A Civilized Evening

The thing about Monday night shows is that they always start early. Maybe this wouldn't be problematic in any other city, but it's hell on the L.A. music fan given that, at any physical point in the city, it can take half an hour just to travel half a mile at 6 p.m. Traffic was how we started our evening. My usual fifteen minute drive to the Henry Fonda Music Box Theater had at least doubled. Then I spent another twenty minutes driving in circles until I saw Amy B., my cohort for the evening, run towards the curb from the box office holding our tickets.

We were supposed to eat dinner at Carousel, which we love on account of the fact baba ghanoush helps maintain our Armenian good looks. We must have driven past the restaurant four times, always searching for the signage in the wrong strip mall, never looking across the street for the signifier, Jumbo's Clown Room. Once we drove as far as Vermont, turned right and, at the corner of Vermont and Sunset, got stuck at an extremely long light made entertaining by the one man political band on the corner. His signs were barely legible, all I could read were "Hilary" [sic] and "Huckabee" in what looked like a single sentence. Was he a Hillary Clinton supporter who wanted Mike Huckabee to be her running mate? Was he freakin' nuts? Dude ranted through a megaphone in Arabic, the only decipherable for the non-Arabic speaker being "Allah." Then, in the middle of his rant, he shouted "Islam isn't un-American." Dude was taking to the streets, showing Angelenos that religious proclamations made on Hollywood street corners in the middle of rush hour traffic isn't solely the domain of Christians.

I pulled my phone out of my purse and turned on the camera.

"Amy, take of picture of him."

"How do I do that?"

"Just press the center button."

Amy pointed and shot right as the light turned green.



At some point, we found Carousel, only to notice the sign on the window that read "Closed on Mondays." And so we continued to drive through Thai Town until we hit the corner of Hollywood and Edgemont and spotted Bamboo House.

"I could go for some pad Thai," said Amy.

I was so hungry, I could eat anything.

Bamboo House has the best Thai food I have ever tasted. I'm pretty sure that is not just the hunger talking. Amy and I split some fried rice (yummy), she got the pad Thai and I got a macaroni dish, the full name of which I can't recall right now. I tasted Amy's pad Thai and was impressed. I never really cared for the dish before because, at most of the restaurants I have visited, it's too sweet and leaves a sickly aftertaste that lingers in the base of my throat. This pad Thai, though, was flavorful and savory. My own dish was a scrumptious mix of macaroni, tofu, tomatoes, basil, red pepper and chili pepper. The heat didn't hit until after a minute of tofu-chomping. Then my nose started to run and my sinus headache dissipated.

After dinner, we headed back to the Fonda to see the Magnetic Fields. We arrived roughly five minutes before the main attraction.

When I first saw Magnetic Fields, in 1998, it was at a place called Threadwaxing Space in New York, which looked like it was also an art gallery. It was this small, white space with wood floors. At least, I think that it was a wood floor. Whatever it was though, everyone was sitting on it. Now, 10 years later in Los Angeles, there were cheap white chairs lined up across the bottom level of the theater.

This is how you know you are getting to be an old hipster-- when you go to seated events in venues that don't have seating to see a band that performs with an intermission alongside guys who think that they are classing it up by wearing a blazer with their jeans and stupid Urban Outfitter t-shirts, not realizing that they wore the same outfit when they screened their theses in film school.

When the band came out, Claudia Gonson, who plays the piano and sings, asked that we not applaud. Meanwhile, Stephin Merritt was motioning "cut" to the audience. Gonson tried to explain why we weren't supposed to applaud, but it was impossible to hear her over the cheers. I think something must be up with Merritt's ear because every time the crowd clapped, which was often, he would tilt his head towards his left shoulder and pull on his earlobe.

Regardless the band played at least two hours (I lost track), working in old and new songs plus pieces from the Gothic Archies and the 6ths. They were, as Amy noted, "way unplugged," which meant that they did not play my personal favorite "Long-Forgotten Fairytale," which I used to play a lot when I DJed, usually with Pulp or Pet Shop Boys. The band did, however, play some choice tracks, including "Grand Canyon," "Papa Was a Rodeo," "Take Ecstasy with Me" and "Smoke and Mirrors." The band also played two of the Gothic Archies tracks from The Tragic Treasury: Songs from a Series of Unfortunate Events and were joined by Mr. Lemony Snicket himself on accordion. The highlight was during "Scream and Run Away," when we were told to scurry our feet whenever Snicket said run and and slump in whatever position we wish to find ourself deceased in when he said die.

"It works better with second graders," he said.

Oh, but it was a loud crowd at that moment. Louder than one could imagine for a show where much of the night we felt burdened by the pressure to act like civilized music fans.

