell and amazing, it was awesome to hang out and hear the tunes of Social D for an awesome set on a nice night out-but for 45 dollars, throw up a video screen or something. You know who had a better view than I did? An entire floor of a hotel a few blocks away standing out on the porch enjoying the show for free. They had a great view I'd imagine. I'm standing here behind thousands of people who should be playing the in NBA. Social D as a very tall following if tonight is any indicator.

So at about 8:20 some dude gets on stage and to hype us up. He says “Social D has some awesome stuff planned, lots of surprises in this full two hour set! They'll be out in a few minutes!”. Wow, a two hour set we're going to get? That's odd, because we're in a residential area with a 10PM “noise curfew” . They're not even on stage yet and you already only have and hour and forty left. Dude could've easily said “And rock it til 10!” and he would've saved himself from looking like a moron who can't do math.

Those last two paragraphs aside, once I heard that “California Love” intro it was freakin' showtime, I was into it. What'd you expect from Mr. 90's over here? I suddenly realized why I was putting up with all this non-sense in the first place. Social freakin' Distortion! Now I'm really in search for a good spot walkin' around jammin' out to “Road Zombie” and “So Far Away” before we found a by the back bar there was this little deck about 8 inches up from the ground, so we stepped up-still nothing, as another pretzel stand has gotten me. So we've settled on just chilling out enjoying this great show from this spot, as oppose to spending the rest of the night walking around missing things. So we're rocking out to hit's like “Bad Luck” and “Mommy's Little Monster” as I'm scoping out chicks walking by in between attempts and some somewhat decent photos.. During this I smell the scent of 'sexy lady' to my left, cool chick, attractive and all that.. she was rocking all night next to what appeared to be her husband I'd assume. So he walks away to hit the bathroom or something and I see her glance over and then she leans into my ear and says “I F*cking LOVE your hair. I'm a hair dresser, I wouldn't touch it! It's perfect”. Now there's a day brightener right there! Being this is the one rock show I've been to where having long hair seemed to be the minority, it was good to get a compliment from an older, kinda hot chick who may or may not have been hitting on me while her hubby was in the bathroom. I'm not stating that that's what I believe was the case, just saying the onlooker may see it in that light. She said her son wanted to come to the show but it's 16+, and I handed her some typical punk rock cliché “See, there's the establishment at work prevent your son from rocking out” I'm so quick witted aren't I?

“Machine Gun Blues” happens to not only be new but also awesome. Lots of little speeches in between songs and honestly the crowd was like, totally not interested. The crowd was asked for “back up singers on this next one”.. and I swear like 4 people raised their hands out of thousands. They were into the tunes, just not anything going on when guitar riffs were not involved. And my only issue with their set tonight was the version of “Ball and Chain” they did right after “Prison Bound”... it was like, a much slower version of it, as if the song was being dragged by the proverbial Ball and Chain.. First time seeing the band, kinda wanted to get the full effect of one of my favorite songs by them, but I'm still having fun through songs like “Lude Boy” and “Don't Drag Me Down” before we heard “Okay, it's time for another story” and this was like 9:43, so I knew this story was going to be the “Story of my life”, which is was before they said goodnight and ducked off for maybe a minute or two...

Came back out to play “California(Hustle and Flow)” and “You can't take it with you” before closing the night with, what else? A classic from an artist everyone's on board with, Johnny Cash's “Ring of Fire”... I tried to record some of it, but let us not even waster our time with what I just saw on the video. These words give you a better picture than that. So it was 10:08 when they officially went off. An hour and 38 minutes keep that “2 hour set” quote in kind from earlier

Awesome night of punk rock. So glad I got to catch Social D-my issues with the venue did not interfere with me and Pam enjoying ourselves yet again-Bad Religion last week, Social D this week-I mean what's next? Well, you'll have to check the concert calender for the official purchases that have been made, but June 11^th there's a free Coheed and Cambria show at the Williamsburg Waterfront that some smart folks are highly recommending I attend. It's a Saturday and I work til 4 and I have a feeling the line for this show is going to start the night before the gig-I have a few friends heavy into them who want to attend, maybe they'll be a spot held in line for me. Headed out there anyway, just hope I make it in. Anyway, thanks for putting up with my non sense for a little while, and keep checking back at ConcertConfessions.Com and of course JayPorks.Com for some HUGE plans later on this summer. Things are happening-stay tuned.

LATE..

Rise Against/Bad Religion @ Terminal 5 NYC 5/6/11

2011-05-07T05:24:00.018-04:00

And the love-hate relationship with this awesome yet dreadful venue continues. As Jim Nantz would say “Hello friends”, and take a seat aboard a train head down the tracks of the 46 installment of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series.. Tonight Me and fellow Jay Porks Experiencer Pam are heading out to meet Terminal 5 in NYC, this time for Rise Against w/ Bad Religion. Now, call me, Pam and my father a few of the crazy ones-but we here are clueless to the fact of why Rise Against is the headliner. This is not a knock at all at the band, but I would be under the impression that Bad Religion would have a bigger following(considering they sold out four shows in NYC last year).. Regardless both shows are sold out as they played here last night.. Since I'm going straight from work I have the white button down on with the blazer, again the “working journalist” look.. and let's get this party start shall we?

I have myself a little idea- And this comes from Reverend Justito and I having back and forth convos about why Rise Against was headlining, and the sometimes crazy differences in popular music on each coast, etc. So how about some statistical analysis on this issue? Again, I'm on my way there straight from work so should getting there early.. how about while I await Pam's arrival (she has the tickets) I use my waiter pad I stole from work to I make two columns- one Bad Religion and one Rise Against and just randomally approach on people outside waiting for doors and ask them simply- "who you here to see?".. Because I gotta find out if I'm crazy or what-the first time I ever heard a Rise Against song it was me accidentally listening to the radio and I only knew who it was by the DJ mentioning that it was the new Rise Against.

So I got off the train at almost 6.. At a stop earlier than I should have,so after walking a distance that should be illegal for us chubby kids to walk- I made it to the front of the place about 6:30, and there was plenty of people out there. I rethought the survey idea- then decided to go through with it.

So standing on the corner asking passers who they're here to see, I got some interesting answers. I would say "Hey, I'm an annoying guy with a blog, just taking a tally here-who you here to see tonight?" You would not believe how many people said to me: "nah man I don't need tickets".. Allow me to go caps lock for a second-I DON'T HAVE TICKETS! JUST NAME THE BAND YOU'RE HERE TO SEE! The stupidity of people and the ability to be such assholes not to just say two words. Just name one band for me-Don't say stuff like “I'm not suppose to talk to strangers” and laugh about walking away..o And to those who said “Four Years Strong”, sorry I didn't have a column for you...lots of not nice people, but the first group of people I ran into were really cool about it.. and at least I was freakin' doin it right? And when people would pass me up I'm yelling at them down the block like “You know what-I don't wanna see you following me on Twitter in 6 months when print media dies” and stuff to that effect.. sarcastically saying “You know this is new journalism, this is how you get your news now-through people like me. And again all the people who said “I don't need tickets” do you think I'd be selling tickets 5 feet away from the 6 thugs who were on different corners selling tickets to this "Sold Out " show? Just taking a survey here..speaking of said survey I closed the polls when we walked inside, and it was completely overwhelming how many more people stated they were here to see Rise Against.. Final total was 75 people for Rise Against and 14 for Bad Religion- and that's counting me and Pam for BR. I figured it'd be at least 50-50, boy was I wrong. I was amazed..So let me state that yes, I did underestimate Rise Against's east coast fan base.

Need to tell a cool story here-Midway through this survey I end up next to a dude wearing an 'EYEHATEGOD' tee shirt( awesome band) and he's trying to sell two tickets. I'm thinking he's a nut-because of the previous mentioned thugs 5 feet away from us, so basically this dude next to me is on their turf. See this is what always happens at these shows-they're sold out in minutes yet I could go night of show and scalp a ticket(unless it's Alice in Chains) from some dude who works the corner. And if that wasn't enough its never some dude who just has an extra-it's you give the money to someone on one corner and walk across the street and someone else gives you your ticket.. it's a whole operation they have going like,-at all these shows I got to in NYC it goes on.. it's looks like dealing drugs except with tickets they way these guys work, I watch “The Wire”.. and to put it gently (tweaking Dorthy's famous line from the Wizard of Oz) ”We're not in Staten Island anymore”.. So one of these big dudes on the corner comes up and wants to buy them- my friend in the tee shirt (Max) tells him 60 for the pair...the dude goes "I'll give you 40".. Im thinking in my head shit man take it and run...Max looks at this dude and says "It's 60 or you could walk". I was floored-now this dude Max is someone who owns a pair of balls-I mean he looks kinda like me, and he's talking down to this professional scalper. So eventually the dude says 50 and Max takes it and he walks away. HERE IS THE KICKER-The dude looks at the tickets at the price says Zero Dollars, Max won them in a contest or something. He scalped the scalper. Then he stuck around as I waited for Pam saying and I quote “It's so funny to watch this guy not sell this ticket-everyone's in there already. It's over.” And it was because right as Pam and I were walking in about 8:15 or so (actually was asked to open my cigarette pack to check for drugs on the way in) and I saw the dude who bought the tickets from Max walking around saying “Does anyone want free tickets?”.. that whole story is tagged with #Winning. I took his number down because he says he gets tickets and stuff and has Seether tickets for later this month at Gramercy-Need to see if I could get my shift covered if so I'm getting those.

Anyway we finally get in and I wanna run out to the rooftop smoke deck because Pam's never seen it.. So many confusing stairwells and a people on top of people on top of people. See at Terminal 5 once those spots along the railings on the 2^nd and 3^rd floors are taken, there's no way to see the stage besides the TVs I'm noticing.. The pic I have up here was taken by annoying people bending near crotches to snap, you're probably thinking "why wouldn't he stay there?".. Anyway. we finally the stairway to the roof when Bad Religion kicked off their set at promptly 8:45 I immediately turned and said "fuck it" as we tried to make our way to a decent spot.. We spent the first two songs on the 3rd floor.. The spots along the railing are like 4 heads deep at this point-again no view at all. Being I was taking a frickin' survey outside for 2 hours-I had no shame in climbing up on a couch to try and get above the people. Still wasn't able to get a decent shot of the stage, because the lights hanging from the ceiling up there obstruct the view.. So I hop down and we turn to each other and go “2^nd floor?”.. so we head down-Way more packed than the 3rd and the best view from there was stage happenings that are being shown on he LCD TV screens all over venue..again, no buenos.

So we headed down to the mobbed 1st floor(the 1^st floor with people stacked out into the hallway you read about in my PJ Harvey review) and found a spot against the wall all the way in the back tucked behind a bar- hey, at least I could get some pics from this spot when the preztel stand isn't in my way. And way back hear the vocals are terrible, like there was a lot of chat in between songs that me and Pam couldn't hear a word of-and this translates on the video I managed to get, which was a vid of “I want to Conquer The World”/"21st century Digital Boy" and then "Infected" (the ladder two by far two of my absolute favorite songs by them)on video in this spot. Anyway, like you'll hear kick ass riffs in these vids, but this is the second time I've had problems with the vocals in this venue (Meat Puppets/Dinosaur Jr back in 08'-walked out on Built to Spill) . So when you hear the sound on the vids-for once I can tell you it's not my camera it's Terminal 5's sound(especially when your so packed that the Fire Marshall would've shut you down right now- you have people backed into the hallway all the way to the merch table-I'm backed against a wall, it's a complete mess down there on that first floor... the only good thing I noticed was people were courteous as they passed by saw me filming they bent down to not get in the way. Props to them..

So like a typical punk band they're ripping through songs at-with the chatter at times that we can't hear, after I've gotten a few vids I'm really into this.. I mean I wasn't taking the setlist down, although there's an unofficial one at Setlist.FM.. So we're hangin' and me and Pam start talking about how old these dudes look..didn't show in the performance aspect of it but you know, you got these “LA Punk Rockers” here, looking more like normal folk.. To put it in perspective. they've been around 20+ years, and I've been on earth for 24 years. Damn... still rocking, and finally just as I got a real head nod going, and some cool tweets all of a sudden it was 9:26, and they went off. 8:45-9:26.... 41 minutes of the band I came to see. Of course I'm not too thrilled but their not the headliner as we know, Rise Against is(and recent Jay Porks polls show that about over 80% of that crowd was Rise Against), but at least I got to hear the songs I wanted and now during the break we can explore Terminal 5 and all it's confusion.

So we finally made it out to the rooftop smoke deck outdoor bar thing and I've mentioned it before, this is a really cool place up here. It's like, the bands should play up here, with the cities tall building surrounding you, drink in hand you feel comfortable. Speaking of drinks, I don't usually do this but I may have went a little over board at the bar. I mean, I try not to get completely hammered at these thing, usually stick to a beer or two. Let's just say a mention of a recent ex girlfriend and whiskey led to long rants by me, and looking down at people who came upstairs and screaming down at them “Here comes more people wondering why Rise Against is headlining!” and a few looked up and said “Exactly!”.... turn to Pam and say “Yea where were you when I was taking the survey buddy?”.. So I'm blabbing on-until I look at my phone-and its freakin' 10:51 already!(RA set time was 9:55) saying “Oh shit we gotta see some of Rise Against!” as we rushed in to at least try and see what was the deal.. We got to the first floor and caught their last song before the encore.. I was really just focused on trying to get some good crowd shots and stage shots because their lights looked amazing, I bet they did put on a great set, even though I have no idea of most of the goings on-the place was jumping on our way out when they were gonna encore everyone's chanting “One more song!” and as we're headed to the merch table me, like being a dick is chanting “No more songs!, No more songs!” which had at least two people in agreement(more people who missed the survey I guess!). Anyway, got the tour tee shirt that says Bad Religion on it next to a picture of Ronald Regan for $20... sweet... We headed to the Pam-Van, and I got dropped off in time to make the Midnight boat back to Staten...

