The Pluto Tapes - Live at SomerVaudeville (Video)

Eventually, I will get off my ass and separate this show by The Pluto Tapes into four pieces, one for each song, which is what I promised my friend Andy Hicks I would do about a month ago. But, for now, I think it is imperative that you all take a look at this awesome show that Andy put on as part of May’s inaugural SomerVaudeville event. If you have time for nothing else, skip directly to the end, to the tag for “Paula Abdul"/"Straight Up”. If that isn’t the most rocking Paula Abdul cover you’ve ever heard, then there’s something wrong with you.

Also, if you’re looking for something to listen to and you don’t already own it, buy a copy of Dead Planets Tell No Tales, the first album by The Pluto Tapes, on iTunes.

Comment on this article here.

Geek Force FiveCast - SomerVaudeville Edition (Video)

Last week, I had the immense pleasure of attending SomerVaudeville, a 21st century vaudeville performance featuring my friend Andy Hicks (The Pluto Tapes), among others. It was put on my Theatre@First, a Somerville-based drama troupe, and I had a grand old time.

For the past week, I’ve struggled to put together a movie of the footage I shot at Johnny D’s that night. I’m not sure if this video quite captures the awesomeness of that evening, but when it features banjos, musical saws, and covers of both Paula Abdul and Kermit the Frog, how can you not watch?

Comment on this article here.

SomerVaudeville, featuring The Pluto Tapes

Just after he finishes playing the first verse of Paula Abdul’s seminal 1988 hit “Straight Up,” Pluto Tapes guitarist Andy Hicks pauses and asks the audience at Johnny D’s in Somerville, Massachusetts, “Really?” The crowd responds with boisterous cheer, and Hicks obliges them with an absolutely fantastic cover. It’s both amusing (how could a Paula Abdul song on guitar not be?) and surprisingly compelling. Stripped of synths and slick 80s production, “Straight Up” is the perfect capper for Hicks’s set of suburban alt-rock/powerpop. It’s the sort of song that you can imagine the disaffected narrator of Hicks’s songs identifying with, much to his surprise, on some drunken post-breakup evening. “You tell him, Paula,” says the narrator in my imagined scenario, a bottle of Sam Adams in hand. “A buh-buh-buh-bye, buh-buh-buh-bye!”

******

Under the moniker of The Pluto Tapes, my friend Andy Hicks (along with his guitar and his iPod) closed out the first act of last night’s inaugural SomerVaudeville show, put on by Theatre@First, a Davis Square-based drama troupe. His three-song set (plus the “Straight Up” encore) was the highlight of the evening for me, but the rest of the show was amazing as well. From banjo-playing Uncle Shoe to storyteller Justin Werfel to the sheer awesomeness of Can-Can Revolution, I was entertained all night long, and the memories of last night are sure to be what will power me through my tiredness today (I got home at quarter past midnight and left the house again at 5:25 a.m.).

Oh, and I may or may not have had my Flip Video camera on me, and I may or may not have filmed portions of the show, and I may or may not be posting the resulting video at some point in the next week.

In the meantime, if you’re looking for something to listen to and you don’t already own it, buy a copy of Dead Planets Tell No Tales, the first album by The Pluto Tapes, on iTunes.

Comment on this article here.