Gang of Four-Boston MA February 7, 2011

All photos by FreeEye2

Set List

You'll Never Pay For The Farm

Not Great Men

Ether

I Parade Myself

Paralysed

A Fruit Fly In The Beehive

Anthrax

What We All Want

I Party All the Time

Why Theory?

You Don't Have To Be Mad

We Live As We Dream, Alone

To Hell With Poverty!

Do As I Say

Encore 1

He'd Send In The Army

Natural's Not In It

Damaged Goods

Encore 2

Return The Gift

Another night out with FreeEye2, another great show. Links in set list go to YouTube postings of those songs from this show at The Paradise in Boston MA.

Picture 3 shows Jon King destroying their first pizza oven ever on stage during "He'd Send In the Army"

Picture 4 shows Hugo Burnham, ex-original drummer, who lives and teaches in the Boston area, sitting in with the band during "Natural's Not In It" and "Damaged Goods"

The night started out on a high note as we met at Pho Viet for Banh Mi. This was the first time FreeEye2 had ever had one.  He loved it (it is impossible not to).  It still rates as the standard in the Boston area for me. The 5.5B/6 rating still stands even though we ate about 6PM.  The bread was still perfect that late into the day.  I asked for hot and got plenty of jalapenos and a good squirt of sriracha.

I was first in line at the club and we got a great spot right in front of where Jon and Andy would end up playing on stage. The Paradise had put metal barriers up around the stage (are we in Cairo?), which were handy to push back against the crowd when the moshing got going.

Hollerado from Canada opened up. Nice guys with lots of familiar riffs, but everyone was there to see GoF.

Concert update: John Doe plays Passim in Cambridge MA on Sunday March 27, 2011. Jill Sobule is on also on the bill. Link here.

Banh Mi Battel-Dorchester MA #4

What: Beef Banh Mi

Where: Chau's Bakery
1456 Dorchester Avenue
Dorchester MA 02122
How much: $3.00
Time of visit: a Thursday about 1PM

Banh Mi.  The sunshine to mentally melt all the ice and snow around me, even for just a moment.

(readers, cue The Dismemberment Plan - The Ice of Boston) (clicking on link should open YouTube in a new browser tab so you can hear my selected audio track playing, but you will have to click back on this tab to return) (this finally works again)

(The Dismemberment Plan is playing The Paradise on Jan. 28th. They sold out before I could get tickets.  Readers, if you can pull off a miracle and get me in, I would be VERY appreciative)

This day's travels took me to Dorchester MA again. Things have been a bit slow on the professional front with all of the snow we've been getting, so I was able to make some time to visit the Fields Corner area of Dorchester.

K asked a Viet friend what Ba Le meant and her friend said "bread", not Paris as I thought. Maybe it is one of those multiple definition words?

To the reader who challenged me to get the sardine Banh Mi,  I wasn't quite up for the challenge.  I don't know if I ever will. Maybe I will after I have tried beef Banh Mi in every place in New England that serves it, though that may not be far off.


Sorry about not having a photo of the menu or inside.  The menu basically listed Banh Mi $2.75 and Special Banh Mi $3.00. That was it for any English.  I tried to get a picture of it, but the place was rather small. It was particularly hard to act inconspicuous and take a picture of the ingredients station and menu. When I got inside Chau's, there was one person in line in front of me. After I was served, I was the only one left inside besides the staff, who all stared at me as I fumbled with my camera.  I got off one shot that turned out too blurry, so I left to not wanting to make a further spectacle of myself.

Banh Mi University graduate? Oh yes! Cum Laude. Note the white deli wrap and elastic as one would expect. Bread was excellent, about as close to perfect as I have had. The crust was eggshell thin and flaky. The inside was light and airy with that slightly chewy texture. Loaf size was just slightly smaller than others I have had recently. The meat was modest in quantity and not super tasty. The shape of the beef pieces was long and thin, similar to Hong Coc. The biggest problem was that the meat was not very warm.  It was sitting in some sort of marinade/cooking juice in the ingredients bin, but considering that it was right next to the vegetables, probably not heated. They did not microwave the meat either as some places do. The plant material was only good. Cilantro was a bit limp and not freshly cut. I would have preferred a bit more too. The carrots were mixed with daikon, generous, tasty, slightly pickled and yet still a bit crisp. The cucumber was very thin and very lonely. Scallions were present here. The smear of mayo was generous and moistened everything very nicely. I asked the counter person for spicy. I did get jalapenos, but these also did not seem recently cut. The first bite had a little heat and continued at a low level for the rest of the Banh Mi. The burn did not last very long. Service was very fast.

