Andy Gapin

I love The Gaslight Anthem. I think they’re the perfect mix of southern rock and country influences with punk rock. I wish I could get out there to see them more often, but Friday’s show at Asbury Lanes was pretty great. It was their first sold out show in New Jersey and they really rocked.

Here are a few entirely-too-dark-to-really-make-out-what’s-going-on pictures…

What a weird show last night. It all came together half decently, but I not only played Death Cab For Cutie for the first–and probably last–time ever, but I also played the new Weezer single. I’ve really been out on them since The Green Album came out. After that and Maladroit, I couldn’t even listen to the old stuff anymore, it was all ruined for me. Had I not been tricked into watching the the video for “Pork And Beans,” I don’t think I would have given it a chance at all, but I kind of liked it a bit. I included the video below the playlist for this week’s The Playlist.

Source: 90.3 The Core

After my second trip to Chicago, I can safely say that it is my favorite city ever. I’m not going to lie and say that the people are any friendlier than they are in New Jersey, NYC, or Philly, but there is a lot less bustle.

Most of the trip was spent eating. I gained about seven pounds over the course of the five days! When we first got there, we hit up Portillo’s and I got a very tasty chilidog and a vanilla milk shake. The next day we had breakfast at a place called Orange that had “frushi” which is basically sushi, but with fruit instead of sushi. It was even better than it sounds. For my actual meal, I got cinnamon roll pancakes which were hands down the best pancakes I’ve ever had in my life…and I’ve had a lot of pancakes. And breakfast the next day included a sweet breakfast burrito from The Bongo Room.

The first night there we checked out No Country For Old White Men at the Second City theater. I had never been there before, but a ton of famous actors have come out of there. I thought that the show was supposed to be completely improv. It was not. But it was still completely hilarious and obviously isn’t the same show every night as there was a lot of current, mostly political, events brought into it. I really recommend checking it out if you have the chance.

We spent one day doing mostly park and other tourist related stuff. We checked out Buckingham Fountain at Grant Park. This is the fountain that is shown in the opening credits of Married With Children. From there, we walked over to Millennium Park. This park wasn’t open the last time that I was there, but it was pretty neat. The Bean was fun to take pictures at and while we were walking around it, we saw some band filming a video using Guitar Hero and Rock Band instruments. It was pretty funny to watch, but I still think it’s an idea that is much funnier until it actually happens. From there we walked over to Navy Pier which was pretty much the Midwest equivalent of the boardwalk at the Jersey shore.

The next day we went to Reckless Records which is a pretty nice record store, but I’m kind of past buying physical CDs anymore and I’m not a huge record collector (when I was younger, I had to force myself to not get into this for the sole fact that I knew it would destroy me financially). I did pick up the reissue of The Replacements’ Let It Be though.

We also went to the Museum of Science and Industry and the Threadless Store. Unfortunately, all of the exhibits at the museum were sold out by the time that we got there, but it was still a fun museum to wonder around and take pictures in. The Threadless store was pretty awesome, but I already had bought all of the shirts they had that I wanted from the online store. Oh well.

On Memorial Day, we went to the Arlington Racetrack. I’ve never been to a horse racetrack before and, to be honest, it was probably somewhere in the top 10 of things that are the least interesting to me. That being said, I actually did have fun. I only bet $20 throughout the course of the day since I’m not much of a gambler, but it was still a lot more exciting than I thought it would be.

All in all, it was an excellent trip despite our flight being delayed on the way back and them waiting until after we were actually on the plan to delay it. Even though we mostly did touristy type stuff, the city has a great vibe to it and it’s a lot of fun. Now that I’ve been there twice, I’m definitely sure that I’d like to move there for a least a few years.

Check out the slideshow!

This one comes from Threadless. I love it.

I ended up playing a lot of the same songs as last week, but it was a good show otherwise…

Source: 90.3 The Core

I meant to post about this earlier, but I took a trip into the city on Sunday night to see the Gin Blossoms at BB King Blues Club. They sounded really good, but when you really only care to hear the hits and there’s a dude blowing pot smoke into the back of your head, it’s hard to get super into it. They played everything that I wanted to hear so I can’t complain, but I don’t get why they thought they should be playing new music. I know that they put out a new album last year, but seriously, I don’t think anyone cares. They have a few really awesome songs, but at this point, there’s no need for them to be making new music. It’s just pointless. The new stuff isn’t bad by any means, but there’s just no place for it.

The crowd was expectedly older and there’s a solid chance that the couple standing in front of us was an erectile dysfunction commercial, but at least they were calm.

I’d like to take a minute and appreciate Mitch Clem. I don’t personally know him, but he runs the website mitchclem.com (fitting, right?) which pretty much makes my day on a daily basis Monday through Friday.

His site consists of two comic strips. One is called My Stupid Life and the other is Nothing Nice To Say. Nothing Nice To Say is pretty much a commentary on punk rock and the music scene that uses all of the bands we know and love, both new and old, in to crack jokes. Sadly, it’s currently on hiatus, but there are some gems in the archive…

Frosted Blakes – One of my favorites since given the chance, I would have the straightest gay sex ever with Blake Schwarzenbach (Jawbreaker, Jets To Brazil).
Hardcore Foods – Can you really say that you’ve never had a conversation with a friend parodying band names to fit a certain topic?
Blake Schwarzenbach – Yeah, I’m sorry. I’m obsessed, but I’m pretty sure I’m guilty of doing this to everyone I know.

My Stupid Life seems to be more of an autobiographical strip that is essentially the Seinfeld of comic strips. Ranging from mustache racism to unnecessary hockey heckling to attempted threesomes, the strip hits all aspects of normal, daily life for a twenty-something American.

Check it out!

The Hold Steady have released the single from their upcoming album Stay Positive on Myspace. It’s called “Sequestered in Memphis” and all I have to say is if the rest of the album sounds like this, then they are on their way to delivering their second perfect album in a row.

Get excited!

Link: http://www.myspace.com/theholdsteady

Last night’s show was a bit all over the place with some of the music that I played, but it was a very good mixture, I thought.

Source: 90.3 The Core

This one came from shirt.woot.com.