When You Can't Afford a Flight to Japan

Smack in the middle of Torrance is a wonderland filled with tofu, bean pastries, manga and Hello Kitty. Mitsuwa Marketplace is a Japanese grocery chain whose website won't translate into English for me. Alas, we will wing it.

The South Bay outpost of Mitsuwa is large, about the same size as a Costco. Roughly half the store is a grocery market specializing in Japanese food stuff. Carlos and I didn't spend too much time checking out this section. Instead, we hit the food court and the boutiques that make up the other half of the facility.

Mitsuwa's food court is overwhelming. It isn't exceptionally large, at least not in comparison to your typical mall food court, it's that there is so many kinds of food that I have never tried. Plus, many of the signs are written primarily in Japanese. After about twenty minutes of perusing menu after menu, I finally settled on the curry shack that Carlos recommended. It's a basic dish, for $3.50 you get white rice and curry then for an additional $1.50 or more, you get your choice of topping. I picked the fried tofu.



The sinus-clearing properties of this dish cannot be underestimated. I could feel the spices burn through my nose and then, suddenly, I could breathe.

We hit up one of the tchotchke shops that lines the entrance to Mitsuwa, where we found this funny little display.



In case you can't read the sign, it says:

"Real tattoo hurts a lot. Well, if you get this, you don't have to go through the pain! Just stick it on your body. How easy is that?"

As you might recall, a little over a week ago, I was freaking out because I learned that My Melody now has a goth frienemie called Kuromi. Well, I found a Kuromi key cap at this shop and had to get it.



Then Carlos got a Shin Chan cell phone charm, which is actually charming his turntables now.



Interesting to note, Shin Chan the cell phone charm is, like Shin Chan the cartoon character, bare-assed under his Action Bastard cape.



We also checked out a bookshop, which was almost a fruitless venture considering that everything is written in Japanese. (Manga fans who know the language, you can get pretty much everything here.) However, I found the new issue of Fruits. Judging from the magazine website, I have a feeling that this is actually last month's issue, but it's pretty awesome nonetheless. I have spent a few hours flipping through the magazine and noticed the following trends.

• It's really hip to look like your grandma when she gets up in the morning.
• MIA is now a bona fide fashion icon.
• The Japanese confirm my sentiments that Docs are always hot.
• Leggings should be baggy around the knees and tights should be in funky patterns.
• Wearing a dead animal around your neck is tres chic.
• Big furry hats are not only warm, but totally awesome (I prefer faux).
• Always wear a scarf, the bigger the better.
• Charms and toys are meant to be dangled from the straps of your very large handbag.
• Short hair is super cool.

I love Fruits. I love Mitsuwa. I really have to go to Japan.

We're in Seattle Part V: Our Last Day

Thanks to the Seattle Times, we learned about the St. Demetrios Greek Festival. This was the 47th installment of the annual food-oriented celebration at Seattle's Greek Orthodox church.

This was the scene at St. Demetrios


Now, in Seattle, they participate in a ritual that is quite foreign to those of us from L.A. It's called football and it's not of the high school or UCLA vs. USC variety. Since it's been well over a decade since we had a pro team in L.A., I forgot the importance in making sure that there is always a tv tuned into the game every Sunday. Here at St. Demetrios, it was all about the Seahawks, with the guys working the beer ran from their posts to spots in front of the big screen every few minutes. Carlos and I made like temporary Seahawks fans, mostly on account of the fact that we don't really have our own teams (although, Carlos is apparently still a Raiders fan and I will root for the Browns), while we ate food like this:



Yum. Thanks to the people at St. Demetrios for the tasty lunch.

That evening, we walked across the street to Whole Foods, where we found a soda called Fizzy Lizzy.



Naturally, I was a fan of the name. Also, I must say that the pomegranate drink is quite tasty.

While at Whole Foods, I took a picture of this piece of public art. I don't know the story behind it.



That night, we spent our final evening at Neumos, where we saw Wolfgang Flur of Kraftwerk, Claude Vonstroke and a host of others.

We're in Seattle Part IV: How Food Almost Ruined My Trip

Actually, I'm back in L.A., but I didn't have time to finish posting before we went to the airport and I, for some reason, couldn't hook up to the Sea-Tac wifi. So, let's go back to Saturday if you will.

We went to Hurricane Cafe again, mostly so that I could try the Mac'n'Cheese, which, by the menu's admission, is "killer." It's pretty freakin' awesome, I'll give them that. Hurricane's Mac is more Italian inspired than the variety I'm used to eating. It's made with penne and topped with tomatoes and parmesan cheese. Quite tasty, but Fred 62 still makes the best.

