Getting Lost = Something New
I've been a big Pink Floyd fan for years; some of you know this more than others. So when I saw that the Pacific Science Center (right underneath the Space Needle) was having a Dark Side of the Moon laser show, I knew that the time had come to see it. (Side note for those interested: the PSC has laser light shows for Pink Floyd, the Beatles, Nine Inch Nails, and Led Zeppelin every Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night. Seattle Laser Dome for exact info.) Our laser artist was Ivan, so I think the shows are different each time.
The show itself was pretty good. I've never been to a laser light show, and it was about what I expected. Kind of like Milkdrop, except on an IMAX screen and more intelligible shapes. What was really cool was when they turned on the fog machines and the lasers would beam through the haze just a few feet over your head. My favorite tracks off the record are "Time" and "Us and Them," but my two favorite parts of the show were "Money" and "Any Colour You Like." As cool as this already was, for the encore Ivan played an old track called "Summer '68," off the record Atom Heart Mother. As some background, I love this song. I was really into the whole album around the end of high school, and I hadn't heard this song in maybe two years. It was penned by their keyboardist, Rick Wright, and begins with very pretty, soothing third chords on the piano, and gets slightly more jarring. I took it as a sign.
Correction from earlier: Meddle is amazing. (thank you axwage.) The show itself started at 9:15, and much of the crowd seemed to be high school stoner types, but there were a decent number of older, formerly hip people (but not that formerly, since they're still taking their young kids to Pink Floyd laser shows). Because the album is only 45 minutes long, you'll still have the entire evening ahead of you for other pursuits; Belltown is right up the street, and there's a Catholic church right across from the science center. My plans were to go back to Fremont and see what was happening up there, but since I don't know my way around the city I ended up in Pioneer Square, and picked the first bar I found (I thought it was called the Firehouse or something but I can't remember. It's just off 2nd street on the main street that crosses over to 1st. I'll look it up). It had a nice setting, and a good feel with about 12 taps and a big black bouncer. The music was kind of crappy - it reminded me of middle school dances and this girl named Annie Snodgrass. Remember that Mariah Carey song "Always be my Baby?" I think they played the entire album. Anyways, so there I was, chatting it up with the bartendress, when this guy came in and sat down at the bar, introducing himself as Kenny. Kenny, it turns out, had just come from a hotel in South Seattle because the police had shown up after he called a prostitute. When the self-employed female entreprenuer couldn't produce identification, the 5-0 made her leave and told Kenny to scram, which brought him up my way. Also, he had a court date later in October to sue the police department for breaking his fingers (apparently he was a heavily sought-after guitarist) that was a reschedule because he missed the initial hearing on account of being locked up. Kenny was half-black, half-Indian, and spent a good deal of time telling me how much it sucked being half-black, half-Indian. I talked with him for a while, because as someone once told me: you need to be open-minded. You never know when one idea will change your life completely.
After some time Kenny decided we needed to go for a walk. Now this isn't a great area of town, and all the bartendresses were leaning in and being like "are you okay? Make sure you're careful." I was already in one of my grandfather's sport coats, but just to be safe I donned my aviators and Kenny and I took off.
We passed a few policemen and some homeless people rolling joints, one of whom was friends with Kenny. He introduced himself as Doc while Kenny tried in vain to get us in the back door of this one club that I actually had been to before and really liked - they had live music going, and it sounded pretty good. It turns out Doc had some sunglasses of his own, so he put them on too. Also, he kept bothering me for cigarettes, even though I kept telling him I didn't have any. So now we're a bona fide crew, with Kenny in his loud blue Carolina jacket, Doc in his red beret, and me in Chucks. We saunter down 1st street, passing various clubs that aren't admitting Kenny and finally, after passing the main drag, turn around. We're walking back and this girl comes up to me and is all like "those are really big sunglasses!" and takes them off my face. I'd like to point out, for the record, that I'm a fairly easygoing guy, so I says to her "haha! can I have my sunglasses back?" which causes her to shriek and run off into her group of friends (mostly guys). So now I'm getting a little angry because I'm in no mood to flirt with this girl and one of the guys sees me making a move and is like "what's up?" and I told him that this girl had run off my aviators and he -- to his credit -- was all like "oh you better go get that shit back!" and I was like "damn right." The guys turned out to be very reasonable; when this one guy stripped them off the broad to give them back to me and dropped them on the sidewalk in the process he was genuinely apologetic. The shades themselves were unharmed, so I told him it wasn't a big deal and thanked him for his help. I have a lot of respect for men who can keep their heads on their shoulders when triflin' bitches are afoot. However, at this point Kenny had started to give this girl trouble, and I kept trying to pull him away but every time he would make a move she would step in front of him and block his path. I had honestly had it with that scene, so I just stepped away and talked to Doc for a little bit before Kenny eventually rejoined us. At this point, Doc acquired a cigarette and just sort of wandered off. I wasn't too stressed about it; he had just gotten out of jail a few hours earlier and I figured he probably had some things he'd been meaning to do. The entire time I kept thinking of that Pink Floyd song, "The Great Gig In The Sky."
