shanachie_quill. Steve Carlson @ the Bitter End NYC

*yawns* I’m not sure how coherent this is going to be because for some reason my lovely insomnia decided to kick in last night and despite doing my normal routine, I didn’t sleep pretty much at all.

ctrokj arrived around 1pm Monday and we enjoyed a relaxing afternoon and evening waiting for

serenelystrange to join us, including going out to dinner at my favorite Italian place (Pisano’s). After

serenelystrange arrived, we hung out for a bit longer before going to bed. We knew we’d be heading into the city the next day…but we didn’t need to leave to early. I’d called Bitter End and knew we couldn’t get in before 7pm.

So yeah…fail on the writing before taking a nap…not that I feel much better…but I did sleep a bit. So back to the whole…what we did in the city yesterday :-)

We kinda bummed around in the morning…I called Dunellen Bagel and we ran over there and got breakfast, then around 1-ish started heading into the city. So because Jersey is dumbass…the trains no longer run all night—they stop around like 12 or something that which means we would have had to leave The Bitter End at like 11…so if the show wasn’t over or we were still hanging out…it would have sucked big time. But…a couple of years ago…I solved this problem. Drive up to the ferry dock on Staten Island, park and take the boat over. Ferries run all night…so no reason to worry about when we left. Gotta say…someone at the Bitter End has a wicked sense of humor…we had a good laugh over the directions when we got to the bottom it read:

By Helicopter:
Fly over top of building. Look for Helipad on Roof. If Unable to see one dangle rope ladder in front of club and descend.
By Horse:
Anyway you want. Tying post and grazing area available upon request.

Anyway after we stopped laughing, I went back up and got the subway directions—which were pretty easy.

We got to the city early enough that once we got to Bleecker Street and found the bar, we decided to wander about a bit…finally decided on Chinese for dinner, then after wandering for a bit more, sat down on a beach by a branch of one of the colleges and read until it was time to walk back and get in line for the show. I’m glad the others insisted on getting in line early, although we had to stand there for a bit (and the line was nowhere near as long as Dante’s), we ended up with awesome seats that

ctrokj picked :) right up against the stage in front of where Steve was sitting. (And I believe

serenelystrange tweeted or something a “we are REALLY fucking close to the stage” picture).

Oh…so I’ll give y’all my *face palm* moment. After showing my ID, I started to walk right past the guy who was taking the cover and banding people.

ctrokj and the bouncer guy grabbed me and I did pay…but yeah…

The bar is apparently a pretty well-known music bar (I’d almost call it like a piano bar) and they do like a bunch of bands some nights. Last night they had a bunch of different bands…but Steve was the second act so we only listened to one other than him. She was pretty good, very energetic and rather perky, but a fun little performance. She even did a little acapella audience participation song for her last number and was all excited about it. I’m not sure it’s something I would listen to on my own, but she had impressive breath control and range. If you’d like to check her out…you can find her on myspace at Jess Hodge or at her own site.

And just because I did take one picture of her:

And then it was time for the reason we had taken this trip! Steve, Darren, and Rosalee made their way onto stage, settled in, and Steve informed the audience that a) they were really jet-lagged because they had flown in from Rome that day. Darren looked up from what he was doing and said “Yesterday.”
“Um, no, today.”
“It was yesterday, Steve.”
“So we’re really jet-lagged and we’re gonna be recording the show tonight so we’d like to get as many songs in as possible so we’re not going to be talking much.” And they just started playing.

Steve near the beginning of the show

Darren showing off his skills

It was an awesome show :D The energy is completely different from any other concert I’ve ever been to, but it was a wonderful energy and I honestly could have listened for a much longer time. But I understand why they couldn’t play longer.

These are the songs we know for sure they played…I thought they might have played more, but we couldn’t remember anymore.
Order of the ones I remember:
Safe to say
Piñata Novia
Wasted Jamie

Then I can’t remember the order, but these were the others:
What Goes Around Comes Around
Hummingbird Billy
Between You and Me
Casual Smile
She’s Not There

And they closed out with:
Nonstop Lady

In addition, Rosalee sang two of her songs:
The End is Near
Jack and Jill

Rosalee gracing us with one of her lovely songs

Some random fun moments from the concert :D
Darren was flipping pages to get to a song and showing Steve the book…Steve goes “No. No. No.” then grins and goes “Yeeeaaah” at one point. I do believe the one he said yes to…was one of the previous no’s.

