Like lots of Seattlites of a certain vintage, I worship The Pixies. No, not little faeries who live in curled up flower petals (nothing against you, Faeries!), but rather the Boston band known for loud and soft sounds, boy and girl vocals, fast and slow guitar riffs. The Pixies rolled through Seattle Thursday and Friday, playing 2 sold out shows at The Paramount Theatre. Like Devo just a few days before, Pixies are touring playing 1 of their albums in full, start to back. Devo played Are We Not Men, We Are Devo (complete with breakaway jumpsuits), and Pixies played Doolittle.

Here’s a couple of shots of Pixies at The Paramount:

And Devo at The Moore:

As I was listening to Pixies play their mighty anthem “Monkey’s Gone To Heaven,” I was thinking that for all their angsty, edgy squirts of guitar, for all their cryptic lyrics, for all their tension (and pretention!), they really are a lot like Devo: Highly conceptual, challenging, not appreciated in their own era (not enough anyway) and most importantly… important!

Sorry to all American Idol winners and runner ups, to all Ladies, Princesses, Girls, and Dutchesses and to all teenage trios of Disney do-gooders, I miss important music. Not all the time. Not every time, but once in a while, isn’t nice to be challenged? To put on a record or see a show and go, “What were THEY thinking?” That happened with the first Devo disc and the first Pixies disc.

So is anyone making important music these days? …but of course. You are welcome to do your own math but here’s my equation:

Devo + Pixies = Arcade Fire

The first time I saw Arcade Fire at Neumo’s, they could hardly fit the whole band on stage, they rocked an accordion, they wore costumes including a motorcycle helmet, which was really more of a necessity for the guy wearing it because the drummer kept playing on his head. And they had something to say, or at least I *think* they did, which is exactly how I felt about Devo and Pixies.

So, what do you consider is important music that needs to be heard RIGHT NOW??

- Shawn

Another cool ride from this year’s Seattle Auto Show . . . . . it’s the Vette of the future, maybe. Mark Cutshall of the show took me around the car.

The Seattle Auto Show runs through Sunda at Qwest Field Event Center. Find out more here.

At their Friday appearance in the Carter Subaru Mountain Music Lounge, Stephen Kellogg & The Sixers talked about creating, shooting, and even choreographing their own music video, with the help of 400 members of the U Mass marching band. Check it out:

And listen to their full live session here.

I’ve already spent too much time at the Seattle Auto Show, which runs through Sunday at the Qwest Field Event Center. Here I am checking out the cars you and I will never be able to afford, but we can drool over the velvet rope that separates us from the exotic rides:

And then there’s the good old-fashioned American muscle, updated for the 21st century. You can take this guy out of Detroit, but you can’t take the Detroit out of this guy . . .. or something like that:

Find out more about this year’s Seattle Auto Show here.

Speaking of Vets… this will make you laugh and cry!

http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/40324

Your thoughts? Share them below!

- Shawn

Hey Veterans, it’s your day.

Our friends at Seattlest put this great list of freebees for Vets:
 http://seattlest.com/

- Shawn

This guy, that’s who. I’m covering a lot of ground over at the Qwest Field Event Center this week. Here I am finding out more about one of the Northwest’s favorite car categories — hybrids:

And here’s a little bit of info on cool crossovers, like that wicked Cadillac behind me:

The show runs through Sunday. Read all about it at SeattleAutoShow.com

I’ve been meaning to post these photos forever. They are a random look at the life of an MD; all the fun, crazy, odd things I get to do and see over the course of a week or two.

Woah, hello, hair style. My hair was big and so was the hospitality of the folks at Home Depot in West Seattle. I met listeners, chatted about OneThing, and got a personalized apron.

Let’s call this one Sisterhood of The Travelling T-shirts. Sarah from Cameron Catering and I baked pies together for Project Pie (still time to order one, people! Check it out here!) and wore orange t-shirts. Why not?

Side note: I bet I’m the only Music Director in the whole US of A with 2 photos of themselves in an apron.

While we’re on a sartorial tangent. David Gray is a dandy dresser, as evidenced by his Paul Smith suit hanging in my office. That’s our new intern Brittany, and me, teaching her how to be a borderline creepy super fan.

These are Steve Martin’s banjos. Yes, that Steve Martin. Saw him at Benaroya last week with his bluegrass band. Rumors rumbling that he’s coming back for a certain shall we say ‘grass extravaganza’…

Coolest show of the year? Devo at The Moore playing Are We Now Men in its entirety. Breakaway jumpsuits, shorts and kneepads, fearlessly embracing middle age, and Chuck Statler films? Are we not men? No, we’re impressed!

It’s a big week for me, because I like cars, and this week the Seattle Auto Show is at Qwest Field Event Center from Wednesday through Sunday, November 11-15.

It’s one thing to visit the show, inhale the new-car smell, check out the concept cars, and sit behind the wheel of all the new models. But I managed to pull a few strings to get a pre-show drive in a car that really caught my eye — the Tesla roadster. It’s one of the fastest cars in the world, it looks wicked, and the coolest part is that it’s totally electric — it’s just about as green as a car can get. So naturally, I had to get my hands on one.

My first stop was Seattle’s Tesla showroom on Westlake in the South Lake Union neighborhood, where I met Jon Taylor, who gave me a tutorial on the car and a quick — and I mean quick — ride. Watch what happens when Jon floors it at a green light:

After Jon handed me the keys and sent me on my way, I immediately headed for I-5 to see what would happen when I turned up the juice on the Tesla. As I get onto the freeway under the Convention Center, notice how I start going a lot faster than the cars in the adjacent lanes:

The Tesla spent the night in my garage, where I charged the batteries using a plug that works in a regular old wall socket. You can also upgrade to a more robust plug that’s like the kind on a washer or a dryer, and you can even get a super-cool charging station from Tesla that completely charges the car in 3 1/2 hours:

And here’s a look at the outside of the car, at rest and in motion:

The Tesla’s probably the coolest car at the Auto Show, but there’s a ton more to see, so, I’m going to sneak in early and do some more blogging from the show later this week. Rubber side down!

David Gray did a fantastic session in the Carter Subaru Mountain Music Lounge on Thursday afternoon (which you can listen to here. ) Then he did an even more fantastic show at the Paramount on Thursday night. Here’s a rather lame Blackberry shot:

I noticed two very distinctive moves that David makes throughout his live performances — maybe you’ve noticed them too. I forgot to bring my trusty video camera to capture the action, but using an ordinary piece of promotional swag I found in the Mountain control room, I was able to recreate David’s signature physical moves. Watch and learn: