Scene three

Day 3 in California went like this:

We woke up on Friday already excited. A couple days before Anna and I left to come out here, we purchased tickets to a show being held at the Music Box at the Henry Ford Theater in Hollywood. My favorite rapper, Blu, was opening up for Living Legends. Our plan was to relax during the day, then go to Hollywood, hang out in Amoeba Music, and then enjoy the show.

We started off the day with a trip to Pinkberry. Pinkberry is a chain of yogurt joints in California and New York. It’s not quite frozen yogurt, but it’s not quite regular yogurt either. Alice tells me it started in Hollywood a while back and they expanded because there’d be lines down several blocks.

Anyway, Alice and Lena were very excited to give us our first Pinkberry experience, encouraging us to sample the flavors (regular, green tea, and coffee) and choose our toppings. The exceedingly perky and excited woman at the counter was also quite helpful. I choose a medium sized regular with Cap’n Crunch, Bananas, and…the woman stepped in and chose chocolate chips for me. She said it in such a way that led me to believe I’d be hurting her feelings if I didn’t choose chocolate chips as the final topping, so I obliged. It worked out in the end though, cause that shit was delicious.

After Pinkberry, we got back to the house and decided to go for a hike. The first right turn off of Alice’s road is Big Sky, which, if followed all the way down, will take you to the beautiful Santa Rosa trails. Samir likes to call the Santa Rosa trail the “long trail,” dividing it into the Preamble, Stage One, Stage Two, and Stage Three. In all, it takes about an hour to walk, but it’s completely worth it. Once Anna uploads her pictures, I’ll post some from that walk.

We just kind of hung about after the walk, trying our best to solidify plans with Lena, Paul, and Matt. Eventually, it all worked out and the four of us piled in the car to go pick up Paul and Matt.

We arrived in L.A. shortly after 5 pm and slowly, but surely, made our way over to the parking deck on Sunset Blvd that lives right next to Amoeba Music. Paul and I nerded out about Hip Hop and our favorite Nas songs. Once we walked in, I proceeded to fly around at warp speed trying to find everything I could think of. I walked out with the new M83 record, an out-of-print Medicine album, and a Mellow record I didn’t have. $25 for three CDs. Not bad.

We left Amoeba and went in search of an Armenian eatery called Arax Falafel. Samir told us their sandwiches were really cheap and delicious, so we were game. We arrived at Arax at 7:35. The immediately told us that they were closing at 8, refusing to make Anna a kebab because it “takes fifteen minutes and we’ll be closed by then.” It was obvious they didn’t want us in the restaurant, but we were hungry and didn’t really care what they thought, so we sat and ate our food. It was delicious, but the owners were just awful.
As we made our way back to the Music Box, our excitement grew to the point of frustration. All we wanted was to get into the venue immediately and watch some excellent music. However, the large Russian gentlemen at the entrance weren’t as excited as we were.

“No pens, no markers, no gum,” said the first intimidating looking dude. Anna, Alice, and I walked back to the car and deposited our contraband. The second time we were passing though security, he made Anna throw away her water bottle.

After being patted down and having our legitimacy ensured, we all entered the club and made our way to the stage. The place was pretty cool; there was a big stage at the end of the building, a balcony overlooking the “dance” floor, and a bar beneath the balcony. Lena, Paul, Matt, and I got drinks after standing around for about 20 minutes or so. I bought a seven-ounce beer for seven dollars and Lena got a Crown and coke for ten. I quickly realized I needed to switch to liquor drinks if my spending was going to be worth it.

The first act was a “hip hop violin and DJ” act whose name I can’t remember. They were really cool though, playing the melodies from some famous songs like “T.R.O.Y.” and Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy.” Next was Blu, though, and I already had it in my mind that no one else was going to impress me as much.

That was absolutely the case. Blu was lighthearted and full of personality. He played all my favorite songs from Below The Heavens, one of the best songs from the Johnson&Jonson album, and he even played his best new song, “GloryUs.” He was funny, animated, and interacted extremely well with the crowd. I couldn’t have asked for a better set.

(I will dedicate another post entirely to Blu’s show.)

Living Legends was on next, but I was there for Blu. Paul, Matt, and Lena stayed in the crowd during Living Legends, but I had another drink and bought a Blu shirt. We all left in great moods and slept really well that night.