So the lesson is, wearing your aviators at night is a surefire way to find out which persons in your immediate vicinity are totally lame. Also, keep a look out for Kenny - he's always looking for someone to jam with.
The show itself was pretty good. I've never been to a laser light show, and it was about what I expected. Kind of like Milkdrop, except on an IMAX screen and more intelligible shapes. What was really cool was when they turned on the fog machines and the lasers would beam through the haze just a few feet over your head. My favorite tracks off the record are "Time" and "Us and Them," but my two favorite parts of the show were "Money" and "Any Colour You Like." As cool as this already was, for the encore Ivan played an old track called "Summer '68," off the record Atom Heart Mother. As some background, I love this song. I was really into the whole album around the end of high school, and I hadn't heard this song in maybe two years. It was penned by their keyboardist, Rick Wright, and begins with very pretty, soothing third chords on the piano, and gets slightly more jarring. I took it as a sign.
Correction from earlier: Meddle is amazing. (thank you axwage.) The show itself started at 9:15, and much of the crowd seemed to be high school stoner types, but there were a decent number of older, formerly hip people (but not that formerly, since they're still taking their young kids to Pink Floyd laser shows). Because the album is only 45 minutes long, you'll still have the entire evening ahead of you for other pursuits; Belltown is right up the street, and there's a Catholic church right across from the science center. My plans were to go back to Fremont and see what was happening up there, but since I don't know my way around the city I ended up in Pioneer Square, and picked the first bar I found (I thought it was called the Firehouse or something but I can't remember. It's just off 2nd street on the main street that crosses over to 1st. I'll look it up). It had a nice setting, and a good feel with about 12 taps and a big black bouncer. The music was kind of crappy - it reminded me of middle school dances and this girl named Annie Snodgrass. Remember that Mariah Carey song "Always be my Baby?" I think they played the entire album. Anyways, so there I was, chatting it up with the bartendress, when this guy came in and sat down at the bar, introducing himself as Kenny. Kenny, it turns out, had just come from a hotel in South Seattle because the police had shown up after he called a prostitute. When the self-employed female entreprenuer couldn't produce identification, the 5-0 made her leave and told Kenny to scram, which brought him up my way. Also, he had a court date later in October to sue the police department for breaking his fingers (apparently he was a heavily sought-after guitarist) that was a reschedule because he missed the initial hearing on account of being locked up. Kenny was half-black, half-Indian, and spent a good deal of time telling me how much it sucked being half-black, half-Indian. I talked with him for a while, because as someone once told me: you need to be open-minded. You never know when one idea will change your life completely.
After some time Kenny decided we needed to go for a walk. Now this isn't a great area of town, and all the bartendresses were leaning in and being like "are you okay? Make sure you're careful." I was already in one of my grandfather's sport coats, but just to be safe I donned my aviators and Kenny and I took off.
We passed a few policemen and some homeless people rolling joints, one of whom was friends with Kenny. He introduced himself as Doc while Kenny tried in vain to get us in the back door of this one club that I actually had been to before and really liked - they had live music going, and it sounded pretty good. It turns out Doc had some sunglasses of his own, so he put them on too. Also, he kept bothering me for cigarettes, even though I kept telling him I didn't have any. So now we're a bona fide crew, with Kenny in his loud blue Carolina jacket, Doc in his red beret, and me in Chucks. We saunter down 1st street, passing various clubs that aren't admitting Kenny and finally, after passing the main drag, turn around. We're walking back and this girl comes up to me and is all like "those are really big sunglasses!" and takes them off my face. I'd like to point out, for the record, that I'm a fairly easygoing guy, so I says to her "haha! can I have my sunglasses back?" which causes her to shriek and run off into her group of friends (mostly guys). So now I'm getting a little angry because I'm in no mood to flirt with this girl and one of the guys sees me making a move and is like "what's up?" and I told him that this girl had run off my aviators and he -- to his credit -- was all like "oh you better go get that shit back!" and I was like "damn right." The guys turned out to be very reasonable; when this one guy stripped them off the broad to give them back to me and dropped them on the sidewalk in the process he was genuinely apologetic. The shades themselves were unharmed, so I told him it wasn't a big deal and thanked him for his help. I have a lot of respect for men who can keep their heads on their shoulders when triflin' bitches are afoot. However, at this point Kenny had started to give this girl trouble, and I kept trying to pull him away but every time he would make a move she would step in front of him and block his path. I had honestly had it with that scene, so I just stepped away and talked to Doc for a little bit before Kenny eventually rejoined us. At this point, Doc acquired a cigarette and just sort of wandered off. I wasn't too stressed about it; he had just gotten out of jail a few hours earlier and I figured he probably had some things he'd been meaning to do. The entire time I kept thinking of that Pink Floyd song, "The Great Gig In The Sky."
So the lesson is, wearing your aviators at night is a surefire way to find out which persons in your immediate vicinity are totally lame. Also, keep a look out for Kenny - he's always looking for someone to jam with.
posted by desmond at 3:52 PM
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