well, I'm talking Rock and Roll

Well. Certainly one of the best concert experiences, I've ever had.



Southern Californian culture is built upon the automobile. I read about this time and time again in California history, and I drive through proof of it every day. Tonight was my second time driving to the Hotel Cafe - and second time driving through LA on my own. The estimated arrival time as per Mapquest was 43 minutes. The reality of LA traffic, the freeway system and LA drivers made it a whopping two hours before I got to the Hotel Cafe. In LA, it's everyone for themselves, and you really have to drive defensively - I think I could have graduated from the Asian Stunt Woman Driving Academy with high honors tonight, I really do. People are insane there...but enough about the driving.

I actually got there around the same time Tom, the band and the crew got there, and I basically lurked around the alley, watching them carry in equipment. The line up started at 7:00 and we could hear Tom soundchecking inside (Karaoke Soul was one song). As I waited to be let inside, I sort of melted into the wall and eavesdropped on all my fellow Tom Mcrae fans - there was a family next to me with the first 10 year old Tom Mcrae fan I've heard of. His name is Austin, and he's a big fan of Tom and AFI and Linkin Park. Later that night, Tom would dedicate "Bloodless" to Austin.

There was a mother and her daughter, several KCRW winners and just a nice eclectic mix of people overall. I got inside around 7:30 and went right up to the front - Tom and the Ollies were finishing the last of their soundcheck, and putting away their equipment for the opening act.

I went and got a brownie and sat in the midst of their reshuffling, Olli Cunningham (keyboards) had his bag in the chair next to mine, so I briefly smiled at him ( we would end up brushing by each other throughout the night) and waited for voleuse and her friends to arrive. Damien Rice's "Delicate" came on the PA system and later the Clash's London Calling would fill the time between sets.

The cafe gradually started filling up, and by the time Annie Stela sat down at her piano, I was sharing my table with John and James, two nice teachers. They quizzed me about my laminated tomination.org fliers and I had James listen to Just Like Blood on my cd player. voleuse finally arrived, modeling her super swank WORLD TOMINATION tank top and then the evening finally began.

Annie Stela played a brief, but scorching set at her piano, and finished to a huge round of well-earned applause.

Then the lights dimmed some more and Tom, Oli Krause, and Olli Cunningham took the stage.

Tom announced it was their last show in America, before they flew back to London and then onto Oslo, Norway, so they enjoyed their last day of warm weather - then asked if anyone had the scores to the baseball game. Red Sox lost, much to Tom's dismay and he joked that if anyone felt like crying into their beer, they've come to the right place.

The set list: wth remembered bits of Tom banter! For yes, I have a mind like a steel trap.

1. You only disappear
2. Walking 2 Hawaii - Tom mentioned that he'd gotten a reputation for writing sad, sort of bleak songs and his previous videos had always had him getting wet or rained on, and that he'd like to see this song be a different kind of music video.
3. Border Song - The beginning of mocking Oli K - Tom introduced the two Ollies and would later say in the night that everyone falls in love with Oli K (cellist), especially on Border Song, and that he [Tom] wouldn't mind if the audience threw him some looks, just to bolster his ego. The Tom and Oli show is quite hilarious in person, especially since Oli would just smile good naturedly - the bit about him having one freakishly over-developed arm because of the bow, and the other one withered away - that one brought a huge laughter from the crowd.

Tom also mentioned the Samaritans, 'that group that tells people to not commit suicide' wrote to him, and he was afraid that when he opened the email that it would contain a missive to 'stop writing songs, people are flinging themselves off the cliffs,' but it actually only wanted him to contribute something to a charity, so that was alright....really, the man is just witty and self-deprecating and charming, it's difficult to describe in words. You just had to be there.

4. Mermaid Blues
5. A + B song - while not the same unearthly, spine - trembling experience I had the first time I heard it live, it was still incredibly moving. It takes on a whole new dimension in a live atmosphere - and it's hard to believe that it's just the three of them, creating such a big vibrant, cinematic sound.
6. Draw Down the stars - there was a lot of cheering and shouting at this gig - I think the KCRW appearance helped a lot with that, it was a lot livelier and noisier this time around, but so much fun. Tom mentioned that it was another song off the first record, which can be purchased here in America, and someone from the audience shouted out "Language of Fools," and Tom remarked, "Oh good, someone's got the first album."

