Seeing Savages In Prague

I first heard of Savages after reading a profile of the band in "The New Yorker" a month or so ago. I checked them out on iTunes and liked what I heard. I bought their album, "Silence Yourself," and fell for it. Hard. It's raw, driving, splintery, with great hooks. Each instrument -- guitar, base, and drums -- is clear, distinct, and urgent in the mix. And I love lead singer Jehnny Beth's voice, even if I can't quite make out what she's singing about most of the time.

Last week, I was doing a casual check on the web to see if Savages were touring Europe anytime soon and discovered that they were the opening act for Portishead in Prague on June 19. I had no real desire to see Portishead, but there was no way I was not going to go to see Savages.

In the end, I paid $70 to see an opening act. I left the Portishead show after two songs. Just not my thing.

But Savages, my goodness. They came on precisely at 8 p.m. and played a blistering 40-minute set. The crowd at that point was sparse and I was able to easily get right up front. (That's my photograph above.) I'm not sure any of the folks standing around me had ever even heard of Savages before, although they seemed to enjoy the show.

It was a perfect night of rock 'n' roll.

Waiting For A Sign

I love cool signs, especially if they're written in cool fonts. Here are a couple more to add to my Gusto collection (just search fonts, if you're into that sort of thing). I found these up at Barrandov Studios in Prague.

I like the hip Soviet-looking 1960s graphics in the No Smoking sign above. The sign below basically asks for quiet, as filming is going on.

Oscar Lives

Daisy met a little ghost the other day on a bike ride.

Down to the black eyeliner, this Únětice fellow on the left was the spitting image of our late, great Oscar (right) from one village over in Černý Vůl.

The resemblance is uncanny. As if the new guy was Oscar reincarnated.

We're so glad to see the bloodline lives on.

You can read more about Oscar here. It's full of links to all of my other blog posts about this cool cat.