Why do we love the Sox? Because I didn't love them growing up, but how can you not love it now? Tonight as David Ortiz's 14th inning single drove in Johnny Damon for the winning run I found myself up jumping up and down in a group hug with Alex and Jen--when else is that going to happen? Thankfully, never.

What really annoys me are the fans who showed up at game four with their bullshit woe-is-me signs--I particularly remember one saying "I can't believe I fell for it again" and another guy wearing a bag over his head and drinking a beer awkwardly through the bag. What the fuck? These people are so desperate to get on TV they show up at a game whose ticket value is hundreds of dollars (at least) just so they can hold up signs showing how sorry they feel for themselves. It's one thing if you're a season ticket-holder who suffered through a crappy season and now you're expressing your disappointment. But to slag off your team--who are still trying--just because you want to get on TV? Seriously, fuck off. No, seriously. Fuck off. They should take these peoples' season tickets away if they have them.

The other aspect of that which bothers me is that it only further fuels the view of Red Sox fans as this self-tortured group that almost gets off on wallowing in their own misery. Enough already. These are the same people whose favorite football team has won two Super Bowls during the Bush administration and who haven't seen their team lose in over a year. Whose basketball team has won more championships than any other by a landslide. They'll be OK.

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Interpol were terrific live, as expected, though they didn't play "Take You on a Cruise," which was made all the more shocking by the fact they DID play "Not Even Jail," which is probably the worst song on either of their otherwise-stellar albums. Even though the new stuff sounded otherwise terrific and I think Antics is a great album, I've recently decided it just can't *quite* compare to Turn on the Bright Lights. The irony is that I first shrugged off Interpol during the spring of 2003, only seeing the light a year ago when Mulldogg made me. And yet as much as I loved TOTBL as a perfectly constructed, consistent album, I still always saw it as having very obvious personal highlights (Untitled, Obstacle 2, and Say Hello to the Angels) with the rest of the songs being good but not music I'd go out of my way to listen to.

But seeing them live first at Curiosa and then headlining at Avalon, I began to re-examine the album. PDA is a terrific song. Roland and Stella really do rock, each in their own crunching guitar-and-awkward/amusing-lyrics way. Leif Erikson is devastating. Listen to it from 2:40 on and...wow. When the guitar part kicks in at 3:15...that might be the best part of the entire fucking album. I wish I had realized this earlier. I now rank TOTBL just behind Yankee Hotel Foxtrot in my best albums of the millennium. As if you cared.

The openers of the Interpol/Secret Machines show was a Philly band called Hail Social. They have a very clean, straightforward sound with thick, undulating bass-lines. Very much good openers for a band like Interpol. I bought their tour EP which has three songs different from the ones on their website. I hope their first album will be a little more layered, but in the meantime they've got some pretty good stuff.


Sam and Co. from The Bravery.

Nina is now chummy with the Bravery, whom she met after their gig last Saturday. She reports they have a UK-only EP coming out soon. I note this is similar to the Killers, who released th UK Mr. Brightside EP last year, and who are similarly on Island Records. Similarly, they sound somewhat similarly. Surely at the behest of the baby-killing pigs at Island, they've taken down their mp3s. Give me a shout if you want 'em and don't have 'em.

Most awkward moment of the show was when, during the final song, the bassist leapt right at me (as I bopped along in the front row). I thought, "hmm...ok" as there was some room in front of me, but then he immediately hurled himself into myself and the person next to me (might have been Nina, but she seemed to avoid the brunt of it). We kind of backed off, as he seemed to have a plan, and he then proceeded to play while lying on his back, but it was all kind of awkward because he had kind of pinned my foot down under his shoulder, and I thought maybe that would kind of help prop him up a little as he played. Then I figured nah, probably not, and just let him play. I felt like the roadie in Spinal Tap when Nigel goes down on his back while playing guitar but then can't get himself back up. Classic shit.


He jumped me. But he's still the man.

I'd like to take this time to also note that the Killers, Franz, and Interpol are all in the Billboard Top 40 albums. Viva la revolucion!!!