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Pop culture dispatches from the Great Lakes

Hard Rock

A Family Affair: Foo Fighters Live at Wrigley Field

August 31, 2015 by Travis J. Cook Leave a Comment

BN-KB596_0830fo_G_20150830122158

There is a casual tendency to observe the entirety of human culture as one long progression towards an evolved singular form – a belief that early art influenced the next wave influenced the next and so on, each form building on what came before it and improving it, making it better in pursuit of the ultimate form. There are truths and fallacies to this, to be sure – musical techniques have come a long way since Gregorian chants, but to say that the ultimate evolution of music ends with, say, “Uptown Funk” is to oversimplify the position. Music grows and changes, but is never a “set form” – there is no textbook end-all-be-all summation that says that this is the pinnacle of musical achievement, that it does not and will never get better than this.

Anyway, that’s all moot, because while Dave Grohl may not be the pinnacle of rock and roll evolution, he’s really fucking good at rocking out.

Yours truly took in the Foo Fighters at Wrigley Field on Saturday night, August 29th, 2015. Standing in the field, buffeted by rain, spilled beer, and thousands upon thousands of fans with no clear concept of concert etiquette (SERIOUSLY, YOU CANNOT COME ANY FURTHER FORWARD, BACK UP ALREADY, FOH CRAZY LADY), some friends and I took in three opening acts before having our minds melted and reforged into explosive particles by Dave Grohl’s band for two and a half hours. To recount this on a song by song basis would trivialize the night – so here’s the setlist if you’re curious about which greatest hits were rolled out. (Spoiler alert – all of them) [Read more…]

Posted in: Alternative Rock, Arts, Grunge, Hard Rock, Live Concert, Music Tagged: Cheap Trick, Dave Grohl, Foo Fighters, Naked Raygun, Urge Overkill, Wrigley Field

Thoughts from the Dugout: Rockin’ the Postseason

October 14, 2014 by Travis J. Cook 1 Comment
Image of Kaufmann Stadium Rainout

Royals-Orioles was rained out last night. So here’s a filler column!

We’re three and two games into the respective League Championship Series, and already, it’s as if everything we expected (NLCS) and didn’t expect (ALCS) is happening. However, there are multiple things which I’m interested in writing about this year, so we’re expanding to another field I love – music. Specifically, rock music. Even more specifically, a completely arbitrary way to honor past acts with a designation which may or may not actually mean anything in the long run.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ballot was released last week, and it’s an interesting pool of candidates, bringing together a diverse and completely unrelated group of acts that may or may not actually have to do with rock itself. In order to fully analyze the ballot, I felt that the best way to do it was to look at their blurb on Wikipedia, listen to a song on YouTube, and then compare them with a player/manager from the four teams remaining in the postseason to which they (somewhat) relate. This is why I get my own column – sheer genius and ultra-spontaneous collaborations. Behold, my breakdown of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 2015 ballot!

[Read more…]

Posted in: Alternative Rock, Baseball, Blues, Hard Rock, Music, Playoffs, Pop, Punk, R&B, Rap, Sports, Thoughts from the Dugout Tagged: Bill Withers, Chic, Green Day, Joan Jett, Kraftwerk, Lou Reed, N.W.A., Nine Inch Nails, Paul Butterfield, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Sting, The Marvelettes, The Smiths, The Spinners, War

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