End of Silence

I found at the last minute yesterday that Helmet was playing Red 7. I’ve been a fan since 1991 or so and don’t miss a chance to see them if I can help it. If I’m remembering correctly, this is the fourth or fifth time I’ve seen them. Granted, the only original member left is Page Hamilton, but it’s still worth checking out. Page’s old bandmate, John Stanier, will be in town this coming weekend for Fun Fun Fun Fest with one of his current bands, Battles. I took a ton of pictures, including this one at the end of the set. You can check out the rest by clicking the photo.

Helmet kicked off the set with the first 5 tracks from Aftertaste in the same order as the record without stopping. They stuck with older material for the rest of the set, only playing one track from last year’s Monochrome, “Swallowing Everything” and “See You Dead” from 2004’s Size Matters. They pulled several off of Strap It On, including “Blacktop” and “Sinatra”, which they apparently haven’t played live in quite a while. Hamilton filled in some back story on the song, inadvertently mentioning the name of the girlfriend who inspired it. He swore us to secrecy. I’ve seen Page take requests from the audience before and he did that last night. There were at least 4 tracks from Betty, including “Wilma’s Rainbow”, “I Know”, “Milquetoast”, and “Tic”. They finished with “In the Meantime” and also played “Unsung”. They had good energy and the club was pretty full. I’m wondering if they’re going to stick with an older set list for most of the tour?

Page clearly likes Austin. He mentioned that they arrived in town on Sunday night and spent some time at Sidebar. They’re headed to Corpus Christi today. You can find the rest of the dates for this tour here.

My wife and I went to see Tony Bourdain at the Paramount on Saturday night. We’re big fans of both Cooks Tour and No Reservations. My wife worked in the restaurant industry here in town and remembers reading parts of Kitchen Confidential with the kitchen crew at Chez Nous and howling at his description of vegetarians and their “Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans”. The show was completely sold out. Bourdain came out and talked about how amazed and thankful he was for how his life has turned out. He’s still completely shocked that he’s been able to do Cook’s Tour and No Reservations after writing Kitchen Confidential.

He reiterated a lot of the themes that appear in his shows: how food brings people together and how a society’s culture is tied to their food. He referred a lot to specific No Reservations shows, so audience members who weren’t familiar with him probably felt a little left out. Since the Paramount sells season tickets and many people end up picking an unfamiliar performer for at least one show, it was clear there were some people who fell into that category. The annoying jerk of the night award goes to the guy in the upper right balcony who answered a cell phone call during the performance, then stood up while talking and moved out into the right aisle and then slowing walked in front of several rows while still talking. What an inconsiderate a-hole. There was a lengthy Q&A session after his talk. At least half of the questions were pretty bad, but he fielded them all gracefully, including the shouts from overenthusiastic groupies. He recommended Bill Bruford’s Heat and, not surprisingly, named French Laundry and Masa as his top restaurant picks even if you have to rob a bank to get the cash to afford eating at either one.
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