Tressa and I saw John Martyn Martin Sexton play in Saskatoon on February 3rd. It was a good show. I only knew the songs Glory Bound and parts of Black Sheep beforehand, but was impressed. Sexton was much bluesier that I had previously thought and a very solid guitarist. He also has a really good voice...like...you don't even know how good, Vince. You don't even know ; )

It was a fun outing and we discovered that Tressa needs a wagon for her purse. So I welded her one ; )

Looking at the list of upcoming albums, three have piqued my interest in the next month.
February 15th:

• PJ Harvey - Let England Shake
  has had rave reviews. Interested in what this will sound like
• Bright Eyes - The People's Key
  latest from the Nebraska band of Conor Oberst, Mike Mogis, and Nate Walcott

March 3rd:

• Fleet Foxes - Helplessness blues
  Long await sequel to there great first album. Really looking forward to this one!

Recently, I've discovered a classical music program, tempo, on CBC radio 2 (105.5FM locally) that coincides with my drive to work. When it is -30 Celsius outside and I can barely open my eyes, it is a nice transition between sleep and dreams and the real world.

I have always liked classical music - in limited doses - so ten or fifteen minutes a day of increased exposure is perfect : )

Plus I get to find out all kinds of useless trivia arcana. Example: Apparently Mozart liked to sign his letters as Trazom - his name backwards.

I enjoy the holidays a lot - visiting with friends and family, time off of work, giving and receiving presents, the world junior hockey championships. What I do not enjoy is the shopping itself.

I liken being in a popular mall or chain store to being in the environment of a casino crossed with a carnival. You have the constant noise of cash registers, salvation army bell ringers, people bustling every which way, high sugar and deep fried food items as substanance, and a lessened sense of time with store hours extended.

Now that I am nearly done my shopping, I hope to start earlier next year and order online : )

The entire wikileaks story is intriguing to me and will set a major precedent in how similar future events are handled. After September 11th, an event now so ingrained in us that it needs no year, I was enthralled in the show 24 which had tense terrorist plots and torture techniques.

Now as the leader of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange is being held in prison on probably false charges, the US Republicans express their hate of him and the need of new freedom of speech restricting laws, one wonders what will come of this all. A good article about the insanity of it all is available at Times Colonist.

On a technical level, it is interesting to see how the 'cloud' is censoring his site, visa, mastercard are not supporting it, DoD attacks have tried to stop it, but it keeps multiplying into more and more mirrors. You can't censor data in our new technical world. You can't forget what has been exposed.

Tressa and I saw Luke Doucet and the White Falcon play the second of back to back shows (November 3rd and 4th) at Amigos in Saskatoon. It was a fun evening.

The opening band was Sunparlour Players, whom I had not heard before. There opener number was folky and reminded me of mumford and sons or frightened rabbit and so I enjoyed it.

A banjo was played in an upcoming song, but except for a a cool usage of percussion - using a steel drum, chimes tied to the end of a guitar and hitting a keyboard stand, the next songs were mediocre to me. The last song the trio played, called dyin' today, used two drum kits and the lead singer playing a bass. Than half way through the song, they switch back to their regular guitar/bass/drum formation. The lead singer than put on a slide and played a very bluesy riff with desperate hell escaping lyrics. It was very entertaining.

The great guitarist and songwriter Luke Doucet than hit the stage and opened with the bluesy-desert-surf riff of Emily, Please. Some of the songs I can remember being played are "For Joy Division fans" The Ballad of Ian Curtis, Take You Home, Mitzi's, Long Haul Driver, It's not the liquor I miss which was sung with a local woman from Saskatoon, Cleveland, First Day (in the new hometown), The Day Rick Danko Died, You gotta get it, Sundown, Dirty Dirty Blonde, and the encore of the great song Blood's too rich.

Of these many songs, the best moments for me were You gotta get it and Ballad of Ian Curtis off of the new album, the harmonica on take you home, the fact that the very old song Mitzi's was played and the encore Blood's too rich.

I had seen Luke Doucet and White Falcon at Broadway theatre about a year and a half ago. It was a good show musically, but a Sunday night and you had to remain in your seats. So this show was much more energetic (despite less people) and funner to sit or stand as we felt. I appreciated the mix of older songs played and Mr. Doucet graciously posed for some pictures after the show.

Very good performance, will make me relisten to the new album. 8/10