Event Calendar

13 April 2006

Xiu Xiu (AK Press, 18 April 2006)

Jamie Stewart of Xiu Xiu played a very intimate, solo set at AK Press' warehouse in Oakland on Tuesday night. Not more than 40 people experienced Jamie's fantastic, yet short, set. Armed with just an amp and an electric guitar, Jamie played about 6 songs from Xiu Xiu's catalog.

He started off his set with a stellar rendition of "Clown Towne." Jamie's voice is so powerful and haunting, and it was especially more pronounced in this setting. After the song, Jamie said a little bit about AK Press' program of donating books to prisoners and a story about how he used to live in the very complex AK Press' office is located. The story was something about him riding a bike in circles while really drunk. It was entertaining, as only Jamie can tell it.

More songs were played including "Fabulous Muscles" which seems like a different song when played with an electric guitar. He ended his set with a very, very unique cover of The Smith's "Asleep". Before he played the song, he credited Johnny Marr as being the "greatest guitar player" ever. A fitting compliment from one great musician to another.

If you haven't seen Jamie play by himself, do yourself a favour and do so. And be prepared to get mesmerized.

Beer Rating:



1 comment:

Anonymous said...

what you don't know: Ian gets into a lot of shows "on the list-style" cos he writes for this mesh mag. very seldom does he not. He did not ask to get on the list for this AK press/prison literacy project show; actually he dropped a few extra bucks in the donations box. alls I gotta say is how fucking lucky am I to have such a good guy as a friend?? SO lucky.