Hutch without Starsky

Blogging has proven rather difficult in the last week or so. Actually, I have had a hard time with it for several weeks now. I'm not sure what's going on, other than the fact that real life has been much more demanding of my time. While I enjoy coming to this space and putting my thoughts on random stuff up, it is trumped by work and helping Anna with her homework (in 1st grade!) and spending time with my wife, even when the time is spent watching The Lair via Netflix. Let's just say that Queer as Folk it is not. The best quote I saw regarding the series is "this is what happens when porn stars try to act." I would agree wholeheartedly, with an emphasis on the word try.

This week has been kind of a whirlwind of activity, most of it good, but still, it has been exhausting. It has, first and foremost, been a week of free concerts. Monday night, I went with our friend Jess to see Eric Hutchinson at People's Court in Des Moines. Jess and Heidi had seen Eric perform earlier this summer when he was the opening act for Missy Higgins. Ultimately, Heidi ended up liking his performance better than Missy Higgins and knew that I would probably like him as well. She was right and I picked up his CD not long after hearing a few samples online. I even blogged about him, so impressed was I with his CD. So when I saw he was coming to Des Moines again, I thought, hey, that could be fun. The only trouble was that it fell right at the beginning of what I knew (even then) might not be the best week. And then when my parents bought tickets to Dolly Parton (more on that later) for Wednesday of that same week, I decided I wouldn't go.

Then Jess won tickets, CDs and backstage passes and offered one of them to me. How could I say no? I had never really been to a meet-and-greet before (the only real time I've ever met someone I am a fan of is when I got the chance to talk to Casey Stratton after his Chicago show) and I am afraid that they are mostly just awkward. You get in there and you realize that you are meeting...another human being. Don't get me wrong, he was gracious and funny and a pretty cool guy. He signed our CDs and T-shirts and pretty much anything else you had. But it was a bit of an anticlimax. Perhaps if I were an uber fan (or a Hutch-head as they refer to themselves) it might have been different. But mostly, it was like meeting someone at church for the first time, only they signed a CD instead of bringing a dish to pass.

The concert itself was quite good. Hutchinson is a very energetic performer and it is clear that he loves what he does. He played every last song from Sounds Like This (a fact I didn't realize until I got home that night) as well as a few from his indie days. But as usual, the highlight of the whole show was his Cher-ification of his song "It Hasn't Been Long Enough." I videoed the whole thing. Get out your glowsticks, bitches!



He does this very frequently (making it the Eric Hutchinson equivalent to Dolly Parton saying "it costs a lot of money to make someone look this cheap") but I can watch it over and over again. My favorite part is the Cher-ish vocal. It is so dead on!

The thing about the show that I could have definitely lived without was the frat boy contingent (and the frat boys-in-waiting.) Jess and I commented that it was funny to watch all these frat boys sing every word to the songs when basically, Eric's work is sophisticated boy-pop (not a slam in the slightest) and that does not fit in well with the stuff that you would expect them to listen to. It made me appreciate even more than I already do the gay guy contingent that seems to be present at pretty much every concert I go to. That population has always been much more welcoming to me than the frat boys.

The concert was fun, but I am too old to get back home at midnight and then be up at 5:15 the next morning, which is exactly what I had to do. But we did get this picture at the meet and greet and I think I look pretty dang good in this picture if I do say so myself!

He is also the skinniest guy I have ever seen. I think I was last that skinny when I was 14!

A grain of salt

I am not getting my hopes up, but perhaps there might, just might be a small chance that David Tennant will be back on Doctor Who for the next full season after all.

Here's the quote:

But we hear the wild-eyebrowed Scot is close to signing for a new full series of the sci-fi hit for 2010.

Our source said: "David loves filming Doctor Who. The upcoming specials have given him more freedom to work on other projects this year and now he’s ready to come back to film a proper series to go out in 2010."

