Presumed to be awesome.

Mercury went retrograde yesterday, which, technically speaking means: oh shit, hold on tight, it's gonna be a riiiide. So, you know, fun times ahead! *g*

On the plus side, though, there has been a plethora of awesomeness announced in the past couple of days!

For example, Russell Crowe is stranded in L.A. and decided to pass the time by joining Twitter! I find this highly amusing. Even more so imagining azewewish rolling her eyes in general Twitter-related annoyance. *laughs* But the BEST part about Russell's recent dive into the Twitter world was his announcement this weekend that TOFOG is (a) releasing a new album around August!!!! and (b) touring the U.S. this summer!!!! *flails* It looks as if the plan is to do a 10 year anniversary show at Stubb's in Austin in August, and from there hit various cities! Chicago, Portland, San Fransisco, and L.A. were specifically named! I am so all over Austin, and L.A., and maybe even Portland and/or San Fransisco!!! Eeeeee!!! TOFOG!!! Live! Sooooon!!!! I cannot wait!!!

And while I was still amidst my flail over TOFOG, azewewish texted me with the news that MUSE has finally decided to do an L.A. show!!! They have, in fact, 3 So-Cal shows in September. San Diego and Anaheim are mid-week, so I'm not sure I can make those. But I am definitely on board for the L.A. show!!! They were spectacular and I am thrilled to be able to catch them again on this tour! Exciting!!!

There are also plans in the works for catching Roger Waters' The Wall 2010 show in L.A. with without_me in late November!!! *flails more*

And, and, AND!!!! Adam Lambert finally announced some summer tour dates!!!! Unfortunately there is so far only one date on the west coast. It looks as if I'll be at the OC Fair in late July! I'm hoping that there will be more dates/cities posted soon. *crosses fingers* Otherwise, anyone wanna go to Atlantic City with me??? (I so wish I were kidding about that!)

Ahhh!!! So much amazingness!!!

Ok, it's been about 20 hours or so since the show and I think I've sufficiently pieced together enough of the itty bitty blown bits of my mind in order to make a post about it. In short, MUSE WAS FUCKING AMAZING!!!

I don't even know where to start, everything about this show just blew me away. Let's start with their stage set up and light show, which was like a visual deluge with so many sensory inputs it was almost impossible to take it all in. The stage was set up with three huge towers that served as multidimensional screens for the visual fireworks. And then for some of the numbers the guys would each play from a platform that rose about halfway up each of the three towers, with lights still being played off of the top and bottom portions, so that it looked as if they were suspended in air. Ahhh. There's no way to even describe what was going on visually during this show! Usually, at some point or many points during most live shows, I'll end up with my eyes closed just kinda riding the energy of the music and the crowd for a while. That was just not happening during this show! The light show was such an integral part of the energy of the show that there was no way to shut it out and still be tuned in to the same vibe. It was insane!

I took some pictures, which don't even come close to capturing the light and laser effects, but might give you a better idea of the tower stage set up I was trying to describe.

( I will be chasing your starlight )

Add all of that visual amazingness to what may just very well be the BEST live performance I've ever heard and you have me with about a million sparkly pieces of my completely blown mind! Seriously, I have no idea how three guys can produce that much sound! Matt is like a man possessed on the stage. And, dear gods, his voice is unreal! They opened the show with "Uprising" and then "Resistance," but I was so happy that they played a lot of older stuff too: "Hysteria," "Supermassive Black Hole," "Starlight," "Plug In Baby," their cover of "Feeling Good." Eeee!!! So much good stuff! From The Resistance they also did "Unnatural Selection," "Guiding Light," and "Undisclosed Desires." And, um, that's all I can remember! But if you're really curious I'm sure you can find the full set list online. For the encore they did "Stockholm Syndrome" and "Knights of Cydonia" and one other that I can't remember. But, and I may have already mentioned this, FUCKING AMAZING!!!

( Matt and Chris and Dom ROCKING MY FACE OFF!!! )

AMAZING SHOW!!! Easily one of the top shows I've ever seen! Blew. My. Fucking. Mind!!!

I've pretty much been feeling like crap all week. Yesterday I skipped out of the office a few hours early to come home and faceplant on my bed, where I didn't move until about two this afternoon. My throat still feels as if someone took a grater to it and I'm sporting one hell of an annoying cough, but at least the fever and raging headache are both gone. Which is good, because I seriously don't have time for this shit.

All of the crazy weather that hit L.A. earlier is now making a muddy mess of my backyard. So, on a sick and dreary day, how do I decide to entertain myself? I decide it's a good time to finally watch Milk. Dear gods, I did not have the emotional fortitude for that today! Don't get me wrong, I thought the movie was fantastic. I, however, was a complete wreck. The high fever might have had something to do with that though. *g*

In less dreary news, did y'all see Adam Lambert on Oprah today? Seriously, that boy is gorgeous. And he charmed the pants off of Oprah. Well, not literally. *shudder* But she was obviously delighted by him. As well all are, dear Oprah, as we all are.

