The Tigers Have Spoken in Le Garage

My new position at work must be keeping me a lot busier, as I just realized I haven’t posted a thing to this blog in a long time. I now get home later, and I’m noticeably more worn out. But it’s going well, and I’m learning a great deal. Now, let’s see if I can even think of anything to write about…

We caught Neko Case a few weeks ago at the Bluebird. I haven’t picked up her last couple of releases, but the show made me think that I need to track those down soon. The woman has an amazing voice, the way she can effortlessly hit some notes is truly mind blowing. A great casual stage manner as well, she was very self depreciative and humorous. It had been a few years since I last saw her, and I think she’s just keeps getting better. Despite not seeing a single mention of the show in the local media, the turnout was pretty big. This was the first of two nights she was playing at the theater, and she begged everyone to come back the following night so that there would be someone there besides her and her band. Damn, I should have gone… The support act was Low Sky, who played kind of slow roots tunes. The singer sounded a great deal like Ian McCulloch of the Bunnymen to my ears – not a bad thing in my book.

Earlier this week I was back at the Bluebird to see The Futureheads. The show was pretty much the same as the one I saw seven months ago at the Larimer Lounge, just in a bigger venue with a larger crowd (and strobe lights! more on that below…). My buddy JT, who I gave their CD to for Xmas, admitted he was a bit skeptical that the band would be able to duplicate their vocal interplay in a live setting. He was pleasantly surprised by how well they managed to pull it off. Their set was very high energy - they played all of the songs on their debut CD, plus a few b-sides (I really need to track down Piece of Crap!) and a cover of the Television Personalities A Picture of Dorian Gray. A really fun night and openers High Speed Scene were pretty enjoyable as well.

There were signs entering the Bluebird the night of The Futureheads advising the audience that strobe lights would be in use. Once inside the venue, they had posted these signs about every ten feet. They even had them posted on the doors into the restrooms. For some reason, this struck me as particularly funny – c’mon, they won’t have the strobes going in the men’s room! That would make it incredibly difficult to use the facilities. As is turned out, they only used the strobes a few times. Unlike the time I saw Spiritualized, and they had the strobes going at some point during every song. I got dizzy a few times that night…

The Workplace Shuffle

Well, I got the word a few weeks ago regarding cutbacks in our department at work. In all honesty, I wasn’t surprised – in fact, it was a bit of a relief, as I had been anticipating something like this for awhile. What did surprise me was the way in which the whole matter was handled – they should have just cut a position, with the remaining people taking up the workload. Instead, they cut back the hours of four employees from 40 to 32 a week. This is to be followed with further cutbacks to 24 hours a week (and loss of all benefits) in the fall. In my opinion, this is dirty pool. If they had just cut an employee (which likely would have been me – last hired, first fired), that person could start a job search and get on with their life. This way, four workers are being forced to play their hand – look for something new, or ride the whole thing out and see if they eventually get restored to full time status when other people leave or the new department structure doesn’t work out.

Despite not being all that surprised, I was still pretty angry about the whole matter and the way in which it was handled. First off, from the way she was talking the department manager has been planning this for some time. So why in the world did she offer me a job last July? The job I filled should never have been advertised. Not to mention that I took a significant pay cut to change jobs, which just further added to my anger. That evening I wracked my brain thinking it over, which was totally useless because there is nothing I can do to change matters. Exhausted, I retired to our music library. I played Fastbacks singles and drank beer in an effort to cheer myself up.

As luck would have it, a position was open in a department that I already work closely with. I decided to apply to keep myself full time with benefits – not only was I offered the position, but my new manager seems genuinely excited to get me (its nice that my hard work and good attitude was noticed by someone). I get to keep my same work week, and I start this Sunday. It was a lateral move, but I’m still excited to learn something new and work with people I already know and like. We’ll see how things pan out in my old department. Despite the fact that I was “not needed,” my old manager hurriedly posted my hours as a temp position. This could get interesting…

In happier news, the li’l woman had a birthday a few weekends ago. Originally, we had planned on trying out a somewhat fancy place down the street from us. As luck would have it, there were record high temperatures in Cowtown that weekend – when it came time for dinner, the birthday girl decided that we needed to go somewhere we she could wear shorts. Later that evening, on a lark, we went to see The Backwards (http://www.thebackwards.com/) – a Slavakian Beatles tribute act. They were pretty good, although we retreated for higher ground when too many couples came up front to dance (the “Czech bar” where the show was held is a bit too much of a meat market on the weekends for my liking). Luckily, we knew some people who had done the same, and had a fine time hanging out with them. Neat factoid about The Backwards – their “Paul” learned to play the bass left handed to keep things authentic. Now that’s tribute act dedication!

P.S. RIP Frank “the Riddler” Gorshin