So I guess that's it for now, I mean overall a fun night. Good tunes, taking surveys, getting tipsy-all in a good days work.. Well, won't be too long til we're back here, and with sticking with the punk theme, we will take our talents to Asbury Park, NJ for Social Distortion at the Stone Pony Summerstage. That will also be courtesy of the Pam-Van, helping me avoid all public transportation for that one. That's Saturday May 14^th.. Keep up with the concert calender and stay tuned for Jay Porks Ticket Givaways this summer. Until then, it's 6:23AM over here on the east coast, maybe I should get to posting this..

Late!

Oh yea by the way epic pic right here-This is that same bum with the creative sign I saw outside the Hole shows I went to way back April of last year. Anyway, I wish I had money for the dude because he was telling me: "Ima catch 'dat Grace Potter N Da knock-turtles ya digg! OO LA LA lala LA LA!" I need to buy this guy a sandwich or something, he is the great bum ever, and he had the same sign..He was screaming "Lets YouTube this shit man!"-and I should've turned him into the next bum who makes millions off YouTube..

Local H rocks Mercury Lounge 4/21/11

2011-04-22T16:14:00.013-04:00

By the end of the night, we all forgot it was the “Early Show”..Hello people, What goes on as we enter the 45 installment of that ever so famous Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series. Tonight we head back to the cozy confines of the Mercury Lounge to see one of my favorite bands still touring, Local H, who I've seen on two other occasions: first time they opened for Electric 6 (barf) and last time they rolled through Gramercy Theater the show was turned into an "early show" last minute to make way for Stone Temple Pilots to do a midnight showcase for their latest album, one of which I've already forgotten the name.

Tonight it's billed as the "Early Show", but at least this time that fact was clear months in advance. As a rock journalist blogger guy, early shows give me a chance to get home at a decent time and get to work. Doors open at 6:30 w/ the show starting at 7:30.. And I know there's an opener, one of which I'll fill you in on when I make it there-now it's 5:26 and I'm on the ferry headed into Manhattan-I guess no time for a stop a Tad's steakhouse before the show like we did on Tuesday, oh well- I can eat later, right now all that's on my mind is that spot leaning up against the stage that I hope to score...

The Dig is the opening act, as I perch myself against the stage as previously planed, to the far right. Made the mistake last time of being 2 feet from the drum kit-I was deaf for days. Anyway the Dig had vocalists taking turns on songs, although the bassist seemed more of the lead guy. They had 4 guys, drums guitar and bass with a keyboardist who had a guitar next to him and played it on some tracks.. Couldn't have played much, maybe 5 or 6 songs but as their set went on they intensified and got heavy. I can say I enjoyed them enough to have a look at their music when I get home. They went off about 7:30, leaving a half hour for Local H to set up- sign said they're on at 8PM..

The room has filled out as I'm pressed against a pillar up against the stage and the few feet of elbow room I had was gone. The pillar plays a role in tonight's video. Let's explain: The pillar I'm leaned against is at the front right corner of the stage, so at times I would lean on the steps getting on the other side of it capturing shots of the band from the side of the stage-actually on stage at one point. I keep saying this place is tiny, but I can't stress it enough. There are no “event staff”, this is basically a bar with a back room containing a stage. So on songs like “High Fiving MF”, and “Wolf Like Me” I sorta move back and forth weaving around this pillar depending on Scott's moves. No one could stop me-it was truly a situation that deserved a tag of #Winning.

First song in, I'm back in my rare Tuesday night form-just rolling tape. It was so loud in the I was able to scream along lyrics without worrying about it being heard on the videos(hopefully)... Kicked things off with "Fritz's Corner" and "All the Kids are Right" before "Cynic"- a song in which I thought I had recording until I looked at the screen and noticed it wasn't rolling. That would be one of my two slip ups of tonight.

You get into that "Okay, now I'm gonna rock out" mode when you hear a few awesome songs in a row- and that feeling was at a climax when we were in the middle of "24 Hour Break Up Session"- and then that's when a full cup came flying from mid-crowd towards my direction, hit me dumping beer all over me and the surrounding few people. Are you friggin kidding me? All over my blazer and white button down (I came straight from work)? If I wasn't enjoying myself so much trust me when I say that someones face was getting broken. Consider yourself lucky dude, lucky that self control prevailed , as I have a job to do here

Few songs later we move into, get this, a NEW Local H song! I know this is the "All the hits all night" tour, so safe to say I was delighted to hear a new number by the band called "Another February". Sounded freaking great-my camera rolling still. Then came to "High Fiving Mother Fucker", and it was at this time that I worked my way around the pillar and was sitting on the steps to the stage watching Scott throw his guitar towards the amp- feeding back that beautiful distortion we've all come to love. And of course I will be fooled again, as I stopped tape bout halfway through that song thinking it was over- something Reverend Justito and I discussed just two days ago; you'd think I'd be ready for that-but they tricked me! I woulda gotten the whole song too, "if I weren't for those meddling kids!".. Tricksters they are those Chicago folk.

Someone screamed "Lets hear it for Chicago!" and Scott stares up and is like "Okay".. Goes on to say “We're not really into anything, but one we're into regionalism. If there's one thing this bands not about it's regionalism. You won't hear a song by us like slamming another region- we feel that we are all equal” Just from that I figured "California Songs" was coming up sooner rather then later. Then Scott says “Here's another failed single” as this jumped into "Everyone Alive"- followed by my favorite song off their latest album 12 Angry Months- and that was "Michelle (Again)".

I have to address these two chicks down front. There were two girls leaning on the stage about 8-10 feet to my left. One of them was screaming stuff at Scott endlessly, at one point calling him over and whatever she said when he leaned over there he was not on board with. Who knows. Anyway, she was with a friend who may or may not have been her girlfriend(they were making out during “Hands on the Bible”, all over each other-forcing my camera to at times float in that direction). So the girlfriend is going with the no shirt just bra look. Like, just the bra rockin' like it was dead of summer time or something. A few times, the bra-only chick stood on stage and just fell back into the crowd getting surfed towards the back. I usually see shit like that go wrong, but not tonight. During one song she jumped up on stage hand around Scott singing along-breaking into laughter as he sorta nudges her away and says something to the effect of “go find your shirt”. I wanted to scream “Show me your tits!”-but again, tonight I wear a blazer-lets act the part.

The person I hate but the song I love, "Eddie Vedder" came up next. It's another one I haven't seen them do live. I had one hand on the camera and the other was slamming my hand against the pillar rocking out. I've mastered the art of one handed typing this week, and I must say I'm proud of myself.

We continued to plow through great songs.. “Mayonnaise and Malaise” , 'Hands on the Bible” came before we finally got to "California Songs" which before the song Scott says “Regionalism” and the five people who didn't get the "regional" joke earlier most certainly have gotten it now. The lyric for "California Dreamin' on the Radio" was changed to "Fucking Katy Perry on the radio”

I really don't know how I was able to record all this as I'm having the time of my life over here 3 feet away from Scott. I'm closer to the band then the speakers are. Then he walks to the other side of the stage during the song and steps down into the crowd and is just jammin' over there surrounded by people. Man, I wish I was over there.

Everyone is shouting out songs one dude catches Scott's attention. Scott says to the dude “I know-I'm gonna get to that-I've got it covered I'm a professional.. I'm up here-you're down there, there's a reason for it” as the crowd lets out a harmonious “OHHHH” then continues on “I don't come to where you work-do I really need to finish this?” before leading into a new song: “We usually do a cover here, but fuck it play here's new one. Song's called "Cold Matter".. Another awesome tune that fits right into my Local H playlist seamlessly. Following that came one of my top like 4 concert memories of all time happening right here tonight- they covered "Joey" by Concrete Blonde! Not that I'm huge into Concrete Blonde, but I frickin love that song and love Local H covering it on that “Local H's Awesome Mixtape” compilation of covers. I know they do it often, but to be right there- to not be watching it on YouTube for those 4 minutes. Epic.

In theme with All the hits all night- "Bound for the Floor" came next, and then to end the night classy, shouting out “RIP Gerard Smith!” before getting into the cover of TV On The Radio's “Wolf Like Me”. I mean, they had already covered Concrete Blonde's “Joey” and then went into “Bound for the Floor”. I figured on the 'All the Hits All Night' bill they wouldn't do any covers (or new music for that matter). More examples of why Local H are so awesome..

While playing, for the second time tonight Scott is headed towards the crowd- only this time he's headed down the stairs right towards me. What the hell do I do? Do I stop filming- is he gonna smash my camera with the neck of his guitar? So I back up as he's continuing towards me-finally stops and leans up against me as I tried to capture it on film but it's too dark to see on the video. Wow. I can't Scott Lucas was riffing inches from me! WHAT?!?! SERIOUSLY?! Amazing. And that was it- they went off like 9:30..

After the show I had to hit the merch table to catch Scott for an autograph and a tee shirt and to try to make this night more epic. As he's looking for an XL I leaned over and said “Dude I thought were coming to smash my camera!” he chuckled and said “Nah, not at all” as I got my shirt, ticket signed and tried to swim through dozens of people packing in trying to meet Scott and buy stuff. I squeezed through and grabbed hold of the door and popped outta the doorway Cosmo Kramer style out onto the New York City street. There I saw Pam, who sadly, was stuck in traffic and didn't make it to Mercury Lounge in time to grab her ticket at Will Call and see the show. I felt so bad for my friend, who loves this freakin band and the damn Holland Tunnel prevented her witnessing the awesomeness. I handed her my autographed ticket (having two more at home anyway), and we went on a hunt for the Pam-Van... what a night..

Thanks for reading, sorry I couldn't get this posted last night as my web was giving me trouble. Below is a full set list. Stay tuned to the site for more shows coming up, including back to Terminal 5 Friday May 6th for Bad Religion(for some reason Rise Against is headlining). See you all then hopefully, thanks again. LATE..

Fritz's
All the kids are right

Cynic
Half Life
“Unreleased song”
24 Hour Break up Session
All Right, Oh yea
Another February(new song)
High Fiving MF
Everyone Alive
Michelle(Again)
Eddie Vedder
Mayonnaise and Malaise
Hands on the Bible
California Songs
Cold Matter( New song)
Joey (Concrete Blonde)
Bound For The Floor
Wolf Like Me (TV On The Radio)

PJ Harvey "LIVE @ Terminal 5!" 4/19/11 NYC

2011-04-20T04:39:00.011-04:00

What goes on people? Sit down because this one is gonna be fun as the 44th installment takes us to Terminal 5 to see the one and only PJ Harvey.. Terminal 5 is a venue I used to hate but have come to love over the past few visits despite their overpriced tickets and booze.. It's located 610 West 56th street in NYC.. It's three floors, the third having video screens showing on stage proceedings, tons of bars everywhere and the "rooftop smoke deck" that I've enjoyed on my previous trips here...

Interesting to note that the 'Bowery Presents' website had no opening act listed, with doors opening at 7PM and show starting at 8:30PM.. now I don't mind opening acts, actually they could be fun to write about when they're good-better when they're terrible. What I mind is when I'm titillated with the notion that we're all going to enjoying strictly the sounds of PJ Harvey this evening only to have it snatched away upon arrival with a sheet of paper handwritten set times of several openers. Just don't lie to us- just list openers TBA and you'll save us all the anxiety. Now I'm headed out there early just to try and figure out what the deal is. Doors opening at 7, I'm slated to be there, to put it modestly, way before that time. Anyway, as with her music, this evening with PJ Harvey is going to be very interesting. Let's roll...

I was through through the door right when they opened-figured I'd scope out spots and all that. Looked up and saw people lined up along the railings on the second and third floors-made my way upstairs. The second floor side railing section is VIP, but the third floor. I pulled up a chair and grabbed my self an amazing spot- can't wait til the lights come on so I could start taking pics of this. And no event staffers in sight on this floor-let's let the bootlegging begin! And still, no signs of an opening act, as the stage seems set up for only one band. I guess we'll find out in about an hour and a half...

I didnt buy into the whole "no opening act" thing until about 8:49, when PJ Harvey and her band it the stage.. She's taken the spot of the stage to the far left- which is directly below where I stand. At times if she backs up the speaker blocks my view of her, but most of the night there she is- in that long white dress looking like Sarah Silverman meets Lady Gaga( it just popped into my head while watching. She was playing this inverted harp thing on some songs, including the one we kicked the night off with: "Let England Shake". And by the way, if I didn't get the concept of the record off the several listens I've had of it since it came out, the point is driven home now-despair, apathy and hopelessness.

Healthy transition to “The Words that Maketh Murder” and “All and Everyone”, beautifully dark tunes about death-I take a look to the ground floor to see what life down there is looking like. Man it is packed down there, looks like the standing room is also flooding out to the hallway by the merch table. Wish the place was lit up more so the crowds of fans leaning over the second and third floors could be seen in the shot.

Tonight I got drawn into a lot more PJ Harvey songs then I figured I would. I mean, my camera is perched on the ledge, so it's not very taxing. That left my mind time to drift away into the next few songs like “The Big Guns Call me Back Again” and “Written on the Forehead”. Then a snag in our proceedings, as during the next song “In the Dark Places” while attempting to zoom in on my camera I hit the stop button, thus ruining the perfect game I was pitching with the bootlegging (end up with 20 songs-the event staff over at Town Hall would go ballistic). I remember live-tweeting a pic at that moment because I had both hands free(most of the night was doing that one handed while recording mind you), and prepared for the next one.

The band is sort of in the middle of the stage not really near the front.. John Parish is playing guitar along with keys at times and other assortments, Mick Harvey is on keyboards, and Jean-Marc Butty is drumming. They're doin' their thing over there while the presence that Polly Jean Harvey commands on stage is some other worldly stuff (like Patti Smith without crappy poetry-no I kid, love Patti). She doesn't demand it, doesn't even seem to do it on purpose-but she's there in that white dress alone away from the band...in the spotlight belting out such dark lyrics mostly. Next up another day brightener called “The Devil” and people let me tell you that this is freakin' awesome, I mean she's like right down there! After our buddy the Reverend Justito tweeted that he'd pay me 3 $2 bills if I was able to spit on her and get it on YouTube. I honestly did survey the angle a bit, but with the speaker overhanging I wasn't sure if I could hock out a flem gem curve ball-so there goes journalism history tonight.