Chau's functions as a wholesale bakery also, which explains the superb bread and lesser  focus on the other ingredients. The business card says that they are open Mon-Sun 5AM-7PM. Parking on Dot. Ave was pretty bad after the recent storm.. At $3.00, a good value for the money. Great bread thought.

I'd give it 4.5B/6.

(_!_) (_!_) (_!_) (_!_) (_!

I guess I'll be back to Dorchester very soon to get to the Ba Le just across the street from Chau's.

Concert Alert-Gang of Four

Sorry about the vintage video, but I figured you needed to get a bit of a history lesson...
And later...



I saw them for the first time with FreeEye2 (I didn't know J-Mar then and she has already said no to this show?!? "Gang of Who?") at what is now the House of Blues in Boston a couple of years back.  I believe it was their first reunion tour (drums still played by Hugo Burnham).  My most fond memory  of the show is them utterly destroying a  microwave oven with a wiffleball bat.  The show was one of my top ten ever.

This tour is supporting their new material (artwork above).  I heard a new track "Never Pay for the Farm" over at NPR's Son of the Day of all places and GoF sounds as great as ever.
Date is February 7, 2011
Venue is The Paradise in Boston.

The Buzzcocks

Buzzcocks photos by FreeEye2

(readers, cue The Buzzcocks - Live) (clicking on link should open YouTube in a new browser tab so you can hear my selected audio track playing, but you will have to click back on this tab to return)

Above link is the Buzzcocks playing in Farmingdale NY on May 15, 2010

The link is a pretty good approximation of the show that FreeEye2, JMar and I went to see at The Paradise in Boston.  The set list in the picture is from the 5/17/10 Paradise show that we saw.  FreeEye2 got a picture of it just before The Buzzcocks hit the stage.  Right after Orgasm Addict, the last song of the encore, I had to battle some underage girl for it.  It ended up ripping in two and I got the larger piece.  After the show, one of the roadies took the set list off the drum riser and came over and gave it to her. She then gave me the little crumpled-up piece she had beaten me to.

The show was great. What else can I tell you?  You had to be there.  The show was 18+ and sold out.  You can see the set list in the photo above. There was LOT'S of moshing.  Being right up front, at least I could push back off of the stage.  There was even some crowd surfing and the kids were not kicked out, just escorted back into the crowd on the side of the stage.  Thanks to the Paradise stage for keeping things fun, punk rock and not too crazy.  I can link you here though for a real review.

Dollyrots photo by JMar

The opening band was The Dollyrots.  They were great!  (Full disclosure, JMar went to high school with Chris, the drummer.)  The songs got the whole crowd moving and Kelly had great stage presence. (More disclosure, Chris got us into the dressing room and Pete Shelley asked me if I was thirsty and got me a Guinness)  Thanks Chris, Kelly and Luis!!!!  And you too JMar!

Music Ramblings

I got to see Johann Johannsson last Sunday.  The show was at the Brattle Theater in Cambridge, MA.  Turnout was light.  I think Crash Arts did a pretty poor job promoting the show.

The show itself was great.  (Disclosure: I was given free tickets by the tour manager for my work at last years show at the Cambridge YMCA.)  Material was off  his last four releases.

Tuesday, I also saw John Doe and Exene Cervenka at the Paradise with my friend FreeEye2. Seating was cabaret style which is very unusual for a Paradise show.  FreeEye2 and I got front row seats in front of John Doe despite getting there a half an hour after doors opened.  The music was a great mix of X and Knitters stuff with a new song written by Exene.  There was nothing off any of John's solo stuff.

PIL played in Boston at Royale (used to be the Roxy) Tuesday and Wednesday.  I was off on a long travel day on Wednesday.  To make up for it, I had dinner with my friends SurGGGe and Surge.  SurGGGe made a wonderful risotto.  PIL will be in Providence on Sunday and in Northhampton later.  I may try to make one of those shows.

All photos from the repective artists websites.