And you thought you had a busy weekend…

Thurs – Great Northern @ the Hammer. This is a great outdoor venue and would be just perfect for a wedding or party. Not the best for live music since the sound just bounces off all the concrete, but really, for a free concert, it was good fun!

Fri – Sara Bareilles, The Last Goodnight, Rocco Deluca. I absolutely love the Fonda, it’s so very art deco. We had the privilege of attending a private pre-concert party a while back up on the roof and it’s an amazing, fun space. We caught the tail end of Sara and for a young’un, she sounded great and really worked the crowd. We went to specifically to see/shoot The Last Good Night as my hubby was at their record launch a week or so ago. They’re quite good – very Maroon 5ish. I have to say though, Rocco Deluca, so not my thing. But dayum can that boy rock a guitar! Impressive.

Sat – KaiserCartel @ the Hotel Cafe. Now with exceptions (mostly being, excessive heat, mass crowds and rude, talkative audience members – see the Hanson show post) I really love seeing shows at the Hotel Cafe. It’s a well-run, small, intimate scene where you can really enjoy the music and the bands’ interaction. And while I don’t see KaiserCartel making it big on the radio anytime soon, their sound was incredible! They ended the night totally acoustic, no mics, wandering around the place singing to everyone. I don’t think I’ve ever heard that place so quiet. It was awesome!

This was followed by…Dave Lichens, Libbie Schrader, Andrea Wasse @ Room 5. This is yet another awesome venue to listen to singer/songwriters. It’s even more intimate than the Hotel Cafe, but believe it or not, they have seating!! It’s upstairs from Amalfi Ristorante over on La Brea. They make some awesome cocktails (and my Cosmo was actually made with Grey Goose!) and they’re not crazy expensive. I hear good things about the restaurant – everything that passed by looked great and again, great prices. We’ll either have to eat there next show, or make it a date night outing. Speaking of, what a great location for a date night…good food, good drinks, good atmosphere and good music. Sounds like a great date to me!

I have to say though, seeing eight performances in three days, well, that’s just a bit much for me. Then again, since the hubby started up with his concert photography biz (before that, he was reviewing live shows), summers are typically like this. It gets to be fun when we get to travel for shows!! I think our next big out of state gig will be Herbie Hancock in Santa Fe, not counting Pitchfork in Chicago (since I’m not going to that).

In closing…holy segue Batman! Can I just say that it drives me crazy when I don’t seem to have a natural ending or a good segue. Mind you, not crazy enough to dwell on it. Just crazy enough to know that it’s out there, for all the world to read.