“The Sky Lit Up” is a great song, and a song called “the Glorious Land” was after that. Some more instant favorites of mine after tonight came 3 in a row, with “The Last Live Rose”, “England” and “The Pocket Knife”. Man I keep looking down,I can't believe this show(and tomorrow nights) are sold out-I thought there'd be five of us here. It is hot as hell I here. As I sweat like a pig (no Porks pun intended) on the third floor, I wonder what must it feel like to be down there with the only thing to lean on is other sweaty men. Again, it was stuffy, but at least I was surround by girls and had a ledge and shit-blackberry sitting on the ledge live-tweeting because that's how I roll-as we rolled into “Bitter Branches”, followed by the only PJ Harvey song I have on my iPod believe it or not, “Down By The Water”. What a great song, not to be confused with the Decemberists song by the same name. That was when the night went from awesome to epic-it was house money from there on.

The building continues to rock out to tunes going from “C'mon Billy”, “Hanging in the wire”, “On Battleship Hill” and “The Colour of the Earth” before placing their instruments down and giving bows as the lights turned on.. the place was going nuts as they walked off around 10:15 give or take a few minutes. As the lights shut off and the crowd didn't pipe down one bit, I kept rolling tape waiting for them to come back out. I timed it at about 4 minutes they were off stage before returning to play us three more tunes: “Big Exit”, “Angelene” and “Silence” before calling it an evening around 10:30..

So many things going right in this adventure we had tonight. Besides the great music, I got myself a good seat PLUS there was no opening act. It was an evening with PJ Harvey. You may look at the set time and think that 1030 is an early time to end a show, but most of her songs aren't 10 minute ballards, I had a few videos clocking in under three minutes. And anyway this wasn't bad at all considering a huge part of my decision upon making this purchase was frustration that QOTSA tickets sold out on me in minutes that day-but alas, the amazing PJ Harvey to the rescue as tickets to this show were on sale same day as that QOTSA show. Pretty awesome fall back plan when you think about it.

Oh well, hope we all had ourselves a fun journey-because I sure did. And this will be done and posted way before I'm finished uploading videos to YouTube, as 20 songs takes a while when your internet connection sucks as bad as mine does. Head over to the Jay Porks YouTube Channel to see everything when it's up

Anyway, quick turn around as this Thursday the 21^st one of my favorite bands comes back to town as Local H hits the Mercury Lounge! Pumped for that already, I'll still be humming PJ Harvey tunes(Full set list below). Well, thanks for participating everyone, and I hope I was able to make you feel like you were there. So until Thursday, I bid you farewell. LATE.

-Let England Shake

-The words that Maketh Murder

-All and Everyone

-The Big Guns call me back again

-Written on the Forehead

-In the dark places.....

-The Devil

-The Sky Lit Up

-The Glorious Land

-The Last Living Rose

-England

-The Pocket Knife

-Bitter Branches

-Down by the Water

-C'mon Billy

-Hanging in the wire

-On Battleship Hill

-The Colour of the Earth

--ENCORE--

-Big Exit

-Angelene

-Silence

Chris Cornell @ Town Hall, NYC 4/13/2011

2011-04-14T04:57:00.014-04:00

Well I may never get a chance to see Sound garden, but this sure as hell is a start! What goes on in those heads of yours people? Well whatever it is put it on pause because tonight 43rd edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series takes us to Town Hall in the heart of NYC (West 43rd off Broadway) to witness a night of the 'Acoustic Songbook Tour' that Chris Cornell is currently on. There was a show here at this same venue last night too, we got lucky that this 2nd show got added because tickets sold out quickly.. I checked today on Stub Hub to see how much tickets were going for and the lowest cost I saw was like 180 bucks or something like that- my tickets were 35 plus the 9 dollars in fees. I got the balcony seats figuring Pam and I wouldn't need to be headbanging in the pit for a show like this- plus there's no way this place is bigger than Radio City Music Hall- so we should expect better pics( and hopefully video) from tonights proceedings as we did when we were #Winning on Sunday night.. I caught the 4:50 train to the ferry and the night officially got underway..

Got to Town Hall about 7pm, this massive brick building. Am I coming to vote for something, Town Hall? But actually when you walk in the place is pretty elegant- velvet ropes and all that stuff. Old style 1940's movie theater seating..

I met up with Pam and headed inside just in time to catch the last two songs of William Elliot Whitmore (whoever that is) was the opener on as we walked in....he got through by 8:30... Walked by all those signs in the hallways that said "no video/audio recording", device stuffed in my pocket behind an issue of the Village Voice and we were set-no pat downs or body scans.

Before Cornell came on Event staffers rolled in literally blowing whistles grabbing all our attention to shout out the following instructions: "NO FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY!!! NO AUDIO OR VIDEO RECORDING AND THAT INCLUDES YOUR CELL PHONE! YOU WILL BE EJECTED IF YOU ARE CAUGHT DOING SO!"

Okay then, if we're gonna be such Nazis about it I'll hold off on the video-just don't anally rape me like the tone of your voice suggests your going to do. I screamed out "Then how'd I see all that video of last nights show on YouTube?!" to no response.

So about 9:15 our man of the night Chris Cornell hits the stage as the place goes wild. The stage is set up with six guitars lined against an amp- four of them acoustic and two electric. Electric guitars? Acoustic songbook? Turns out they were just a decorative element to the stage setting.

From his first greetings to the crowd you could hear how awesome the sound is gonna be in this place. He asks if anyone was here from last night, then says he's gonna change things up a little bit tonight. Not sure if that's good or bad right now-because the set list I saw from last nights show was pretty epic. .. first song he jumps into is “Dark Globe ”, covering the late great Syd Barrett-the sound in this venue is something to be mentioned again, the strums of the acoustic felt like I was on stage with the guy-now my friends we've got ourselves a ballgame! Before playing a song called “Ground Zero” he mentions how it's about Hurricane Katrina, anyone else find that sort of odd?. But what I love about a show like this is the little stories that get told inbetween songs, like the origins of the song and such. For example before he jumped into “I Promise It's Not Goodbye” he explained how he has a fan who used to write him letters and emails and stuff and he had a daughter with brain cancer. He says “One day he sent me a poem written from the perspective of his daughter-probably wanted notes on it or something but I read it and had to put music to it right away” then went on to play the song. Little knowledge nuggets you pick up at shows, gotta love it. So the building is kinda quiet (or quieter than most crowds I've been in) listening to Chris speak and sing his songs... Well, most of us were quiet. A row in front of me, two seats to the right there was this cool chick who we were chatting with before the show started and she warned us that the song request she'd be screaming out all night is "Jesus Christ Pose".. Now just imagine an intimate quiet setting, everyone relaxing and then at every opportunity you hear a loud blistering fan scream "JESUS CHRIST POSE!!". I mean it was hilarious-this is a section I can roll with... I bet there were a minority of people in the building who found that annoying, but I actually thought it was quite humorous.. Rather that then “Freebird” right? I thought so.

So this show is chugging along, I'm loving being in a seat for all this-the whole atmosphere makes me feel like an adult seeing a play on Broadway-the only difference being that this DOESN'T suck. A song I could get on board with, “Can't Change Me” was followed by “You Know My Name”. Awesome already as we now begin to dig into the Audioslave catalog with “Wide Awake”. There were a lot of songs tonight I couldn't name off the top of my head-so I worked with the “write down lyrics and google it later” motto. Didn't really need it for “Call Me A Dog” though, that one sort of spelled itself out. And being a 'Temple of the Dog' song made it all make sense. I got myself lost in “Sunshower” while I was live tweeting pics and little comments all night long, but then my attention was grabbed by the sounds of that familiar riff and a roar from the crowd, as our first 'Soundgarden' of the night “Fell on Black Day” fell upon us. It's weird because I want to be screaming singing along to it but it's only Chris and his guitar up there so there's not a lot of “noise” too drown me out you know. I'd be heard, and if I was someone who had singing talents I wouldn't be here writing about it if you catch my drift. And are you freakin' kidding me we're jumping into “Blow Up The Outside World” next?! Little back to back 'Soundgarden' action-I can dig it. Chris you had me at hello!

Back to the 'Audioslave' with “I am the Highway” before he puts his guitar down and turns to a phonograph set up to his right. He says “I'm going to perform this as it was meant to be done” as he pulls out the vinyl and starts to play the track which is the piano part to “When I'm Down” while not playing guitar to anything to it.. pretty cool.. I start to smell pot and see a dubey being passed along the row in front of me.. I mean, if you take flash photography we'll kill you but do all the drugs you want I guess. The only crime there was me not getting in on that as . “Sweet Euphoria” and “Heaven's Dead” followed. Damn, I wish every night was like this-good music plus being comfortable make the night life as a “rock journalist” a lot less taxing. Back into Temple of the Dog mode with “Say Hello to Heaven” (one of Pam's highlights of the evening) followed by “Seasons”... Then, I didn't realize we we're into the Led Zeppelin cover of “Thank You” until a few lines in..

Then, and you got me on this one, he plays “Sad Sad City” by a band called 'Ghostland Observatory'.. he explains something to the effect of: “I wanted to translate this song from the electric stuff they use to guitar”. After that, he says “Okay everyone now lets stretch a little bit-stand up”.. so like half the place stands, I guess that wasn't good enough as he jokingly says “okay now I'm telling you to stand up-everybody stretch it out”.. so we did-everyone in the building on their feet as we ran through two more from the Audioslave songbook- “Be Yourself” and “Doesn't Remind Me” before he said thank you and went off at about 10:50....People are screaming “One more song!” chants.. people who've been to as many shows as I have-you know there's an encore coming. And if there isn't one you'd know before they turned the lights on. You get a feel for the shows after a while.

So of course, back out comes Mr. Cornell for a few more songs. All of a sudden the girl in the row in front of me like jumps out of her seat almost into the ceiling with exuberance as Cornell starts the riff for “Jesus Christ Pose”-but then stops abruptly while saying something that I couldn't hear over the screaming crowd. That was some effed up shit for that chick screaming out “Jesus Christ Pose” all night(which people seated downstairs said they heard loud and clear all night) to be teased like that. Maybe he did it just to mess with her-wouldn't that be cruel and awesome at the same time? Interesting moment to say the least before we broke into “Black Hole Sun”-started thinking of the memorable music video. Then the token Beatles cover “A Day in the Life” followed by some solo Lennon action with “Imagine” before playing another 'Audioslave'-“Like a Stone”... While listening to it in its raw acoustic form, I turned to Pam and said “You know I really love this song” and she agreed as we got back to listening to it being the final song of the evening, with Cornell getting a stand ovation and heading off at about 11:15PM..

Incredible evening all around. I mean, besides the show being unique and highly entertaining-the commute(via Public Transportation) to this venue from my house is about as easy as it gets for me AND the rain tapered off and I didn't feel a drop. Smooth as the red velvet seats at Town Hall, a place I will hopefully be visiting again.

Well, that's it for me as it's reaching 5AM and I'm due for a nap before work at 12.. Thanks you all for participating if you made it this far down, and I leave you with tonight's set list in more readable form below, plus a reminder that I'll meet all of you back here on Tuesday the 19^th as we'll head out to Terminal 5 to see PJ Harvey! Thanks again people- LATE!

Set List:

-Dark Globe(Syd Barrett)
-Ground Zero
-I promise it's not goodbye
-Can't change me
-You know my name
-Wide Awake (Audioslave)
-Call me a dog (Temple of the Dog)
-Sunshower
-Fell on black days (Soundgarden)
-Blow up the Outside World (Soundgarden)
-I am the Highway (Audioslave)
-When I'm Down (sings along to phonograph)
-Sweet Euphoria
"heavens dead"
-Say Hello to Heaven (Temple of the Dog)
-Seasons
-Thank You (Led Zeppelin)
- Sad Sad City (Ghostland Observatory)
::At this point we were instructed to stand and stretch
-Be Yourself(Audioslave)
-Doesn't Remind Me (Audioslave)
Encore
-Black Hole Sun(Soundgarden)
-A Day in the Life (Beatles)
-Imagine (John Lennon)
-Like a Stone (Audioslave)

Charlie Sheen @ Radio City Music Hall 4/10/11

2011-04-11T03:49:00.017-04:00

So the day has finally come upon us- Charlie Sheen on his "Violent Torpedo of Truth/ Defeat is not an option tour as it embarks on it's second night at Radio City Music Hall(1^st night was Friday before a Saturday night stop in Washington, DC). Also bare with me, as this is not a rock concert yet I'm posting here, at a site devoted to sharing experiences with you from rock concerts. Simple math, if I put the words CHARLIE and SHEEN next to each other in a sentence, any sentence-this piece(and this site) will get that many more views. Just throw a #Winning in here and there and you're all hooked. Robert Patterson (of Filter) was on guitar all night-so we're not too far from the realm of music anyway; Eff that- I'm going with it.

Since the day I got these tickets, I've been kept up to date by people telling me things like "oh, I heard he got booed off stage".. Yea, in Detroit- a town full of angry unemployed people expecting to see Charlie Sheen turn into Bill Hicks right before their eyes. This is not a magic act- there's no rabbits being pulled out of hats here and I understand this-too bad the “real” media doesn't get it. My mother busted out the “But Jay, he hasn't been winning” line earlier this week really annoyed the crap out of me. This is just an actor who was fired from his job for being himself-he's now out to make attempts at telling the world his story, tell some epic tales of epic times. I saw video clips of the show from Friday night and people are like screaming stuff out during his sentences and I'm thinking like: dude- can you shut up so I can hear this Nick Cage story?

Rolled with a posse for this one, with my friends In the pic left to right it's Me, Jon,:Chach, Taylor and Pinky. Running a little late, but after burning down several blunts on the ride over from Staten to the City-we were in a parking garage a block or so away at 8PM exactly(costing us 42 bucks to park in the garage, I'm in the wrong business!). My first time at Radio City Music Hall-this place is mammoth to epic proportions . The lobby when you walk in with the 100 feet long chandeliers hanging from the ceilings, carpeted floor, some of the sexiest women I've ever seen in one place-now we are talking! And it's not like I'm alone and don't want to get caught staring at some dude's chick-I have muscle tonight, my eyes are on every single tittie in that building. We walk up three flights of stairs (3^rd mezzanine balcony) and are shown to our seats which are primo to say the least. First row overlooking the entire nights proceedings. Had my cup on the ledge until we were viciously scolded by an usher “HEY! NO CUPS ON THE LEDGE!! GET IT OFF!” I've had cameras confiscated in nicer tones of voice then that dude gave us.. sure dude- no problem, cups off.

