Monday, November 23, 2009

The Weekend Past: Wow ... What a Whirlwind!

Whirlwind weekend recap! Let’s dive right in, shall we?

Friday brought nothing major to start. I took care of some radio station business in the early morning and picked up a package I received. That package? A mix CD from my friend Colleen, filled with fantastic indie tracks! And I ended up making a new video for my channel in which I discussed the CD and my passing 250 subscribers.

The evening brought me to a singer-songwriter showdown at the Undergrounds. There were 10 performers, 3 or 4 of whom I quite enjoyed and who made it onto the finals the next night. The first performer was Eliana Rampage Framm, a keyboard player. I hadn’t heard of her before, but she blew me away. If I were to pick a current artist who she is most similar to, I’d go with either Regina Spektor or Amanda Palmer. Seriously. She’s that good. The second performer was Dylan Campbell, a guitarist who has a fantastic indie sound. The third performer was Matt Camussi, a guitarist and a member of the campus comedy troupe, The Pappy Parker Players. He kept forgetting the lyrics to his Beatles cover and his original song, but he kept the audience attentive with self-deprecating humor and such. Eli, Matt, and Dylan were the top 3 on Friday, moving on to the finals on Saturday.

After the gig, I left with two friends, Greg and Dave, who I met up with there, but not before talking to Dylan about getting some airtime at the station. I migrated with Greg, Dave, Shaina, Sarah, and a few of their other friends to one of their dorm rooms, across the way from my place. Eli joined us and we all proceeded to chill and talk for the next hour and a half or so. Good times. I made my way back to my place and caught up with a few web friends and some web stuff for another 2 hours. And I turned in WAY past my bedtime. But it was the weekend, so all was good.

Saturday was a lazy day. I woke up late (for me, anyway) and grabbed some nosh from the pancake brunch in an adjacent dorm after filling up my wallet. Good stuff, not that there’s anything wrong with the dining hall food. The rest of the afternoon consisted of long AIM and MSN sessions with mostly web friends and a bit of Beatles Rock Band (which I hadn’t played in weeks!) with Tom from upstairs.

The finals of the showdown on Saturday were … interesting, for lack of a better word. Eli went on first and she did a fantastic job, but not quite as good as on Friday. She didn’t take it so well, to say the least. The guy who came in first walked on stage and stripped to his skivvies. … Yeah. Don’t ask. Matt and Dylan also did quite well, but Dylan came in 4th and Matt tied for 5th/6th, I think. Apart from the performances, I ended up winning a Post-It pad collection for telling a blonde joke and an iPod Nano in a raffle. I spent about the same amount of time as I did the previous night with Eli, her boyfriend, and a few of her friends. We all did our best to get her out of her rut, and I think that we somewhat succeeded. Once again, I hit the hay around the same time on Saturday as I did on Friday.

Sunday flew by. Over the last few days, I had assembled a shortlist of stuff I wanted to play on the show, in addition to the interview with Dylan. I ended up playing most of it. The interview with Dylan went quite well, which I was pleased with, and he enjoyed himself, which I was also pleased with. The rest of the day comprised of an Op-Ed meeting, an activist training meeting, and lounging around, chatting with web friends on AIM, MSN, and TokBox. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll grab some much needed sleep.

But before I go, here’s Vampire Weekend’s latest single, “Cousins”. It’s kickin’, it’s addictive; Listen to it!


Allons-y, Alonso!

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