#ConanOBrien

Jack White Rocks Conan & El Rey w/ Wanda Jackson (Jan/2011)

Wanda Jackson w/ The Third Man Records House Band (featuring Jack White) – El Rey Theater – Los Angeles, CA – January 23rd-24th

So its Sunday night, so I’m watching my favorite show – Californication – which is a little more fun when you are watching it in California – before heading down to one of my favorite venues,the El Rey Theater tonight for what promises to be a legendary evening.  To make it all the more real, after I claim my ticket at Will Call the first person I see when I walk in is Hank Moody‘s hot lawyer, Carla Gugino, (who was standing next to Kirstie Alley who was in a deep conversation with Beck and Marisa Ribisi) standing next to me at the bar – Did I somehow will her into existence?

Fearing it could be a Scientology pow-wow, I bolted quickly. It was surreal for certain, not to mention the reality of being here tonight to see one of my all-time idols, Jack White, performing with the legendary Wanda Jackson in such a great, intimate venue. Billed as Wanda Jackson and the Third Man Records House Band (featuring Jack White) they were only doing four of these special show – 2 on each coast (LA/NYC). My history with the El Rey Theater actually starts with Jack White, as over 11 years ago, on my first trip ever to Los Angeles, I came here to see the White Stripes literally incinerate the place. I bought a record at the show that I could probably make a down payment on a house with now. To add to the surreality, I met up with Hutch (soundman for Queen of the Stone Age) and Josh Homme. I’ve been with friendly with both since the days of Kyuss and have maintained that naturally through my work with Claude Coleman Jr. and Ween. It was great to see them both, and all this was happening before a note of music had been played.

El Rey’s red curtain opened to reveal the Third Man Records House Band dressed in pink and black swing-goth formal wear. The band teased Shakin’ All Over as Jack White rambled on stage with a swagger that is totally unmatched by anyone. This dude is a freaking pimp. The band was tight as hell and to call the bass player, Olvia Jean (the Black Belles), “hot”, would just be cheapening the whole experience. This girl had style/grace/chops that could kill.

A true raconteur, Jackson amused the crowd with tales from her past that were so charming it got as much of a response as the songs did. Before playing the classic lament Busted, she pointed out that she’d seen Elvis  play in Vegas, then fluttered a piece of paper: “If the King of Rock can have notes, so can the Queen.”
The crowd explodes at this and was red hot for the whole show.

Setlist:

Shakin All Over (just the band)
Riot in Cell Block # 9
Busted
Mean Mean Man
You Know I’m No Good (Amy Winehouse cover)
Like a Baby
Right or Wrong
Blue Yodel
Rip It Up
Nervous Breakdown (Eddie Cochran cover)
Fujiyama Mama
Funnel of Love
Dust on the Bible
Let’s Have a Party

Encore:

Heartbreak Hotel
Shakin All Over (reprise w/ vocals)

Conan O’ Brien Taping (musical guest: Wanda Jackson & Jack White) – Warner Bros. Lot 4 – Culver City, CA – January 25th

So the other night at the El Rey Theater for Wanda Jackson and Jack White, I meet up with some of the guys from Queens of the Stone Age, and they graciously gave me an extra ticket they had to the Conan O’ Brien taping where Wanda and Jack where set to perform.

Score right? – I wouldn’t say that I’m a dedicated Conan fan (though you couldn’t tell it by me catching 3 of the shows on his tour last summer) and my main motivation was to see Wanda and Jack again, but was very excited to see it in this setting. I’ve been to a few TV tapings before and I’m always fascinated by the process so I was really looking forward to this. I’m sure you have heard the whole story about his shakeup with Jay Leno, etc. and it showed just what a chord he strikes with young people as a groundswell of support rose up for him, so these tickets were impossible to get, so I was very grateful to the Queens guys.
I get to the lot and its a lot of standing around and waiting, and be filed like cattle in a series of different lines. Then you are walked into the studio exactly like how you were walked into the museum on Field Trip back in elementary school, (except holding hands was forbidden). So that was a little silly, but it was interesting to see the studio.

The other guests were Patton Oswalt, who I’m also a huge fan of, so this was like the ideal episode for me to attend (then again Motorhead was on the next night haha) and Steven Ho, a martial artist that trains people to do fight sequences in movies. He ran Conan through one of these exercises that was really entertaining and funny.

and then it was time for the musical guests and for me the main reason I’m there, of Wanda Jackson and the Third Man Band w/ Jack White. Having seen it the previous two nights at the El Rey, I knew what to expect but still no less thrilled.