So Charlie Sheen sits in a chair aside with another dude, and the other guy is basically keeping things on track topic wise, prompting Sheen with questions and stuff. One of the first things Sheen is preaching on is to the effect of : “You know I always say to Plan Better (#planbetter), so tonight we planned better by throwing out the script and just saying fuck it”..

Robert Patterson from Filter(a band I saw in the 1^st ever Jay Porks Concert Experience!) was a few feet away from them holding his guitar playing along to zingers and such. For example, Sheen says “Can I smoke in here” and as he's lighting up Patterson plays the “Smoke on the Water” riff-awesome. I actually dragged my friend Chach to that STP/Filter concert back in May 08, so he's seen Patterson twice now. Anyway, the moderator dude was like going through this $20 booklet they were selling that had a bunch of stuff in it, including a list of the “20 best Charlie Sheen quotes”.. A rant about what being bi polar actually means ensued-with a Doctor being brought up on stage only to find out he was lying about being a doctor..

We got a light “7 gram rocks” chant going, then He asked us to pick it up saying- “that's be awesome lets have a 7 gram rocks chant ”. Then went on to explain how we got ourselves to this magical number of seven gram rocks. Sheen states “I was jamming this huge rock into my crack pipe and it wouldn't fit it was impossible”-we're all already dying in laughter here as he says something to the effect of: “So I took it out and banged it on the scale broke it in two. While smoking a 3 gram rock I noticed the other one was 4 grams, so I finished it all up right there”

But Charlie has supporters he tells us, gazing into the crowd. “Where's Daryl? I know you're here Daryl stand up take a bow” and I notice floor seats middle/right section the spot light finds him I look on the big screen and it's actually frickin' Daryl Strawberry, there in the crowd trying to be incognito wearing army fatigues. A few minutes later he'd be forced by Charlie to come on stage to take a bow- “Just take a bow for the people”. Besides the massive chants of “Daaaaaaaarrrrrryllllllll!” when he walked off some fans shouted out “Lets Go Yankees”, to which Charlie replied “He played for the Yankees?”(Obviously we know Daryl actually did play for the Yankees in the late 90's as a role player on those championship teams). Do you understand how hard it was to avoid a “Strawberry's the only dude who's smoked more crack then this guy” line? Oops.

“Where's James?” Sheen says gazing into the crowd again- “C'mon James I know you're here take a bow”. So on the big screen we then see a shot of James fucking Lipton, host of “Inside the Actors Studio” in the crowd watching the onstage goings on. Really? This dude seems like the most serious guy in the world with all his thespianism speak and such, I can't believe he's here to win tonight. “Want to come up and ask me some questions James?” to a resounding cheer from the crowd-he's not really into to at all Charlie continues to coax him “I know I promised I wouldn't but just come up to take a bow at least” so finally he comes up on stage and hugs Charlie and then is asked if he had one question to ask Charlie what would it be and he replies with “Well(in his all deep, serious voice he has), it would have to be what I ask all the actor I have on-What's you're favorite curse word?” Easy answer for Sheen, who said it's “Fuck...or Denise-either one” to a huge harmonic roar from the crowd. Lipton heads back to his seat. Damn-is there anyone else in here I should know of?

For the seven minute intermission they've decided to show a short little flick, which was described as the “real” interview ABC should have aired. It contained the questions asked by Andrea Canning and Sheen's responses edited to much funnier things. Like at one point every shot on Sheen had him with most cigarettes inserted in each hole of his face-first his nostrils then to the point where he had cigs in his ears and about 5-6 in his mouth until finally it just cut to a giant cigarette sitting there in the chair burning. Also clips of Sheen and 3 friends in his house arguing in the kitchen-but they're speaking Spanish. I am far from disappointed with this night so far this shit is hilarious!

We come back from break and Sheen is in the balcony right below us all the way across the room making his way towards the stage. He sits and someone screamed out some sentence containing “Lorre”. He came to admit that Chuck Lorre “doesn't completely suck” and he went on to call Jon Cryer a “Rock Star” and apologized for calling him a troll in earlier interviews. He continues on topic, stating that he'll eventually write an apology and “I will be back on that fucking show” while prompting everyone to write in letters demanding his return.

So we're still jiving along, and he takes a few questions from the audience(wish someone could muster up something good).. Some women had a photo album in her hand and said when handed the mic : “Charlie, do you remember the Tyson/Holyfield fight in 1996? You spilled you're drink on me I have the pictures”-he's like “really let me see that..what year again?” she says “1996” So Sheen explains that you gotta understand when you party with him “drinks get spilled” and went on to say “Look how epic that is-she remembers that 30 years later and I have no recollection of even being there”

Another audience member asked him if he had any money left, which prompted Sheen to reach in his bag and say “I got 100 bucks, here you want 100 bucks? Take it” and just hands it to dude(sitting in 700 dollar orchestra seats mind you). Other people were handed the mic, one asking how he can become a warlock... Sheen looked at him, sort of knighted him in a way and said “You are one”..

We took one more senseless question, before Charlie left us with this “You can't live in the past. Unless you can bring me a souvenir from said event then it doesn't exist-and the only souvenir I brought back her from Friday night was ME! Goodnight, Love you guys!”

As the lights came on we all got to hear and view Snoop Dogg on the big screen doing a song I could only imagine could be called “Winning”, featuring lines like “Sheen with Tiger Blood like Snoop and Gin&Juice”. Tried to tape it, but the audio quality was an absolute abortion via Blackberry video camera. I only have one SD card, so I figured I'd test run it using the phone's camera tonight, unaware that I wasn't even going to be patted down whatsoever.

And As we exited we noticed that everyone had, you know, stayed til the end. Went to about 9:30, after coming on about 8ish.. No booing, no one walking out-everyone in the building having a blast. Take that conservative America!

So to tie things up here, I got what I expected and more. And I'm so glad too-just to shove it in the face of all you non-believers. All the people out there who look at me like I'm a satanist for supporting a #Winning cause yet tune in religiously to eMTpyV to keep up with all the latest happenings on the Jersey Shore. Not to rant or anything, but all those people could seriously suck it-two standing ovations tonight! Me and four of my friends sitting at Planet Hollywood after the show running up a 170 dollar bill all in agreement of the epic night. I even spotted a Roger Dorn (Corbin Bernsen's character in the movie Major League, starring Charlie Sheen) jersey hanging up on the wall I got a pic of myself next too with Taylor. Our waiter was on board with the whole scene, actually writing at the top of our check “The Tiger Blood Was Free”. Complete awesomeness from all ends. And just for you Robert Patterson I'm going to blast Filter as I write this up just because you kicked ass riffing all night...

Anyway, I'm done folks-I still have two school assignments to do that are due tomorrow but this was more important. Needed to let the internet know what a genius Charlie Sheen is. And we'll meet again soon right here, as I head out to Town Hall this Wednesday 4/13 to see Chris Cornell on his “Acoustic Songbook Tour”. So til then, thanks for participating and I hope it was as good for you as it was for me. LATE...

GWAR w/ Mobile Death Camp and Mensrea 2/20/2011 Music Hall of Williamsburg

2011-02-21T03:58:00.014-05:00

Years ago I remember I had the Beavis and Butthead video game for Sega Genesis. Played it for months on end, but I could never beat the game. In the game the boys are out on all kinds of adventures in hopes to be able to snag tickets to the GWAR concert. Well folks, tonight I beat the game as I have finally made it to said GWAR concert! We embark on a trip to Williamsburg for the 42nd edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert series with intentions of being destroyed by the timeless metal gods that are GWAR at the Music Hall of Williamsburg. And the best part is that I've been provided with a ticket free of charge because of the work I do for the fine folks over at ConcertConfessions.com. And another added caviot to tonights events, I'm here with Lex from LastRemains.Net, who is also probably the only chick I know into metal. Doors open at 6:30 and the show is at 7:30, all seems to be set for an awesome night..

Mensrea went on almost 7:30 on the dot- I had to run to the bar downstairs to beat happy hour 5 dollar Heineken, which ends when the opening band starts..Coming back up and looking out into the crowd- You gotta love the mosh pits starting this early-these people are devoted to that shit.. Mensrea belted out tunes well deserving of those pits; they were HEAVY. Plus, the bass player had some epic dreads going on- I envy those locks. The lead singer, sporting a bald head( how do you headbang with no hair without getting a massive headache?) and a long goat tee screaming lyrics to each song with that look on his face.. The look like he would enjoy beating the crap outta everyone in the room.. They rocked it until 8:15

Mobile Death Camp had the stage set up at 8:30 on the dot.. Went on a few minutes after that.. For three dudes these guys are know how to shake a building.. I made my way down to try out my photo pass, and for the first time ever it was successful! There I am-IN FRONT of the guardrail I usually am stuck behind and I'm snapping shots from inches away from the band without having to show up 5 hours before the show to nail a spot down front. Sweet. They played a song called "Negative Minds" before they went off at 9:15.. pretty cool band.

Smoking a cig before GWAR hit the stage- the line outside has more people on it than people that were inside.. Shit is about to get hectic up in this mofo. When I came back in and saw the monitors on stage being wrapped up in garbage bags. Okay then, so I guess hectic is gonna end up being a severe understatement.

Made my way back in and headed right down in front leaning myself on those garbage bag coated monitors ready to start snapping shots. I look to the left, and look to the right and I noticed I was the only one in the photo pit not wearing a poncho-should've taken that as a sign. As soon as GWAR hit the stage around 9:45, two 'slaves' came out and started shooting fake blood at everyone in attendance as the set kicked off with the scumdogs of the universe began to destroy us all chord by chord. My white hat was removed swiftly by a stream of fluid and I almost slipped and fell as I put my ( now red) hat back on I could feel the room shaking as the crowd standing behind me went into a frenzy-forget that; it was way beyond a frenzy. There was so much going on down there in the photo pit- while trying to snap shots and making best attempts to avoid additional moisture; the next thing you know we were a few songs in and already being told it's time to recede back into the crowd. Fair enough, me and Lex are taking turns holding our spot up a few steps along the left side of the room against a railing. Event staff came over to tell me not to take any video-which by the way I wasn't taking at said time. I was too busy taking it all in- all the chaos that was going down on stage. The drums mounted high above a set of (pretend) boulders, a half the band barley wearing pants, the pretend Lady Gaga that came out with a toilet strapped around the waist(signifying the garbage she is) with blood streaming from her titties and feces coming out of her face. It was even entertaining when the music wasn't playing and they were cracking jokes about Lara Logan, the CBS reporter that from what I'm told was slightly fondled during the celebrations in Egypt(for anyone else it would be “too soon”, but not GWAR because they'll destroy you). Then this one dude climbed in front of me and stood up tall on the railing and took a dive right into the crowd escaping the grasps of event staffers-if only someone in the crowd who have had a grasped of this dude as I watched him plummet into a sea of people and disappear. As loud as the music was , that was one thud that I heard loud and clear. Slaves running around the stage with more streams of fluid shooting at us, and just when I thought being on the far side was an escape I felt the stream smack me in the face-by the looks of the stains on my pants they were also shooting a blue liquid of some sort. Myself, both cameras are drenched as characters on stage have their insides ripped out and spew blood all over us ( these guys must have an additional tour bus that just holds tanks of this fake blood-there was so much).

At like 11 o clock they walked off stage for what couldn't be longer than a minute before coming back out to play a few more for us- at this time the staffers are so concerned with catching bodies that surfed their way to the front of the crowd that they're not near me, meaning it's time to hit record and go all Michael Moore in this bitch-I got a full recording of "Sick of You", which was their last song of the evening. The lights came back on, everyone drenched as the house speakers begin to play the Bee Gees- to which we all did what we had to do-we started dancing. I looked at my phone and it was 11:15, and we ain't gotta go home but we gotta get the hell up outta here.

So there you have it-scorched by the metal gods that are GWAR. I had in no way imagined it would be that much fun. When you go into a show only familiar with a song or so from a band you don't think you'll get much out of it. Well I got way more than I bargained for here. Without a doubt it would have been worth the $25 ticket price, and I am very grateful for the chance to cover these trail blazing residents of Antartica. I can seriously get used to this ‘press pass’ thing

Well if you made it through this; through all my nightly tweets, Facebook mobile updates and by scripture length show review- then you understand why it is vital that before I post this I must jump into a quick shower as I look down at my bloodstained hands in amazement. So anyway, thank you all for participating and I'll catch you all April 13th for Chris Cornell- but for now here's hoping we can get a blurb in the Brooklyn Vegan or something; goodnight everybody!!

Ozzy Osbourne w/ Halford 12/1/10 Madison Square Garden

2010-12-02T14:04:00.014-05:00

Breaking News folks: Heavy Metal LIVES! Hello again people, what goes on? Well tons of stuff with myself, as Tonight the 41st edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series takes us to the world's most famous arena: Madison Square Garden, to catch the legendary Ozzy Osbourne. A long overdue first time ever for me getting to see Ozzy, safe to say I'm a little stoked. Supporting Ozzy on this first leg of the tour is Halford, band fronted by Judas Priest frontman Rob Halford ( Any chance they play "Breaking the Law"? It's the only Priest song I think I know). And an added bonus- I acquired these tickets through a website "Ticket Liquidator" for $39 a pop and avoided Livenation/Ticketmaster's big business services charges. Sweet. Meeting Pam there, an accompany to several Jay Porks Experiences(six this year) and the show starts at 8PM. All signs point to a fun night, now let's get this party started.

Heading up the escalators at 8:15 I could hear that Halford has already kicked off their set. Rob Halford kept thanking the crowd for keeping metal alive- glad I could do my part. Had trouble finding our seats so we sat in the second row(row B) in section 348 (tickets had us in row E). We sat and watched Halford storm through energetic set of some extremely heavy tunes. They were pretty cool having not listened to them until tonight. I wish they would've played 'Breaking the Law'- but unless they played it first it wasn't on tonight's agenda. But they did play 'Jawbreaker', which I didn't know that I knew until I heard it. So that was pretty sweet. They played one more and thanked us for again, “Keeping true metal alive” before ducking off at 8:53pm.