Remember the jet-lag comment? Steve is explaining why they’re so jet-lagged and that they are on tour for “the new CD. The new CD…crap what’s the name of the new CD?” Darren and Rosalee are looking at him like ‘are you kidding me?’

ctrokj ,

serenelystrange , and I all blurted out “Days Behind” and Steve kinda looked down at us, laughed a little, and grins, then goes “Yeah, right, Days Behind.” The laugh was kinda like ‘I have fangirls…right there…and I dunno he was like really amused about the whole thing.

For “Casual Smile”, he sets his guitar down and goes, “So there’s this one song on the new CD and I play no instrument on it…which I hate.” But it’s an awesome song and they did a lovely job with it.

Steve trying to find something to do with himself during ‘Casual Smile’ since he doesn’t have his guitar

He asked us to buy the CDs so they didn’t have to cart them home again and then goes “and they’re off stage to your…” looks to our left (his right), then to our right (his left), thinks about it… “right.” And that…I know how hard it is to translate stage directions into audience site when you are on stage. Darren was sitting there pointing to where the CDs were though…which was fun.

When they did Hummingbird Billy…I totally kicked myself this morning…I completely forgot my camera can take video. Darren and Steve just totally went to town playing the keyboard and guitar…just completely showing off. I mean I was impressed with Steve before but Darren? Fucking a-MAZ-ing…and the two of them together…wow. If that’s what they do when they are so jet-lagged they’re almost falling over? Just…wow…

The guys rocking it out during ‘Hummingbird Billy’

There was one song (I can’t remember which one) where Steve finger picked instead of using the guitar pick. So he needed to do something with the guitar pick. He didn’t want to stand up apparently and put it in his pocket, so he tried to stick it on his guitar. It promptly slid off. So he licked it, stuck it on his guitar again and told it “Stay!” This amused me so greatly I had to take a picture of it:

Of course after that song when he tried to pick it up again, it slid out of his fingers and fell on the stage so he just left it there.

I think I said they were recording the show last night (I am totally too lazy to go back and look), but we have no idea why or what they are doing with it. Perfect venue for recording it though. It would be totally awesome if they released it live (and yes I totally forgot to ask why they recorded it).

After the show (and after I got my CDs--Days Behind, Groovin on the Inside and Rosalee’s Love is the Way), we headed outside to talk to Steve, Darren, and Rosalee for a few minutes. (

ctrokj had asked Darren if Steve was going to come back out and visit when we saw him on our way to the merch table because Steve had vanished as soon as they stopped playing.)

Since Steve was (of course) being monopolized by other people when we got out there, we talked with Rosalee and Darren for a bit first. Rosalee was so cute when we asked her to sign her CD. She seemed genuinely surprised that we would ask—asking us “really?! Me?” when we held them out to her. She was very sweet though, asking our names and how to spell them.

Steve finished up his conversations and turned, starting to head back into Bitter End. We totally thought he was leaving (and we had struck up a conversation with another couple of girls while we were waiting—on and off) so

ctrokj and I yelled out “Steve!” He spun back around, pointing at himself, then at the door, and said (in a sheepish little boy type voice) “I was just gonna go get a drink.” We apologized, but explained we didn’t know that and didn’t want him to disappear since we had been waiting. He very nicely came back and signed our CDs and took a picture with

ctrokj and me then signed things for the other girls before going inside though.

While he was signing,

ctrokj asked him if he could get Kane to come to the East Coast. He replied (in all seriousness) “I can’t get Kane to do anything.” LOL the funniest part? She meant the band…and Steve totally took it as Christian. She backtracked and explained, but he insisted it wasn’t his choice.

me, Steve, and ctrokj

So all in all it was a totally awesome night. I really enjoyed the music and the show…I will say I did not enjoy two things. One…the price of drinks in bars in Manhattan (fricking 3+ bucks for like 6 ounces of soda? Dayam) and driving in Staten Island. Yes I know…I used to live there…I never particularly liked to drive there when I lived there either…but much better to drive on the Island than having to rush away because otherwise we’d miss the last train.

And since

serenelystrange did the "fingerwork" on this one and we both wanted to pimp RosaleeWanyway...if you'd like to get a copy of her CD--it is available for download on Amazon at: Love is the Way

In addition, Steve's new CD Days Behind is available at Amazon for download or at his site for purchase (if I read his site right)

All of the pictures I took are here…I was totally wrapped up in the music and didn’t take many (didn’t even realize it until later) and you (obviously) saw some of them already.

And now for some random pictures