Wednesday, March 15, 2006

The Life Pursuit


I hadn't heard of Belle and Sebastian until just recently. I listened to clips of most of their albums at Barnes and Noble and enjoyed what I heard.

Then I remembered that I had seen that they were coming to The Riverside. "Please be there this weekend" I thought. They were and I bought 2 tickets.

Abbey and I went to see them and The New Pornographers (opening act) on Saturday night. Let me first say that I had a great time.

The New Pornographers were quite good. I am very impressed with their sound and constant ability to keep me interested in what will happen next. They're not afraid to jam on stage and that's usually a good thing (and was in this case) and they seem to be very grateful for performing and for the audience.

Belle and Sebastian was great also. I only have their newest album, The Life Pursuit, but from listening to that a ton and the clips of the other albums I've heard, I'll be getting more of their music. They put on a great show including the awesome background/harmony singer Sarah Martin kicking some serious ass.

She honestly has one of the sweetest voices I've ever heard. She's always in tune and never lets me down. I think I'm love.

Maybe the next time they're in Milwaukee I'll take her to Alterra...

Oh and in case you couldn't tell from the pic above, Abbey and I met the lead singer of Belle and Sebastian after the show, chatted and took a picture with him.

I knew that the performers generally left the stage door on the riverwalk behind the Riverside 30-40 minutes after a show. I learned this when my family inadvertantly stumbled upon Harry Connick Jr. signing autographs after his show we had just seen in May of 2002.

That was friggin' sweet.

"They brought me here for Mother's Day!" said my ecstaticly starstruck mother.

"Oh, that's real cool." said the man himself.

I was pretty pumped to meet him. I mean, I had been listening to his records for the better part of 5 years at that point and he was and is somewhat of a musical idol/legend to me.

But back to Belle and Sebastian.

Abbey and I were checking out the stage door when a small man with a black pushed back fedora walked out of the door and headed toward Mo's. We waited for a moment and followed.

Our quest led us to Stuart Murdoch, the chief songwriter and lead singer of Belle and Sebastian. He was chatting with a few fans and we were next in line. Luckily we didn't have to make much of an introduction.

The crowd parted and there stood this man. A very softspoken, yet confident man, he greeted us at once and asked our names.

We told him and he immediately commented on our buttons (purchased approximately 15 minutes before we met him). They say "Scotland's for me!" and have a logo that is on the latest album artwork.

He chuckled about the buttons and then said that he wished he had more time to spend in Milwaukee. He liked the layout and the look of it.

I assured him he'd have a good time here.

They had to get going to Minneapolis to make a gig the next day.

Abbey asked if he'd take a picture with us and voila! The rest is history.

(This post goes out to Andrew Aschenbrenner. Thanks for the introduction to the great band!)

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Joe, aren't they a band from Bangladesh?