Before Ozzy came on they played a little intro video on a large screen set up on stage( a screen that for once they'll use to show live shots of the band for those of us a mile away. What a thought!). The video consists or various clips from popular movies and tv shows only with Ozzy staring in all of them. Started with Avatar where he's laying on a table in a lab being turned blue. Then they went Jersey Shore and showed Ozzy dressed like one of those douches from the show as he was cursing out that fat orange Snoopi girl. Cut to a forest circa 'Twilight', and insert Ozzy into Robert Patterson's Character. The chick is like "Your a... But your a... A vampire." he turns and says "Vampires are for pussy's- I'm the prince of fucking darkness" before opening his coat revealing gigantic boobs. I gotta find it on YouTube somewhere- a very entertaining couple of minutes.. But now folks, LET THE MADNESS BEGIN!

Now on to the set- which kicked off with "Bark at the Moon" after Ozzy gave us a little pre-show pep talk. Fireworks shot off loud scaring the hell out of me as the band jumped into it. From the first second you knew it was going to be one of those amazing nights. Whole arena was screaming bark at the moon midway through and on screen as the song plays their showing alot of Gus G- who has been getting ridiculed by everyone I told I was going to see Ozzy too for not being Zakk Wylde-well from where I was sitting he was literally tearing the guitar to shreds. Song ends and Ozzy starts talking-his beaten up English makes it hard for me to understand full sentences, but I did hear that every other word was 'fuck' besides constantly reminding us throughout the night as he did before the show that "The crazier you people get the longer we'll play", Sounds like a deal to me. “Let me hear you Scream” came next before one of my favorite Ozzy songs was played: “Mr. Crowley”.. as the harrowing tune begins fireworks begin to drizzle onto the stage before revealing the word 'Ozzy' in satanic text on the screen. Now I've hit the point where I'm sitting there looking around telling Pam constantly “Damn-this is fucking awesome!”. Trying to sustain a decent head nod going while taking video is a task in itself-but it worked out well. The Garden's awesome sound + Ozzy having a video screen led to a few awesome videos if I do say so myself. I sat back and took it all in as we jumped into “I don't know”,-(Insert the title of the ONE song of the night I couldn't name here)-, “Suicide Solution and “Road to nowhere” before I pulled out the camera another time for “War Pigs”(which can now sit alongside the video of 'Cake' doing War Pigs back at Central Park). Then N.I.B. started and at the height of my buzz from the only 2 beers I could afford($9 a pop!) I was air drumming in my seat as I, as they say 'let the tunes take me away'. Epicness! “Killer of Giants” and “Shot in the Dark” came next before Ozzy walked off stage leaving Gus G. alone on stage soloing something wicked.. this went on for several minutes-there was then a bass solo for a minute before a drum solo during which the drum kit was like rising up slowly with smoke blowing outta the bottom of it. Like a rocket ship taking off, that looked freaking incredible. So it's about 10:30 while all this heavy amazing soloing is going on up on stage- so I'm at this point assuming this will serve as the encore and we'll probably be out of hear before 11PM.

Ozzy returns to stage screaming the same line he's been screaming all night: “ Come on fuckers! The crazier you fucking go the longer I fucking play!”.. Then you hear the drum beat that leads into “Iron Man”. Roars from the crowd, as the dope smoke in the air at this point is giving it the feel of PacBell during the World Series-hell I'm on board. “I ain't going no fucking where man it's too much fun for me” Ozzy says as the set continues on strong with “Fire in the Sky”, “Flying High Again” and “Into the Void” was followed by “I don't wanna change the world”. After each of these songs Ozzy just leans back on the drum kit arms crossed listening to the packed arena go crazy.

Keyword crazy, as we're well passed the 11PM hour getting into an epic version of “Crazy Train”. To say Gus G impressed would be an understatement. Then again it's not like the Prince of Darkness would have some slouch guitar player or anything, so I guess it should've been more expected. Then came the nights only down point. Sorry people, I'm not into “Moma I'm coming home”-and when it's past 11:30PM and you're afraid you're not gonna have time to squeeze in “Paranoid”-you don't want to look around at people embracing each other swaying back and forth with lighters raised 'Kansas' style. I turned to Pam and said “You know, I friggin' hate this song”.. but my dreams were not shattered, as they ended up playing “Paranoid” next, before thanking the crowd as several loud BOOMS ensued wiith fireworks shooting into the air behind them. Ozzy says “Thank you good night! you guys are fucking cool...Oh yea and a merry christmas too, don't get too fucked up!”. Lights came up about 11:45PM.

If I clocked that correctly, that was a two and a half hour set by a 61 year old dude who's consumed more drugs in his lifetime than the company of Pfizer has produced since inception. It's really hard to state it in a well educated sounding sentence: All I have is that “That shit was fucking crazy”. That's what I wanted to write as this review. Those five words-that shit was fucking crazy and just post some pics. But Ozzy had to go and be all awesome, and lead me to have to write up a wordy review in order recount all his phases of epicness throughout the evening. Whether hilarious opening intro videos or dumping buckets of water on the standing pit section in front of the stage, the Price of Darkness ceases to amaze us all-even people “haters” like myself.

And with that we're done here. Thanks for reading if you made it this far-and note to everyone. Earlier this year I set a personal goal of getting to at least 20 shows this year, basing it on me attending 9 shows in 2008 and 12 in 2009. Tonight festivities made 20 for this year-so a pat on the back for me. If anyone has any ideas for shows for me to head out to I have nothing purchased, so please send suggestions my way. Thanks for stopping by again, LATE.

Set List:
Bark at the moon
Let me here you scream
Mr. Crowly
I don't know
-(One song I couldn't name)
Suicide solution
Road to nowhere
War pigs
N.I.B.
Killing the Giants
Shot in the Dark
Gus G soloing, drum solo around 1030

(Encore)
Iron Man

Fire in the sky
Flying high again
Into the void
I don't wanna change the world
Crazy Train
Moms I'm coming home
Paranoid

Matisyahu w/Dub Trio 11/29/10 Brooklyn Bowl

2010-11-30T04:34:00.009-05:00

This is without a doubt the closest I'll ever come to attending shol. Welcome back friends as The 40th installment of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert series takes us back to the venue we began 2010 with- the 'Brooklyn Bowl'- a bowling alley/restaurant/ 600 person capacity concert venue. It's a pretty cool place to see a show-even after dodging all the hipsters flooding the streets of Williamsburg to get there. Tonight we're in for a treat as 'Matisyahu' headlines the first of five consecutive shows in Brooklyn billed “The Festival of Lights”. He does these shows every year in celebration of the Jewish holiday Chanukah.

For those unfamiliar with his work, Matisyahu is a Hasidic Jewish reggae singer/rapper/beat box extraordinaire. And there is nothing half assed about his religious practices as he sports Tzitzis hanging from his pockets, the two curls of hair on each side of his head swinging with a full beard-and sings reggae as authentic as you'd hear blasting through stereos in Jamaica, while weaving in lines of Hebrew prayer and Yiddish phrases that probably go unnoticed to the naked ear. It's a scene man.

I rolled in about 10 minutes to 8PM; the opening act Dub Trio is suppose to come on at 9pm. With prime real estate in sight right in front of the stage unoccupied- I leaned myself up against it, just left of center and prepped myself for the nights proceedings.

And finally a concert where I'm not the resident Jew in attendance as I'm spotting yamacas everywhere. And the disco ball hanging from the ceiling is in the shape of a dradel. Chanukah is technically 2 days away-but right now I'm already in the holiday's full swing. Times like these make me wish I never dropped out of Hebrew School..

Dub Trio came on stage a couple minutes after 9PM. The guitar and bass player's both had these sort of synthesizer type things set up in front of them, the bass player actually had an Apple laptop sitting there and what appeared to be a pedal/effects board of some sort elevated to hands reach. This is the only time I'll ever probably say that the opening act was substantially louder than the headline; as these guys were as hard rock/experimental metal as much as they were 'dub'. The drummer was epic though, as he seemed to be the only one keeping with the dub flavor-he was a beast. And Dub Trio wasn't a tough act to watch either. Shifting from dub/ska sounds to the heaviest of riffing in a noise filled 40 minute set. I don't even know how many songs they played-it could have all been one song for all I know. They don't have a vocalist so it was strictly business up there. When they went off, there was a dude right by me down in front and he was shouting out to the guitar player something about the slide bar he was using-and the guitar player was a total prick to the dude; wouldn't even shake the dudes hand. I hate to tell you dude, but you're in Dub Trio not Led Zeppelin-you don't have the right to big time one of your six fans in the room. It's not even like they were busy packing up they're gear because Dub Trio is the backing band for Matisyahu. Wouldn't hurt to look over and say “Thanks man” and stick a hand out.

We had a 20 minute break or so before Matisyahu came on. I turned to check the room to see if a quick cigarette run was doable-room was completely packed and it was a situation where I was not going to loose my spot(not only for sight lines but resting my coat and back pack on stage), so I turned back towards stage and a few minutes later the his Holiness had hit the stage. It's party time.

“Darkness into light” was first song they got into. The backing band is the aforementioned Dub Trio-claiming their same places from before. They're not as heavy now as they flow through a few songs but they got progressively heavier as the night went on-some of these Matisyahu reggae jams turned into hard rock songs when performed live. Matisyahu had on a white Yankees hat, a scarf that said “Liverpool” and Adidas high tops with the three lines on each sneakers side colored Red, Yellow and Green-keeping with our Rastafarian theme of the evening. I looked over at the set list on stage and counted twelve songs. I turned to a dude next to me and was like “12 songs setlist?” and he replied with “Watch dude they jam out-it's going to be a late night”. Looking at this list, they had to have played more because I heard(and think I got video of) them doing a song called “Jerusalem” which is not listed. I'm getting lost in these songs-it starts to get trippy when Dub Trio just lays feed back down as Matisyahu chants as if he's facing the whaling wall. At other times during jam outs he was jumping around on stage, possibly doing the C-Walk as he began to headbang during long instrumental jams. Halfway through his hat had flew off and he continued to bang his head metal style with those two curls swinging back and forth as he danced around violently(almost kicking me in the face at least twice) . Looking up at him you could tell he's one of those guys that takes his sets very seriously as he rarely spoke between songs opting to either stare into the crowd with a slight head nod going or some chant that would start soft and intensify into the beginning of the next song. I could swear there were times in the set where he was “Freestyle rapping”, and I got to record a few of his beat boxing sessions. That stuff was epic, as he did it acapella in edition to jumping into jams on the tail end of songs keeping rhythm with the bass and drums keeping it so funky. Such a fun night as I reach for my phone to check the time it was 11:45PM and we're not exactly saying goodnight yet as we were still getting into songs like “Youth” and “I will be Light” before playing “One Day”-a song most of the crowd was shouting for all night. That's when Matisyahu goes over to the guitar player and starts waving his hand around his head signaling for “King Without A Crown”, which they jammed out to for about six and half minutes before saying goodnight to loud roars from the crowd and people like me hounding the roadies for one of the copies of the set list that were taped to the stage(one of which I was able to obtain).

Sweet night I must say. Totally didn't expect Matisyahu to rock out a two hour set list on a Monday night. Hell, there was a lot of stuff tonight I wasn't expecting to witness. It was really fun and we can definitely conclude that this night was a 15 dollars well spent. I would suggest to anyone in the Brooklyn area this week to try and find your way into one of these “festival of light” gigs, as it promises to be an eventful evening to say the least.

Fiction Place w/ The Globes Mercury Lounge 11/15/10

2010-11-16T03:09:00.008-05:00

Tonight seemed like a 'coming out party' of sorts as Fiction Plane proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that it's not just the band that feature Sting's son. So people, what goes on? Welcome to the 39th edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series which brings us to the Mercury Lounge in New York City to see the band 'Fiction Plane' (Joe Sumner-Bass/Vocals, Seton Daunt-Guitar, Pete Wilhoit-Drums). And there's an interesting sidebar story with tonight's proceedings as it's an “early show”. By early I mean EARLY. Doors are set to open at 6:30 according to 'Bowery Presents' website, which also lists Fiction Plane's set time at 7:30PM. Put it in perspective: Bowery Presents website has info on the later show here tonight and says doors for that open at 8:45.. being a Monday night it doesn't bother me that's it's early.. I'm just psyched to see this band..So I say we take a seat and enjoy this Jay Porks Experience.

Fiction Plane was a band that first came to my attention in 2008 when their single “Two Sisters” started to get major play on local rock stations over here the in big apple. Then I got to see them briefly all the way back at the third ever version of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series-that was a show in NJ where they opened up on that year's 'Unity Tour' w/ 311 and Snoop Dogg. I didn't catch their whole set that day due to long lines while filing into the PNC Bank Arts Center so when I saw them headlining a gig for $12 a ticket I was more than thrilled. Especially at the Mercury Lounge-one of my favorite venues to see a show.

Arrived at 6:15.. I'm used to saying that I hopped out of the cab at this time, but uncharacteristic of my usual laziness-I took public transportation the whole way there.. And patting myself on the back for finding the place without looking up directions either-went on my own memory; which is suspect at times but paid off here. So I walk in and say “Hi, my ticket is a will call”- I was met with a hand to the chest and told " Okay great-We're not open yet. Doors are at 6:30 and first band is going on at 7".. I walk back out and there's a whole 11 people outside( I counted-but then again half of these people may be with one of the bands). Let me tell you why this is the type of place I love to see a show- it's the definition of a 'sweat box'. It's tiny, a foul stench will fill the room once full and it looks like it hadn't passed a building inspection in 20 years. I didn't even remember how small the room was until I got in-it's reminiscent of the living room at my house. There's one guy serving as event staff and he's at the door check I.D.'s. As 7PM draws closer I see we're up to at least 30- something people now. I'm sitting along the bench on the wall placing my cup on the stage to reserve the space for now-as I'm gonna enjoy a seat as long as I can before the show starts... I think I'm going to have to back up when the bands come on to try and get my camera in better position. As I'm sitting there starting this review on my iPod I notice an older couple sat down next to me. Not older like 30 or 40, older like senior discount. Minutes pass and at least two or three other couples in the same age range walked in-I saw one woman looking for a seat so I offered her mine. Can't pass up a easy mitzvah when it presents itself.

