Neat.

I made it in to town just in time for the farewell concert of Jeremy Facknitz, one of the brothers from Standing Room Only. His brother Jarod played with him on some of his songs. Jarod plays pretty much everything, but for this concert, he limited himself to drums, Casio, and accordion. He wore a pair of Ray Charles sunglasses for most of it, which was funny in itself. But the neat thing? He had the best fake drum kit I have ever seen. It consisted of a bass drum, kit-style, with a foot pedal; on top of this was balanced a crash cymbal. He played the sides of the bass and the cymbal – it had the effect of a mostly-closed high hat. It was fantastic! They closed with a number called “Hide and Seek” (lines, mostly: Hey, guys! Where are you?) and Jar got SO FUCKING INTO IT that the very vibrations from the cymbal were enough to unbalance it, and when it fell off onto the floor, Jarod abandoned all pretense of decorum and started jumping on it. It sounded great.


I also heard (on NPR) a rendition of “Little Drummer Boy” set to the background orchestration of Ravel’s Bolero. It was amazing! I’ll have to track it down.

That’s it – two neat things so far. I’m sure I’ll find more.


Merry Christmas. I miss you.