Overdue Recap: Drag The River, Joey Cape, Chris Shifflet @ Casbah, 2.15.09

I've really jumped around on my posts and in the meantime it seems a lot of the shows I went to in February got lost in the fray. In the first week of February, I saw the Fruit Bats show, Devotchka, worked at Bird and The Bee and Obi Best, worked at Greg Laswell and Joshua James, then even hit Blind Lady and the Ken Club for Swim Party, Le Switch and Gray Ghosts. I've written about most of those already though Bird & The Bee doesn't get a review since I was stuck in the Atari Lounge (it was raining) and The Ken Club show followed a day at Blind Lady Alehouse which, er, turned me into a blind lady. But now I'm up and since my content has been a little on the light side lately, I'll at least catch up with some photos from February.

So let's rewind to February 15, 2009.
Drag The River, Joey Cape of Lagwagon, Chris Shifflet of Foo Fighters at the Casbah.

The full post if you click 'keep on reading'.


On this particular Sunday, there were two shows scheduled at the Casbah. Drag The River, Joey Cape, and Chris Shiffelt played a 7 pm show and they were followed by a hip hop show featuring Yo Majesty and MC Flow. A bit of a culture clash I'll say, but I'll get back to that in a bit.

By the time I actually arrived at the show, Chris was finishing up his set and while the show was sold out, it appeared that few people knew who he was but it didn't matter, he seemed happy to have a full crowd, even if they were chatty and just working on their heavy drinking credentials at the bar. Personally, I was really into what I caught though I was a little shy with my camera so this was the best I could do.


Joey Cape of Lagwagon was up next. I hung up front with O and it was kinda funny when Joey said hi to me, mistaking me for O's wife, who was actually off to the side of the stage. He was really cute about it, albeit a little embarrassed, then was sure he knew me from somewhere either way. The girls next to me gushed a little. "Oh my god, he totally said hi to you!" Funny.

Anyway, I have to say I loved his set, and the crowd was in full on singalong mode the entire time. I do have to say that I'm always a little surprised that "singer-songwriters" get relegated to coffee shops, but a few, I don't know if it's because there are more lyrics about whiskey and cheating or what it is that makes some music in, what is to me the same genre, garner such love from punks, but it's a bit funny. I'm not complaining, however, because it's a lot more fun hearing the music while downing shots of Jameson or Makers than shots of espresso for sure.

So Joey played and indulged the audience with their requests, though he had to refuse a few because he didn't remember how to play them, but it made for a very kinda communal and awesome set. I would also be remiss if I didn't point out Joey's rad "It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia" t-shirt that I made sure to capture in the photos.



And then of course, Drag The River closed out the night. By this point of the night I'd left to the smoking patio and back bar and was pleased that the Bradys and Josh Mosh and crew were kind enough to let me back up front but the lights were so low I had to get a little experimental with my photography and while I couldn't exactly maneuver to take pics of the full band, the show was incredibly engaging and left me hoping that DTR keeps coming back to San Diego every 6 months or so to give us our fix.







Back to that culture clash I mentioned earlier. And clash is really a misnomer because there was no clash, but because the first show had sold out and the later show had not, the bar staff was pretty casual and didn't clear everyone out as they might on other nights when two shows are booked, so people hung out continuing on their PBR tall cans and shots of whatever whisky they could afford and it made for a fun night when all the crew rolled in for MC Flow and Yo Majesty.

I hung out on the patio for a while and then attempted photos of the second show but it's probably when I became aware that my camera's life has come to an end and I just couldn't take anything worth posting. I stayed for all of MC Flow and part of Yo Majesty but I decided to call it a night before the tops apparently came off. And that was fine with me. And in my head, I drove home with "Medicine" in my head.