The Globes hailing from Spokane, Washington, hit the stage a minute or two after 7.. working with Two guitarists(who share vocal duties), drummer with a bass player doubling on keyboard. Whenever I see any type of keyboard on stage I get discouraged a bit-but I got into these dudes fairly quickly.. Guitar player on my side of the stage was working multiple pedals below him distorting noises much to my enjoyment. They do a lot of start-stop/ loud quiet loud stuff with their sound; by the third song in these dudes were rocking hard- riffin heavy guitars building up during verses leading to softer choruses with harmonically sang vocals at times. The drummer had on a Modest Mouse tee shirt. These guys look like they're gonna smack their instruments together as they are so close to each other on this small stage violently rocking back and forth with each strum. They kept thanking us and seemed very happy to be here. Well, we were happy to have them as The Globes went off at 7:40PM to substantial applause from the growing crowd. I noticed on their MySpace page that they're playing a show Friday(11/19) in Brooklyn at a place called 'The Rock Shop'. If you're in town you should check them out-won't be let down.

I'm a pessimist at heart-so it's surprising to me that this place is not as empty as I thought it would be, as I returned from my mid-band cigarette to find myself not able to get back to my spot against the stage. Wasn't mad about it because I needed to back up anyway- so now I'm standing about 4 or 5 rows of people back as the crowd pushes themselves closer to the stage as minutes pass. Joe Sumner is on stage discussing with a roadie the status of an acoustic guitar they seemed to be having trouble with. Finally Joe says over the mic to the sound guy “It's broken-so I guess fuck it”.

They kicked the set off with a song called “Two Sparks”- a tune easy to sing along to through your first listen as people begin to do- screaming the “We're gonna burn you!” line of the song. The room has filled out nicely by now, as I'm being bumped into on occasion. I thought I was in here to enjoy the handful of Fiction Plane songs I'm familiar with-not the case at all. As each song went by I kept thinking “Wow-this legitimately rocks”. Two things I quickly noticed while these dudes were playing: 1)This guitar player insane! And 2) Joe Sumner is having tons of fun up there. He's jumping around, leaning into the crowd, bullshitting in-between songs all smiles all night. Like when they jumped into the song “It's A Lie” a few songs later-he joked about having to “sing high on this next one”. Seton Daunt is the aforementioned guitar player-and man he's doing some amazing stuff over there. Dude had a pedal board of Mascis-type proportions. Sumner introduced the band more than once- “I'm a registered alien” Joe says before he pointed to the drums “Pete Wilhoit behind the drums..He's an American (to a loud cheer)... And on guitar Seton Daunt who is a foreigner!”(to a louder cheer).. Also when the opportunity presented itself Sumner hit us with some funky bass grooves. And even though sometimes unfairly tagged as Sting's son's band-there were times where one would look up and hear those dashes of Ska along with singer playing bass; it's hard not to say “Wow, these guys are like 'The Police' meets 90's alternative!”. At the same time Sumner's demeanor and stage presence makes you realize that people would probably think higher of Sting if he wasn't such a Prick. Yes, I said it. Obviously I've never had the privilege to meet the man or had a personal discussion of any sort with him. But he just comes off to me as a prick; complete opposite of his fun loving, energetic and entertaining(along with hard rockin') son. As songs play Sumner seemed to be enjoying us as a crowd(the building was literally ROCKING as I felt the floor below me basically bouncing with thumps for most of the night-felt like it was going to caved in). He said he was enjoying us more than we were enjoying the band-kept saying how great it was to finally be back in NYC and saying things like “from here you guys are doing amazing!”.. Easy to be a good crowd when a rocking band is As the night progressed I was impressed more and more. It's getting really hot in here, Sumner seems to agree as he takes his leather jacket off midway through the night. Their sound is far from complacent as we shifted from Ska/Reggae flavors to pretty heavy, almost headbanging type levels of rocking throughout the evening. There are two girls in front of me who are way into this-flailing arms in the air, dancing around and screaming with unbridled enthusiasm at the start of most songs. I mean, a hand or two may have gotten in the way of the video I was recording, but I'm not here to complain about fans enjoying a show. I'd be doing that if I wasn't “working”. The crowd was summoned for assistance in singing on a few songs- “Tommy” off their 3^rd full length studio effort 'Sparks', which was released earlier this year. “Why don't I have more than one of their records?” is what I kept asking myself. “Sadr City Blues” was another one of the endless amazing songs they played-Unfortunately I was not able to obtain an official set list but a reader of this on ConcertConfessions.com named Wendy found it for me and I will paste it to the bottom of this post.

My cell phone shows me 8:45PM so I know we're closing this out soon... as we got towards the end of the night, Sumner looks at the set list and says “Okay whats next... well, the guitar is broken so I guess we can't play that one!” as they then jump into their most popular song to date “Two Sisters”.. I was singing along as quietly as possible because I was trying get video on that one. Extended it a little bit as the song went for roughly six minutes. Anyone who's been to a concert knows that feeling you get when you finally hear that favorite song you have by the band you came to see that night. A state of bliss that can only be match by sex or the taking of illegal substances. I was totally walking on air at that point as a journalist turned prissy little fan boy-they played one or two more before 9PM rolled around and it was time to say goodnight..

What a night! Fiction Plane took care of business tonight in every sense of the phrase. I'll be the first to admit in all honesty I did not think they would rock THAT hard. I underestimated them and in return got blown away. I'm at the iTunes store as we speak getting more of their music to put on my iPod. Why aren't these dudes more known? Their sound is so easy for your ears to get along with-down right funky at times. It can't be denied that this is a lot more that “The band Sting's son is in”, but don't take my word for it-take me up on this offer: See them live and if you exit the venue anything less than blown away then shoot over an email and the Jay Porks Experience will personally refund what you paid for you ticket. That's how confident we are in the musical abilities of Fiction Plane.. it's a sure thing.

For those who made it this far, our deepest thanks go out to you for taking a glimpse into the Jay Porks Experience. Next on the concert calender is 'Matisyahu' 11/29 at the Brooklyn Bowl.. should be fun-hope to see you there. LATE.

Official set list as handwritten by Joe Sumner:
Sparks
Faze
Push
It’s A Lie
Tommy
Zero
Shoes
Sadr
Drink (not played due to acoustic guitar situation)
Sisters
Denied
La La La

Gorillaz Escape from Plastic Beach comes to MSG with N.E.R.D. 10/8/10

2010-10-09T20:47:00.011-04:00

Purchasing these tickets on Tuesday night for a Friday night show, I didn't expect premium seating.. Didn't need it at all.. What goes on people, thanks for stopping by and hoping on board the 38th Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series which takes us back to the Mecca- Madsion Square Garden, for NY's taste of the Escape From Plastic Beach Tour with Gorillaz! Show is set to kick off at 8PM with N.E.R.D. billed as the opener.. This should definitely be interesting. I love cartoons and I love music by Gorillaz- so combining the two elements should be exquisite..

A few differences from when I was here last week for Alice In Chains- the floor pit section has seats as oppose to standing room. Also, I wasn't routed to another section upon arrival- sat in the seat listed on my ticket: Section 401.

N.E.R.D hit the stage a minute or two after 8PM.. Looks like visual effects will be tonight's theme- for an opener N.E.R.D had some light show going.. Three mini screens on the stage... Two hot chicks table dancing on each side of the stage- nice. I see two drummers with a dude on multiple keyboards in between them.. Guitar and bass player too- going with the full band. I appreciate "Hip Hop" ( if we wanna call this that) when a live band accompanies it. Makes it seems more, I don't know for lack of a better term, more real. Because truth is, if you play ME a beat I could rhythm to it, alot of people can. But ten minutes in I'm enjoying this- not even that "good for the opener" enjoyment- I legitimately like this.. Pharell says "since we're in the greatest city in the world where people know music, we're playing some new N.E.R.D." they then got into a song called " I've seen the light".. As the set progressed I got more and more impressed.. Here's the thing about us New Yorkers- most neighborhoods are ethnic ones, so we all learn to appreciate hip hop on one form or another- and when they closed out the set with "Lapdance", I was officially into it.. Seriously.. N.E.R.D. Just took the biggest stage in the world and killed it.. Great job- I'm sold.. They ended their set at 8:35PM

At 8:40 Matt Pinfield came on stage to pump us up for Gorillaz.. These days, Matt host the morning drive time (6-10AM) show on101.9 WRXP in New York City. Besides mentioning that the show '120 Minutes' will be coming back on the air soon(That's not a joke).. . He then told us that, get this: LOU REED WILL BE PERFORMING TONIGHT! Holy freaking god this is going to be crazy! Mick Jones, Paul Simonon and Mos Def as well are in attendance and will all be making appearances..

A cartoon character appeared on screen as the lights dim at 9.. "When's this warm up band going to finish?", was what this angry green cartoon dude kept asking while looking with one eye straight at the screen straight at us.. Similar shorts like this made 2 more appearances throughout the night- then the screen cuts to a shot of Snoop Dogg- crowd goes crazy as they jump into " Welcome to the World of the Plastic Beach", with Snoop Dogg on screen rapping his parts of the song.. The big Gorillaz neon sign on stage is lit and changing colors with moods and sounds.. directing sitting under it in chairs is the orchestral part of the band(horns and stuff) who are not seen- most of the time only being shown in silhouette(which was trippy). Light show is exuberant, different cartoons flood the big screen with each song. This looks like a pretty expensive production (but not over the top in the vein of Pink Floyd/It worked like in the vein of the Flaming Lips). The crowd gets crazier and crazier every song that passes- even I don't know all these Gorillaz songs, but they're rocking and there's nobody in there having a bad time.. “Empire Ants” was pretty jaw dropping to experience live.. Also I had some nice looking ladies dancing in the row to the front of me.. " Tomorrow Comes Today" almost half way through was the point where I went from really enjoying this night to just starring in amazement, repeating my signature phrase: “Wow”, to myself.. One of those moment where I kept reminding myself I almost didn't attend this show...

As I looked around to notice the only empty seats in the house were the ones to the far sides and behind the stage which during concerts aren't sold when the stage is placed where it is. I'm pretty shocked that Gorillaz(intended as a side project mind you) would sell that many more tickets than Alice In Chains two weeks ago. Upon googling it I saw one site listed the show as “Sold Out”- got my Tickets Tuesday night so not sure if that was official or not.. and while I'm taking a look around, allow me introduce you to tonight's rhythm guitar and bass- Mick Jones and Paul Simonon; they were in some band called ' The Clash', maybe you've heard of them. Keeping the melody flowing steady all night.. Then a Gorillaz cartoon version of Lou Reed was shown on screen, with Reed taking a pair of chopsticks to tangled wiring-had the XL forehead going just like the real life version. Reed came out to chants of “LOOOOOOOOOOU” and they played “Somekind of Nature”. During the song I can see(kinda) Reed signaling to the stage hand pointing at his monitor and pointing to the sky. He did this almost the whole song, I'm going to assume that meets “turn this shit up”, but again I'm in section 401 Reed exited the stage after that, as my dreams of hearing Gorillaz doing “Sweet Jane” were shattered. “Super fast Jellyfish” had the group of attractive young ladies in front of me excited, along with the rest of my section. Damon Albarn is a freaking genius man. Him and of course cartoonist Jamie Hewlett have created a monster, blending the brit pop sound of Blur's front man with completely unfabricated Hip Hop vibes. At one point during the set Jamie wanted to mention about how they played overseas, and then introduced us to what he call the “Arab American “ section of the orchestra. I am so glad he brought that to NYC in the midst of these bigoted New Yorkers complaining about a Mosque “near” Ground Zero. Glad that everyone in the building can see that people who are of Arab decent can be and are just like all of us-they can be in an awesome friggin' rock band that is in the midst of ( I must preface this with figuratively) burning down the house at the Garden. Incredible on so many levels!

Anyway, as the night And the guest list doesn't end as after they went off at 10:30 and then ran back out for the encore; Mos Def took the stage for “Sweepstakes”, De La Soul came back out for “Feel Good Inc.” (they may have made an earlier appearances-but the only person I could tell who it was without introduction was Jamie from my distance).. other in attendance performing on songs were Bobby Womack, Bashy, Miho Hatori, Bootie Brown and Yukimi Nagano.. And of course you knew this moment was coming- everyone's favorite Gorillaz song “Clint Eastwood”, with some of the rap lyrics changed(to the dismay of one of my YouTube commenters), Jamie even jumped the gun on the chorus first time around... It was great, and I recorded every minute of it! . “Demon Days” closed the out this night of insanity. Went off at about 10:53PM

WOW. Gorillaz, Escape from Plastic Beach Tour. Are you serious? Did this band really just put on THAT show? Did they really just tear down Madison Square Garden, the Mecca?? There was not a dull moment during the set.. Of course my personal highlight of the evening-LOU REED came out and performed! Incredible.. Seriously one thing I gotta get off my chest to everyone right here-I cannot believe I was just in the same building as Lou Reed! That is the stuff of legend.

Vaselines LIVE at Webster Hall NYC 10.6.10

2010-10-07T05:31:00.013-04:00

Sub Pop records- 20 some odd years later they still have some real deal quality on their roster... Okay people, what the hell goes on? We're here coming to you for the 37th episode of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert series and it brings us to Webster Hall, to see Glasgow's finest: The Vaselines. After an extended break ( about 20 years) Eugene Kelly and Frances McKee are back in the saddle, on tour in support of their latest release, " Sex with an X" . I caught them once before, in May 2009 as they set fire to the Music Hall of Williamsburg- completely killing a 20+ song set of their entire catalog. Now, with like 12 new ones in hand, it'll be interesting to see what songs make the cut tonight. Also be interesting to venture out to Webster Hall again.. Did not enjoy my last few concert experiences there if I remember correctly I saw the Melvins here last year and Local H back in November of 2008. Made it in time for the 5:10 ferry into the city- ticket says doors at 8 and show is at 9.. Should be fun. So let's take a stroll on yet another Jay Porks Experience shall we?

