If You Didn't Already Know

Dave Matthews isn't just an amazing guitarist who knows chords that almost don't even make sense, and plays with some of the best musicians who share a passion for jamming over just playing a song the ol' boring way, he also has an overabundant collection of amazing lyrics. Sexy ones. Deep ones. Dirty ones. Silly ones. Ones that speak the truth.

This year there was no opener, just an acoustic setup. It started out with Dave and Carter, and with each song the stage invited another band member to join in on the action. Tim, then Boyd (who was apparently celebrating his 217th birthday---or somewhere around there....he lost track and stopped counting.....which is probably why he dropped his wand 3 times later in the show), then Stefan and Coffin, etc. Then after a break, the band returned to finish off the night with the electric setup.. 

Cotton thoroughly enjoyed his/her first Dave concert, dancing most of the night away, while I relied on lots of water, a really expensive snow cone (totally worth every penny at the time), and pure enthusiasm to carry me though the night as all the extra fluid in my body started to settle in my feet. 

Braving the heat with my love was more than worth it, though, because the Dave Matthews Band never disappoints. Allow me to walk you through last Saturday night's set list and you'll see why (if you're already a faithful fan, then you know this doesn't even brush the surface of their ridiculously good collection, but there's only time for so many songs in one night.)

"People stare and we just ignore......we just ignore everything.......kissing all the time......and I'm looking forward to much more....."

-Recently 

"I could never love again so much as I love you. Where you end and where I begin is like a river going through......Take me eyes, take my heart, I need them no more, if never again they fall upon the one I so adore."

-Grace is Gone

"Would you not like to be sitting on top of the world with your legs hanging free?......When I'm walking by the water, splish-splash you and me takin' a bath. When I'm walking by the water come up through my toes, to my ankles, to my head, to my soul, I'm blown away."

-Lie in our Graves

"You look the same. I mean, you look different, but you haven't changed........Funny how you take me right back again."

-Stolen Away on 55th and 3rd

"You've got your ball, you've got your chain tied to me tight, tie me up again.......Sweet like candy to my soul, sweet you rock and sweet your roll......I'm so lost for you when you come crash into me, and I come into you......In your eyes, love it grows......Forgive me for my haste, when I'm holding you so close to me......In a boy's dream, hike up your skirt a little more and show your world to me.....You wear nothing, but you wear it so well."

-Crash

"Now I'm thinking that you did all you could when you said, 'My love, take it slowly'.........Take me back to just before I was spinning. Take me back to just before I got dizzy. Take me back. It's amazing what a minute can do."

-So Damn Lucky

"We look at each other wondering what the other is thinking, but we never say a thing, and these crimes between us grow deeper.......People in every direction, but no words exchanged, no time to exchange them. When all the little ants are marching, red and black and tan. We all do it the same way."

-Ants Marching

"I'm sick of you, and I'm sick of me. I'm sick of war, and I'm sick of peace. I'm sick of sound like I'm sick of silence. I grow sick of the darkness until I'm sick of the light. I'm so sick that this sickness has me dying........So I will live as I see fit and there will be those who will not like it. But in the arms of a woman I found my way home. To the arms of a woman, I will always go."

-#27

"God or the Devil alone could not have made you up; the two must have worked as one, together.......Do know you what it is to feel the light of love inside you, when all the darkness falls away?......Love me baby, love me baby, shake me like a monkey baby and forever I am yours. I can't stop thinking about you, why would I want to?......I like my coffee with toast and jelly but I'd rather be licking you from your back to your belly; I think that I'm going to."

-Shake Me Like a Monkey 

"You crush me with the things you do........Lovely lady, I am at your feet, I want you so badly.......Let's go drive until the morning comes and watch the sunrise to fill our souls up......It's crazy thinking, just knowing that the world is round. I'm here dancing on the ground. Am I right-side up or up-side down? Is this real or am I dreaming? Lovely lady, let me drink you please. I won't spill a drop, no I promise you. Lying under this spell you cast on me, with each moment the more I want you....You know you crush me, baby......Lovely lady, I will speak to you sweetly. I adore you; I mean that you crush me." 

-Crush

"What I remember the most about that night is I love the way you move, baby. I like most liquor but I don't like Gin and don't always like the skin I'm in.....but I love the way you love me, baby. And I love the way you move........I'm not all bad but I'm a faithful sinner. I might get lost, but I'll be home for dinner."

-Spaceman

"You ain't never had my cornbread. It's a little bit of heaven and a little bit of 'aww yeah'......Make you wanna run around naked, 'cause you know it looks good on you."