However, it is the Sun, so it could just be a whole bunch of crap. But the fact that Donna Noble and The Master (with John Simms reprising his role) are both coming back for one-off appearances in the next year makes me very happy!

Maybe there is a God, after all.

You Are Screwed

I totally want this shirt. Heidi, are you listening?

(a closer look at the design)

My favorite part is the "You Are Screwed" at the center of the shirt.

Real blogging soon, I promise. I have a bunch of stuff I want to write, but neither the time nor the brains to actually do it.

What it feels like...

...to be on Madonna's T-shirt.

And because this one is just plain freakish...

As Thomas said, I could do this all night. Well, maybe not all night, but it's still damn fun! And I think it gives you better results than that Yearbook Yourself site (which always made me feel like I was having my picture taken at one of those carnival things where you stick your head through the hole and suddenly you're a gorilla.)

You can do this too!

One more for the road.

I'm walking blindfolded

So Heidi's out at Panera tonight doing the NaNoWriMo which means that Anna and I have been left to our own devices for a while. We played Monopoly Junior (Princess Edition) in which she completely cleaned my clock. But we have also completely immersed ourselves in the Pointer Sisters! It all started with "Automatic."



"Automatic" is one of those Pointer Sisters songs that Jason Hare of PopDose refers to as "sung by Mr. Pointer" because of Ruth Pointer's deep vocals. Anna even said "Dad, is that a boy?" which was when I took the opportunity to point out that it was the Pointer SISTERS. I had forgotten how good of a song "Automatic" really was. This led us through a cornucopia of Pointer Sisters hits - "Jump (For My Love)", "I'm So Excited", and of course, "Neutron Dance."

But for my money, "Dare Me" is still my favorite Pointer Sisters song. And XO wrote the definitive piece on "Dare Me."

Woolly bully

This fall has seen what can only be described as the Drama of the Woolly Bear. It's funny that such a thing can cause the drama that it has, for I had never even heard of woolly bear caterpillars prior to this fall. A couple weeks back, Anna found a woolly bear caterpillar in our yard. She brought it into the house and put it in a clear plastic box with some leaves, a few sticks and some grass and christened him "Woolly." It was no a super secure box and she did insist on taking it out of the box to let it crawl on her finger. Within the first 24 hours of captivity, it had escaped and after a massive search, it was located. However, on Halloween night, Anna was up until nearly midnight because of our Halloween party. The next morning, we found the box upended and the caterpillar gone, likely the result of her manic over-tiredness the night before (as in, she had likely inadvertently knocked the box over and didn't realize it.)

There were a large number of tears shed on that Saturday and especially that Saturday night, despite all our efforts to spin it in to something like "the woolly bear is meant to be outside," "he is probably going to hibernate" or other such platitudes. So the following Sunday, Anna and I went out to Ada Hayden Heritage Park here in Ames on the hunt for another woolly bear caterpillar. The first one we found was a dead one, but it didn't take long before we found one, and then another and another. We only kept the one, which Anna named Claire and we got a much sturdier container for this one.

I did some investigation on the internet and found out that you could keep them through the winter (they go into a hibernation state) and then in the spring, the caterpillars pupate and become Isabella tiger moths in the early spring. I thought, what the heck? Let's try it.

So yesterday, we put potting soil in the bottom of the container, some new leaves and a few new sticks as well. Anna decided that yesterday was the day to put the woolly bear, container and all, on the porch and let it hibernate for the winter.

I did not think much of it at first, but the more the day wore on, the more I questioned that decision. I was laying in bed last night trying (in vain) to sleep and couldn't help but think that perhaps we had killed the woolly bear by putting it on the porch so soon. All I could think of was the heartbreak that Anna would feel on the death of this, the second woolly bear. So Heidi and I brought it in and tried to find it. We thought we had found it, but this morning, on closer inspection, what we thought was it was not it. I looked around in the cage this morning and found it, but I'm not sure that it's still living. I am no goddamn entomologist, so it could be hibernating and just non-responsive, but I think I am going to have to put the cage back on the porch this morning and not mention a word of the whole thing to Anna.

