Wednesday, April 19, 2006

In which Southland denizens are teazed by the idea of a flying scooter





Those few who read this know that I am a scotter enthusiast. Here's a scooter that rides the air. Who in Southern Cali has not dreamt of flying over the 405?

Cool? Yes. Fuel efficient? Not at this time, anyway!

But keep working on it, guys!

Sunday, April 09, 2006

A little bit country...


In which we get a little western here out West


Been meaning to write a post about Devon Sproule since I saw and heard her play at the Hotel Cafe on Cahuenga about two weeks ago, but work's been getting in the way a lot recently.

Sproule's a singer-song writer born in Canada to commune-living American hippie parents. She eventually came south, to Virginia, to find that she a had a little country in her blood. Part of what my friend and workmate, Ben-wah, terms the "Charlottesville Underground" music scene, Sproule has released fours CDs and has toured extensively in the U.K.

I went to the Hotel Cafe not really knowing what to expect. I had niether noticed nor heard of the place until Be-Wah invited me to hear Sproule play. I was really pleasantly surprised. The Cafe is a spacious but dark, almost mysterious room, more suited to cloak and dagger that contemporary folk.

I don't count myself a big fan of folk, generally, but I came with an open mind. And it turned out to be worth the trip. At first blush Sproule reminded me of Mazzie Star with a little Patsy Cline thrown in, but without the steel-geetar twanginess of either. "Country music for the vintage clothing crowd*" is how I described it to Ben-wah after the show, though I was being a little too flip. What's really different about Sproule, to me, is her lyrics. She has a knack for turning the mundane into poetry, and is not afraid to be funny.

Her latest album is "Keep Your Silver Shined."



* For the record, I used to manage a vintage clothing store.