-Cornbread

"Come and see, I swear by now I'm playing time against my troubles. I'm coming slow but speeding.......The difficulty's coming.......I will go in this way, and I'll find my own way out......I wanted to stay, I wanted to play, I wanted to love you......Why wont you ever be glad?......The way the rain comes down."

-#41

"Like the other monkeys here, I am a humble monkey....But then came the day I climbed out of these safe tree limbs, ventured away. Walking tall, head up and singing, I went to the city......Now I am the proudest monkey you've ever seen. Monkey see, monkey do.....Then comes the day....I turn to question me. I wonder do I want the simple, simple life I once lived in well?.....In a way they were better days."

-The Proudest Monkey

"Satellite in my eyes, like a diamond in the sky......Strung from the moon, and the world your balloon, peeping-tom for the mother station......Look up, look down, all around me......Someone's secrets you've seen......eyes and ears....have been in my yard. Tell me more, tell me more."

-Satellite

"Wanna pack your bags something small? Take what you need and we'll disappear without a trace......and then when we get to the ocean, we're gonna take a boat all the way to the end of the world. You and me together, can do anything."

-You and Me

"Could I have been anyone other than me?.......Sing and dance.....Dark clouds may hang on me sometimes but I'll work it out. And then I look up at the sky, my mouth is open wide; lick and taste. What's the use in worrying? What's the use in hurrying? Turn, turn, we almost become dizzy."

-Dancing Nancies

"I hear more than I like to, so I drown my head in a sense of humor. I laugh at what I cannot change."

-Drive In, Drive Out

"Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water. Jack fell down and broke his crown because he was messing with the preacher's daughter."

-Belly Belly Nice

"What I want is what I've not got, and what I need is all around me......Sometimes a Jimi Thing slides my way and keeps me swinging. I'd like to show you what's inside and I shouldn't care if you don't like it."

- Jimi Thing,  Jimi Thing (Scat)

"Feel the ground against my back, counting stars against the black. Thinking 'bout another day, wishing I was far away. Wherever I dreamed I was, you were there with me."

-Sister

"No reason to get excited, the thief he kindly spoke. There are many among us who feel that life is but a joke."

-Along the Watchtower

You Can't Stay Here

I was kinda sad the baby shower trilogy was over, since it was so much fun having people I enjoy the company of all gathered together without much effort on my behalf AND getting to unwrap surprises for the baby. I really love surprises. 

But then we planned a hot date with Allison and Stewart and the surprise saga continued! Those sweet sweet friends of ours went out and found the most adorable Baylor gear for our new human, in the spirit of our first common interest as friends.

We introduced them to Jessica and Bobby shortly after, if you call screaming their names over the tunes of a Led Zeppelin cover band and hoping they could lip read well enough to catch every other word a proper introduction. As cool a joint The Grotto was, and as great as the cover band played, it wasn't exactly a conducive environment to catching up on verbal transactions, but who needs more than good classic tunes when there's fantastic food to be devoured? Besides, everyone knows Led Zeppelin must be enjoyed in loud doses.

After our carnivorous affairs, we decided to venture out into the charming downtown McKinney square, since 4 of the 6 of us had never been, and found ourselves sitting on a cozy little outdoor patio with romantic white lights hanging from the trees and another live cover band playing groovy versions of hip songs and alternative classics far enough in the background for us to gibber jabber about everything from work to play until all the chairs had been put up around us, the music long subsided, and the lights dimmed.

Not ones to need more than a subtle hint, we moved on in search of more. More music. More drinks. More time to soak in the beautiful spring night weather in the company of good people.

It wouldn't take long for us to figure out small towns close down early, and although we didn't HAVE to go home, we wouldn't be staying out another minute in McKinney.

Like everything, it was fun while it lasted, and seemed to be over too fast.  

When He Gets Close To Me....

.............I shiver.

The most amazing man's birthday was on Sunday (my husband's). Sure, I may be biased, but for good reason. 

He knows just how important the power of touch is. 

He also is aware of how equally weighted verbal language can be if used in the right way.

He's a man of integrity in love, in life, and in work.

He has a vulnerable heart, in the best way possible.

He'd sacrifice the very last thing in his possession if it meant making sure I had everything I needed to be happy.

He's a family man.

He doesn't just tell me I'm beautiful, he finds a way to make me feel it, inside and out.

To celebrate his coming to and staying in this world, I surprised him with a double date reservation, Carrie and Ryan were also celebrating their wedding anniversary, at Season's 52. Laughter and food is always a good combination. We only made too much of a ruckus a couple of times, as evidenced by the stares from neighboring tables who obviously weren't having as much fun as us. Even better, a sweet friend of ours is a manager there, but was off that night, and made arrangements to surprise us with a bill sans the appetizers and desserts we indulged in!

