The Bald Heretic

Trish and Darin Murphy’s current musical project “Skyrocket” performed at the Houston Continental Club on Friday night to a packed house. The group is made up of a fantastic batch of Texas musicians and the performance is nothing less than spectacular.

Of course you must like 70’s and 80’s cover tunes because that’s what they play, and they play it remarkably well. Trish Murphy sang Heart’s “Crazy On You” in the first set and it was spot on. Other songs for the evening included “Rock and Roll All Night” by Kiss and “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” by Simple Minds just to give you an idea of the repertoire.

Their song list is available online here.

It’s an amazing show and I highly recommend checking them out if you have the chance.

Pics from the evening are here in the Skyrocket gallery.

Tags: Concert photographs, Continental Club, General, Houston, Live Music, Music, Photography, Sony Alpha 700 by Jay Lee
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The Tom Waits show was literally fantastic. Not only the performance, but the cast of characters in attendance. I got to see many current friends as well as people I don’t tend to run into except every so often when an event like this rolls around.

I struggled with the idea of not bringing a camera and I knew that cameras were technically verboten but I really wanted to get some shots of this once in a lifetime show.

It’s been many many years since I smuggled a camera into a concert. The last time was at a Frank Zappa concert in 1984. I pondered tucking a camera as I could not imagine the staff of Jones Hall patting people down or scanning anyone with metal detecting wands. But I just couldn’t bring myself to do that so I opted to bring my Alpha 100 with the good old 50mm lens for a low profile shoulder bag “hope they don’t make me go back to the car” casual walk through the front door and what do you know? It worked. In hindsight I should have brought the new camera and bigger lens. Ah well, live and learn.

Once the show was underway point and shoot cameras as well as pocket video lit up the audience and the staff at Jone Hall did nothing to stop any of it so I snagged a few shots of my own.

The set list from the show:

Lucinda
Down in the Hole
Falling Down
November
Dead and Lovely
Lie to Me
Day After Tomorrow
Hoist that Rag
Get Behind the Mule
Cemetary Polka
Trampled Rose
Jesus Gonna Be Here
Lucky Day
Tom Traubert’s Blues
House Where Nobody Lives
Innocent when you dream
Make it Rain
Murder in the Red Barn
Come on up to the House
Dirt in the Ground
Eyeball Kid

Goin’ Out West
All the World is Green

For a recap of the show itself you can check out the story at The Houston Chronicle

The above two photos are my favorites of the evening. The rest are here in my gallery.

Tags: Concert photographs, General, Live Music, Music, Photography, Sony Alpha 100 by Jay Lee
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The Allen Oldies Band celebrated the release of their new album “Ride The Wild Surf” last night at the Continental Club. Needless to say, a good time was had by all.

Especially entertaining was Tomas Escalante (Suspects/Clouseaux/El Orbits) and his son singing backup on “Sweets for My Sweet”, a song written by Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman and originally recorded by The Drifters in 1961.

Tags: Concert photographs, Continental Club, Friends, General, Houston, Live Music, Photography, Sony Alpha 700 by Jay Lee
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If you still want to see Tom Waits but didn’t score tickets you still have a chance to go one of the shows on his upcoming tour…

Via Anti

Tom Waits to scalp own tickets for charity

TOM WAITS is auctioning off 5 pair of premium tickets to shows in Phoenix, Houston, Columbus, and Atlanta on his “Glitter and Doom” tour to benefit various charities beginning Wednesday, June 11 at 10am pacific at ticketmaster.com. The auction for the Phoenix show will end Friday, June 13 at noon pacific, while the other three auctions will end Thursday, June 19 at noon pacific.

“Some folks prefer to pay more, you get a good seat, a good tax write off and a good feeling for helping for your needy neighbors,” says Waits. “It’s scalping for charity.”

While each of these 4 shows have been sold out, Waits held back these choice seats in order to donate the proceeds generated from these auctions to assist the following worthy causes:

The Young Adult & Family Center at UCSF - click here.

Summerfield Waldorf School - click here

Children’s Village of Sonoma County - click here

NAMI - Sonoma County - click here

Catholic Charities - click here

Place your bids here

Tags: Live Music, Music by Jay Lee
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I was very happy when I saw that Poi Dog Pondering was playing at The Continental. I’d forgotten how much I enjoyed them…

I had a lot of fun shooting this due to the projections on to the band stage that were part of the show.

Tags: Concert photographs, Continental Club, General, Houston, Live Music, Photography, Sony Alpha 700 by Jay Lee
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The second annual Disco Expressions Prom Night at the Continenal Club was a huge success.

Sam and crew from Wear It Again Sam had setup shop in front of the club so that patrons could purchase vinatage 70’s style clothing since the show was billed as “Prom Attire Required.”

A lot of people showed up in costume and many more availed themselves of the makeshift clothing store out front. Everybody (with the exception of a handful of obnoxious party-goers hogging the front of the stage and being generally unpleasant) seemed to be in the spirit of things and were genuinly friendly and festive and had no problem getting into the spirit of things.

The rest of the photos from the event are here.

Tags: Continental Club, Friends, General, Houston, Live Music, Memories, Music, Photography, Sony Alpha 700 by Jay Lee
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Rick Miller

Mary Huff

More SCOTS in the gallery

Tags: Concert photographs, Continental Club, Live Music, Sony Alpha 100 by Jay Lee
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Tags: Concert photographs, Houston, Live Music, Sony Alpha 100, The Big Top by Jay Lee
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They Might Be Giants put on a great show last night. I did secure my photo pass so I was able to shoot the concert. Sadly, the barricade that is usually in place at The Meridian was nowhere to be seen. That is usually the primo spot to be in for shooting the shows there, especially the big draws like TMBG. It creates a jostle free zone for photographers and lets you have some flexibility.

With the barricade gone I has to jockey for position at the front of the stage which was a huge pain. Still, got some good shots…

The rest are in the gallery right behind this link.

Tags: Concert photographs, General, Live Music, Sony Alpha 100 by Jay Lee
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