Bright Eyes (4/9/25)

Readers might remember I saw Bright eyes not to long ago - and it wasn’t a great experience.  Coming back around on tour, under their official name - this time at The Agora - I thought they’d be worth another try.  This one was better.

Basia Bułat (4/4/25)

I was traveling to Minneapolis for a work conference and was ELATED to see Basia Bulat would be performing at The Cedar Cultural Center, supporting her newest album!  I’ve been anxiously awaiting new music and a tour, and she hit all the notes.  Such a personable and authentic performer - and a great venue too!  I would have taken more photos, but I was too busy taking video!  Now I just hope for a second leg of the tour where she comes to Cleveland!

Maia Friedman opened.

Occidental Gypsy (3/28/25)

I’ve heard great things about BLU Jazz+ in Akron for years, and finally made it happen!  Made this into a fancy night out in Akron, stopping at the Diamond Grille for a great meal and then BLU Social for a cocktail before the show.  Occidental Gypsy was a treat.  Classy and fabulous, all the way around.  Looking forward to doing it all again.

Martha Wainwright (3/22/25)

It’s been a long time since I’ve been to Ann Arbor, and probably even longer since I’ve seen a show at The Ark.  I’ve always appreciated their business model, and I was even more excited to see Martha Wainwright was doing a 20th anniversary tour of her self-titled release!   I saw her ON that tour back in 2005 at the Beachland Tavern - one of my all time favorite shows.   Performance this night at The Ark completely lived up to it.  I had a great seat for the show, but that also meant that it wasn’t really appropriate to capture any video of the show - so photos will have to do.

M3F Festival 2025

This year I headed West to escape some of Ohio’s winter - and see one of the best lineups I've seen in a 2 festival!  M3F Fest had an list of artists and I’ll include everyone I saw below.  I won’t review each one, but the video is a collection of my favorite 15 seconds (or so) from each performance of the weekend.  Seeing Phoenix was great too!  Definitely want to go back:

Here’s who I saw!

Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs (DJ Set)
LP Giobbi
Alvvays
LCD Soundsystem
Monster Rally
Confidence Man
Doss
Leisure
Mindchatter
Sylvan Esso
BAYNK
Girl Talk
Justice

Brite Winter Festival (2025)

Brite Winter Festival, this year on the East Bank of the Flats!  Loved it - as always. 

Travis (2/11/25)

It has been a pretty rough beginning of the year, and I had chosen to not see some shows - including ones that I even had tickets for (Joy Oladokun, Guster, ugh), but I did make it out to see this Travis show at the Agora.  Going back and trying to figure out when I saw them last, I realized that it was before I started my blog (9/13/00 at the Agora), but I did post about them here - talking about how nice it is having just moved to a city where I don’t have to drive two hours back home after the show.  Reading that was just a little extra motivation to make sure I made it to this show - and I’m so glad I did!  

They sounded great. It wasn’t a huge crowd, which I’ll always appreciate.  Even got a nice spot up front for some good video.  They’re such a delightful and down-to-earth band.  Fran in particular is a real character.  I ran across a podcast he did with Bob Lefsetz.  Very entertaining.  And their new album is as good as anything they’ve done!

BoomBox (2/12/25)

Another BoomBox show show at the Beachland Ballroom, another great reason to dance.  Met some really fun people that night...

Of course it’s always a delight to see Joey Sardelle warm up a crowd.

Rubblebucket (1/19/25)

I’ve seen Rubblebucket plenty of times before (2011, 2016, 2018), but as the first couple seconds of this video shows - they put on a spectacle when they perform.  Of course the music continues to be great too.  I mean how can you not love Stella the Begonia??

As like last time, Hannah Mohan (All The Kids) opened for them.  She continues to have a cool indie sound about her.