*Sorry you had to buy your own birthday card (since I didn't have any cash and my debit card had to be canceled, thanks to Target's security breech) and gave it to you two days late (my bad), and that the Cowboys lost (again), but I hope you had a birthday to remember for years to come. 

(Vickie got Patrick and Amy a cookie cake to commemorate last year's epic grammatical icing failure.)

It's That Time Again

As always, we waited until the ultimate last minute to start working on the annual kpLOVE Christmas CD and now it's crunch time! We work better under pressure. 

Of course, we can't send out a CD filled with Christmas cover songs without a cheesy picture of the two of us on the cover. Don't worry, I wont use the one with my belly hanging out (see above)....THAT kept happening and it was a few weeks ago!

You may be wondering who our photographer was........which would be none other than Me, Myself, the self timer, and this amazing new tripod I found that starts off about 6 inches tall and expands to 42 inches! (A big step up from last year, which was balancing our tiny bendy tripod on top of a box, sitting on a stool, centered on a chair....haha)

Oh, and those candy canes that we so cleverly used to make into a heart (yeah right.....TOTALLY stole the idea from Pinterest) are Sour War Head Candy Canes. Best candy cane ever invented!!

I wanted better scenery than the backyard privacy fence this year, so we headed down to Deep Ellum and stalked the vintage walls, taking selfies of ourselves like a couple of crazy people (which only helped us fit right in, if you're familiar with the area).

Being in Deep Ellum is almost like being back in Hollywood, a little bit of this and a little bit of that; a lot of old and ghetto mixed with some spiffy new, equipped with crazy's, normals, and hippies, with music, art and food on every corner, and never a shortage of police sirens or character.

A few people got intuitive and asked if my blue shirt with the blue walls indicated a gender reveal, but I assure you, we have no idea; blue just happened to be the "it" color that day.

It is funny, though, considering Patrick wore blue, I wore blue, and we kept ending up in front of blue walls!

But it was nothing more than pretty, promise. 

One more confession........we weren't really on our A-game this year. Apologies. 

You'd think getting iced in over a weekend and having an actual decorated studio room devoted solely to creative thinking would reinforce some production, but sickness is a powerful force (2 days before we recorded, I could barely swallow my throat hurt so bad, and Patrick was no better off).

The good news is, there's always next year!!!

The extra good news is I'm dedicating this entire week to kpLOVE Christmas songs of years past by including them in my posts!!!!! I know you're excited, especially if your CD's are as unorganized in the trunk of your car as mine are and you've been wanting to pull out your old favorites to get you in the spirit, but couldn't find them!

What you may not know about this tradition is we started it 5 years ago, our first Christmas as a married couple, to send out the gift of joy to family and friends since we wouldn't see anyone for the holidays (we were living in California) and couldn't afford to buy anyone gifts (we were very poor, but very happy).

If you have a this year's coming in the mail, well, I hope it arrives in time.

And with all that being said, I really do hope you have a Christmas filled with love, laughter, and peace.

Remember, love comes in all different sort of ways; spread it as much as you expect to receive it!

Robbed!!! (Kinda, but not literally.....)

It would only make sense, knowing us, that after taking over 2 hours to travel a mere 30 miles, we'd drive up to the parking attendant of How the Edge Stole Christmas in a mad hurry, and realize between the two of us, were were short $4 for parking!! Thankfully, the sweet lady kept Patrick's drivers license and let us park anyway, trusting she had enough collateral on him to expect a return after he hit up an ATM.

The streak continued when I found our seats while Patrick went back to tie his loose ends. We wouldn't see each other for another 30 minutes, due to me being in the right seat and the right row of the wrong section, and Patrick not having his phone to find me!

(I swear this is a fantastic picture on my computer, and Blogger has been doing this really weird thing where it chooses random images to lift the saturation and contrast out of!!)

Saying I was disappointed to miss Panic at the Disco sing "Miss Jackson" and see Capitol cities do a little jig while singing one of their catchy tunes would be underly adequate, but a glimmer of excitement hung tight, knowing we'd arrived together (finally) in the actual correct seats, just in time to see Blue October. 

30 Second to Mars was an extremely pleasant surprise. As it turns out, Jared Leto's not just all stunning blue eyes with a chiseled jaw line and good hair; he has the chops to sing anything acoustic (the ultimate talent test), including a Rihanna cover, and has a sense of humor to match.

