Vancouver is far from the no-fun city it once sported the reputation as. Nowadays, it's more like "no funds" city. Interestingly enough, the seat I had at the Streisand concert on Monday would've gone for $1500 in Toronto. Made me feel better for spending $100 on it. For the record, I passed on McCartney, Young and Cohen. And, yes, dammit, that's me being all mature and restrained and stuff.
Today's shirt is quite possibly my first Vancouver concert tee. It's definitely the oldest one still in my wardrobe and it's in fantastic nick for being AS OLD AS MY GRADE EIGHT STUDENTS. Yup, in fact, I bought this shirt on November 1st, 1999, at the Vogue Theatre, a fact that didn't occur to me when I picked it this morning. Happy buy-day, GBS "Turn" shirt! Sadly, the plaid PJ pants I bought at the same concert have been reduced to scraps years ago but they were gorgeous and comfy and served me well.
The b'ys from The Rock are celebrating their 20th anniversary next year and touring the continent with their "XX" album. They'll be at the swanky Orpheum Theatre here in Vancouver on March 10th next year. Of course, I bought my ticket already. One more seat at the wedding reception or a night with three fabulous Newfoundlanders? Pfft.
Like most of the musical acts that I follow, I appreciate that Great Big Sea has never lost that feeling of camaraderie and fun that made them so great to listen to when they first emerged on the scene. Furthermore, their salt-of-the-earth NewfoundLANDer personalities have never failed to strike a genuine note with their audiences. The b'ys have found individual as well as group success over the two decades and their fans are the first to flock to a solo show or tune in to a TV show to catch a cameo appearance. Pretty sure that Alan Doyle's stint on Republic of Doyle (no relation, haha) saw a ratings boost for those episodes. Mind you, Russell Crowe showing up might deserve some of the credit too...
To sign off on topic, enjoy a video of Alan, Sean, and Bob playing their unreleased single "Great Big World" in studio.
And to sign off slightly off-topic, I've been edumicated recently on the existence of NaBloPoMo (National Blog Post Month), an homage offshoot of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). This was exciting news but, unfortunately, because I only write on school days and NaBloPoMo requires you blog everyday for the month of November, I don't think I technically qualify. I've sent a note to the organizers to see if I can still participate. As of sometime yesterday on Google-Time, I crossed the 2000 pageviews milestone and I don't THINK me checking my own page accounts for more than half of those so.... yay! Thanks, readers, commenters and especially you lurkers because I've really been enjoying this exercise and even when there isn't a lot of chit-chat, the stats show that you're all sticking around. :)
Thanks for this post! One of my absolute all time favourite bands. I'm totally jealous that you get to see them in concert next year. I saw them about 10 years ago and it was such a fun concert! I really do miss some of my fave Canadian bands. Fortunately I've discovered some great Kiwi bands. But always love hearing the feel good music of GBS. :)
ReplyDeleteYou're very welcome!! You should see if you can get ahold of Alan's solo album "Boy on Bridge" It's great stuff! And I believe my friend Kendel Carson is on there playing fiddle.
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