I realize that it's stupid to pin my success or failure as a father on the survival of this caterpillar. It is the ultimate in ridiculous and surely there will be more traumatic things that she will confront sooner rather than later. There would be those that would look at me with disdain and shake their heads and say "it's just a caterpillar!" but those people do not know my daughter's tender heart. If this caterpillar does not survive till the spring to become a beautiful moth, she will be crushed. Momentarily, yes and she will not likely need therapy for it, but it will hurt her. She is not one of those kids that will forget about something like this. I fear that she will pin her hopes on that caterpillar all winter and if it does not emerge in the spring, we will have many tearful days and even more tearful evenings. A part of me regrets even telling her that the possibility to keep the caterpillar over the winter even existed.

I think the Drama of the Woolly Bear speaks to larger insecurities I have as a parent, not ever sure if the decisions I am making are the right ones, being pissed at myself when I am short with her and realizing that she will not be little forever and there will come a day in the not-too-far-off future that she will not want to be with me at all. It also speaks to the part of me (that I think exists in every parent) that wants to shield her from all of life's disappointments, even though intellectually, I realize that's not only impossible but also mind bogglingly stupid. If I protect her from everything in life, what will she do when I am no longer around to protect her? It's the fine line between doing your job as a parent and being their advocate while also allowing them to live their life. That line is nebulous and moves around a lot, but it's still our job to keep an eye on it.

I wonder if all parents feel this way to some degree. I know when I was a kid, I would watch my parents and they just knew everything. Now, I realize they were probably doing something not all that dissimilar from what I am doing now - the best I can and hope it all works out.

I guess for all those moments of frustration that I wonder where my daughter gets her tender heart, I need look no further than these pages. But there are certainly worse things to pass on.

"Palpable sexuality"

Paul Rudd is my hero.

(thanks to Matt and Heidi for putting this video on my radar.)

Skellig

Loreena McKennitt's The Book of Secrets is one of those quintessential fall albums in the life of Dan. I always manage to rediscover her music at this time of year. A big part of it is that we bought The Book of Secrets while on our honeymoon in Chicago in October of 1997, so her whole catalog feels very autumnal to me. And of all of McKennitt's albums, The Book of Secrets is still probably my favorite, even though that's kind of a cop out because it does contain her one "hit" song, "The Mummer's Dance."

Tonight, while I was driving home from work, I found myself listening to "Skellig" which I have not listened to in quite some time. In the song, a Irish monk who lives on the island of Skellig Michael relates his final dying words. I have always loved this song, it is so dark and haunting. As I drove home tonight, I thought of how if I were to have lived during the Dark Ages, I would have undoubtedly been one of those Irish monks, perhaps living in the Skellig islands and copying reams of religious documents by candlelight.

I can't help but think it would be a simpler, less anxiety-ridden existence. With a view like this, I think you would be hard pressed to get too caught up in drama.

From the liner notes of The Book of Secrets:

In the end, I wonder if one of the most important steps on our journey is the one in which we throw away the map. In jettisoning the grids and brambles of our own preconceptions, perhaps we are better able to find the real secrets of each place; to remember that we are all extensions of our collective history.

Do you believe we can change the future?

...well as Madonna would say: Baby, we can do it, we can do it all right!

I'm sure it is no shock to anyone that I have cast my vote proudly for Barack Obama. I am hoping for an overwhelming victory tomorrow night, one that can be a true repudiation of the last 8 years and of McCain's truly deplorable campaign of fear, slime and lies. There was a time that I could have supported John McCain. In 2000, he was the obvious better choice. He was independent then, he had a soul. Now, he has proven himself willing to do anything ANYTHING to win the presidency. And that, I'm here to tell you, is one of the reasons to deny him the presidency.

