Nurse the Hate: Hate Corporate Rock Beer Prices

I went to see Modest Mouse/Band of Horses/Love As Laughter last night at the giant corporate rock tent. After my $8.00 to park and getting a Red Hook ESB for $7.00, I watched Love As Laughter stare at their shoes while playing their not unpleasant indie rock. Clearly these guys aren’t ready for the big stage. Bit of advice…You have 3000 people watching you. You might want to DO SOMETHING. Band of Horses were great. This is a band I expect big things from. They played a few songs off of their yet to be released second album, and they really knocked me out. Very impressive.

I then quickly stepped onto the tarp for my ass reaming as I shelled out another $7.00 for a 12 oz bottle of Red Hook that was poured into a plastic cup. After walking past the $30 t shirt stand, I assumed my place in the weird mix of extremely dirty hippies, the lost souls of slackerdom, college kids, and suburbanites.

Modest Mouse now has Johnny Marr playing guitar. Marr made his name as The Smiths guitar player in the 80s, and has been a high profile sideman for a number of years now. To see him as a member of Modest Mouse is really odd. It’s like walking up to you and saying, “Did you hear? Slash is now a member of Hinder.” Oh? OK… Or maybe a better comparison is if suddenly Brian Setzer joined the Whiskey Daredevils. Then we’d go play the Beachland, and pretend it’s not really fucking weird that this is happening. I guess Modest Mouse was good, but I kept thinking about how this turn of events came to be. It’s not like indie rock guys from Idaho hang out with old British rock stars. Or do they? Maybe there’s a whole Idaho/England scene I’m not aware of…

Random Notes: I am now officially back. Livan Hernandez shook off a shaky start to go seven innings and eek out a win over the Marlins last night at +101. Why the red hot Diamondbacks were even money against the Marlins is anyone’s guess. Today I’d take a hard look at the Cardinals at +116. They’ve won eight of their last ten, and face Rich Hill today. Hill, as you may recall, got roughed up against Colorado in his last start giving up 9 hits and 7 earned in 5 and change. In two starts vs. St Louis, he’s got a 5.11 ERA. I’ll take the hot hitting Cards as a dog.