Further evidence of that creativity? Today's post will be a photo-and-video scrapbook of Saturday evening.
I haven't been to a whole lot of music venues in L.A. yet, but I've decided that the Wiltern is one of the best in town, thanks in part to its kick-ass marquee, which on Saturday, looked a lot like this:
Another thing I love about the theater is that the name is an amalgamation of WILshire Boulevard and WesTERN Avenue, which intersect near its entrance. The name would have been even catchier if the theater had been built where Jackson Street runs into Kass Avenue, but, sadly, whoever was building art deco theaters in L.A. in the early 1930s missed a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. (Also, there's no Kass Avenue in Los Angeles, but whatever.)
The National mixed in several songs from its newest album, High Violet, including Bloodbuzz Ohio, which I especially like, and Conversation 16, which is a favorite of my exceptionally gorgeous wife.
Among its other wonderful qualities, Conversation 16 includes this rather snappy lyric:
I was afraid I'd eat your brains
I was afraid I'd eat your brains
Cause I'm evil
Cause I'm evil
And one of the highlights of the concert was hearing lead singer Matt Berninger explain the deeper meaning behind those words. "That song," he said, "is a metaphor for this one time that I ate a girl's brains while she was sleeping."
We in the audience assumed he was kidding, of course, and we got a good chuckle out of that metaphor.***
Another cool part of the night was meeting - in person! - my online friend Violette, a music connoisseur with whom I've been exchanging tweets since that first National concert last August. Violette has a great (and recently redesigned) music blog, which you should check out, so long as you finish reading this post first.
OK, enough with the words. How 'bout a few of my very favorite photos I took Saturday night, and a couple of videos that I might or might not have shot with my digital camera, depending on whether I needed the band's express written consent to videotape anything ...
The stills
If you were in a band, you'd put this on an album cover, right?
My favorite picture I've taken in a really really long time.
Motion & Sound
Start A War
Mistaken For Strangers
The band's remaining 2010 tour dates, you ask? Right here.
* Tip for all of you aspiring writers out there: This strikes me as a potentially dramatic way to start any story not involving the birth of a child.
** Well, two or three of you.
*** For more metaphor-inspired hilarity, please don't hesitate to read two other recent SFTC posts, this one and this one.
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