|
COMING UP MO PITKIN'S w/Gretchen Witt Thursday, July 13 9:00 PM Tickets: $10 34 Avenue A (btwn 2nd & 3rd St's) New York, NY --F/V to 2nd Ave-- (212) 777-5660 Directions! SKETCHRAWK Thursday, August 10 Details TBA More info Past Shows (with commentary!) PETE'S CANDY STORE Wednesday June 21, 2006 11 PM Solo show First show ever with a heckler! Sort of. He just wanted me to keep playing past the club's curfew and dedicating songs to all his friends. I guess "heckler" isn't really the word. "Antagonizing fan?" "Best friend?" Thanks to everyone who came out, it was a cool show, and I was psyched to play at Pete's, it's such a great spot. Also, O'Death was really frickin' good. You should hear 'em. THE GOLDHAWK Wednesday June 7, 2006 9 PM Solo show Remember how I said they grow nice people in Hoboken? Well, this time, I had a lot of equipment with me and I wanted to hail a cab from the Path train to the venue. I was having trouble getting a taxi, so this guy that had just got off the train offered me a ride. What the hell, Hoboken? I mean, thanks, but seriously. Why so nice? What are you trying to prove? So, this show was part of the "Folk You" concert series, hosted by Lazlo and Jim Testa of the long-running 'zine Jersey Beat. And it was pretty frickin' great. Jim's a great guy, and a bit of a walking rock encyclopedia, and since I am a walking not-a-rock-enyclopedia, it's always to good to pick up some knowledge when I can. Thanks to Fran at the Goldhawk for having me back, 'twas fun! CRASH MANSION Monday May 22, 2006 8 PM Horn & Strings show Fun show, and my first time sharing the bill with Gretchen Witt, who I'll be playing with at Mo's in July. Got to premier a fun new song tonight called "Ever the Badass," featuring Brian on guitar and Chris on trombone. "CHAMPAGNE" @ PLAN B Tuesday April 18th, 2006 8:30 PM Solo show I love doing this show. Livia and David are such great hosts. Biz's diary keeps getting radder. THE GOLDHAWK Sunday April 2, 2006 7 PM Solo show This show was part of a series called Hoboken Comedy Night, hosted by Heather Fink (I was the musical guest). And it was the first time I'd ever been to Hoboken. Apparently, they grow nice people there. I must have looked a bit lost on the PATH train, because the woman next to me volunteered to be my Hoboken tour guide, walking with me as I got off the train, and then all the way to The Goldhawk (about 1.5 miles), giving me an off-the-cuff historical tour of Hoboken the whole time. Awesome. And the gig was great, too. Turns out Heather is quite the excellent host, and all the acts were memorable, especially Angry Bob and Joshua. THE UNDERSCORE Saturday March 25, 2006 10 PM Horn & Strings show CAFFE VIVALDI Saturday March 11, 2006 9 PM Solo Show Caffe Vivaldi, I will be back. You were too fun. Your piano was too warm and awesome. From what I heard, your chocolate was too tasty. Oh yes, I will be back. This show turned out to be quite the little marathon, unexpectedly. It was pretty great, though. I thought I had 40 minutes to cram full of all the new stuff I wanted to play, while still getting in all the "Around the Square" stuff. Then it turned out that everyone slated after me had cancelled, so the bartender asked me to keep playing. So a 40-minute set turned into about 100 minutes. Not unlike a feature film in length! It was awesome. I got to try out a bunch o' new tunes: "Dexterity," which I had premiered at the Champagne, and the totally brand-new "Detective Del Muro" and "Uncomfortable Favor." "Uncomfortable Favor" is about a guy who ends up killing his brother, and my real-life brother was in the audience, which was a wee bit odd. I decided to un-dedicate the song to him just to clear up any possible confusion. I love my brother like a brother. Let's keep that clear. Since I had so much time on hands, I went ahead and brushed the dust off some old songs that I look forward to making part of the "rep." I got to play "Reminisce," the song I wrote for my (awesome) brother's wedding; "Coffee and its Cure," the song about, er, coffee; and "Red and Yellow," a song about a mad scientist that got some good feedback. I'm looking forward to trying that one out again at Underscore. Thanks so much to Ishrat at Caffe Vivaldi for having me. As I said, I'll be back. :) "CHAMPAGNE" @ PLAN B Tuesday February 28, 2006 8:30 PM Solo Show This was so much fun! Champagne is a great new variety series; I was flattered to be invited, and now I can't wait to go back and do it again. The show was filled with a lot of great stand-up and readings from the likes of Meat's Biz Ellis, Jordan Carlos from the Colbert Report, Margot Leitman (whose act was based on someone who, by some weird cosmic alignment, was a childhood friend of the bartender), and Healthy Chef Alex, who Netflixers around the world often recognize as Morgan Spurlock's girlfriend from Supersize Me (or in my case, I didn't quite recognize her, but I thought she was a distant friend whose name I forgot... in the course of conversaton it came out that I only thought I knew her because I saw her in a movie... hm. whoops). Anyway... I closed out the night with a few songs, including