My number one reason is the strange population of turtle people that seem to inhabit all of Manhattan. Anywhere I walked in Manhattan, I found myself dodging people meandering back and forth across the sidewalk, crawling along as they pecked away at their Blackberries, and stopping to gawk at anything and everything.
I know, I know, some of these people are tourists, and they can't help it. But I'm pretty good at picking out tourists after all this time near DC, and a lot of these people weren't tourists. They were just damned slow. I'm becoming increasingly convinced that New York is the city that never sleeps because it takes everyone so long to walk to their destinations, they need all 24 hours of the day.
My second reason is the lack of history the city has preserved. Cities I've really loved visiting, like London and Boston, have seemed to be able to grow larger and progress without bulldozing over all of their past. These historic buildings intermingled with the new gives a city a sense of place, a charm and a character that an endless string of skyscrapers will never impart.
I'd always thought of New York as the city that impossibly demolished the old Penn Station and replaced it with the hideous hole known as Penn Station today. So before this trip I made an effort to see if there were any historic areas left. I found a few — an old Dutch house in way, way, upper Manhattan that I didn't have time to see, and Fraunces Tavern, which I did.
Fraunces Tavern is a small museum, a restaurant, and part of a small, brick block of buildings cowering under the skyscrapers not far from Wall Street. It's also the place where George Washington gave his farewell speech at the close of the Revolutionary War, and the room where he spoke has been restored. Compared to other historic sites and museums I've visited, it wasn't very impressive, but I think the Fraunces Tavern deserves some props merely for continuing to exist, a historic holdout in lower Manhattan.
Fraunces Tavern
It's not the only holdout. I also stopped into Trinity Church, a more famous but equally historic landmark. I was surprised that the interior looked more like the English cathedrals I've visited than any other church on this continent I've visited, and was glad I went inside on this visit.
New York also seems to suffer from having too many things to do. I know one that's one of its qualities — there's something for everyone in the Big Apple. But it also results in analysis paralysis when you're trying to decide where to eat dinner, or grab drinks. How do you choose when there are 200 great options?
And, perhaps more importantly, by the time someone distills down those 200 great options into a guidebook, recommending a place, anyone with any sense has moved on to the next big thing, fleeing impending horde of tourists. The cool non-touristy neighborhood spots that you can shake out with enough Yelp skills in other cities are the places that became stopping points for tour busses long ago in New York.
So those are my main reasons for not really liking New York. I won't even go into the subway, except to say that I was so relieved to descend down the escalator into Gallery Place's cavernous, CLEAN Metro station on my way back to Silver Spring.
Don't get me wrong, New York has a lot of redeeming qualities, and I'm sure I'll be back. It stands alone in variety and quality of options for theater, restaurants, nightlife, and shopping in this country, even with the aforementioned paralyzing bounty of choices. We walked across the Brooklyn Bridge and then had pizza at Grimaldi's Saturday, and checked out the High Line on Sunday, all quite fun. And there were bagels. BAGELS!
But if I could somehow swap its position with Boston, and have Beantown be within a 3-3 1/2 hour train ride of Washington instead, I'd do it in a heartbeat. Screw the bagels. The very thought of Boston that close makes my mouth water for a cannoli from Mike's.
One more Underworld video...although I feel it's appropriate
Mmm... New York? I like you.
So here is the problem with going to New York for the first time ever to see an Underworld concert. The concert was so amazingly mindblowingly awesome that we got up on Saturday and went, okay, what do we do now? Because nothing New York had to offer was going to be as great as that concert.
So we moseyed over to Grand Central Terminal, which was really lovely. It was nice to see all the open space, as it hasn't been sliced into a mall like Union Station, as much as I love Union Station. Then we took the subway to where the subway construction started, and a shuttle bus to Battery Park, where we were going to pick up the ferry to Liberty and Ellis Islands.
A bit about the subway and our navigation of New York. MTA doesn't have a decent map posted of the New York subway. The one they have kind of looks like the London Tube map in the 1930s before they figured out that the linear map was the way to go, except they also try to put other geographical features in there to make it extra-confusing. We were able to find this one online which did enable us to get around, sort of.
On Friday, we decided on Josh's advice to walk to the concert in Central Park. It was quite a few blocks but it was a nice walk. We went past Rockefeller Center, stopped for dinner and kept walking. We passed the New York Library, with the lions in the front, as per Josh's instructions. Then we decided to stop for coffee right near the Empire State Building.