In 2004, my Kerry vote was more of an anti-Bush vote. I was always Dean person even though many thought he would have been an even worse candidate than Kerry ended up being. I voted for Kerry because I believed that the country really couldn't take 4 more years of Bush. I sat and watched not only Bush's re-election but also my own state go red by the narrowest of margins. Looking back on this day in 2004, we were totally kidding ourselves hoping for a Kerry victory. But this is not 2004. And tomorrow night, barring anything unforseen or vote tampering or polls so out of whack with what people are actually doing, we will be seeing Obama's acceptance speech and McCain's concession speech.

Janeane Garofalo famously said "At this point, anyone who votes Republican has a major character flaw." I don't know that I'd go as far as to say that. I know some conservatives who really do make sense. However, those conservatives haven't been taken over by the far-right fringe of the party, the portion of the party referring to Obama as "the terrorists' candidate." However, I would strongly encourage anyone voting for McCain/Palin tomorrow to reconsider and think about the future of the country as a whole, rather than just your pocketbook or your sphere of control. I have been frequently criticized for having my little heart bleed all over the floor, but really, for all those supposed Christians that would say otherwise, we are our brother's keeper.

Do I think Obama will come in and magically sweep away the last 8 years and we will be in a nirvana? Heavens, no. And I think a lot of people on the left are going to be mighty disappointed when they find out that Obama is not going to be able to do all he has promised. But the thing to bear in mind will be, would we have fared any better under McCain? I think the answer to that question is likely not.

Who knows, in 4 years, I may regret my vote much like many regretted their vote for Bush. But I have to live in this moment and at this moment, it is time for a change.

So tomorrow, get out there and VOTE!!! And vote Obama/Biden!

Practice makes perfect

a/k/a I think we're going to need to get another guitar.



Not bad for someone who a few months ago wouldn't even pick up the guitar. Wait for it at ~1:02. That's the moment.

On facial hair

I grew a beard in 2003. It was kind of a spur of the moment decision after years of razzing from my brother about "when are you going to grow a beard." Heidi was going to New York for a week for RWA and I thought, what the hell, I'm just not going to shave while she's gone and see what happens. I experimented with different lengths (usually, the difference was a matter of millimeters) and cuts until I finally settled on the one that I liked. Someone accused me of looking like a Hasidic Jew early on in my experimentation. Nice.

But bearded is how I have looked for the last 5 years. It's not really all that long of a time compared to the other 31 years that came before it. But as you can tell in the posts below, I had to shave my beard for my Halloween costume and let me tell you, it was a moment of stress.

I have no idea why I dislike my shaven face so much. It's not like I have a fat face so I can't say I'm hiding it behind facial hair. Heidi says I look much younger without it, but that's not the droids appearance I'm looking for. I shaved it in New York when I had left my beard trimmer at home and decided rather than go for the Grizzly Adams look, I'd rather shave it off and start over again. The only other time I have been completely clean shaven in the last 5 years was in August of 2007 when I just decided one afternoon that I was shaving it off. After a few days of being clean shaven, I grew it back. It was the first time that Anna ever remembered seeing me clean shaven.

The last time I did this, I didn't blog it. Many people missed out on my clean shaven look. Well, here it is. No beard, but I do have some pretty rad sideburns.

A part of me wants to keep the long sideburns, but it is not the mid 70s.

Fear not, in a week I'll look like my profile picture again. Maybe.

As a teenager, I hated my facial hair. I never thought it would be integral to my image of myself. It's funny the twists and turns life takes.

Deh Jabba wanga

One of the stops that we always make on every trip to Chicago is Gaymart Chicago. The name is actually a bit misleading because, while it does have a lot of Pride merchandise and greeting cards with men in their birthday suits for sale, it also has a TON of pop culture items that I have not been able to find anywhere else. They have a shitload of Doctor Who merchandise that usually you would otherwise end up buying online (I could have bought my Sonic Screwdriver there rather than ordering it from Amazon Sellers) as well as other stuff that frequently borders on the kitschy side of pop culture.

