Best Friday Night in a Week

Friday night was excellent. I'm still getting over it. For starters, I had dinner with Laura and Patricia at Benny's Burritos on Greenwich Ave. It was great to hang out with the girls and tell stories and stuff. Also, I've finally decided that Benny's is only barely enjoyable. Whenever I eat there, I need a lot of positive reinforcement to believe that I like it. Like, if the person across from me is all "Oh, I love Benny's!" I'm likely to say "Yeah, Benny's is great!" But if the people I'm with aren't flipping out over the food, I'll pobably pause and think "Do I even like this stuff?" Whatever I may say about the place, I bet I eat there again in less than a month, because it is close by and they aren't stingy with the beans.



After dinner I went down to the Bowery Ballroom to see the Kaiser Chiefs with Amber. As the Kaiser Chiefs are one of the latest "bands of the moment", the show had been sold out for weeks. Amber had had her ticket for a long, long time, but I had no ticket and they were going for $50 or more (much more) on craigslist. I wanted to go to the show, and I wanted to not pay more than $20 to get in. And you know what? It turns out that it's very easy to get into sold out shows at the Bowery. After the show has been going for a while (I arrived during the second opening band's set) you just go up to the guy at the door and say, "Hey, can I get in?" and he'll say "Wait over there." Then you stand to the side for ten minutes or so, and then the door guy says "All right, you can go in" and then you go in, pay $15 for your ticket, and rock out. Just like that.

Anyway, regarding the Kaiser Chiefs. They've got a lot of buzz going on around them and, strangely enough, they really are a great band and their new record, Employment, is something else. Pitchfork gave it a really bad score, so check out their review if you want to read some real nonsense--the critic pretty much says "this is a rather good album, but the band is enthusiastic the whole way through, so I'm giving them a 6.7." What? Anyway, I didn't have to listen to Employment all the way through before I was sold on this latest band to invade our shores from England and their live set did not disappoint. There was so much jumping and whatnot going on onstage and the crowd just ate it up and had a great time. And even though Ricky, band's the lead singer, had torn a ligament in his foot or something like that (he took to the stage with a cane) he still pulled off all sorts of rock star leaps and even dove into the crowd during "I Predict a Riot", the band's "break-out single."

These are my Kaiser Chiefs photos, without words.













And once the show let out, did the night end? No, not even. Next thing I knew, I was more or less dancing in the East Village at Rififi's Britpop Night (where I took this dark photo of debatable artistic worth). Had I my way right now, I would be the world's greatest Britpop dancer--or someone hanging out in the Britpop DJ booth. (geeze, how many times am I going to say "Britpop"?) And then, after the dancing, was the night over? No, because we ducked into the Beauty Bar on 14th so I could see what it was all about and compare it to the Hollywood one (dig back in the posts a bit if you don't already know about my trip to the Hollywood Beauty Bar). The verdict: Bigger. Drunker. More glam. Not as many Hollywood girls. Less chill, more rock. And the dj played the Beach Boys. Then, after hangin' at the Beauty Bar, was Friday night over? Yes. Then Friday night was over, and it was plenty late.

While I'm at it, let's get Saturday taken care of. Slept in. Felt tired. Studied. Went to Sound Fix in Williamsburg, walked over to Dumont, straight up could not believe how tasty their risoto was. Caught Melinda and Melinda with Rebeckah and Amber--it is possible that on a a day without photographs I will discuss Melinda and Melinda in some relative depth, but for now let me say that it's fairly good, but I think most people in the audience would have been pretty satisfied if the whole movie had taken the Will Farrell comedy-angle. When you've got a movie that is half one story and half another, sometimes you're left feeling like you've only got half a movie.

Here's a nice enough little article on the Kaiser Chiefs that ran in Sunday's NY Times. Click.

Whoah While writing this post last night I got offered a ticket to the Kaiser Chiefs' show at Maxwell's in Hoboken tonight. We'll have to see what happens there, the family is in town, I might be supposed to be eating with them, and maybe I shouldn't rock on a school night? At least I was up at 7 am to get my study on today, maybe I've earned the show?

Finally No, I don't mean "finally, we've all been waiting so long" but "finally, this is the final item", check out the trailer for Kiera Knightley's new bounty hunter movie, Domino. Does it look cool? Yes. Click.