Doll Test, The Tripwires, Model Rockets and Jonathan Richman

In a continuing effort to see/hear as much live music as possible, we trekked to beautiful Ballard, Washington (Seattle neighborhood immortalized in the Robyn Hitchcock song, "Viva Sea Tac") to the Tractor Tavern to hear Doll Test and John Ramberg's two bands The Tripwires and The Model Rockets - the last a reunion show.  Great fun!   I'd never heard The Model Rockets live or Doll Test at all before.  Both were awesome!  See/hear for yourself!

That's what I should have been doing for last New Year's...

& Here's Doll Test



They were handing out cds Friday night - got the one named for and containing that song. I rather like them.

Apologies - I can't seem to find any Model Rockets videos. They all seem to be about 'real' model rockets for some inexplicable reason. Hmmpf!

We made it back to Portland as dawn was breaking, oh 5-ish a.m. Caught a few hours sleep, waking in time to get Salvador to his doctor's (veterinary) appointment. My little old man. He's on high blood pressure meds now. The doc said he was doing better - blood pressure looking good - yay! 17 is getting up there for a Tabby Boy.

Decided late in the afternoon to go out to Jonathan Richman's Aladdin Theater show - luckily not sold out! Was my first time to hear him live - knew him mostly by reputation and from hearing others do his songs ("Pablo Picasso" done by Bowie on the Reality album...) Barbara had been a big Modern Lovers fan back in the day.

He didn't do Pablo Picasso, but he did this



and had everyone singing the chorus with him in Portland, too.

Got Three Leg Torso at Holocene on Wednesday to look forward to. Haven't heard those guys in a long time. A friend of mine was Bela Balogh's girlfriend's house mate years ago so all of the barbeques at their place ended up Three Leg Torso gigs - nice! Ran into Courtney a while back at a show - either Richard Thompson or Nick Lowe, I can't remember which.  Wait... it was longer ago than that - it was Bill Rieflin's Slow Music project.  The show where Peter Buck was playing his Rickenbacker with a butter knife.  

Here's a preview



On the Portland Streetcar - how very (weird) and Portland! Pirates (finally made it to the Pirate store in the Lloyd center today) and Gypsy music, what more could you want?