However, I did come across this little wonder, and at 5 bucks, the price was right. It is a Bib Fortuna coffee mug!

(Bib's intergalactic mug shot - no pun intended)

It was actually mislabeled as an Emporer Palpatine mug, if you can believe that.

Anyway, the more I look at it, the more I think that the character of Bib Fortuna must have been inspired (at least a little bit) by Joseph Merrick, probably better known as The Elephant Man. Talk about a story that I was obsessed with when I was a kid. I watched the movie The Elephant Man more times than I can count as a kid. I read the book several times. But more than that, I remember the documentary Some Call Them Freaks that ran over and over again on HBO (and that we probably taped back on the VCR my father used to bring home from school over the summer.) It was narrated by Richard Kiley and featured Robert Wadlow, Robert Earl Hughes, Chang & Eng Bunker and Tom Thumb among others. It rode the line between amazing and a little too scary, but it just kept me coming back for more.

Anyway, here's probably the most famous scene from The Elephant Man. I had completely forgotten about it.



Wow - this post went in a very different direction than I intended. Such is the fun of blogging I suppose.

Happy Halloween!

Hello, I'm the Doctor, how are you?

And this is my companion, Sarah. She's from the north.

Defense of Marriage Act

If you read only one thing today, I beg of you to make it this.

Heidi forwarded this to me this morning and wow, it is a great piece. The author of the piece basically defends marriage from those that would pick it pieces and then weaves it into a impassioned plea to support marriages of ALL kinds. He lists all the reasons why being married rocks, and none got my cheering support more than this one:

The Ball and Chain is for Losers. I can't emphasize this enough. Adult men I knew growing up, or stereotypical sitcom dads on TV, were always talking about how "the old lady won't let me" just go and do whatever fun thing they wanted to do. News flash: If that's your life, it's both of your faults for being lame, uncommunicative, lazy bastards. Don't settle for misery. If my wife or I want to go do something, we just let the other know, and if the other person's not up for it, no problem. If they wanna tag along, even better.

Let me tell you, if there is any one thing that makes me insane, it is those men who use their wives as an excuse for everything that they supposedly "can't do." There is a fine dividing line between being courteous to the needs of your partner and being a doormat. A close cousin to this are those men that have been married so long that they are now completely incapable of matching their socks without help from their wives. I do think that this is a bit of a generational thing but I still see men of our generation acting this way! Stop the insanity!

Being married, as is mentioned in the article, is not always easy. You do have to make sacrifices and you don't always get along and sometimes the other person just makes you want to run screaming from the room. But overall it is a huge net positive - at least it has been for me.

And this is the part where I beg any of my California readers to vote No on Prop 8. While I don't think that marriage equality is dead in this country if Prop 8 passes (the tide is bigger than one state), it will send the wrong message and set the wrong type of precedent. And with Iowa waiting in the wings, lets hope that those non-discriminatory voices prevail in this fight.

Oh, and it's Halloween today! It's only the best holiday ever!

Nothing gold can stay

I woke up this morning to find a comment from Paul on my Madonna concert post. The part of the comment that caught my eye the most was the non-Madonna related part of the comment.

David Tennant is leaving Dr Who!!!!!

I didn't believe it at first. This rumor has been floating around for over a year now, but alas, it is true.

Say it ain't so!

Tennant as the Tenth Doctor will always be "my Doctor." While Heidi's will probably always be Christopher Eccleston (#9), it was Tennant's mad energy that made the show for me. Yes, his Doctor was quirky and not for everyone, but he always seemed to be right in line with the show for me. I cannot blame Tennant for wanting to do other things either. He's an actor and not around just for the sole purpose of playing the Doctor. Still, it does make me feel a bit sad.