one song, "I'm Random," which I hadn't played live in about 2 years, and another one called "Dexterity" which made its first public appearance last night. People seemed to like 'em both, so perhaps they'll get trotted out again in the near future...? Thanks again to Livia Scott and Dave Engel for having me play last night. Champagne pretty much rox. THE KNITTING FACTORY (main space) Hurricane Kid Benefit Compilation - CD Release Party Tuesday December 13, 2005 7:30 PM Jeff w/Brian Letiecq on guitar It was an honor to be asked to appear on the Hurricane Kid CD, and it was a ton of fun to help them launch the record. Brian and I got to meet a bunch of great bands, like the 777's and the Sell-Outs, and we got to perform a few songs for people that had never heard of us, which is always great. I also got to test out a new song called "Reminisce," which will probably be played at the next Knitting show. Lastly, I had my first-ever politically oriented interview! It was pretty funny, actually... After Brian and I finished our little set, the producer's brother approached me and told me he was doing a documentary on the show, and the whole idea of independent musicians joining together for a good cause, etc. I happily accepted the invitation to do an interview, but let's just say I was, er, surprised by the subject matter of some of the questions. So, if you're eager to see me stumble my way through some serious political commentary, watch out for that doc! Emphasis on stumble. (I don't know; I have my own political stances, but I usually keep them separate from my music because I don't wish to divide my listeners on grey-area political issues. I don't want to make people feel like they need to choose a side on a tough world issue before they can listen to me sing a song. I understand that other musicians may feel the need to do this, but it's not an interest of mine. Plus, I feel like it requires serious diligence to remain fully and impartially informed in this increasingly splintered and skewed media age, so I tend to leave the detailed commentary to the trusted experts, the people who read both the left-wing and right-wing papers and do their own research, etc. I don't think my daily news-skimming should necessarily grant me a publicly accessible political outlet. I'm not saying all artists should stay out of politics, I just know that I don't consider myself an expert, so I'd rather not fill my music with rhetoric that could potentially be ill-informed.) Anyway... :) Thanks so much to the Knitting Factory folks and the esteemed Mr. Felluss for having us out there last week, it was awesome. MAKE-OUT ROOM Wednesday October 5, 2005 9 PM Solo show I think I learned a little bit about why many singers don't usually do midnight sets after flying on the same day... Very sore throat notwithstanding, this was a fun show, in a pretty cool venue. Very different from most of the past gigs in terms of the vibe; this place is more bar-oriented than sitting-right-in-front-of-the-musician-and-listening oriented, but the crowd was still great and receptive. It was a long solo set, so I took the opportunity to trot a few songs from the pack that haven't had much of a chance on the road yet. "Reminisce," the wedding song that I tried in Seattle for the first time, went over great! I'm gonna see if I can work this into the rotation more often. I also tried a strange song that I really like to play called "Plum," which is about a heroin-addled guy I saw on the subway a couple years back who started to freak out, at which point he took out a plum and ate it savagely. Really savagely. ANYway... I really like doing the song but don't get a chance to try it out much, as it's a bit on the long side. Perhaps I'll get to arrange it and give it a shot at The Knitting Factory... It was also great to finally see Brent Weinbach, a really brilliant stand-up comic who performed before me that night. I wish the crowd would have been a bit larger for his timeslot, he would have killed. After I went on, a great singer named Joel Murach took the stage, along with a fiddle player and his hilarious brother, who managed to pouund drums, whiskey and beer simultaneously. You rock, Joel's brother. CAPITOL HILL ARTS CENTER Friday September 9, 2005 Midnight Solo show Thanks so much to the Seattle Sketchfest staff for inviting me to play. Dusty Warren and Cory Nealy of the illustrious Flaming Box of Stuff hosted a good ninety minutes worth of underground comedy and music acts, and I opened and closed the night with a whole bunch of ukulele. It seems that "President of Mars" and "Nicollette" are becoming mainstays of the live shows, along with the "Around the Square" songs. Gonna try and see if I can get those two recorded soon... I also tried out a new tune at the end of the night, a romantic song called "Reminisce" that I wrote for my brother's wedding but never played outside of the ceremony. I think it may have hit home with some folks, 'cause I saw some people start to make out in the crowd. Oooo! I saw you! MEDICINE SHOW THEATER (link) Saturday August 27, 2005 10 PM Jeff & quartet (uke/piano, guitar, cello, trombone) Oh, man, what