7. Bloodless - dedicated to the aforementioned Austin, who also plays electric guitar, acoustic guitar, trumpet and wants to learn the bass guitar for his band (You know what I did in junior high school? Hid in the library and drew comic strips. Clearly, every one blooms at their own rate.)

Tom - "Ha, and they said I would never appeal to kids...." and then someone from the audience shouted, "well, we've got a fifteen year old here!"

8. The Boy with the Bubble Gun - Tom said Killing people is wrong. Well, most people, anyway. Heh.

9. the final song - Tom thanked everyone for coming out and for all the fans who had been spreading the word - I think Chris and Erica were old friends/fans of his, and Erica later snapped a picture of me, Tom and voleuse together, but already I'm getting ahead of myself. They played "ghost of a shark" as the finale and thanked everyone for coming out and supporting them.

After a thunderous amount of applause, the call for an encore started and Tom, Oli K, Olli C returned to play "Language of Fools," as the other requests needed a full band to back them up. Tom said he hoped to come back next year and then ----

after prodding James and John if they were going to buy Just Like Blood (they did), I went off with voleuse to see if we could say hello to Tom and give him tomination.org and WORLD TOMINATION merchandise (along with advertising the tank top, voleuse also had postcards.

It seemed like another gridlock, as we waded through the crowd, drifting by Oli K and Olli C, before meeting up with the rest of voleuse's friends and then Tom, who was in a corner, talking to two blonde women.

Then comes what I like to call the Awkward Polite Unobtrusive Part of the Evening, as voleuse and I waited for Tom to finish his respective conversations.

This consisted of me standing right behind the women and trying not to stare at Tom, while being polite and unobtrusive. This sadly failed as I had a large piece of laminated cardstock that I was clutching, meaningfully, and I'm sure the poor women thought I was burning holes in their heads. Meanwhile, random fans stopped by and congratulated or thanked Tom on a show well done and I tried not to feel terribly envious of their obviously easy going confidence in breaking into conversations and then leaving gracefully.

But finally, I managed to talk to Tom on my own, and beside the usual "I've come to say hello again" spiel, I also gave him the laminated flyer for tomination.ORG, and then hastily assured him that it looked much more impressive in direct light - which he then took to direct light and exclaimed over. He loved voleuse's tank top, and after she had given him her postcards, said that a photograph had to be taken of the shirt and of us. I then found Oli K chatted with him about the show and how they enjoyed playing the dates here, and showed off voleuse's tank top once more (she truly was my fashion accessory for the evening. Possibly the only time that it's acceptable to be pointing at a woman's chest area specifically and calling attention to it), and then got Tom and Oli's signatures on another tomination.org flyer (I also scrawled down the set list on it). Tom brought us over to the merchandise table and showed off the flyer and the postcards and the shirt to his merchandise people, and there was some really flattering and wonderful marks said at that point, only by that time I had sort of gone mute with pleased shock, and so I don't think I had much to contribute in the way of witty conversation. I also got more free singles to giveaway for the site, so - be on the look out for *that* competition.

Tom asked Erica to take a picture of us three, making sure that the tank top got equal play, and after that, I wandered outside and found Olli C, and of course, he was chatting with someone else, so I sort of did my hovering trick again, until Olli could talk to me. We chatted about how horrible the traffic is in LA (Olli said that getting to the Long Beach gig was something else...), he got a kick out of voleuse's tank top (I fully expect tons of these tank tops to be sold immediately.) and I managed to get his signature for the flyer, and then I wished him a safe flight to London, and he wished me a safe drive back home and that's it.

Took me half an hour to get home, by the way. Time works differently, clearly.

But oh. I'm just so pleased and so happy that the guys liked and appreciated our efforts as much as we appreciated theirs. :)