So if you know New York you know by now that we had been going in the wrong direction. For about 20 blocks, it turns out, starting somewhere after Rockefeller Center. I looked outside the window of the Starbucks and saw 33rd Street. We needed to enter the park at 72nd. Uh, whoops. Turns out there's more than one New York Library with lions in the front. We had thought it looked bigger in Ghostbusters.
We still had plenty of time to make it to the concert but we were not about to walk 40 blocks there. So we found a subway station and a train going in the right direction and got on. At about this point we're congratulating ourselves on our ability to find our way around a city via the subway, if not on surface streets. We take the DC Metro frequently, and have ridden the subway in other world cities as well. We are subway veterans!
And then the train starts going straight through stops. A lot. Turns out we were on the express train and it didn't stop until 125th. We got off at 125th, took a closer look at all my subway maps, and got on a local train going back in the opposite direction.
So it was a relatively minor deal when the subway stopped earlier than it should have with announcements that there would be a shuttle to Battery Park. In addition to various subway issues, the other lesson learned from New York is that you can't just hop on a ferry and head over quickly to see Liberty Island and Ellis Island. The shuttles are three decks and take forever to load and unload. You can't go up in the Statue of Liberty because of security concerns, so we stayed on the boat and took pictures from there, then got off at Ellis Island, nosed around the museum there a little, and headed back. Somehow all of this took several hours, we were hungry, and our feet were still suffering the aftereffects of the Underworld concert (and walking 20 blocks in the wrong direction) so we decided to bail on plans to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge and took the subway back to the hotel.
We had some dinner and then — after another hilarious subway ride in which I thought Melvin had gotten off the train for reasons unknown, when he had, in fact, moved to the seat next to me (I was engrossed in composing a text message that would not get sent until we got topside) — met up with Josh and Kelly for drinks at this very cool place called the Flatiron Lounge. The decor was perfect in every little detail, and they had lots of good jazz and swing playing, with lots of delicious, creative drinks (although expensive, of course). We had a few drinks there and then headed to an Irish pub type place that I cannot remember the name of.
Hanging out with friends was definitely the best part of our Saturday in New York. I guess that's the thing about it — most of the really touristy things are just really touristy, and I'd already seen them a bazillion times on TV and the movies. We had no desire to go to Times Square, for example, although the Empire State Building would have been good to do if not for my raging fear of heights. But New York does have so many great places for eating and drinking.
Which is good, because, if not for Josh and Kelly, we would have probably been better off continuing on to Boston for another night of Underworld.
And now for an extremely long and detailed post about the Underworld concert. There will be a later post on New York. Sometime.
So I posted earlier that the Underworld show in Central Park completely exceeded my high expectations. Most of the reason for that was Underworld, but part of it was the venue. We were at Rumsey Playfield in Central Park, which was much smaller than I'd expected. Underworld isn't nearly as big in the US as in Europe, but still, they played the Hollywood Bowl for their Los Angeles show, and Paul Oakenfold opened for them, so they're not exactly small, either. They've been gravitating toward outdoor venues, so maybe that's the only place in New York that was outdoors and worked.
For whatever reason, it was a much smaller venue than I'd expected, and we were maybe 100 feet from the stage. So instead of watching an outstanding show where we could barely see the stage, we were close enough to see everything and really really feel the thump of the bass.
The thing — well, one of the things — that makes Underworld different from other electronic acts is that they do an actual live show, and they have an actual front man — Karl Hyde. There's nothing pre-recorded, and the setlist isn't set in advance (well, except everyone knows they're going to play Born Slippy), so Rick Smith, the other half of the duo, is up there piecing together little snippets throughout the show. In the pictures I link to later in this post, you may notice a third guy up there, on the boards with him — that's Darren Price, their DJ for the live shows. Add to that a huge video screen in the background, synched to the music, and you certainly have the makings for a hell of a show.