Our friends across the pond are used to the constant changing of the Doctor and his companion. I was sad (but not distraught) when the popular Rose left and was replaced by Martha as the Doctor's companion. However, I think the loss of Tennant as the Doctor is tremendous. There is little doubt that I will still continue to watch the show, but I don't think it will ever be the same.

At least we get 4 or 5 more episodes this year before Tennant is gone for good and he's regenerated into someone else entirely. And those will be some very large tennis shoes to fill.

C...A...N.D.Y.

(In the interest of full disclosure, this is likely to be long. Just so you know.)

OK, it's time for me to get my butt in gear and blog the concert. The Sticky & Sweet Tour was the fourth Madonna tour that my good friend and Madonna partner-in-crime Jeff and I have been to and our first Madonna concert in Chicago since our first one, The Drowned World Tour. I'd like to say that it was something cosmic that led us to come full circle on Madonna concert locations this time around, but mostly, it was just the date that fit in best with Jeff's school calendar. We were also kind of looking to avoid having to fly, and Chicago was by far the closest that she was coming to Iowa.

We arrived in Chicago around 6pm on Saturday. Jeff and I were staying in the western burb of Naperville, mostly because hotels are MUCH cheaper in the burbs than in the city and also because the further west you stay in Chicago, the shorter the drive home on the day you leave. Anyway, we got there that night and checked into the hotel. Afterwards we went out and scouted around downtown Naperville looking for food and other diversions. We eventually found both and then headed back to the hotel where I watched my first full episode of SNL in over a decade.

The next day we headed into the city and spent most of our time in Boystown/Lakeview which is one of my favorite parts of the city. Our main destination was Borderline Music, which is a small record store that is a must-stop for me every time I go to Chicago. Named after the early Madonna hit song, it is a virtual treasure chest of Madonna CDs, vinyl and other memorabilia. But it is not limited to Madonna. If it is dance-pop or a gay icon, you can almost certainly find it in this store. It is great fun to shop in, although I'll admit the last time or two that I have gone I have not been as tempted as I was the first few times. Jeff picked up a couple of CDs (Hard Candy Extended Mixes and the Sticky & Sweet Tour Demos) but I left empty-handed. We ate at a little greasy spoon where I got my required Chicago hot dog and then it was time to go pick up my Blogger buddy Yuri, who was staying in a vacation apartment with his wife down by the Sears Tower.

This is where the trip got a bit tricky. On Halstead Street, while headed out to Lakeshore Drive, I managed to somehow mistake a right turn only lane for a parking lane and ended up turning out in front of a very large U-Haul truck. I heard and felt the thump and presumed the worst. Dear God, I have wrecked the car in Chicago. I stopped the car and looked at the damage and, while not bad and certainly not of "wrecking the car" caliber, it was still something I wish had not happened. There was no damage to the guy's U-Haul (he was probably going all of 10 miles an hour when he hit me) and it was clearly my fault so we went on our merry (well, maybe not so merry) way.

We got down to Yuri's place and picked him up and went back to Borderline. I was still rather unmoved and almost left empty-handed AGAIN, but ultimately, I picked up Guy Oseary's book of photos from the Confessions Tour for 40 bucks. First edition hardcover, and really, I just loved the Confessions Tour so much I thought, why the hell not? And as a bonus, I was given the album flat of Hard Candy, even though I had gotten into a disagreement with the owner of the store as to whether or not the Hard Candy album cover is worth a shit.

We grabbed some pizza and then headed for the show. There were some tense moments where I deviated from my map and didn't know exactly if the road I was on would connect to 90/94 or if it would simply go over it or under it, but I trusted my instincts and we made it intact (with only one brief trip through the ghetto that surrounds the United Center thanks to me not being in the right turn lane after exiting the 290 West to Damen Street.)

So, after all this, we finally made it to the concert. Once we got the car parked and got inside, we got in line to get buy the tour merchandise. It cost pennies to make and they sell it at 10,000% markup. However, like lemmings, we buy it anyway. I bought the tour book and the coffee mug (natch) and a little magnet. Total of 55 dollars. Jeez. All to feed the Madonna machine (and her divorce lawyers.)

