takin' mom to moe.

Now that my son is with his dad for a month, my relationship with my parents shifts a bit. They live close by and are very involved in our lives, which is wonderful. They babysit my son or we all go do something usually revolving around activities that the little guy enjoys, etc. Now that I'm flying solo, my days are filling up with Diss work, yardwork, hanging with my boyfriend and slipping out here and there to chill with my girlfriends. So, it's a different kind of effort to interact with my parents when there isn't a fresh faced 8-year old to focus on. For instance, I'm going over Thursday afternoon to do a shitload of sidewalk edging for my father, who can't do it himself anymore. And I'm sure I'll be on a ladder checking gutters or some other daughterly task. Which is fun in its own right.

Anyway, tonight I'm taking my mom to see moe., a band originally from Buffalo and longtime friends of mine. They are playing a free outdoor concert at Artpark in Lewiston, NY, a bastion of natural and artistic beauty sitting right on the Niagara Gorge (google Artpark. It's a beautiful place). The concert starts at 6:30 and moe. will play two sets with no opening band (a usual live format for them). My history with moe. begins in 1993 when I saw them live at a bar in downtown Buffalo and was simultaneously trying to bully my way into the Buffalo music journalism scene. I wrote my first "feature" article on moe. in a zine called "Slack." It was my first article AND their first article. We became fast friends and still have contact after all these years.

I'm hoping to get backstage to say hi and I'm hoping my mom will enjoy this experience. She is not a regular concert goer, per se, but my son has brought out this wonderful youth and invigorated energy in both of my parents, so she is up for anything these days. moe. always puts on a great show to boot.

moe. is often listed as a jamband, if that term even has any merit left. I find them a well-rounded representative of the blue-collar town that bred them.....sort of Rush meets The Dead meets Triumph meets George Carlin. The band is humorous, smart, and wickedly musical. I also respect how they grabbed the reigns of the band back from Sony after signing an early record deal (1996-ish) and discovering that they could more ably handle their career themselves.

Artpark is about an hour away, over several bridges and into the northern part of the Buffalo-Niagara region. I haven't been there for awhile, and in prep for the trip, I've compiled a moe. playlist for the Nano to take along. Here it is:

1. Seat of My Pants
2. Stranger Than Fiction
3. Spine of a Dog
4. St. Augustine
5. Captain America
6. Happy Hour Hero
7. New York City
8. Tambourine
9. Plane Crash
10. Nebraska
11. Not Coming Down
12. Moth
13. Buster
14. Timmy Tucker
15. Brent Black
16. Rebubula (live)

Not a bad way to spend an evening with mom. Dylan is coming soon, and maybe I'll take my mom, myself, and my son (he'll be back by then, and this would be his second time seeing The Dylan).....this could be the start of a great multi-generational rock out for the Bradys!!!!