Here was the official setlist:
1. Luetin 2. New Train 3. Crocodile 4. Pearls Girl 5. Biro The Leggy 6. Two Months Off 7. Rowla 8. Glam Bucket 9. Rez / Cowgirl 10. Born Slippy Nuxx 11. King Of Snake 12. Jumbo
There's some confusion as to whether it was Biro the Leggy or Beautiful Burnout, off of the new album Oblivion With Bells. It sounds like Beautiful Burnout may be Biro the Leggy's younger brother. Here is an unofficial setlist, put together by someone who has better memory than me:
1. Luetin 2. Dark Train 3. "HMH Untitled-2" improv 4. Crocodile 5. Improv 6. Pearl's Girl 7. Improv 8. Beautiful Burnout 9. Two Months Off 10. Rowla 11. 5 Foot 5 12. Glam Bucket 13. Improv 14. Rez/Cowgirl 15. Small Conker and a Twix 16. Born Slippy .NUXX 17. King of Snake 18. Jumbo
Luetin was an interesting choice to kick things off. It's not one of my favorites, but with a slightly slower beat it gave the crowd a chance to warm up. Karl read the lyrics off of a music stand, which cut back on the energy of the piece a bit. It was the only sign all night that they were at all out of practice. Although, to his credit, Luetin doesn't really make any sense, so he can't really be blamed, except for writing it in the first place.
Luetin video
They followed Luetin with New Train, which is some variation (perhaps in name only) of Dark Train. It was a great choice, and one the crowd definitely appreciated. During Dark Train, the video screen behind them kicked into overdrive with a barrage of images, clipping through them at an incredible pace. The screen continued to change throughout the night, sometimes showing live video of Karl or Rick and Darren, sometimes filmed video of Rick and Karl, sometimes photos or other video, and even vintage Atari games — Asteroid, Space Invaders, and finally Pong.
New Train/Dark Train video — this is the cleanest video I've been able to find out of the concert, although you can't really hear the big Underworld bass.
Crocodile sounded great live. It was very danceable and the crowd responded very well to it. Definitely the next Big Underworld Dance Song.
Crocodile video
It took the crowd a little while to catch on to Pearl's Girl, but it still sounds as good as it ever has. I really liked the multimedia screen during this one — words in varying font sizes flashing across the screen so fast I wondered what Underworld was subliminally dropping into my brain.
Pearl's Girl video — this is the best one I could run back across but I feel like I've seen one that's less jerky and lets you see the video better. If I track it back down I'll replace it here.
Beautiful Burnout / Biro the Leggy was a little slower and a little heavy on the vocoder for my taste, but still definitely danceable. I'm very curious to hear how it sounds on the album. I think there were some layers that didn't translate well live, and some of my favorite Underworld songs are just too intricate to really work live. They play Dirty Epic rarely (although they did play it in Denver...Denver also got Moaner — so jealous) and I don't think Banstyle/Sappys Curry ever left the studio.
Beautiful Burnout / BTL video
Beautiful-whatever-it-was was well-positioned, because the next song was a huge, sparkling version of Two Months Off, which had the crowd jumping up and down and screaming, "You bring light in, to a dark place." It was sometime before Two Months Off that they busted out these giant inflatable air tubes to video of Rick and Karl messing around with them in a giant field. The air tubes seemed a little weird at first but they became part of the show, repositioned by the crew periodically and lit up to go with the music, and they worked remarkably well.
Two Months Off — The audio is really fuzzy, but you can see the air tubes and the bouncy crowd
When I finally heard where they were going after the improv period, I exlaimed "Rowla!" Talk about a song that translates well live — it lost the delicacy of the album but was driving, booming, and very danceable.
Rowla video
Glam Bucket was dense and experimental, something to sway to, which was good, because I realized at this point just how much my knee hurt. Normally, if Karl's on the guitar, it's just one of many layers of sound, but you could definitely hear it in this one. I love those little guitar moments in a lot of Underworld songs, so this is another one I can't wait to hear on the new album.
Glam Bucket video
Glam Bucket gave the crowd a chance to rest up, which is good, because Underworld was about to launch into an impossibly spectacular string of songs. Before I go into those, though, some general observations:
1. Underworld puts on a multimedia show. Granted, it's a multimedia show where the music is the obvious star. but between the music, Karl Hyde's crazy antics on the stage, the lights, the smoke, the glowy air tubes and the video screen, there's a whole lot going on. Combine that with dancing and I was in total sensory overload for two-plus hours, but that was part of what made it so oustanding.
