Geoff Holden

This past week, I saw/heard two concerts. Barenaked Ladies on Tuesday night, and Trans-Siberian Orchestra last night (Sunday).

We might as well be chronological about this, so I’ll start with Barenaked Ladies. It was a really fun show, they played a nice mix of old classics and the new stuff, and even a version of Feliz Navidad sang by Tyler Stewart (calling himself ‘Seasonal Sam’)

The Trans-Siberian Orchestra show was very entertaining. Maybe I’m just dense, […]

This was supposed to be a different post, but the quality of yesterday’s concert has preempted it.

Yesterday was the Bridge School Benefit concert. What a show. The lineup included Neil Young, Death Cab for Cutie, Foo Fighters, Trent Reznor, Brian Wilson, Pearl Jam & Dave Matthews Band. It was all acoustic, and quite fantastic.

It’s the 20th annual benefit concert in aid of the Bridge School, a non-profit organization to help the education of individuals with severe speech […]

I saw another concert this past weekend. This time it was John Mayer and Sheryl Crow. Once again at Shoreline Amphitheatre, and once again to a pretty packed crowd.

Although I don’t claim to be a huge fan of either of these artists (not like Dave Matthews Band and Counting Crows), I rather enjoyed the show. Marjorie Fair was the opening act, who I can honestly say did nothing for me. […]

Last night, I (finally) saw Dave Matthews Band live in concert. On a scale from one to awesome, it was totally awesome. No photos though, as the Shoreline people wouldn’t let me bring mine in.

They played for almost three hours, and it was still too short. No number of live recordings or concert DVDs can prepare you for the actual experience of seeing these guys in top form. My only regret is that I didn’t get tickets for […]

Last night I attended my first (hopefully of many) concert in the Bay Area–Counting Crows & the Goo Goo Dolls at the Shoreline Amphitheatre. It was a good show. The Goo Goo Dolls were better than I had expected, and I had wanted to see Counting Crows for quite some time; now I have an actual live performance committed to memory to go with the six other live shows I have on CD […]

It’s been a while since I complained about music on here. Guess the time has come again, but this time I’ll complain about the industry.

First up, copying/downloading, etc. I can see why they have major issues with downloading music when people do it instead of buying it. But a lot of people do it to sample, to find new music (the radio is no longer useful for this, see Payola). I know there are very few CDs that […]

When I wrote my last post, I had intended for the word “defenses” to be a link to a page about sunscreen, etc. but I couldn’t find one I thought would make a good link. Instead I stumbled on a song I hadn’t heard in years that I’m glad I found again.

The lyrics to said song were taken word-for-word out a column in the Chicago Tribune by Mary Schmich. It’s been interesting to go […]

I’ve never been a big Apple fan, nor have I been an Apple hater, but after my iPod experiences last night, I want to vent a little.

Ever since the first iMacs were unveiled, I was convinced that Apple had finally gone totally ‘form before function’, ’style before substance’, etc. They’re more about looking cool than working well. This has also been demonstrated by the fact that the powerbooks don’t have a link light on their RJ-45 […]

Last night I went to a Sarah Slean concert at the Delta Hotel ballroom. It was a pretty good show. Justin Rutledge opened for her with some Christian-Folk-Country music. He was pretty good, although not really my style. Sarah Slean’s set was pretty good, lasting around an hour and a half or so. I hadn’t listened to a lot of her music before the concert; I only knew a couple of songs, […]

I received a copy of Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code (the special illustrated edition) for Christmas this year, and just got around to starting it this past weekend. I had been told on a couple of occasions that it was a really good book, and each of those people were right. An interesting and entertaining book that’s very difficult to put down–which is why I also finished it this weekend. For anybody who hasn’t read […]