Category: Beer

Tonight Kelly and I (along with our friends Miranda and Brian) saw The Shins perform at the Crystal Ballroom. We all met up at McMenamins Ringlers Pub for dinner and drinks before the show. When Kelly and I first arrived, our server listed off some new beers they were serving (brewed at Ringlers, not sure if any of the other McMenamins carry them or not), one of which cought my attention, a Scotch-style ale on nitro. I had one and it was fantastic. Dinner was also very good. The show started at 9pm, so shortly before we went on upstairs to a packed Crystal Ballroom. I'd forgotten until that moment that the show was a sponsor-filled event put on by the local radio station 94.7 FM. It was full, very very full.

The opening act was a great local band Viva Voce, who I'd been wanting to see for a while. Miranda, Brian and myself had seen The Shins once before, about a year ago (Kelly missed out due to a work event, if I remember correctly), and again, they were fantastic. They played a lot of new material from their upcoming album (released on January 23rd), Wincing The Night Away. The stage was decorated with Christmas lights, and their 'entry' song was the Vince Geuralid song "Christmas Time is Here", from the cartoon A Charlie Brown Christmas. Kelly was smiling a very big smile, as Christmas time and that film (and song) are closely intertwined and always put a smile on her face. The whole show was great fun.

A few months back, Ghost Dog had mentioned this band, OK Go, and sent me this link to a video of theirs (which is super lo-tech, but brilliant). A couple weeks back he mentioned that they were coming to town and wanted to go. Tonight we went to the show!

The show was at a venue I'd never been to before, The Hawthorne Theater, so Kelly & I, and Mr & Mrs GD drove over to the Hawthorne district and had dinner at the Bridgeport Ale House just down the street from the theater. I got to try a Bridgeport beer I hadn't had before, the Black Strap Stout, which was really delicious (slightly chocolaty and creamy). The meal was good, though nothing to go into too much detail over (kinda hard to screw up my meal, a chicken sandwich) :).

After dinner we walked up to the venue, got in just in time to check out the first of two opening acts, The Mediam, who were… uh… loud angry youths (you know, loud distorted guitars and a screaming singer). Between the deafening noise and the sweat (it was like a furnace in the place), we didn't last long before we moved over to the bar area, where we could cool off and relax a bit more before OK Go took the stage. The bar was serving beers from Off The Rail Brewery (based in Forest Grove, Oregon) which I'd never had before. I tried the stout, which was very good, though less of a stout and more of a strong dark ale in flavor. We ended up hanging out there through the second opening act, Quit Your Day Job, so I don't know if they were good or not.

OK Go put on a really fun show. Spiffy hi-tech stuff aside, such as entertaining video clips projected behind the band during songs (including those of live cameras that were stealthily placed around the stage, including a very small one attached to the singer's microphone, pointing at his face), and the smoke machines, and the confetti machines, etc., the band puts on a very good show and are excellent live. At one point, right in front of where we were standing (towards the back) some crew rolled out and assembled this small round platform, and then three of the band members walked through the crowd to the platform and performed two acoustic songs, right in front of us, before making their way back to the stage to continue the show. Overall it was a great show, though the venue isn't my favorite of the smaller concert spots in town. Hopefully next time they'll play elsewhere.

Note: I hope to have photos from Kelly's phone, which I emailed myself, though only two have arrived and of those, they were two of worthless ones. Providing they ever arrive in my inbox I'll add them to this post.