We took our seats but I had another engagement. I knew that my one of my favorite Madonna bloggers (and fellow Debbie Harry fan) Matthew Rettenmund was going to be at the show as well. I took a chance and e-mailed him prior to leaving and asked him if he'd like to meet up and he was more than willing. He gave me his cell phone number and around 8, we were texting back and forth trying to find each other. Eventually, we met up. He's a wonderfully gracious fellow and it was great to meet him. So not only did I get to meet Yuri (who has been a long time pal via blogging), I got to meet yet another blogger! (XO, we wish you had been there as well!) That does not happen every day.

Madonna was, of course, fashionably late. She started around 9PM which was just about what Yuri predicted (I was predicting 9:20.) But when the lights went down and the music for the intro started, the crowd went wild. The opening animated sequence that led into "Candy Shop" was great. It was a bit like the opening credits to Charlie & The Chocolate Factory and set the tone for the opening segment quite well. Before we knew it, the revolving platform came all the way around and revealed Madonna sitting on her throne. It was not quite the disco ball - nothing ever will top that - but it was a good entrance and kicked the show off well. I still am a bit embarrassed by how much I like "Candy Shop" but it is kind of one of those songs that is so bad it is good.

Far and away, my favorite segment of the tour was the "Old School" segment which featured Madonna doing the long rumored double-dutch jump roping in high heels. Starting with "Into The Groove" and winding through new and old stuff with remarkable finesse, it rivaled the opening segment of the Confessions Tour in quality. Included in this set was the rocked-up "Borderline" with Madonna doing her guitar playing. I did not miss out on my chance to sing along with 30,000 other fans to a 25 year old song that has not been performed live in just about that long. It was a great moment, right up there with the similar singing of "get up on the dance floor!" from "Vogue" at Re-Invention. And "She's Not Me," a new song from Hard Candy that I had been warming to was FANTASTIC, with Madonna beating up look alikes from various stages of her career while classic images played on the screens behind her.

My first moment of stunned awe came during the beautiful performance of "Devil Wouldn't Recognize You." Sitting on top of a grand piano, surrounded by transluscent screens upon which images of rain were being projected, Madonna was dressed like the grim reaper and performed what is perhaps my favorite song off of Hard Candy. This "gypsy" section also featured "La Isla Bonita" but really, for it being the 58,000th live performance of this song, it was pretty good. It was also pretty much the same performance that she did at Live Earth, so it's a bit lazy recycling that, but who can blame her? One big surprise of the evening was a very heartfelt performance of "You Must Love Me" from Evita. We expected it to be terrible, but it was actually VERY good.

The last segment of the show started off with Madonna in football gear (ill advised, IMHO) singing "4 Minutes" along with holographic images of Justin and Timbaland. I have been famously NOT a fan of "4 Minutes" but this performance was pretty good. The highlight of the last act, and arguably the whole show was "Like A Prayer." As Yuri would say, it was off the chain. Between the performance of this classic song and the words and images being projected up on the screen which included quotes from religious texts that highlighted just how similar all world religions really are, well, I'm not ashamed to say that I was profoundly moved. It was the point in the concert that many of her detractors would accuse her of being pretentious but the fans lap up.

Ultimately, the last act of the show was also its weakest, mostly because we had to suffer through yet another version of "Ray Of Light" which was not all that different from its Confessions Tour incarnation and a completely bastardized "Hung Up." Removing the synths and the ABBA sample and replacing them with crushing electric guitars was not a stroke of genius. And "Give It 2 Me," while a rousing closer, seemed a little too much like "Hung Up" from the Confessions Tour.

