Spoon - Live at Emo's [December 4, 2004]

If you are wondering why I'm making such a flurry of posts lately after several months of near extinction, here's the deal.  My company is doing so well in this slow economy that they decided to give me and everyone else in the organization one week off - unpaid.  This is my week.  Legally... technically... I am not supposed to do any work for my employer this week.  Fair enough.  

You must know Spoon by now.  They definitely got more popular after being dropped by a major, and IMHO got better, too.  This is a bootleg from a hometown show at the venerable Austin, TX rock club, Emo's.  This happened just a few months before Gimme Fiction was released.  That's the one post-major Spoon album I don't really like.  No biggie though; the setlist draws liberally from the entire Spoon catalog up to that point.  

It sounds awesome, too.  Kudos to the entrepreneurial fan and/or sound man who made this pristine recording.

i don't make any of this stuff

Don Caballero - Live at the Middle East, Boston, MA - March 9, 1999

Don Caballero's lineup has never been constant.  For a brief time after What Burns Never Returns was released, the band remained a quartet despite the departure of founding guitarist Mike Banfield and bassist Pat Morris.  John Fine (Bitch Magnet, Vineland) took over on guitar.  Eric Topolsky, already playing in Ian Williams' other group Storm and Stress, filled the bass spots.  That quartet toured a bit in 1999, including this date in Boston, before reverting to the pedal-driven trio which eventually delivered American Don.

This boot is notable for a few reasons.  Firstly, of course, it sounds pretty good for what was apparently a crowd mic recording.  Also, they play two songs from Don Caballero 2, a live feat which for whatever reason was not attempted by the original quartet at the time What Burns... was released.  Lastly, the track "That Badge Means You Suck" was an early version of "You Drink a Lot of Coffee for a Teenager."  

Often imitated, never duplicated, frequently hated - Don Caballero.

Elsewhere go