2. Karl Hyde is awesome. I knew this already, but I finally got to see it in person. He looked like he was having an absolute blast up there, dancing around. If you saw him bust out some of the moves he pulls at a club, you'd probably stare and go, "what's up with that guy?" Because, let's face it, we're all a little reserved and always trying to make sure we don't do something uncool. But Karl Hyde comes out in front of thousands of people with his arms flung up in the air, dancing around like someone who doesn't care what anyone else thinks about his dancing. And he pulls it off with such joy, such willingness to just embrace the music, that you feel jealous, and then realize that you're released to do the same thing — throw your arms in the air and just go with the music. It's a very powerful feeling. Karl didn't stay in the spotlight the whole night, though. He generally hung back by the deck whenever he was playing the guitar, and sometimes went to the back of the stage and danced there. It made us focus on Rick, who was Very Seriously bent over the deck the entire night like he was doing surgery, and Darren Price, who kept darting around with a hand on his headphones.
So with that said, now it's time to descend into the brilliance that was the best version of Rez/Cowgirl I've ever heard, and I don't say that lightly. Out of a big booming improv bass-y piece, they pulled out the lyrics "everything, everything," over and over again, and it really seemed like they were going to play Cowgirl without Rez, which is pretty much sacrilegious. The loop slowed down and the lyrics distorted, and they slid in the twangy beginning to Cowgirl, and I thought, "wow, they really are going to play Cowgirl without Rez," and I honestly felt a little cheated.
Oh, me of little faith. Out of the twang came just the slightest few electronic pops, and then it slid perfectly into the beginning of Rez, at which point I started screaming and turned to Melvin and yelled, "You can't play Cowgirl without Rez!" with a giant grin on my face. The crowd was already super riled up at this point, and when the song hit that big Rez crescendo, which will never, ever, get old, they went apeshit, myself included. I didn't even consciously think about it — I just HAD to jump up and down and wave my hands in the air with the rest of the crowd.
The transition to Cowgirl was flawless, and Karl sounded great. The crowd was singing along with him — thousands of people yelling, "I'm invisible, I'm invisible." If it wasn't already, it was clear at this point that despite a long hiatus filled only with scattered concert dates, online-only releases and soundtracks, Underworld hasn't lost a thing (or a beat, if you prefer a bad pun). The crowd had huge energy, all the way through to the end, but how could they not?
Rez/Cowgirl 1 — don't turn the volume up on this one too high because it's pretty fuzzy, but it's the only one I've been able to find so far that has the Cowgirl tease at the beginning, through to Rez. I am so hoping that they release audio of this concert, particularly this song.
Rez/Cowgirl 2 — the Cowgirl half of the above video. Again, don't turn it up too high.
Rez with cleaner sound (although less bass)
I was a little sad when they started the opening to Born Slippy Nuxx, because I figured that was it, save maybe for an encore, and the concert would be over soon. But then it kicked into gear and I got caught up in the music, telling myself to just enjoy the hell out of what was left.
Some bands, I think, play their big hit with a little weariness, maybe even a little contempt, like they can't believe they have to trot out the damn song every night. There was none of that with Underworld. It was more, here it is, we're all having so much fun, we know you guys love this song, and it is what it is. And of course the crowd went nuts, jumping up and down, fists pumping the air, despite the fact that we'd all just expended so much energy during Rez/Cowgirl. It goes without saying that we all shouted "Lager! Lager! Lager! Lager!" when the time came.
Born Slippy Nuxx — the sound's about as good on this one as you're going to get, although every video I've found of Born Slippy looks like complete and utter chaos because the cameraman is getting jarred so badly.
Born Slippy Nuxx (different clip)— I mentioned smoke earlier when I was talking about multimedia, and you can see what I was talking about here. The smoke and the lights in time with the music look outstanding. Turn down your volume, though, because it's pretty fuzzy. Lager! Lager! Lager! Lager!
When Born Slippy was over, it quickly became clear that they still weren't done, and then, after a transition period, they brought out King of Snake, and the crowd went nuts again. It was an extremely high energy version, with the big I Feel Love bass line cycling around quickly, Karl spinning around in the back of the stage and the camera, like, Blair Witch close on his face. I was dancing on adrenaline at this point — the music sounded so good, there was no way I couldn't keep moving.
King of Snake 1 — The sound's reasonable on this one, and it's even pretty still.
King of Snake 2 — Second half of the above clip
They really did end it after King of Snake, although they were back quickly for an encore. It was Jumbo, which is actually my least favorite Underworld song. But I wanted the concert to keep going, and I actually liked the song much better when it was live and I was there, swaying and clapping with the rest of the crowd.
