Each week CityBeat staffers share their weekend plans: from dinner and drinks or special events to out-of-town concerts and stories we’re working on. And some of us just watch TV.
Mike Breen: I’m planning on going to see Pixies at Horseshoe Casino Saturday night. I was actually fortunate enough to see them “back in the day,” before their breakup in the early ’90s. It was 1989, so their classic Doolittle album had been recently released, and they were touring with Love and Rockets, who had just had their first real “hit” with the song “So Alive.” The bands played at Riverfront Coliseum (now U.S. Bank Arena) when the arena was doing concerts in what they called a “theatre” setting (basically putting the stage in the middle of the venue facing one side, selling tickets only for half the arena, so it was slightly more “intimate” than the bigger shows there). My memories of the show are foggy, but I remember being a big fan of both bands at the time and being satisfied with the concert overall. My most vivid memory is of Kim Deal — when she sang, her mouth formed what looked like a big Cheshire Cat grin that beamed all the way up to our nose-bleed seats. (And I think Love and Rockets’ Daniel Ash came out in drag for their “So Alive” encore.)
I also saw Pixies towards the beginning of their lengthy reunion run, in 2005 at Lollapalooza in Chicago, and it was a great set. It was cool to see them reap some of the rewards of their vast influence on the music that led to the creation of Lollapalooza in the first place. And it was amazing to see the over-the-top response from the wide-age-ranging audience.
The Pixies seemed to be solely doing these reunion tours for the money for a few years too long — they’d been a reunion band longer than they were an actual band, before they finally started making new music again (which is actually pretty good). This will be my first time seeing them without Deal, which will be odd. Add the fact that this is a casino concert (which doesn’t have the stigma it once did, especially at Horseshoe, but still …) and I’m mostly just really curious to see how it all goes down. It should be appropriately surreal.
Nick Swartsell: I’m heading to Chicago to catch a few friends’ art show Friday and then, on Saturday, to watch Dan Deacon at Thalia Hall. The venue is super-rad. It’s a 122-year-old hall in the Pilsen neighborhood modeled after the Prague Opera House. The building contains a punch house, a crazy-ornate performance space, a restaurant and a lot of history. Interesting fact: In the early 20th century, Pilsen had more people from Bohemia than anywhere else besides Prague. In 1915, a group of Bohemian activists drafted documents in Thalia Hall that would prove to be the beginnings of an independent Czechoslovakian state. Crazy stuff. I’ll just be dancing my face off to the weirdness that is Dan Deacon, though, not helping helping to create any nations or anything.
Jesse Fox: This weekend is one I’ve been looking forward to for awhile. On Saturday my band [The Slippery Lips] is playing a show with a band I really like from LA called FIDLAR. I have friends coming down from Chicago and up from Florida to see it, which makes it even more exciting/flattering. Anticipating we will have a pretty fun-filled and wild Saturday, I haven’t made any plans for Sunday yet … except perhaps continuing my binge watching of Community now that I have a Hulu Plus account and will likely be useless to the world otherwise.
Editorial Intern Sarah Urmston: My weekend begins getting dragged by my buddy Andrew to see Pitch Perfect 2 at Newport on the Levee, where luckily they serve alcoholic beverages to get me through it. I will also be checking out a house to lease for the upcoming year, saying bye-bye to good old Clifton Heights. Woo-hoo! I am especially anxious to spend Saturday afternoon in OTR, where they will be kicking off the 2015 City Flea in Washington Park. I can’t wait to spend money I don’t have on vintage/handmade items sold by local vendors and check out the grand opening of style boutique Idlewild Woman! Sunday I’ll check out Crossroad’s weekly message at Bogarts in Clifton. Church in a bar? Coolest way to end a weekend.
Editorial Intern Zack Hatfield: I’m heading over to City Flea on Saturday after inhaling brunch at a to-be-determined OTR restaurant I probably can’t afford (a weekend ritual). The flea always has interesting wares — Fern frequently has a snazzy selection of succulents and cacti worth browsing — so good that my apartment has of late turned into a sort of mini-terrarium/cactus shrine. At the risk of sounding nostalgic, I’ll probably check out the Butterflies of the Philippines at Krohn Conservatory on Sunday — I haven’t seen that since I was a kid, and there’s something badass about being surrounded by thousands of butterflies that span the colors of the rainbow. I guess my inner lepidopterist just can’t resist.
This article appears in May 13-19, 2015.
