Blitzen Trapper
Going into this show, I thought it had been a long while since I'd seen Blitzen Trapper. I remembered seeing them in 2008 and 2009, but completely forgot that I saw them last year at the Mohawk during SXSW opening up for The Roots. I think the Roots must've fried my brain that day, because Blitzen Trapper are hard to forget.
I was incredibly pleased that BT's live show has continued their upward climb in quality. I've seen them four times over six years and each one has been great. I didn't know quite as many songs this time around since I hadn't heard their new record before the show, but even their songs I didn't know were fun. Blitzen Trapper also achieved a rare feat: getting me to love a song the first time I heard it. They played the single "Shine On" off their then upcoming album VII. It's a gospel-tinged americana track that's as gripping as it is lighthearted.
Weekly Comedy Podcast Highlight: Flop House #140 "After Earth"
As I near the point where I'm caught up on the back episodes of My Brother, My Brother and Me, I realized I don't want to ever catch up. I always want to be able to fire up a new episode. So to that end, I started looking for a few new podcasts. I tried out Wham Bam Pow with Cameron Esposito, It's That Episode with Craig Rowin and Pop My Culture. They're all good, but nothing that compelled me to listen to everything in their archives. Then I remembered that I'd long ago subscribed to The Flop House, a bad movies podcast that I saw recommended in some year end staff picks list at the AV Club. Being that I already had How Did This Get Made, I didn't think I had any room in my heart left for another podcast making fun of bad movies. I was very, very wrong.
Whereas the joy in listening to HDTGM is pretty much all in the incredulity with which the hosts describe the movie they watched. They can't believe that someone let Robin Williams make a sad/scary movie called "Toys" and market it to children or that Halloween 3 is a franchise movie that doesn't feature its star character, for example. The joy in The Flop house is that it scoots aways from that middle ground and is both more serious (identifying script elements that could be easily changed to improve the movie) and more silly (doing 5+ minute riffs about Sly Stallone showing up to their party and refusing to leave). It's run by two Daily Show writers and their bartender buddy and is another podcast where it feels like you're genuinely just in the room with some funny friends (see also Harmontown and My Brother My Brother and Me).