A friend recently returned to the United States from South Korea. She is teaching English across the Pacific and is on a two month long vacation. To celebrate her return, we decided we’d head off to check out the local music scene. Via e-mail, I suggested two places as possibilities: either Spaceland or Silverlake Lounge. I also gave her a couple myspace links so that she could listen to the residency bands at both locations and decide which she liked best. We ran into some immediate problems. I didn’t realize that her Internet access was spotty (she didn’t have a cell phone as she’d cancelled her cell phone plan when she left for South Korea). I started to feel some pressure when I got a text from another friend asking what the plan was.
After finally exchanging some e-mails (she headed off to the library), she said she wasn’t able to listen to any of the bands at the two venues and wanted me to make the decision. I replied back saying we’d go to Spaceland and if she’d just call me to determine an appropriate time to pick her up.
She called me up later, using her mother’s phone. Unfortunately, I was on my work phone with my boss when she called. So when I picked up my cell phone, I asked if she’d call me back in five minutes. She didn’t call back. After 30 minutes, I decided I better call her back. She didn’t answer. I waited another thirty minutes before calling again and got her mother who promptly hung up on me. Hmm . . . I called back. The phone was handed over to the daughter. All was settled and so I sent a verification of location and time to our other friends via text messages.
(The six hours or so that the above planning unfolded over made me feel like I was living in the aftermath of “2012” or in the middle of “Book of Eli” or “The Road.” Technology had taken a step back and I was at a total loss on how to function without it. If the post-apocalyptic world ends up anyway like “The Road” you surely don’t want to travel along side me because we’ll be fresh meat for the cannibals.)
I got to my friend’s house and was immediately offered something to eat. Do you want some dinner? – no, really, I think we should just head off to Spaceland. Have a brownie? – which was promptly put into a sandwich bag. How about some Korean candy? – I was given a handful and decided to have one. Nasty, and promptly returned the additional candies back into the bag, sorry for offending. Have some sweet bread? –no, seriously, we should go.
We got to Spaceland and a couple of our friends were already there. The first band up was Open Hand (pictured left). They had a trio of female back-up singers. I was asked to take some photos of one of the singers, because she looked like one of our friends.
Next up was Year Long Disaster
, the residency band. After their first song, they had a drum kit problem. I over-heard a young lady saying, “Isn’t it funny, they’re called Year Long Disaster and they start their set off with a minor disaster?”
My observation of Year Long Disaster (pictured right and lower left): I think they must be anti-vampires. At one point, the lights came down and the lead singer said, “It is so dark and no one can see how handsome our bass player is.” This was said with a sense of humor, but he was serious because he gave a look to the back that indicated that he’d prefer to have the lights on. And when the lights went on, he said “Thank you.” Hmm, a fear of the dark?!? – that the vampires will find lights off as too inviting. Anyways, I’m joking, I just say “Daybreakers” before writing this blog.
Back to my friends. After Open Hand, my teacher friend and another friend said they wanted to go to 7-Eleven. They scurried off and never came back. After Year Long Disaster, the two of us still left inside decided to go on a search and rescue before our friends got turned into frogs by voodoo master Dr. Facilier (“The Princess and the Frog”). We found our two friends on the sidewalk, chatting away. We headed off to the 7-Eleven where we bought some late night snacks. While there, I took a picture of the People magazine cover, which had a photo of one of the Jonas Brothers’ wedding. This I promptly loaded onto the Facebook wall of a friend.
After hanging around 7-Eleven for a few minutes, we broke up and I drove my friend back to her parents’ house. And so ended our night out.
Spaceland’s Monday nights in January were dedicated to rock and roll. A complaint that was shared with me regarding much of 2009 was that Monday nights at Spaceland seemed to be under the control of a handful of bands. You might have a different residency band, but it was like there was a rotation of bands and they were just inviting each other to play during their residency month. Now one of those bands in that rotation was Local Natives and I love Local Natives, but I do have to agree with that complaint and so it is nice to see Spaceland go with a solid rock group to mix it up a bit on Mondays.
About my friend:
It was awesome to get to hang out with her after she was away in Korea for the last six months.
It is too sad that she’s heading back at the end of February.
I learned that setting a level of expectations is not always a good thing. I started the precedent of sending her monthly e-mails about what was going on in Los Angeles. Upon her return, she learned from other friends about “other” events that happened in our circle of friends and was not too pleased that I hadn’t mentioned anything to her about these events. (Now I actually had told her about these “other” events and came to the conclusion that she hadn’t read my e-mails.) My reply back was that she would have been left totally uninformed if I hadn’t kept her updated with what pieces of information I had passed along. Her replay back was that I was still to blame for not letting her know about certain events, because I’d started the precedence of keeping her informed. She’s going back to South Korea in late February, I’m wondering if it is wise to keep up this precedent or try to convince someone else to take on the duties . . . simply too much responsibility and the messenger gets the blame for not providing enough info.