Photos –

Lainna Fader
Jackie Canchola
Roy Turner
Meghan Sinclair

Conan O Brien’s Legally Prohibited Tour (April/2010)

Conan O Brien’s Legally Prohibited Tour – April 24-25th – Gibson Amphitheater – Los Angeles, CA

I get over to Universal Studios (where I had never been before) and just walking thru there is like a theme park inside a mall. A really overpriced/over-the-top mall. The Gibson Theater in located way in the back and around the corner so I literally walked through the whole place to get to it.  I was flying solo on this one and that was fine, got my ticket and got inside.
I was surprised at how large this place was, it was freaking huge, thought it might hold like 2k and it was more like 6k.
I was glad to be seeing it in L.A. because of all the stops and I’m sure they each were special in their own way, that this was gonna be the one. Several reasons, a) the resources of just the celebrities he can use in his act based on proximity alone , and b) this is where he lost his job in the first place -so you know THATS getting brought up.
Quick back-story, unless you have been living under a rock, you have heard the whole uproar about Conan O Brien losing his Tonight Show slot to some shenanigans and can’t be on TV again for 7 months so he decided to hit the road and do a live show (hence the title Legally Prohibited).
I’ve been to L.A. a million times and I’ve never had the celebrity sighting thing ever like I have this time. The minute I sit down, I realize that I’m sitting behind David Spade and Craig Robinson.
The show starts with a video montage lampooning the events of the last few months that I just briefly covered, and then you see his old sidekick Andy Richter, who announces Conan and the place goes ape-shit.
And yes the first thing he says is :

““This is my first time back to Universal Studios since I lost my job,” We are less than 400 yards away from my old Tonight Show sound-stage. ”Sit back and enjoy an incredibly awkward situation.”

   To help anchor the festivities, a bunch of celebrity guests like Jonah Hill, Jon Hamm and Aziz Ansari helped to facilitate an old O’Brien show staple involving outrageous clips from Walker, Texas Ranger (though the bit is now named the Chuck Norris Rural Policeman Handle). Lots of music and variety stuff, including a weird bit about  “a girl that looked like Conrad Bain“ that ended with the inflation of a giant harmless looking bat from Meatloaf‘s Bat Out of Hell Tour.

 The biggest surprise of the night involved Jim Carrey, who flew thru the air dressed as a masked superhero and no one knew who it was. Conan was dressed in a Superman costume and when he pulled off the mask, the crowd roared!  they did a duet of “It’s Not Easy to be Me.”  and the crowd gave them a standing ovation.

Night 2  Ok so back for the second of the L.A. stops of this awesome tour. This time Sam came with me. We were able to buy a pair off this drunk couple, and the seats were better than I had the night before. The show was exactly the same as you would expect, except for a few minor things. The guests he brought out for the Walker, Texas Ranger thing, were the same except in addition was Seth Green, and my future wife Sarah Silverman. She is good to do her own thing, because you can tell that you doesn’t collaborate well. She seemed so afraid of failing and intimidated (or embarrassed) by Conan, that she came out and he set her up to do a bit, but you could tell she wanted out of there as fast as possible. One other thing, since in this age of technology, I figured the Jim Carrey gag at the end would have leaked so large that their was no way they would try it again tonight. So much so that like an asshole, I gave the ending away to Sam, thinking it wouldn’t happen twice.

 One other good thing was that we got to see the opener, Reggie Watts, who was fantastic. He kinda looked like an Arabic King Buzzo, with this giant, out of control fro.

He did this masterful improvised set consisted of stream of consciousness stand-up in various shifting personae, mixed with loop pedal-based a cappella compositions, it was crazy! And the dude sounded like he could rap and sing if we wanted to for real.

Conan Obrien Legally Prohibited Tour- SMU Campus – Dallas, TX – May 13th

So if you read the previous entry you know that I caught both nights of the Los Angeles stop of this tour already. I was eager to see how it would change once it was out of LA on the road for a bit, and how it might acclimate to the local atmosphere. I had big night planned as right after this I was driving less than 2 miles to finish up with seeing Talib Kweli with Hi-Tek as Reflection Eternal.
Oddly, in all my years, I’ve never been to a show at Mcfarlin Auditorium on the SMU Campus. I had tickets to a Pearl Jam show here when I was 18, but didn’t go.
I didn’t realize how small it was, thus also making it difficult to find as I got inside, took my seat after the opening film sequence was ending and Conan was about to take the stage.
There was a palpable sense of liberation in O’Brien’s delivery. More than once he mentioned the difference between making comedy “at” someone in front of a TV and doing it live, in an interactive show.
Even if some of his material was a tad predictable – Texas is really big, Texans sure do love their beer – there was no way anyone at the packed house was not going to whoop and clap with abandon.
He involved a lot of local color, too, with a video appearance by Triumph the Insult Comic Dog (with neighborhood references dubbed into his highly profane routine), and a three-song set by Jimmy Vaughan, and that was after during the Walker Texas Ranger bit, he brought out Dallas Maverick’ Dirk Nowitzki.

Still a great show, ran into a ton of old friends, and was very happy and grateful that I’ve got to see this tour three times so far.