Staring Problem/Fran/Deadbeat

 
 
 
  As I was driving to this place East Room from beyond the southwest side, the clock on the dashboard stares me down bleeding minutes. I grab a tissue and block it from my sight. I do that whenever I think I'm late to something. Usually I'm right. And this time I believed I was missing out on seeing Staring Problem headline a show there with Fran and Deadbeat. East Room is unfamiliar to me but is in a familiar area around Milwaukee Ave. So I park where I usually do, which is far away. Rock Star parking is only available after I park the car. Made the walk colder than necessary. Turned wrong on California, walked almost a block, and it's still cold. Oh, that turn I should have made on Fullerton. So I finally make it. Its hilarious how places that have always been there suddenly look different when you are about to walk in. As I walk in, there is outside Alix the drummer talking with friends. Damn....maybe they are done, and she just chillin'. So I go ahead on upstairs. Usually there is music being played or some remnant of it still buzzing in the air. There is people walking around, congregating, talking, there's a nice merch table there to my left. No music, just the voices of people. What the fuck have I walked into? Oh there's Lauren...let me ask her, but I already know. ....Oh, that's the singer and guitarist. As it turns out. The whole show started so late, that they made me look early. Not even the first band Deadbeat has played yet.

  So this was where Staring Problem releases two new tracks Ghost and Lifelines. And those tracks are fabulous. I've been into them since their first self-titled release, but wow, their new shit ever since Long Winter I can't stop hearing.  And now I'm anticipating what they got coming next.....yah, I know that's sort of the point of the fucking release event. Fran and Deadbeat were also great, the long delay worked for me. Fran left a great imprint on me. In the moment that I was seeing her I forgot why I was there. My anticipation, or impatience for seeing the headliner vanished, went to take a long piss, was not present. I was in the moment listening to Fran and into it. As I listened the mind still wanders. The friend that saved my Mac stuffed my itunes with all kinds of awesome music including, I think the entire catalogue of Aimee Mann, including the fucking Christmas album. I had like two.......alright three albums there before he fixed it.  
  So, yeah, Fran pleasantly reminds me of Aimee Mann, and also Maria Taylor. I noticed too there was genuine interest among the crowd. This was so for Deadbeat as well. An audience can be mercilessly indifferent given the space and opportunity. The space of East Room has many corners one can occupy if you don't want to see the band, so these people did not have to stand in front of Fran and yet there was a good crowd for her, and Deadbeat. I noticed a few dancing and swaying when they heard Desert Wanderer. Damn that song got me too. Live, this song really is beautiful. I already know Lauren and Alix, they are mercifully cool with me. So I had to look for some balls to walk up to Fran (her name is Maria) and say how impacting her music was to me. Both bands so different from Staring Problem. Deadbeat was great as well. I will actively go see Deadbeat now as well. I recall buying the CD when they played Empty Bottle. 
  A lot has happened since I first saw Staring Problem, seven years? I don't want to go through all of it. But my nieces and nephew learned to speak, went from one grade in school to the next.  I got a Staring Problem shirt that has a picture of a cat. My nieces naturally think the pic is that of my cat because I'm Zak Galifianakis to them....actually they think I'm Baskets, but moving on. I just feel fortunate to have been exposed to their music over the years. They have been part of my personal soundtrack for all that time and yet its like they are really taking off with Long Winter and everything was building towards that, and now previews into what's next, Ghost and Lifelines.
Zig