Jumbo 1
Jumbo 2
Jumbo 3
Jumbo wasn't nearly enough to unwind my brain. As we followed the stream of people out through the dark, tree-lined paths of Central Park, I felt stunned. My feet were so sore I could hardly walk, and I kept asking myself, "did that really happen?"
Hands-down the best concert I have ever been to. I thought that seeing them once would be enough, but if they come back to the US again, I am so definitely there. And if they don't, well, I can think of worse reasons to go to Europe.
So this weekend I did two things I've yet to do in life. One was visit New York (not sure how it came to be that I never made it there before now, but I didn't), and the other is see Underworld live.
So Melvin and I took the train up to New York, where we went to a concert that was AMAZING. I tried not to get my hopes up, because Underworld hasn't done much more than play scattered dates in the last few years, and because I thought that nothing could possibly live up to my expectations of their live show.
Turns out they WAY exceeded my expectations and completely blew my mind. There will be much more later, when I get my truly mammoth blog post done, but I wanted to at least get a post and a picture up now. Sadly, I didn't want to take my digital camera because I had visions of it being crushed or smashed underfoot, so I got a little disposable job. Despite 1000 speed film, most of my pictures didn't come out, and those that did are still grainy (I think I am done with film). Fortunately, I realized that out of all of those people holding up digital cameras in front of me, at least some of them were going to post their photos on Flickr. And they did. So there will be links, and lots of them.
So it has been a very long time since have blogged, and that is primarily because June was crazy. I suppose it is time for an update.
1. Eileen and Jeff came out to visit over Memorial Day weekend, and much fun was had. I finally got to meet Melissa in person, which was v. cool, and Melvin joined us for our Baltimore adventure. The Orioles and seafood were involved. That's all of us there in the picture. Photos on Flickr
2. Not long after that, it was time for the second round of visitors. My parents brought my grandfather out to see the World War II memorial and the rest of the city. We did Tourmobile, and my dad and I got off at the Vietnam memorial. I hadn't been there since I moved out here, and had only been there once in 8th grade. It definitely has a different emotional resonance at my age than it did in 8th grade. If you are like me and haven't seen it as an adult, I definitely recommend it, but be prepared to cry. We caught up with my mom and grandfather at the World War II memorial. All in all a good trip, and my grandfather said he really enjoyed himself. Photos on Flickr
3. Pretty much immediately after they left it was time to turn around for another visitor — my friend Tanya, this time. It is amazing, despite having so many visitors in such a short time, I really did almost entirely different things with everyone. Tanya and I hit a ton of museums, including some I hadn't yet been to, so another v. fun visit. Photos on Flickr
4. Now it is time for ME to travel (although my parents are in town again at the end of next week because my dad has a work thing). Up this weekend — San Francisco, for Eileen's transcontinental birthday bash. Then at the end of July it's time for the annual family cruise. This time to Canada/New England, which should be fun. I'll get to go to both San Francisco and Boston for the first time this year, and...
5. I am going to see Underworld!!! They are playing in Central Park on Sept. 14, and Melvin, Katherine, Eric and I all have tickets already. I am crazy excited for this. I have never seen them live and have always wanted to so so much. And, oddly enough, I have never been to New York, either (which is really inexcusable now that I am a 2-hour train ride away), so that'll be another major U.S. city crossed off the to-visit list.
6. Putting a slight damper on San Francisco is a mystery leg problem I seem to have developed. Last week I looked down at my calf and there was a giant bruise that I couldn't remember getting. No, I hadn't been drinking. Much. The bruise kept going down in size but over the last couple days I have been experiencing odd random pains, tingling and numbness in my leg. Sometimes it feels like a shin splint. Sometimes my knee (this is, of course, the leg with my bad knee) hurts. So today I went to the doctor and he wasn't too alarmed, which I took as a good sign. I did have to get x-rays but they won't send them to the doctor until I'm already in SF. So hopefully I will not get a call on Monday telling me that a legkillerapede has burrowed into my calf or something. Fortunately, I can walk on it pretty well. It's actually sitting and standing that it hurts the most.
7. The good news that came out of the visit to the doctor today is that my cholesterol, which had come back as absurdly high for someone my at my age and fitness level, has dropped 90 points. Or they screwed up the test in the first place. Being that I've done little different except eat less meat and more blueberries, and I'm taking a B vitamin, I'm going to go with the screwup. Either that or Trader Joe's B vitamins are miraculous.
8. Is anything from China not contaminated with dangerous things?