( Vids of Adam's Oprah performances. Mainly for MY entertainment. *g* )

Ok, moving on now.

So, all my L.A. chicas, Cassidy Haley is playing at the Viper Room on Friday. I'm kinda counting on y'all to go and TELL ME ALL ABOUT IT!!! And someone tell me again why I don't live in L.A. yet??? Oh, yeah, that pesky bar exam thing. Blah. Professional licensing requirements. So annoying!

But I digress. Cassidy Haley. This Friday, January 22nd, in the downstairs lounge of The Viper Room, at 8 p.m.; tickets are $7 at the door. L.A. represent!

Since we're on the topic of live music, what the every loving fuck is with Muse and their apparent determined refusal to announce an L.A. show??? They announced a few more dates today, NONE of which included L.A. or anywhere in SoCal! They're headlining Coachella, which is all well and good, but there are few things I'd like to do LESS than sweat my way through a music festival in the middle of the damn desert! They did announce a Vegas show on April 10th, that is currently under serious consideration. I'd still like to go to New Orleans later that month to see Cassidy, so I'll have to see if I can make both work. But, really, Muse, why the scorn for L.A.??? *baffled*

And since I'm going to blame the after effects of the fever for the incoherency of this post anyway, let's clear out some of my tabs and do some fic recs, shall we? *g*

• Hush (Adam/Tommy; NC-17) by cjmarlowe. CJ wrote this for ME!!! As part of the amazing fandom fundraising efforts for Haiti this week. And, dear heavens, this is just HOT. It's a gagging fic, which isn't always my thing, because I'm all about the filthy talk, but, yeah, um, she really makes it work. Hot. I mentioned that, right?


• Only Take What You Can Carry (Adam/Kris, NC-17) by seperis. Man, this fic takes you on a ride. And, really, that's the only way to describe it. It was a long, winding, fantastic trip. Sometimes I thought I knew where we were going; sometimes I was a little lost and disoriented; but I was ALWAYS completely entranced by the trip.


• Hot Mess (Adam/Tommy, NC-17) by janescott. Tommy in a silk teddy. Do you really need to know more? Yeah, I didn't think so. *g*


• Brand New Shoes (Adam/Kris, R) by jerakeen. I've been doing some catching up on some of Jerakeen's fics that I somehow missed, so y'all might have already read this. But it was new to me, and I loved it!


• That Old Black Magic (Adam/Kris, PG-13) by jerakeen. Another new to me fic. This is just fantastic, though. She spins out a long and thoroughly satisfying story that is just magic.


• La Mer (Adam/Kris, NC-17) written by jerakeen for reel_idol. Um, mermaids??? Yeah, I didn't think so either. But, it was Jerakeen, and as you can tell from this list alone, I tend to love just about everything she writes, so I gave it a shot. And I'm glad that I did because it was DELIGHTFUL!

So, yeah, sleep, read fic, and watch movies that made me cry. That about sums up my week so far. How's you're week going? *g*

The Ricardo Arjona concert on Saturday was, um, different. Two years ago when he toured he put on one hell of a show. He's known for his songwriting, but damn did he ever rock it out. This time the vibe was SO different. I'm assuming it was purposefully so, as this tour's stage set was designed as a street/neighborhood scene and the show started off with the band coming on as if they were street musicians. So the entire show had this laid back, neighborhood street party vibe -- which was cool, but definitely not the rock concert I was expecting based on his last tour. Regardless, I've always said that he's the best Spanish language songwriter of our time -- he is just a craftsman with the Spanish language and what he does best is storytelling, and this show definitely highlighted that. And, props to him too for always being willing to take his music into deeper waters and tackle difficult subjects. My favorite example of that off his new CD is the song Que Nadie Vea, which tells the story of a gay boy growing up. He's been criticized for it -- that he simplified the story into generalizations and that he didn't give the song a "happier" ending. But, just that he wrote an LGBT themed song is noteworthy. There might be others, but right now I can't think of a single other Spanish-language song that deals so openly with the topic. And, criticisms aside, the song is typically Arjona in that what it does is tell a very personal story.

( Que Nadie Vea )

In other music related ramblings, I got a ticket to see David Cook in November. What have you done to me American Idol??? *laughs* Who am I kidding? Shame lost all meaning for me when I flew to Kansas City to see Adam Lambert! So, yeah, David Cook! 6th row floor seats! Exciting! *embracing my shame*

If I can manage to find a decent ticket on Sunday morning, I think I'm going to go see Pink. Her performance at the VMAs was amazing! I hadn't bought tickets to her show because there wasn't anyone who wanted to go with me. But, fuck it. I'll go by myself. *nods*

I just finished downloading the new Muse CD, so I'm off to give it a listen! 'Night all!