archive.tylerdave.com All the stuff from when Dave was actually called Tylerdave.

The show tonight was even better than I expected as Rusted Root was just plain awesome.

The show opened with a band called The Polyester Starfish. I’m not going to say that they were great, but they weren’t too bad for a warm-up-the-crowd act. Apparently they’ll send you a CD with some live music on it for free if you e-mail them your address.

Mike Doughty played next and performed just as expected (which is to say he played well and was very entertaining). He played a new song which I didn’t recognize but sounded good. The rest of the show was pretty much like Smofe + Smang.

The surprise of the night (for me) was just how good Rusted Root was. I truely thought that they had to have gotten soft over the years. To my joy, I found my assumptions were wrong. I am amazed by their raw musicality. Every member of the band is a master of many different instruments. Half of the fun was trying to guess which ones they’d pick up next. It’s clear that they enjoy what they’re doing. I’m not nearly doing their preformance justice with this description so I’m going to try to get my hands on a bootleg of the show to share how really good it was.

I took a bunch of pictures at the show too. I brought the film to Wallgreens on the way home. I’ll go pick up the prints tomorrow morning and should have them scanned and viewable by the afternoon.

I’m going to go listen to some Rusted Root now…

[UPDATE: The idiots at Walgreens don't know how to make photo prints correctly so I need to take the negatives to a real photo place. At least I only had to pay $2 for processing. Maybe this is an indication that I need a new digital camera.]

Furthurnet is a new file sharing network designed especially for sharing live recordings of groups that explicitly allow recording of their shows. Their user base isn’t all that big yet (so it may take a while to get what you’re looking for) but it is growing quickly. The software itself is open source and is available for download from their website or from their sourceforge project site. The interface is simple and familiar (somewhat Napster-esque) but only performs searches for groups that are in the Taper-Friendly Bandlist. The list is surprisingly large. Give it a try.

Both Rusted Root and Mike Doughty encourage the taping of their shows so I’m now downloading some of their recent live music in preparation for the show tomorrow (uh… tonight). I can’t wait!

This weekend I bought replacements for my Rusted Root CDs that were stolen a while ago in preparation for their Oct 5th show at CWRU. I like Rusted Root’s older CDs but I have yet to be won over by their newer music, which seems earthy and feels less intense. It will be interesting to see how this show compares with the last time I saw them live, way back in 1995.

I do like Rusted Root but the real reason I am going to the show is because Mike Doughty (formerly of Soul Coughing) is opening. He is by far my favorite musical artist. His uniquely poetic lyrics, simple guitar and imperfect voice match beautifully. You can freely download some of his music from his page at MP3.com (I suggest Grey Ghost and Busting Up A Starbux first).

If their tour happens to stop in a town near you, I would strongly suggest going to see it. The rest of the tour info is available on Doughty’s and Rusted Root’s websites.