Taylor Swift 1989 Tour

Yes, I went to her stop at Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara last Sat, with my daughter of course. And this was the first time ever I have been to an American pop-star's concert. (Depeche Mode was close but they were not American :P) We bought the tix in the morning of the first day it went on sale and we could only get the "top-level" tix (which still costs $100+ each) We estimated she probably makes between 1-9mil that night. Well, according to this article, she made 2.5mil per stop on average recently. And this tour will push her 2015 earning over 100mil.

Enough about the business aspect, let's talk about the music! So, the format of a pop concert is actually similar to a rock concert: both started with some lesser opening acts (I mean, usually, once in a while you find the likes of Alice Cooper opening for the likes of Motley Crue) The openers for Swift were Shawn Mendes and Vance Joy. Mendes played all by himself with only his guitar (and his voice) which was tough (but also less people to share his money :P) Apparently he has lots of teen female fans and didn't mind. Personally I don't care too much of his songs (sounded like a lesser Ed Sheeren) The music of the Australian Vance Joy was more enjoyable to me as there were traces of influence by English bands like Oasis (according to Wikipedia, he's inspired by George Harrison, so that's in the ballpark)

The wait for TayTay's appearance was finally over ~9pm (oh yeah, that's a long wait. My daughter was a huge fan of Swift for several years. It peaked around the time of the release of "1989" last year though. You know a girl could only like the same artist with the same level of dedication for so long! She has already "moved on" to One Direction. I guess our constant reminding of how expensive the tickets were made her appreciate it a bit more. In fact, glad to see her enjoying the concert a lot that night) The setlist could be found on the Wikipedia. As expected, she started with several hits from 1989, which represented her transition from pop-country to "simply" pop. I was on the fence about this transition. I mean, I like to see musicians sticking with their roots. However, Swift has been more pop than country already so she might as well cross the line completely. Anyway, the new songs are kinda enjoyable. I just think the country elements made her more stand out from the other run-of-the-mill pop stars. I admire the efforts in rearranging her old and new songs to make them coherent in one concert though, for example, Trouble was rearranged and sounded more mysterious. The other highlights include her playing acoustic guitar/piano to accompany her singing, and she played a white Johnny Marr Fender Jaguar on the song We are never ever getting back together (You know how much I love Jaguar :) Last but not least, the production was top-notch: the sound system was loud and clear and the "run-way" stage that split, elevate and rotate was cool (and seemed safe for TayTay and the dancers) I wonder what concert I would go with my daughter next.

Al Molina, Strunz & Farah

An old schoolmate was in town. She's a huge jazz fan and immediately thought of me, "famous" for going to live jazz. Of course I (more like fellow performers in the bay area) didn't disappoint. Before the first show, I took her to Guitar Center on Van Ness for sheet music (the selection is small but still interesting enough) We also had oyster from the Swan Depot on Polk for our happy-hour. Then we drove to Brisbane (a city that I'm not familiar with. I've only been to Cow Palace to saw Twins' concert there years ago) and the 7 Mile House (which I've never been to but learned that it has been in business for 160 years, even earlier than the 100 year old Swan Depot!) However, when I arrived, I almost thought I was in the wrong place: it looked run-down and small. And I was hesitated to go in with my friend. In fact, if she's your typical HK chick, I would have left immediately. She's a seasoned world traveler though and actually convinced me good stuff is found from hidden gems like this! Man, she couldn't have been more correct. First of all, it also "doubles" as a sports bar with several games on big TV (baseball, hockey and basketball playoff!) Second, the food was pretty good. We shared a bowl of seafood. We were really surprised that all tables were reserved on a Tuesday night (we sat at the bar) When music started, we knew why: trumpeter Al Molina and his bands played top-notch jazz. His show was a tribute to great pianist Horace Silver. We sat so close to the trombonist that I could actually read his sheet music (and I did!) I found that the solo order for each instrument was written on the sheet music. I hesitated to write that down with my band but not any more.

The second show was at the world-famous Yoshi's, the one in Oakland. Avant garde jazz bassist William Parker was playing at Yoshi's SF, but I'm more interested in the world music/new Flamenco guitar duo Strunz & Farah (accompanied by a percussionist and a flautist/clarinetist) I have seen them live before but they have a huge catalog and also have new music coming out soon. I was impressed. So was my friend.

Chick Corea and the Vigil

I gave a hint that one of the two concerts I attended during the weekend was Chick Corea. He is certainly one of the biggest names in jazz today. You could be pretty sure it would be a good show. Indeed, I saw him with his group "Origin" many years ago. While I didn't find the music spectacular, it was a good show nevertheless. Same for one of his more recent album, Five Peace Band Live. I'm more impressed by his piano duet with the young Hiromi. He is the type of musicians that makes the others play better. He seems to be in a even better physical shape than I saw him last time. And I also enjoyed the music better this time.

One thing I really like is instead of drawing attentions to himself, the big star, he made the whole band shine, especially the up-and-coming guitarist Charles Altura, as well as the horn player Tim Garland. As a guitar player myself, I paid a lot of attention to the former. Here's a video of him playing with his group:

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In addition to playing the same ES335 with Chick Corea, he also played a nylon acoustic and sounded great on it too.

I am really looking forward to hearing the new album from this group.