a night. So, this show took place on the closing night of Sketchstock 3000, a music/comedy festival hosted by sketch group A Week of Kindness. It's a good thing that the crowd was primed for comedy, because things went hilariously awry about 30 seconds into the set. Brian and I didn't have too much time to tune before beginning our set, but we tried to tune quickly right before launching into "Temporary Song," our opener. It sounded, er, a little bit off. My poor ukulele started going further and further out of tune, partially from the heat in the room, but mostly because it is 9 years old and very tired. Brian and I kept going, though. I tried to tune while we played and it just didn't help. About halfway through the song, I just put the dying uke down. Everyone cheered. I was lucky enough to have a forgiving crowd, much less a crowd that was actually on our side because of the whole tuning mishap. It was REALLY out of tune, you had to be there. Luckily, we had a piano, so we just did the rest of the set with me on the keyboard. And it ended up going great after that! I'm really excited about how one of our new songs, "Nicollette," is going over. Hopefully, we'll be able to get back in the studio and lay it down at some point, but at the very least, I should be able to come up with a demo for it shortly. Thanks to everyone who came out that night! Next time I see you, I'll have a new instrument... JIGSAW (link) Saturday August 13, 2005 10 PM Jigsawlon Music/Poetry Series Jeff & Brian (uke & guitar) I was honored to be the featured performer at Benjones's bi-monthly showcase. Jigsaw is really a unique place: a gallery for fine art, music, fashion design, 'zine art and graphic novels, which sits in a little storefront in the East Village, right above Benjones's apartment. It's such a cool place, and I'm sad to hear that it will very likely be moving down south next year. Brian and I enjoyed the heck out of playing there, even if it was about 95 degrees out (and inside too; thanks to everyone who came and sweated it out!). THE LIVING ROOM (link) Wednesday August 3rd, 2005 8 PM CD Release Party for "Around the Square" Jeff & band What a fun show! And to all those people that go on and on about what a great sound system/staff they have at The Living Room: you are absolutely right. Thanks to everyone who packed the room; I was surprised and endlessly pleased to see you all there! Since I've been told that people like setlists, here's what we played: Sit Around (new instrumental intro!); Temporary Song; Like Yesterday; Gramercy; Am I Still; Nicollette (new song w/cello and trombone); This Wall (new song for the band). We had no encore planned, thinking that we'd play until the very last minute that we were alotted. But people started shouting and Steve the sound guy gave the a-ok. I decided to play a song that I hadn't played in a year and a half called "The President of Mars," and some people knew the words! It felt like a weird and fantastic dream. Thanks so much to everyone who helped make that night amazing: Jeannie, Jennifer and Steve from The Living Room; the whole band for playing like I've never heard 'em play before; Frank and Stefan for documenting the event (photo and video clips coming soon!), the family for stepping in as impromptu roadies, and Jessie for promotion, guidance, and well, everything. PUSH Cafe Wednesday July 13, 2005 8 PM An impromptu performance at PUSH's bi-monthly showcase. Played a duet version of "Temporary Song" with the estimable Brian Letiecq on guitar, and debuted a new song, "Nicollette," which may be heard at the Living Room in August... Really nice crowd, cool space! 2004, you ask? The lion's share of 2004 was spent in production on "Around the Square" and on tour with Elephant Larry. Aside from a few open mics here and there, the live shows were put on hold, and Jeff kept his playing urges in check with sideman gigs, which are listed at the bottom of the page. The Good Coffeehouse (in Park Slope, Brooklyn) Friday, November 7, 2003 8 PM This was such a fun night. Polar opposite of the last two gigs. Part of a long-running concert series held in a converted church off Prospect Park. I shared the bill with a great Americana/folk guy named Pat Wictor. And since I didn't plug this show too much, I ended up playing for a full house of hardcore fans of good ol' mountain music. And they actually liked the electric ukulele! Phew. Met some very cool people there, and I was surprised to have some of the true-blue folksters coming up and telling me that they "connected with my stuff." Awesome night. CBGB Gallery (link) Friday, September 5, 2003 9 PM Asked back for a Friday night! Did some newer tunes. Great crowd again. CBGB Gallery (link) Thursday, July 31, 2003 9 PM 1st bringer gig, and about 70 of you guys showed up. Thanks! _____________________ (playing sax w/The Point Six) Luna Lounge Wednesday January 11, 2005 8 PM (playing sax, bkgd vocals w/CBE) Pianos Thursday June 1st, 2004 8 PM (w/CBE) Acme Underground Monday June 7, 2004 8 PM (w/CBE) Decade Wednesday, March 31st, 2004 8 PM (w/The Point Six) Groove Friday, November 14, 2003 8 PM |
| close |