Still, I thought the concert was amazing and SO much better than I was expecting, especially since I am so lukewarm to Hard Candy. However, the tour has made me rethink a lot of the harsh words I had for Hard Candy. I still think it is mediocre and no Confessions on a Dance Floor and that Madonna is capable of MUCH better, but it is not terrible. I still cannot fucking stand "Incredible" and "Spanish Lesson" is still ridiculous, but I came to appreciate the album a lot more thanks to the live versions presented in the tour. And sometimes, it takes a live performance to get the song to the right spot in your head.

Leaving the United Center proved to be tricky as we waited for 45 minutes in the parking lot before hitting the expressway to take Yuri back to his apartment. It was far too short of time to spend together. I would have liked to have hung out with him more! I am happy to say that he is a great guy and damn lot of fun to hang out with. And we both share the same aversion to parallel parking. Brothers from another mother indeed.

And with that, Jeff and I were off to Naperville.

It's funny...every time Madonna tours, I say to myself "Oh, I went the last time, I don't need to go this time." Yes, it is expensive but the woman earns the price of those concert seats. And especially Sunday night, she was in such good spirits, smiled more than I have ever seen her smile during a show and engaged the audience in a very un-Madonna way. While I still think I liked the Confessions Tour better, this one probably took the place of Re-Invention in the number two spot. She never fails to amaze me in concert. There is something so surreal about being in the same room with Madonna, even if it is an arena the size of the United Center.

Next time, though, I'm joining the fan club so I can get those primo floor seats.

(all photos of the tour courtesy of madonnalicious)

From your head down to your toes

While we got a few flubbed lines of "Beautiful Stranger" during the requested song section of the show, the Monday night crowd got practically the entire version of "Dress You Up."



Somewhere, Matthew Rettenmund is really wishing he had had Monday night tickets (unless he did.)

MTV for us oldsters

It is practically a cliche to say "Remember when MTV used to play videos?" Well, as I am fond of saying, just because something is a cliche does not mean that it isn't true. As a child of the MTV generation, I cannot count the hours logged as a teenager watching music videos. The story I love telling is how on one Friday night in 1986, I was flipping between MTV, Friday Night Videos and Night Tracks and all three were playing the same video (for the record, it was Cinderella's "Nobody's Fool")

As I've gotten older, MTV and I kind of parted ways. But now, MTV has launched it's MTV Music site. And let me tell you, it is a sight for sore eyes. Not only does it have a bevy of classic videos, they are also done in what I would consider high quality full screen format (something that is sadly lacking on YouTube for the most part.)

It does not collect every video made during the hey day of MTV (no Bangles, for instance), but there are a lot on there (1,131 pages of them to flip through if you're bored.)

And as a treat, here's one of the first music videos I ever remember seeing.

The Go-Go's |MTV Music

(hat tip to Boy Culture -- and yes, the Madonna tour review is coming! These things take time!)

Holding pattern

I had full intentions to blog the whole Madonna concert experience tonight, but when it came right down to it, my brain was not functional enough for the kind of post that is likely to be. Anyway, for the time being, here's video from the tour. Most of you die-hard Madge fans will have already seen these, so these are primarily for those readers who are dying to get a glimpse of what I saw.

Candy Shop:


Beat Goes On:


Bear in mind, this woman is FIFTY and doing more than I could do without crushing chest pain.

Post-Madonna update

A quick update tonight. We are back at the hotel room after Sticky and Sweet. For me, it vastly exceeded my expectations. Madonna was in a great mood and was CLEARLY having a good time. I will be blogging it in more detail in the days to come, but just wanted to say that we are alive and even though we've had some interesting things happen (a fender bender, for one!), it has been a great trip.

I got my camera into the show tonight. Most of the photos I tried to take turned out like utter shit, and after a while, I quit taking pictures that I knew wouldn't turn out and just enjoyed the show. But I did get this one. It's the best one I got, and that is not saying a whole hell of a lot.

More to come. First I want to get back to Iowa, and then I swear I'm not driving a car for at least a week.