We spent the afternoon walking across downtown, which isn't as far as it might seem, so that we could interview some L.A. DJs who were in town for dB. The first thing you learn in Seattle is that everyone jaywalks. A potentially deadly habit in L.A., jaywalking is a way of life in Seattle mostly, I imagine, on account of the fact that there is no traffic. (There is, however, a lot of construction, so half the downtown sidewalks are closed.) There are so few cars traveling through downtown Seattle that jaywalking becomes a necessity, lest you spend fifteen minutes waiting for every light to change.

After the interview, we went back to the hotel and asked the concierge about restaurants. He suggested the Japanese/Korean hybrid spot across the street. We went there and I decided to bite the bullet and try kimchi. I know what you're thinking, how does a girl who grew up in a part of town with as many Korean markets and restaurants as the north west San Fernando Valley go her whole life without ever eating kimchi? Well, for one thing, I really don't like cabbage.

Regardless, I tried the kimchi. I loved the way the spices filled up my clogged sinuses and seemed to free them of mucus. I ate some more. It was great. I was so proud of myself for trying something new and actually liking it.

We finished dinner, walked back to the hotel and started to get ready to head back out to Neumos. As we were about to leave, I started to feel ill. Desperately ill.

I tried my green eggs and ham. I liked them, too. Then they made me sick.

We missed the show at Neumos, but figured we could still make it to the afterhours. I decided to lay down for a bit and I didn't wake up until the next morning.

We're in Seattle Part III: On Mexican Food and Grunge

On Thursday night, the nice door guy suggested that we try eating at Bimbo's Bitchin' Burritos, which is apparently a very hot Mexican food establishment on Capitol Hill. Since the restaurant is only a block away from Nuemos, we decided to grab dinner there on Friday night.

Now even though neither Carlos nor I are of Mexican decent, we are L.A. natives, which makes us fairly particular about our Mexican food. It just seems like people outside of L.A. (or, even a lot of high class L.A. types) can't handle the basic concept driving all Mexican dishes-- lard makes things taste better. But, we're in Seattle now, so we figured we ought to give the city's take on Mexican food a chance.

Bimbo's menu features a few varieties of burritos, tacos and nachos. Much to my dismay, there is nothing involving chili relleno here and very little involving big scoops of guac. With that in mind, I figured I would go with the least authentic of Mexican dishes-- the nachos. I ordered a vegetarian version, since it boasted lots of guacamole, and asked to hold the sour cream. I was pleasantly surprised to see that my plate of nachos came just as I like them-- all stuff and light on the chips. However, the chips were pretty small, which meant that I had to eat most of it with a fork. That just seems a bit awkward. Carlos had a chicken burrito, which he said was alright, but I got the impression he wasn't impressed with Seattle's take on the L.A. staple. Yeah, that's why I ordered nachos.

As far as the ambiance is concerned, Bimbo's looks a lot like Jabberjaw did back in 1996. The place is decorated with flea market finds, including a plethora of Lucha Libre memorabilia and Keane paintings. Musically, they seem to dig the Melvins and things that sound like the Melvins.

It's bizarre that the Melvins, a Washington band that relocated to Los Angeles, has become the reference point of this trip. It seems that grunge was never just a trend up here and, as such, it really never went away. The last time I saw this many people wearing flannel, I was a senior in high school.

After Bimbo's we walked around Capitol Hill. Like L.A., there are a lot of homeless people. Unlike L.A., the graffiti is minimal. All we saw was "El Barto" sprayed across the back of a brick building. Someone must have been feeling nostalgic for the glory days of the Simpsons.

We stopped inside a coffee house before heading to Neumos. That is another difference between L.A. and Seattle, this city actually still has coffee houses that aren't affiliated with Starbucks or Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, which is perhaps a bit ironic considering that Starbucks is from Seattle. I can't remember the name of the coffee house, but it was virtually identical to anything we had in L.A. ten years ago. Inside, they played TV on the Radio, which might be the most modern thing one can find that comes from the School of the Melvins. One thing was obvious, though, Seattle is a rock city, so much so that it makes L.A. seem like Berlin in comparison.

Back at Neumos, the crowd was much smaller than the night before. I don't know if this was because Guns 'N' Bombs isn't as well known as Diplo, or because the crowd was split between three rooms.

If the dB events are indicative of the dance scene in Seattle, one point can be made. People do not dress up here. In L.A., we always thought of ourselves as being fairly casual, but here, everyone is one wearing jeans and not those of the Seven for All Mankind variety. During the course of my few nights clubbing here, I have not seen a single sparkle top, no shoes that look like Jimmy Choo and no Olsen Twin clones.