iron & wine/calexico show

ok, so after we got back tuesday (i'm still working on that one), i came very close to skipping this show. i was knackered and i knew the music would be chill enough to make me fall asleep standing up, but i gathered my last ounce of energy and went in to meet co-worker chris and the jensenator for some unbelievable shit.

tim fite was up first...this guy is all gimmicks. some of it's funny, he's got some drawings and he refers to himself as "the gentleman with itchy legs". but it got old real quick. sadly, his music was pretty good, but i was leaning towards not liking it by the end for all of his schtick.

calexico were up next and holy hell, these guys are so fucking awesome live. i loved it because there are so many people up there and they are each interesting to watch. there are two trumpeters, one of whom doubles as a xylophone, accordian and guitar player, and the other of whom does these awesome, for lack of a better term, mexican style whoops. they played for about 30 minutes or so, which was annoying, cause i would have rather seen more of them than the first dude. at the end of one song, they did a little bit of the specials' "ghost town", with a little mexican attitude, it was hot. i'm gonna say this again just to make sure you get the point: these dudes are fucking awesome.

after that was an older mexican dude who'd never been to new york before. he's on the first or second track of the "in the reins" ep. he did some pretty cool shit, but i missed a lot of it when i went out for a smoke. the howling trumpeter from calexico played a little, too.

then there was a band that sucked so much ass i'm not gonna say anything else about them.

finally, i&w came out. they played about four songs from woman king and some stuff i didn't recognize. there was a quick tease when sam played the first four notes or so from "such great heights", but it turned into another song that sounds similar. that would have been pretty cool.

then, little by little, calexico came back out. they played most or all of the ep as well as an awesome version of "all tomorrow's parties", which was so fucking loud and full and layered, it was like a wave breaking over me. they also covered "wild horses", for which they brought out a special guest. he was a freaked out looking kid who didn't seem to have ever heard, let along sung, "wild horses" before, but it was still very pretty.

all in all, a show worth draggin your entirely exhausted ass to.

streams available of other shows at kexp and npr.