I got on line before 7, roughly an hour before doors were said to open.. There two lines, one for the Vaselines and one for “The Studio at Webster Hall” located downstairs-where they host DJ sets and that kind of stuff. I know, I also just threw up in my mouth a little bit. It gets worse: downstairs in the 'Studio' tonight at 11:30 is the " Built to Spill After party" (following their Highline Ballroom set which will be going on I'll assume at an adjacent time to the Vaselines tonight). I wouldn't wanna go see Built to Spill's concert, lead alone attend an after party for it. Why can't the club and concert scene be two separate entities? I hear these club goers chatting on line, and they think the random sounds of noise they listen to is music- ITS A BUNCH OF RANDOM SOUNDS! I freaking hate techno/house/freestyle music freaks with a passion known like no other. To put it short-I do not want to be near “those people”.

As I'm standing on line waiting for 8 o clock, word came via text from my father, telling me that Doc Halladay just no hit the Reds in Game 1 of the division series... Now there's a team I definitely do not want to see in the World Series as a Yankee fan.

About 8:20, after the doors finally opened and I grabbed a beer, made my way towards the front and I found myself perched on a foundation thing putting me about 3 feet above where I'd be viewing if I was standing on the floor- this is such a win.. And if event staff tells me I can't stay here my bag is sitting on the stage, ensuring my back up spot.. And once this place fills up I don't see how event staff will be able to reach me to stop my videos. So suck on that SubPop records for not answering my email requests for a photo pass.

Jeffery Lewis came out around 9 and as oppose to last tine I saw him when he opened for Dinosaur Jr at the Brooklyn Bowl back in January..That night it was just him and a projector with a sheet hanging up and he plugged in an iPod as his back up band.. Tonight :Jeffery Lewis and the Junkyard! Lewis on Guitar with a Bass player, Drummer , a girl on Violin and a horn player.. It was alright I must say.. He made me not hate him anymore.. We had to sit through 2 video/ history lessons he likes to do with the projector. His into cartoon stuff I noticed, as he was selling his own comic books at the merch table for $2.50 a pop. . The first slideshow was about the fall of the USSR and the other had to do with the French revolution.. Other than the screen slide shows accompanied with music- everything else about the set pretty cool.I got a little head nod going through a few of these songs.. Safe to say a much needed improvement for his act.. Check out the vid I have up on my YouTube page.. At 9:23 they said they had time for 2 more.. Went off near 9:30 right after they ended the set with Jeffery Lewis's "Ganster Rap about killing Mosquitos” . I should've taed it, it's actually pretty funny..

Special shouts to the two people who held my spot as I went to smoke a cig. I gave them my business card- let's hope they check out the site.. Crystal Stilts is the band set to come on at 9:45...

Cystal Stilts were ten minutes behind schedule, not kicking off til about five minutes to ten.. That had a keyboardist up there with a bass, guitar drum set up and the lead singer sans instrument.. halfway through the set the piano player-who is like 10 feet from me because by now I have my feet up on stage and as the kids say these days, I'm chillaxing- he says anyone know the score in the Yankee game? Of course I did, so I screamed out “3-0 Twins Bottom 5^th!”.. he looked at me and said “Really?” I was like “Yea I got wifi in here!”. Bowery Presents provided WiFi access for us the entire night, and to that I'm grateful. As they're playing I can see into a window upstairs were I see Eugene Kelly sitting watching the room.. Coolness.. And few songs in, Crystal Stilts ( Brooklyn's own), was winning the crowd over with their jingle jangle hard pop they played.. Sound like they take some cue from the Vaselines- who wouldn't? Most of their tunes seem to be clocking in at under 2 and a half minutes- as nothing seem to drag along far passed a second break in song.. They went off at 10:20...

And the wait begins.. 10:49 comes and still no Vaselines on stage.. I told one of the roadies I'd give him 5 bucks for the setlist he taped to the stage..he said after the show.

The Vaselines hit the stage a couple of minutes before 11 and they got the party started with " Oliver Twisted" and completely began to set fire to everyone's face; quickly. You could feel the power of all three guitars melding into singular melodic tones from strand one... They had a slight light show going, and. best news of all-I have maintained my spot perched above everyone else, and I've got the tape rolling on this whole show- no event staff in sight. Being right in front naturally compromised the vocals slightly (or maybe it's the sub par Webster Hall sound), but it wasn't to a point where you couldn't hear.. " Monsterpussy" was up next and I'm noticing the band maybe slowing things down a tiny tiny bit as compared to the normal pace of their songs, lyrics wise anyway.. Hardly noticeable to the naked ear, but when singing lyrics I was streets ahead of them. One of the new singles, " I hate the 80's" followed.. Frances was talking to the crowd a bit between each song as Eugene tuned up...hard to make out what their saying through the thick Scottish accents, but Frances said that her children asked " Mommy, why do they play the shitty one on the radio" referring to the chorus lines: "I hate the 80's cause the 80's were shit!".. That was followed by " The Day I was a Horse", which is a song about taking LSD and pretending to be a horse. You got to love this band- all their songs are about drugs or sex and they know how to keep a sparkling sense of humor to keep it all tasteful. Well, maybe not tasteful but everyone should cherish the cheerful smut the Vaselines throw at you while performing live. It's a scene man. Then came the title track of the new record " Sex With An X".. Next came a familiar strum, and before they were done tuning up, I got ready to record tonight's version of "Jesus Wants Me For A Sunbeam" which was met to a huge hand from the crowd. What a moment in time.

The continued on to rip through songs off the new record like "The Devil Inside me" and then Jeffery Lewis was invited up on stage to play bicycle horn on " Molly's Lips". Everyone loves Jeffery Lewis tonight as he got a huge hand.. Next came " Such a fool" and holding the set list in my hand, it seems they had 'Whitechapel' listed and then crossed out in pen with Such a fool penciled in. Interesting. I wonder what the reason for that change was. “Slushy” and “Let's get Ugly” followed- amping up the crowd for the next level of awesomeness, when they played “Son of a Gun”. We all really got into that one. “No Hope” and “Rory Rides Me Raw” came before my favorite song off their new record, and that song is “Ruined”. It's the first track on the album, and it completely smacks you in the face-it's consistently heavier than the rest of the record.. I like the lyrics too, lots of quotable lines-like lines you would use in a Facebook status update to describe your mood.. Another one off the new record followed “Mouth to Mouth”.. The new record “Sex With An X” is a must buy-go find it..

The Eugene says to Frances “Do you wanna tell them?” and Frances says “Well I don't want to tell them either” and then after a sign she leans into the mic and says “This is going to be our last song of the evening”. She said “We have tons of stuff to do!”..”Dying for it” was the song, and then they ducked off stage-but the mains didn't come back on so you knew they'd be out for a few more.. I saw the roadie dude I had asked for the set list before they went on. I was like “Dude! Your my man wit the list right? You got me right?!” He reached in his pocket and handed me a copy! And I didn't even have to pay him for it.. Sweet! Thanks dude, hope you find this blog... Anyway, they came back out and played two songs “You Think Your A Man” and “Dum-Dum”... Vaselines show over about 12:05AM...

Amazement, joyfulness , sheer delight-all of these phrases could describe my mood as I walk down the chilly NYC streets headed towards the X1 express bus.. I had a great time, saw the legendary Vaselines and I got to see 2 other pretty cool bands as well in 'Crystal Stilts' and 'Jeffery Lewis and the Junkyard' .. Hope everyone enjoyed this little stroll through the Jay Porks Experience, and I hope you'l; be back in a few days to catch the full scoop from Gorillaz 'Escape from Plastic Beach Tour' when it hits the Garden this coming Friday.. We'll be there in full effect, and I heard though the grapevine some special guests may be in order-but I don't want to jinx anything.. I catch you all there-LATE

BLACKDIAMONDSKYE AT MADISON SQUARE GARDEN 9/24/10

2010-09-25T04:20:00.008-04:00

I felt the same way that I feel when I'm going to see any of my teams play at the Garden-there's half as many people as capacity and everyone's drunk and loud, only the product in front of us all tonight weren't a bunch of sad losers! What goes on people, welcome into the 36th installment of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert series (I'm dead serious about the “Never Ending” part of that if you didn't know by now) which has me feeling a bit sporty I must say. I mean come on, we're at the Mecca of sports-The world's most famous arena, Madison Square Garden to check out the legendary Alice In Chains with Deftones and Mastodon rounding out what is billed as the BLACKDIAMONDSKYE tour..Like I said, so happy to be coming here to see something good and not the New York Rangers sad excuse for a hockey team or the dreadful basketball team that plays there who's name is not worth the proverbial ink. But by the looks of the arena, you'd thought something crappy was going on. That place got half full at best. Upon arrived, the early comers were re-routed to different sections leaving a full empty row in between every row. When I made a pit stop during Deftones, event staff was just telling people, and I quote “There's tons of seats, it doesn't matter what your ticket says just find an open seat”.. So I paid $38 plus fees for this thing to not be near capacity? That doesn't make me proud of my NY peers at all. And why not just charge $25 for these seats I'm in now and you'll sell the place out.. We're at least twice the distance I was when I first saw Alice In Chains with DuVall in 2007 at an outdoor venue in NJ that I paid $20 for tickets. It just bewilders me that this thing isn't crammed full-and later when AIC came on and everyone was standing up it looked like the place was packed-trust me when I tell you it was far from that.

Anyway, on to the tunes shall we? Mastodon played from 7PM to about 740PM, they were actually on when we were walking in, so I missed the first tune. They were heavy, they were dredging, did I mention they were heavy? I wondered if the sound got this loud for the first opener how much was it going to elevate throughout this night.. and these guys are REAL metal-they have the duel vocalists going on-the regular singer AND the screaming singer dude.. That's how the real metal acts roll.. their light show (not much bright lighting) vs my camera was a losing battle for us, so I apologize for not putting a crappy picture of nothing up here, as all night I had problems with pics considering the distance..Of the few of us that were there, there was a group of dudes really getting into it-skin head dudes doing heavy metal air guitar-fun from a far, but certainly not a collection of swings I want to get in between.. That's the thing about metal-the fans. I'll be the first to admit that they were a little heavy for me, I mean I enjoyed it but wouldn't blast their records all day long-I'd go deaf... But the thing about metal is the fans. They come out strong every time, they spend money. You know they spend money because they know all the words to all the songs that came off the latest record.. They come to shows, far and wide, rock out they buy albums and shirts and are not afraid to show how into it they are- This is unlike some people, who just find ways to listen to music on the internet without buying/owning it.

Deftones went on shortly before 8PM...Deftones rocked it out... Enjoyed them a little more because, compared to Mastodon, they were at a much more manageable volume. They had the nu metal thing going on-some songs it seemed like they were like a way better version of like, Korn or something and then at times they went to a totally different place..Also, Chino (vocals, guitar sometimes) had this table set up in front of him, that he would climb up and down during portions of songs.. he would jumped up there to do one of his deep screams and then jump down off of it-and hey he does not shy away from the occasional “F” bomb, using occasional in a sarcastic sense of course.... and way more Deftones fans then expected, much like with Mastodon, we had air guitaring skin heads-not the mean skin head tho, I'm just calling them skin heads because they were bald and I don't know their names. I highly doubt any of the fun lovin' Deftones fans beat women or ride Harley's religiously-c'mon now what do you think this is Slayer or something? They worked it til ten minutes before 9, that's when a curtain went up in front of the stage, and the army of roadies began to set up for Alice In Chains..

Let me mention the huge middle finger I gave society by smoking cigarettes right in my seat while ducking event staffers, whom of which the Garden seemed to be light on tonight... pot was being smoked everywhere-it was great. So suck on that James Dolan!

The sheet that was in front of the stage was used as a prop for Alice In Chains' intro, there was some cool effects going on there, including a beating, blackened throbbing veined heart, like from the front of their record Black Gives Way To Blue.. Roars of the crowd (it's about 9:30 when the intro started ) as you can see the silhouettes coming out on stage. Then the drapes fell, and “Them Bones” was what they chose to kick things off with. Awesome from string one-what makes this band is the professionalism, the musicianship they bring to the table. I mean, I can rave all day about Jerry Cantrell's sick ridiculous guitar skills, as I did back in May (which can be viewed here: http://concertconfessions.com/2010/05/24/mmrbbq/ ). Tonight lets take a look at Sean Kinney, who is drumming in a different league than most others. He's off doing some other stuff over there with free flowing ease that was reminiscent of something out of the Ginger Baker handbook.. His drums were set up a foot or two up from the floor. A screen a few feet high ran effects from one side of the stage to the other, and under his drum kit in the middle... this was attached to a platform where Jerry, DuVall and Mike could climb up and play on during songs, which they did. I just wish one of them would have done the 'Slash' leap off that thing mid-riff. That would've been epic, but it didn't look so high anyway, so maybe it just would have been stupid I guess. And in further comparison to the show in May, DuVall seems to winning over more and more fans every time.. They love him-shit I love him. He rocks. Mid set when I stopped working for a few songs and was sitting back taking it all in, I remember just looking at that stage oh so far away, and thinking about oh how far gone this band was before they found this dude. And Mike keeping it in step over there on bass, with the hair swinging every which way yet always landing down and perfect-maybe I could get whatever shampoo he uses. Also remember, I have Mike and Sean's autographs on a bootleg ticket I bought to an AIC show at Irving Plaza last year, on Sept 9th. (Didn't have a show to “review” for that, but the night's events are here:http://jayporksmusic.blogspot.com/2009/09/ever-scalped-ticket-only-to-find-out-at.html ). Anyway so they felt bad, and signed my ticket that I paid $50 for and turned out to be phony. So not only am I enjoying these tunes but I know these dudes aren't dickheads in real life. Whats better then good people who play great music? And I mean great- I mean you should've heard “Grind”, you would've jumped into the time portal that leads to the fictional 90's neighborhood I spend my life living in too. You'd love ever second of it. There were times where you couldn't help but starting thinking of where you ranking Cantrell among guitar greats... he's amazing with it. Does anyone else stroll around stage like this guy? He doesn't walk back and forth he like power walks. I saw him pass by Mike Inez's microphone to hit the wawa peddle-I guess they got their effects boxes linked up or something. that was really cool.. I like how they had the screens set up playing stuff where, if you didn't know what song was playing you could still sort of figure it out by the images synced with the song. Everything about the set was perfect, besides them running off for the encore at 10:35, roughly an hour after they went on. It must be MSG's ceiling for concerts is 11PM, because BlackDiamondSkye isn't going cross country for tomorrow's show, they're going to New Jersey-no flight to catch. During the few minute break, I see some kid lean over to his friends asking them if they want to stay for the encore-what is that some sort of joke? You're going to leave early? The same way I would leave a football game before my team comes back and scores the winning touchdown. Amazing how some people behave-sickening.. They came back out and played a seven minute “Love, Hate, Love”, then “Man In the Box” and “Would?” to close it out, and were tossing hundreds of guitar picks into the crowd as they thanked everyone and headed off to call it an evening.

