Sooooooo.... I'm sitting around last night trying to just have a nice relaxing evening. I read some Bridget Jones (working on that reading list baby), took a lil nap, had some dinner, made some more roasted chick peas, played the piano for a bit, did the dishes and then settled down to do some more reading. I decided, why not turn to TV on. BJD is easy enough to read that something fun in the background wouldn't be awful. So I turn it on...scrolling channels....not much on.... maybe I'll watch the Sing-Off. So I turn it on, look up....AND TIME the F*CK OUT ZACK MORRIS!!!!!
On the TV in front of me is my one, my only, my idol, Benjamin Scott Folds. Apparently he's one of the judges (with a girl from the Pussycat dolls and a guy from Boys2Men) on the show.
!?!?!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!?!?!??!!
How in the world did I not know this? And how all of my friends fail to inform me of this. A little history... as much as I would love to say I was there from the start, I got hooked back in the day in 7th grade with Brick, just like everyone else. But from there it was instant love.
I dragged my Uncle and my cousin up to upstate bumblefuck NY (Buffalo i think) to go see him and picked up my sis on the way. He played with the Flaming Lips and Train, and he was them (Ben Folds Five) then. It was just love, pure love. I was hooked (like I hadn't been before).
Since then... I've seen him, oh, I don't know... every chance I get?
- NYC Ben Folds and a Piano (release tour of first solo album) with my sister
- Worcester with my college friends
- Lupos in RI with my sister
- Bank of America Pavilion in Boston on the Odd Man Out Tour (with Rufus Wainwright and Guster) with my ex James
- Orpheum in Boston with my ex Steve for the release of Way to Normal
- TD Bank North (ugh, opening for John Mayer) with the ex - Steve
- With the Boston Symphony Orchestra at the BSO with my friend Danielle (cause ex-steve f*ed up bigtime) - FRONT ROW CENTER, maybe 5 feet away - I have amazing video.
- With the Boston Symphony Orchestra at the BSO with random Craigslist girl- probably the BEST performance of his I've ever seen. TRIPLE encore
- With the Providence Performing Arts Symphony at PPAC with a bunch of co-workers
And I know there's at least one or two more times that I'm brain farting on right now.... so that's a minimum of 10 times either way. If you couldn't tell by now, I kinda like him just a bit. Especially back in the day when he was adorable freaking Ben.
And especially before he had 5 million wives and left them all one by one... Kind of hard to love his love songs as much after quite so many failures, but that's ok. I love him anyways, and The Luckiest will still most definitely be played at my wedding at some point.
So what's new in the works for Mr Folds besides this random judging shtick you ask? Well actually, his next album coming out will be with auther Nick Hornsby. Hornsby is writing the lyrics and Folds is putting them to music and performing them. Between the PPAC show and the last BSO show, I got to see three of these demos performed live. And let me tell you, this album is going to be FANTASTIC. First, a really sad but incredibly moving song called Picture Window (this is my favorite - total ben folds emotional style - chokes me up every time). A hilarious song about a washed up musician singing his one-hit-wonder about his ex-wife, Belinda (this is the actual performance I saw btw). And finally, an absolutely freaking hysterical song about Palin's daughter's baby-daddy, Levi Johnston and his tough tough life, called, The Levi Johnston Blues.
Alrighty, now that I've gotten that all out there and paid my respects, I feel loads better. Time-in.
Koat,
ReplyDeleteYou know I can relate to this post with my undying admiration for my very own Josh Ritter. I always freak out when I find random interviews or live tapings of him/his songs. Indeed, if I was stranded on an island and all I had were a solar powered tv/dvd player and the choice of 10 movies, his live concert in Dublin would be one of them. Granted, Josh Ritter isn't as famous as Ben Folds, but I do go see him whenever he plays in the city (and he lives in Brooklyn.. with his new wife [pooh] but I've yet to run into him...although one day my good karma will come full circle and this will happen). I'm actually seeing him open for the Swell Season next month!! le sigh
I think he's one of the only musicians (besides Pete Seeger, Dolly Parton, and Willy Neslon) that I would approach. Although, I think I'd be too speechless and resemble a Heinz Ketchup bottle.
Anyway, you have me gushing now about my own love affair, but ooooooh you're lucky!
::Sigh:: I'm gushing/melting sitting here just thinking about him. And he's the only one on the show with real in depth music theory knowledge, so he's always critiquing all the technical stuff too...AND IT"S SO FREAKING HOT!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteI want to have his babies.
the end.
I had no idea of your extreme love, or I would have let you know of his judging earlier!! His performance tonight was so cool!
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