The big thing of Saturday was Mary Beth's and my sixth anniversary! We hung around and lounged around in the morning. Then did some errand stuff. Later in the afternoon we went downtown for Mid South Pride fest. We got there just as the parade was starting. We got a pretty good spot on the corner right across from where it was starting. I guess it wasn't more crowded was 'cuz of the two nutjobs with the sign standing on a stool and shouting about the bible and jeey-suhs! and sodomy and hellfire. A lot of people were just telling them that they loved them or making fun of them and laughing. We mostly just laughed. The parade was pretty good. I screamed a lot. Wish I'd had my earplug because the volume was hurting my right ear. Really, it was my own screaming that was hurting it. I'd cut it back and all, but ouch. Oh, before the parade we quickly stopped by the Bernie booth and one of the ladies gave Mary Beth a Planned Parenthood condom necklace 'cuz she was sad she missed out on 'em last week at Cooper Young. After the parade we walked down to Rendezvous. Mary Beth had never been and I hadn't been since I was more or less a kid. The ribs were really good. The seasoning (which they're well known for and Mary Beth cooks with at home so I know it's good and all) was just great. And they way they're char-grilled. Delicious! I know they get slagged lately for consistency, but I thought we had a good experience. I was kinda craving banana pudding. We though maybe Soul Fish would have some so we went to end the night there. They didn't have it, but they had a very creamy lemon pie that was a perfect substitute for my craving.
Yesterday was the big day! Trip to Nashville to see Kraftwerk! We started off in the morning and picked Jacques up. The ride up was pretty uneventful and fast. We had lunch along the way at Loretta Lynn's Kitchen. It was a buffet (they had menu food too, but we got the buffet) but it was a good buffet. Some of the stuff on there was really great. We didn't have too much to do in town. We went to Grimey's. On the used side I picked up: The Chinese Stars: Turbo Mattress (disc is shaped like an actual "chinese star" so I was shocked my cd player in here was actually able to play it, let's see how many others can play this pointy disc) and v/a: STRP1: Reactions to the Music of Dick Raaijmakers (pretty stoked and surprised to see this, never heard of the comp itself, but Dick Raaijmakers is pretty incredible and I was happy to find something like this...I almost went right past it, but backed up 'cuz my brain registered the Basta label's logo in the corner a second later...so yeah, smart move). Then in the regular Grimey's side I picked up a few things: Orange Juice: The Orange Juice (a little bummed 'cuz Jacques was telling me it's the one with "Rip It Up" so that's why I got it, but it's not...doh!), The Body: Master, We Perish, and Michael Price: Entanglement. I'd had a plan then of going downtown to the Ryman and since it functions as a museum during the day we could do that before the show, then maybe kill the remaining time somewhere around there. Well, the tours were $20 a person and there was only an hour left for them anyway so I didn't realize they'd be so much so we were like screw that. The area nearby didn't seem to have anything that wasn't completely lame and horrible so we just stayed in the Ryman's adjacent cafe thingie and sat down and drank things. That's how we passed the few hours before the show.
Then we got in! The only merch that had for sale was shirts so I picked up an Autohan shirt and one of those wireframe "www.kraftwerk.com" shirts. Here we parted ways 'cuz our seats were separate. Mary Beth and I sat up in the balcony on the left side of the stage. The show was really fucking good. 3D glasses and all that jazz. The 3D was kinda cool, but the video stuff would have worked just as well in 2D. Anyway, the video stuff was pretty awesome. I mean, I'm sure you konw what the Kraftwerk show looked like. The four of them were each standing on their stand while the projection had stuff for the songs. A lot of the visuals were fucking awesome. They opened with "Numbers" and all these numbers and old-school kinda console computerty fonts and stuff. A lot of the visuals were also goofy and campy and that was cool too. There were a lot of early 90s-level 3D renderings. Maybe they've been using the same graphics for all those years. I dunno, it was pretty awesome anyway. The set went in groups of songs by album. They did a lot from Computer Work (as I said, that was first). The one surprise was they only did "Trans Europe Express" from that album. They did a long and awesome version, but I thought there'd be more (at the very least "Showroom Dummies," I'd been hoping for "Europe Endless" as I'd had that in my head, and if not one of those then "Hall of Mirrors" but it still ruled). "Autobahn" was also the only song from that album (but that's exactly what I expected). When they got through The Man Machine without "The Robots" I knew that was going to be in the encore. Of course it was. In fact, they used the curtain closing to put out robot models of the band members in their places. "Radioactivity" was awesome, and they did the "Stop Radioactivity" version they play lately, I guess. Mary Beth said she'd never thought she'd get emotional hearing that song. Kraftwerk's version of "Hello, Cleveland!" was during "Spacelab" where they had a google maps type image pointing it as the "spacelab" came in over the map from space. Then it landed next to a picture of the Ryman. Oh, and can I say how awesome it was that the show was fucking Kraftwerk playing the fucking Ryman? I don't know, just so seemingly incongruous that it was just perfect. I enjoyed the venue more this time that the other time I'd been (for Sigur Rós several several years ago, I felt a little disconnected from the band sitting back in my seat, I guess) but the old timeyness and historicness just worked so well with Kraftwerk. In a lot of ways the show was exactly what I expected. And it exceeded my, not my expectations but my feelings?, hard to word what I'm getting at. Maybe that it met my expectations on a corporeal level but exceeded my expectations on an emptional level. It was a really fun show anway. One thing I noticed was that at times Ralph seemed maybe a little tired. Of the members on stage, he was one of the ones that moved around a little bit the most (maybe second most for him). But some of his melody runs and vocal lines dragged behind just a little bit. And sometimes the lines he sang fell off before the end like he was a little short on breath. It wasn't anything major, but I hope he's in good health.
After the show Mark somewhat ambushed us so we saw him and Danika. Also, before the show Matt (an ea friend of Jacques's) met us. So he was back with us after the show. Brett Eugene Ralph met us after the show (he's a fun guy and about the nicest guy you can imagine). We were kinda being dragged around by Mark around the block for a bit, but then we decided (me, Mary Beth, Jacques, Matt, and Brett) to meet at this asian fusion place Brett recommended called PM. We were still full from lunch, but we had a little bit of food and it was good to talk with everyone. It was lucky the show got out real early. Kraftwerk was the only band and they played a long time for a single band, but it was still 9:30 when it ended. So that gave us hang out time and time to start back driving home without killing ourselves. We left the city close to midnight and we made pretty good time getting back. It was cloudy so we didn't see the super moon directly. But it made driving for me and seeing the road and taking curves easier because the moonlight through the clouds was making everything brighter (I'd brought my glasses for night driving but had left them in the trunk and didn't wanna stop unless I had to so I was glad I didn't need to). Okay, so we had a nice time sleeping in today. I took the day off, naturally, so now what?