And what an evening, glad I could be part of it.. besides the place not filling out. Really disappointed me that this show wasn't long sold out. It was the biggest show in Alice In Chains history-and a lot of the alleged die New Yorkers missed it. But the billed bands delivered big time, and there's nothing more you could really ask from the musicians.

So this was fun right? Hope my Dad thought so, as these tickets were my birthday gift to him back in July, which he is now calling the best birthday present since his Gibson SG when he was a teen...and of course hope you had as good of a time as I did, as I'm one who can never get enough of the Alice In Chains.. I have the set list below, I don't think I missed any but I'm sure if I did It'll be pointed out to me in a rudely stated comment.. Anyway, as for now I'm off to upload some more video, which isn't so good picture wise but the sound is superb, so I felt it was worth adding to my archives. Thanks, for putting up with my non sense for a little while, and I'll see you all October 6th for The Vaselines at Webster Hall.. LATE...

Alice In Chains Setlist:

Them Bones
Dam That River
Rain when I Die
Again
Check My Brain
Your Decision
No Excuses
Down in a hole
Grind
We Die Young
Acid Bubble
Lesson Learned
Rooster
(Encore)
Love hate love
Man in the box
Would?

"An Evening with Ween!" Central Park Summer Stage 9/17/10

2010-09-18T05:22:00.010-04:00

Stop what you're doing right now and Google “Ween”. Then check and see when they're coming to your town, or contact them and beg them to come to your town, because if you don't see Ween live in concert, then you just don't know what living is about. What goes on... Lets get into the 35th edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series and the completion of our “Three Nights of Weirdness” tour, which brings us back to the Central Park Summerstage, only tonight to see the immortal Ween.. And it's not raining! It's actually pretty nice out- sun is shining and everything. I'm going to try and show up as early as I can, as I have no idea what kind of turnout we're looking at and I'd love to get a better spot than last night.. 'Doors' are at 7, and my ticket is at will call.. Will this be the same set up as last night where there is no opening acts and we get two hours of Ween? That would be awesome, but let's not get our hopes up..

Stepped out of the cab at 6:30, I'm here way earlier than last night and there are tons of Ween fans everywhere-it was so different then last night, like it was in an entirely different place..I know Ween has a following, but you would've thought Phish was playing or something the way everyone came out tonight. The crowd was one of the best I've ever experienced.

As I was on a line to get Pizza I turned and noticed the smoke machines starting to get going. Got my slice, pounded two beers and headed towards the stage to try and get a good spot. I stationed myself on the same side as last night, but substantially closer.. I almost was along the railing, I was this close to offering the girl who was there $20 bucks for her spot.. The smoke is everywhere, I look at my phone and it's 7:30, and the a huge roar from the crowd as Ween hits the stage, at seven freaking thirty! So another night of no openers as “An Evening with Ween” begins at 7:30

“Buckingham Green” was what they kicked it off with... The stage is electric from the first chorus break with the lights going crazy. Ween has a much more extravagant light show then Cake last night-not comparing the two bands but differentiating the two nights at the same venue.. . Times of continuous strobe lights bouncing off smoke during in-song jam sessions made you just look up to the stage and take it all in- there are no inhibitions at that time.

There's probably twice as many people as there were for last nights evening with Cake- That sort of surprised me as I waited on one of the longest lines I've ever seen to get in. So many people were pumped for this in the hour before they went on, and we are definitely getting more than our money's worth."She Wanted to Leave", “Bananas and Blow" followed, and I am amazed that I was able to get any sort of set list going here. I was scribbling down the lyrics to songs and just spent the last hour googling them to get the titles. Again, so worth it though, as Ween is relentless up there getting into "Learnin' to Love" and then the epic “Transdermal Celebration”... some others were(in this order) “Take me Away”, Don't Get 2 Close","Even if you Don't", “Push Th' Little Daises" which I was able to tape unlike the following “Sorry Charlie"or an amazing version of “Voodoo Lady” which I was so pissed I didn't get... That was the song in my head all freaking day! I didn't recognize it until it was too late, still great though and they were at that song for like what seemed like 15 minutes-in the middle they got into a jam of some sort, one involving the Deaner and his amazing riffs .. dude could really shred.. . Later “Happy Colored Marbles, “The Stallion Pt. 3","Your Party", The awesome Bowie cover “Let's Dance”.. these guys are so cool!.. my new favorite song came next-" You Fucked up" followed by "Hey There Fancy Pants"," The Goin Gets Tough From The Getgo”", “I'll be your Johnny on The Spot”, “The Mollusk", “Spinal Meningitis","Mister Will You Please Help My Pony," Roses are Free".. and then they ducked off stage at 9:48.. I'll now assume that Central Park Summer Stage has a 10pm end time for all shows.. .

Returned to the stage at 9:50, and Dean gets on the mic to say " we only got ten minutes to do our thing here".. With everyone in uncontrollable screams- they jumped into "Fiesta".. Then, another song I picked up on during my week and a half of doing Ween research- "Mr. Richard Smoker" as I smoked my last cig. Then it was nearing 10, and they played the only song they could play after 2 and a half hours of straight rocking- "Dr Rock".. a song that makes you just wanna scream, and we did! Well, I didn't because I was recording, but amazing... I am completely blown away-Blown! I knew Ween rocked, but I wasn't aware of the magnitude of their rockin'. That was one for the record books.

Fucking Ween- kicking ass every song of the entire set.. I was getting into songs that I didn't even know yet halfway through I'm singing along with everyone.. And the Deaner- can't say enough about the Deaner. Now I can see how the Meat Puppets and Ween are apples from trees located on similar farms in far away towns. Completely tearing it apart on every song. They played non-stop for two and a half hours. What more could you ask for.. the professionalism that comes with putting on a show rides a thin line between being cool and being pretentious- Ween sums up what the “Being cool” side of that line is all about... Amazing, can't say enough about it. And to top it off, on the way out there were dudes selling balloons filled with Nitrous Oxide (Whip-Its) three for $20... I could not resist and it was awesome.. I sat myself on a rather large rock and while finishing off the balloon I notice there was a field of people who just enjoyed Ween, sitting on the grass, benches and floor doing Whip-its... What a night... On the way out I grabbed myself a Ween 2010 tour tee shirt.. awesome

It was without a doubt “Three nights of Wierdness”, and it was worth every penny I spent this week and the 3 hours of sleep I've gotten since Wednesday.... but now I have a full week to rest up and I'm going to need it because the next stop on the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series is the BLACKDIAMONDSKYE tour @ Madison Square Garden Featuring Alice in Chains, Deftones and Mastodon … I'm going with Pam. My Father will be along for the ride too, as these tickets are his birthday gift this year. Come on now am I the greatest son ever or what? Anyway, thanks if you made it this far... LATE.

Ween setlist
Buckingham Green
She Wanted To Leave
Bananas & Blow
Learnin' to Love
Transdermal Celebration
Up On The Hill
Take Me Away
Dont' Get 2 Close (2 My Fantasy)
Even If You Don't
Push The Little Daisies
Sorry Charlie
Voodoo Lady
Happy Colored Marbles
Stallion pt. 3, Ice Castles
Final Alarm, With My Own Bare Hands
Your Party, Let's Dance
Touch My Tooter, You Fucked Up
Stroker Ace
Wavin' My Dick In the Wind
Fancy Pants, Going Gets Tough
Waynes Pet Youngin'
Jonny On th' spot
The Mollusk
Spinal Meningitis (Got Me Down)
Roses Are Free
Encore:
Fiesta
Mr. Richard Smoker
Dr. Rock

An Evening with Cake @ Cental Park Summerstage 9/16/10

2010-09-17T03:27:00.007-04:00

Someone needs to buy me one of those things John McCrea is rolling around with-I could probably learn how to play it.. unlike guitar, an instrument I've had since I was 7. Anyway, what goes on ...Everybody welcome themselves to The 34th installment of the Jay Porks never ending concert series and the 2nd of our "Three Nights of Weirdness" tour, tonight bringing us to see the band Cake at the Central Park Summerstage...

This show comes with a slight backstory. Back in March 2009 I had tickets to see Cake at Terminal 5.. Up the street before doors opened, a friend and we took it upon ourselves to participate in the recreational use of Marijuana. The police, safe to say were not too thrilled and put us in jail- hence us missing the show. From then on when I listened to any Cake song I would be reminded of sitting in a cell until roughly 1:30AM being made fun of by police who didn't believe that we "found the stuff on the floor". So since I heard they were coming back I got on it- and tonight is the night. And I will not go to jail tonight! I am finally going to see Cake...

After the riding the Ferry through a “tornado watch” with sideways rain, I made it to theentrance of Central Park on 5^th ave and 69^th st slightly before 8PM- 'Doors' opened at 7, and their were herds of people filing into the park. Ticketmaster had this billed as " An Evening with Cake", their were no openers listed.

Walked into this epic park that is Central Park(you know a park is huge when you each entrance is in a different neighborhood), and found my way to Rumsey Playfield, where there was a ginormous stage set up, with surrounding concessions. Have to mention I had a kick ass slice of Pizza on the way out.. Who would've thought the best things in life are served outside. The ground is covered with what looks and feels like a carpet- it's some sort of comfy tarp. I guess it's there because of the afternoons heavy rainfall, to protect us from the mud.. Shortly after 8 I notice the stage looks to be set up for Cake already-really? There really are no openers? This is awesome!

Stormed into the set with “Building a Religion”, I heard it as I was buying a water.. I still couldn't believe there wasn't an opener-how late can they run this? Moving along, “Sad songs and Waltzes” was the 2nd song they played. Something far from sad was when they got into 'Wheels' and couldn't pretend it wasn't there- somebody is smoking some pot somewhere near me and I have to find out who. Then I thought to myself “Stay focused- eyes on the prize, don't do it" . So I investigated no further and went back to taping... Started enjoying myself to the point where I forgot to take notes for a few minutes, which is odd for me. But somewhere before they went into "Frank Sinatra", John McCrea was lamenting about how the rain(which was at it's heaviest a hour to two earlier in the day) had finally stopped. Way to jinx it, halfway through “Frank Sinatra” I looked up at the lights and noticed the rainfall.. Wasn't raining hard but it was steady, really steady. All of us with cameras started a " No Um-brellas!" chant for all the people who needed to shelter themselves from the rain hence putting another annoyance in front of those who are taking pictures for the various websites we all contribute to.. Next was "Love you madly", and they ended the first half of their set with “Sheep go to Heaven” which I was really getting into.. Looked at my phone and it was 8:58..

During the little intermission I guess we'll call it an intermission, I looked down to notice the mud is seeping through the carpet..looks like there's puddles of coffee all over the place. Everywhere I stepped it's like quicksand-only real, and disgusting. Not the fashion connoisseur, but consider these sneaker done for. Also, there was a tree on the side of the stage that McCrea had some fun with. It's one of those trees you buy in the stores with the promise that you'll plant it somewhere and help earth blah blah blah.. He grabbed it and put it in the middle of the stage- saying it looked better there. There was many funny moments the lead singer granted us tonight.. from conducting sing alongs from the stage, having different sides of the crowd sing different parts of the chorus to the continuous banter about the store bought tree. Think about it, Central Park-a place full of trees-when to Home Depot's home and garden dept. and bought a tree. It is truly a crazy world. Believe it was a figi apple tree, but not well versed in botany so I would double check that if you really care.

Came back out at 9:14 and played "Shadow Stabbing" and I have say for lack of a better term- it's getting pretty funky out here. Every Cake song comes equipped with a kick ass baseline that you wish you could insert into all your favorite songs. And how could you not be diggin' that trumpet action. Amazing.... Now, on to a not-Cake song, Black Sabbaths "War Pigs", which has been a staple of Cake's live set for a number of years...then an odd one- the lyric-less "Arco Arena”., a song where McCrea kills it playing lead... Jay- Z actually uses this song as the instrumental for a song on The Blueprint 2 called "Guns & Roses".. The 'vibraslap' wielding McCrea is credited for songwriting on The Blueprint 2's inner sleeve- odd facts that I know.. hey it was in my album collection in high school. Anyway on to "Jolene" the extended version I guess, as I turned to Pam and said “Wait, still Jolene right?”.. after which they play "Pentagram". Then, in a shocking turn of events-they played a new song off an upcoming new album! It was awesome. I stuck my camera in my pocket for this one. They made me like “Stick shifts and safety belts”, where as I was never that big a fan of the song. But they sucked me in tonight.. They then followed with “Never There” and tried to go off 9:54..

When they ran back out at 10 o'clock, I turned to Pam and said “ Short skirt Long Jacket and the Distance then home”. Well I was right on two of those three. As the got back on McCrea said something to the effect of “we're being told we need to get this one song done quickly and get outta here” before jumping into the one, the only, “The Distance”.. Show over roughly 10:05...

Besides no Short Skirt Long Jacket and some other obscure covers, cannot be disappointed with a full Evening with Cake.. had the little break in between and everything.. it was awesome and the best part was I didn't go to jail! So I can now listen to Cake's music with better memories.

It also completes the 2^nd night of the Jay Porks “Three Nights of Weirdness”. Tomorrow night, at the same destination we will be rocking out to the music of Ween. Attending this show on high recommendation from people I know and people I don't know. Should be awesome-going to show up extremely early and try and get some better pics and videos for everyone, as tonight could been better in the sightlines category. Well, I'm tapped out for now, thanks for putting up with this non sense for a few minutes.. LATE..