House of Blues

Went to the Vicon party last night after the reception. I found placing a DJ on stage a little goofy. The House of Blues itself is designed well enough: there's a stage, there's a dance floor, balcony seating. All that makes sense. I keep kicking myself for not spending the $47 they wanted for The Pretenders when they were here. It would have been a decent show I think and I should have gone. At least I'd expect some kind of performance in the sense of musicians doing something, producing good music. Here we get this DJ spinning records. Yes, vinyl. There was a bit of intrigue when she actually scratched the record to put in this kind of dramatic pause into the techno music. But apart from that she just stood there, occasionally egging the audience on by lip-synching technified song remixes (think Pet Shop Boys' "West End Girls" on speed). I think as a DJ she was pretty good, but as an act "center stage" not really. But that's just me.

What's with the go-go dancers you ask? As I was walking up the street to the bar I struck up a conversation with a seasoned SIGGRAPH attendee on this very topic. She said that she'd seen some SIGGRAPH newbies earlier with their jaws on the floor taking pictures. Well, I'm not exactly sure why they're there, but they seem to show up every year at these types of events (I mean the go-go dancers; well, the newbies too I suppose). At the House of Blues there were two on stage as you can see, and at least three more placed strategically around the bar. There may have been more somewhere else. I've seen them just about every year. I guess they fit with the DJ act well enough (got to have somebody moving up on stage), but really I would have preferred a band. One year (in L.A. I think) they brought in Ronnie Dawson, a rockabilly band. They kicked butt. In New Orleans they had Rosie Ledet. She was good as well. I was hoping for something like that at this venue. Call me old fashioned but I think a DJ is boring in comparison.

Time to pack up and head to the airport. Surely there'll be a long queue to get through security. I think the last time I was here the line extended all the way out of the airport into the parking garage (really, I'm not exaggerating). I'll take a snap if that's the case today.