MGMT, Spoon & BECK @ Hollywood Bowl - The un-review

Last night's concert featured not one, but three astonishing artists under the stars at the Hollywood Bowl. It was, trust me, a great night of music. But, I am no critic. No reviewer. I'm just a grateful tag-along as another reviewer's "date."

Don't expect any great musical insights from me, for anything along those lines you'll have to see what you think of my husband's review of the show today in The Orange County Register.

Anyhow -- This is just my own take in my remedial, amature blog which sports about 20 hits a day. Max.

So, here's the micro-amateur-review.

It was dazzling.


We had amazing seats. MGMT, who opened, was terrific. (I'm a huge fan of this group, so I was walking on air from their first familiar notes.)

Following their set, Spoon came out played a really mesmerizing, lengthy set, as well. They were really great, too. I finally heard more of their work, last night, meaning that now I need to seek and devour their cd's to obsess over how cool I think they were, too.

Last night, was one of those nights where on numerous occasions I just had these waves of goose bumps come over me. It was a sensory appreciation of being cloaked in some of the best contemporary music available all gathered in one night for us. I'd be watching and taking it all in, when all of a sudden another wave of shuddery, goosebump-y happiness would just wash over me. (and this was sober, mind you.) I'd probably have to be revived with smelling salts if I'd gone to Coachella.

Naturally, Beck, was off-the-charts good. Musically, he was sizzling -- In terms of connecting with the audience and other members of the band, he seemed a bit aloof, I thought. Never offensively so, but I don't feel like I can tell what kind of person he is at all after having seen his show last night. Had sort-of that Dylan hide-behind-my-face thing going on.

(Honestly - I think Beck is so intreguing and so, so talented therefore, so very sexy (anyone that talented is sexy regardless of their gender or age) can you seriously blame me for not wanting more?

His lanky circa 1978 long hair sort-of kept us all a bit at a distance, however. I wanted to read his face as he tore through his set. Sometimes, even with two giant plasma screens focused on this man-behind-the-mike-behind-the-hair-under-the-hat dwarfing the stage, it was challenging to always get a read on him.

Even when we could see his face, he's something of a "deadpan" read. But, perhaps this is him being true to his work these days. I get that. I'm just a Beck fan who wanted as much as I could get, that's all.

Over all his attire was what I'd classify as a 80's low tech look. This presentation of the legendary Beck did, frankly, surprise me -- as did the inclusion of a far more complex, instrumentally influenced sound. I suppose his new work has evolved into a richer, more multi-layered form of musical expression. It worked, even if it does take his audience into a darker, more introspective and, possibly, more...uhm. I looking for a better word for this, but I keep coming back to the word "depressing," place. But, hey. I guess that just means his work is relative to what's happening globally, these days, which only makes me love him that much more for exploring that musically.

The feeling I got from the last part of his set, which included his dad conducting the LA Phil. behind him under a huge computerized LED screen with 1 or 2 dimensional images flashing in the background, all lent one to an overall feeling that we were just blips in the sound bite of our existence. Especially so during his song "Replica."

This song was haunting, but entirely upstaged by a futuristic clip playing over and over of asian faces peering into some sort of monitor (the audience) over and over during the song. It certainly added to the "we are all just faces and meaningless and disconnected." Hey, I have no idea if this is what he was going for, but it sure hit me that way. It was kind of, well, a bummer even though the music was haunting and beautiful. But, still I like, "Fuck. We're all meaningless, in the end, aren't we?"

Which, possibly, we are.

Let's face it, anyone paying attention to the world these days is not going to run around with a "Fuck it, let's just party!" attitude. The world's going to hell in a hand bucket faster than a Republican can shoot something in the face, so what artist paying attention to any of this could possibly run around in silly clothes and roll around in purple satin sheets under a mirror ball last night? At least, not these days. Hopefully, another day.

Anyhow, he was low tech on the style-o-meter and bit shaggy grunge meets the 80's. Not unappealing at all, just surprisingly low tech for a guy who is so very hip and cool and, well, adorable.

The show was wonderful, though.




















At one part of the concert I felt bad for the assembled, (perfectly on pitch) orchestra their very first song joining Beck up on stage. There seemed to be an amplification issue going on that inevitably distracted from the music. And I did cringe inside for all of those talented musicians working so hard and having their sound become so distorted and ugly. Unfortunately it did ruin what was clearly a beautiful piece, otherwise. I know that had to not be what they wanted, but they fixed it after that one. The orchestra blended seamlessly after that first piece. It was beautiful.

Hey, whose complaining? Not me. -- I loved every minute of the show.

Sadly, we don't really get how to use our new digital camera so all our jpgs of the show were really bad. I'll have to go troll Flickr now and see who does know how to use their camera.



In any event, last night Pete and I drove home in happy, but exhausted silence. I have no idea what he wrote -- He's in the dining room right now bouncing it back and forth with the editor - I'm sure it's much better than this.

But, I just wanted to say I loved finally getting to see Beck live. I love his work, love his voice, his music. Clearly he's a colossal talent who hopefully we'll hear alot more from in the future.

Like Spoon, I also heard many pieces of music I had not previously been exposed to yet, so now I can go out and hungrily seek and devour more Beck, as well, to, hopefully, get closer to what this very interesting, astonishingly talented guy has to say.

In short, last night was a great night .