Well, a New Year has begun.
But before it begun, I headed to San Francisco to catch the always incredible LCD Soundsystem at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium on New Year's Eve. A five and a half hour drive there and back was definitely worth it.
I know what you're thinking... an interview with them would've been nice, I don't want to get FOMO from solely seeing pictures from a show I didn't attend! Rest assured, you can read an interview with LCD's James Murphy here and 3 Q's with Nancy Whang here.
LCD Soundsystem holds a special place in my heart. Strap in, because I'm going to tell you why, you can skip this if you want. I discovered them as a teen. You might already know the following from past pieces I've written, but I grew up in the 'blog -era'. There were no Spotify algorithms back then, you found out about cool music from reading blogs, MTV, magazines, record shops, FYE. When I was 15, I even started a music blog of my own. I was obsessed with music and 'blogging' was my way of connecting with likeminded people.
I grew up in a rural town in upstate New York - when I say 'upstate New York' - I don't mean Beacon, Hudson or even Kingston - which are inundated with artists; I mean Woodridge and I mean Monticello, nestled in Sullivan County, an area that has been slowly dilapidating since the fall of the Catskill Mountains resorts back in the 1990s. A beautiful place in terms of nature, but the kind of place that feels like a box that no one ever leaves.
I remember always wanting to move to New York City, but what really sold me was my first experience in Brooklyn. One weekend, I must've been around 16 or 17 years old, I took the Metro North / New Jersey Transit train by myself down to New York City to hang out with someone I met off MySpace. I'd eventually get heavily grounded by my parents for doing this, as one month later, they found out where I had been after analyzing the location data of my cellphone calls. They'd learn that I was not in fact at my "best friend's house a few minutes away" but instead roaming around the Big Apple. You see, every outgoing and incoming call was listed on the phone bill and I had made one major mistake by using my cellphone to call someone while I was in the city. I almost got away with it, but I digress.
My MySpace friend met me at Penn Station and we took the subway to Brooklyn. There, I went into my first Brooklyn coffee shop and immediately my mind was blown. People were dressed cool, people were working on art on their laptops, people were reading books. Coffee shops like this didn't exist where I came from. In my town, the only coffee shop was Dunkin' Donuts and you didn't really go there to hang out. And what was playing in the background? LCD Soundsystem! Are you kidding me?! Up until that point, not a single person I knew, at least in person, listened to LCD. Only people I knew from the internet. I felt like I had found gold.
The following year I moved into my first New York City apartment. At 18 I'd simultaneously attend city college, get a job at a restaurant and DJ on the side. Using the semi-popularity of my music blog, I convinced promoters that I knew how to do DJ, even though I had never DJ'd a club in my life, although I did 'practice' at home. Bouncers used to have to sneak me in because I was underage. I'd always play LCD Soundsystem.
Then, when I was older and making music of my own, I'd eventually meet James, Nancy and Pat in person hanging out in New York. You know how you get worried about meeting your idols? They were so down to earth and 'real'.
I now live thousands of miles away from New York and when I saw LCD was playing relatively nearby, up the coast in San Francisco, I knew I had to go. I convinced my partner that the drive from LA wasn't that bad and at 12AM on January 1st, 2024, we experienced DFA-themed lighting bolt pieces of confetti showering down upon us. I high-fived multiple strangers. Time stopped.
After the show, I met up with Nancy to give her a copy of Issue Three which she was featured in. She gave me an unexpected Christmas present, which was an amazing Suzanne Ciani shirt that her and her partner Nick (of Holy Ghost!) made. James asked me about how my music career was going and we talked about different ways of approaching a mix. The whole time I tried to play it cool, as I often do with people of whom I admire, but I've always wanted to tell them how much their music means to me and about that moment in Brooklyn as a teen. Maybe they'll read this, who knows!
Whenever I miss New York, which is often, I put on an LCD record.
Anyway, thanks for going down memory lane with me and here are some photos from the show!
Happy 2024!!!!
Pics by Danz & Matt.