With a charming knack for getting the crowd hyped and engaged, the energy was infectious, especially when he had the crowd raise their lit phones up high, brightening the entire venue like a glow worm while he sang "City of Angels". My favorite part was an intimate moment when the entire crowd sang "The Kill" with just Jared and his guitar. Beautiful.

Nostalgia set in when Stone Temple Pilots hit the stage. Playing all my old favorite rock songs I remember listening to with my parents growing up, I felt sorry for all the really young kids who bailed early, going home without being able to appreciate a part of Alternative Rock's history. 

I was intrigued to witness how well Chester Bennington meshed with the band as the new lead singer. At times he sounded exactly like Scott Weiland, making it easy to pretend it was the complete original band, and then other times he sounded like the lead singer of another band singing another band's song (duh.....completely expected since he IS the lead singer for Linkin Park, after all). 

If I held them to a snobby state of criticism, I'd say they harmonized well and overall sounded fantastic, but was the most believable when performing their new songs......and I really, REALLY wanted to hear Chester belt it out with his signature scream, like I know he can, regardless of whether or not it fit in with a STP song. 

And then there was the ice storm that took the forever underprepared DFW roads hostage.........

I hate being robbed of time and money, but such is this funny, funny life. 

The Kessler

Last Sunday night, to continue on with my birthday festivities that everyone's probably tired of hearing about by now (Hey, I get a whole week. It's just how it is.), we met Tim and Lara in the Bishop Arts District of Oak Cliff for some dinner and a concert.

Everyone was letting me decide on the food, and up until the last minute I still couldn't come up with anything that sounded good (very uncharacteristic of me) besides bread, so Eno's it was, where the boys could have their pizza and the girls could have bread and soup after eating appetizers of fresh bruschetta and truffle cheese bread.

As if I wasn't already blessed enough over the weekend, Lara surprised me with a new apron similar to one she has that I really liked. As soon as I start cooking again, I'll be putting it to good use, and it'll be perfect for flower shop days!

From one cute place to the next, we headed down the road to The Kessler. Built in the 1940's, this vintage building with a serious art deco flair that's been partially destroyed by disasters over the years but restored and still standing, has been everything from a movie theater, to a church, to a retail store, and now a unique and understated concert/art venue.

Today, it's renovated to be pretty true to it's original state, making it a very cool and intimate place for a concert. Even cooler, sitting in the comfy seats of the double row balcony was a perfect perch for people watching, especially one drunk girl in particular (who we were taking bets on for puking before the night was over from all the spinning she was doing).

The headliner we came for, A Silent Film, is a British indie band we missed while having lunch at Edge Fest last spring, with a confusing name that leaves most people wondering if you're talking about listening to a band or watching an actual very old style movie with no sound.

If you're vaguely familiar with any of their songs, it'd probably be Harbour Lights, but my favorite for the night was a new song performed beautifully with just the piano, of which the name I remain clueless to.

Now, the important question is.......how do we get Dave and Tim to play here?!?!?!? 

Snow in October!!!

Outside on the patio eating pizza on a beautiful fall evening in downtown.....

An incomplete sentence, and yet, need I say more?
I needn't, but I shall. 
After Neo's with Lara and Tim, we walked to House of Blues just in time for the doors to open, hoping we were early enough to get our faces painted for the Walk the Moon concert. Unfortunately, it was come-with--your-own-damn-face-paint-night, so once again we were the dummies with just regular makeup on and decided mauve lipstick wouldn't really look very cool as warrior stripes (I guess they were too tired from performing at ACL to go the extra mile).

The Mowgli's (you may know them by their most popular song, San Francisco), what we decided has to be one of the poorest hippy bands out there due to that fact they have enough members to form a small village, set the Fen Shui in the room by smudging the stage. (I seriously had to look that up, because I had no idea what lighting a stick of sage and waving it's smoke all over the room was all about.) During their performance, they told us it may snow later, but I genuinely thought it was because they were about to sing The Great Divide, and never considered it having literal meaning.

Walk the Moon entered stage with Circle of Life blaring through the speakers. The little kid came out in everyone, grownups alike singing aloud. The cool thing about these Ohio native indie rock guys is their ability to bring out the young booty shaking skills of all genders and walks of people. With their songs consisting of only the positive major chords, uplifting lyrics, and an 80's vibe beat, even grown men who you'd usually see awkwardly standing in one place like a stone statue, can't resist the urge to let loose. Fact.

And then, even though it was well above 70 degrees outside, inside it snowed. Fact. Ask Lara, who went downstairs to buy a $40 sweater.