What a show

Last night I went to the Jason Mraz/Alanis Morissette concert at the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall. It's an amazing theater in Portland that opened in '84, but was originally the Portland Public Theater built in '28 (or so I'm told, as I was not only not alive but not in Portland :op). This place is absolutely INCREDIBLE - it's absolutely gorgeous, and the acoustics are amazing. Given this concert was the acoustic Jagged Little Pill tour, it was the pefect place for it. Very intimate, only 2,776 seats. I'd never seen Alanis, and was totally psyched! I had Mezzanine seats, which were up pretty high, but in a place like that there's really not a bad seat.



I got me a Sapphire & tonic, sat down and enjoyed the show. Jason Mraz opened first, and he was great. Has a great voice, and is funny as hell too. Half the time he's signing his heart out and the other half he's up there telling jokes, being silly and having a good time. I've heard his songs on the radio and always thought he was pretty good, but I had no idea how good that guy could sing. Really amazing.



Alanis was absolutely amazing. Her voice is phenominal. She's a bit wiry, half the time she was stading there flailing limbs left and right or walking randomly and pretty damn fast around the stage, but hey whatever works. The stage setting was neat, it was made up to look kind of like a vintage living room, there were oriental rugs on the floor, sofas and even a pink stuffed bunny sitting in a chair. Kinda cool - I'd never been to a show like that. Most of the shows I've been to were large venues, not intimate like that.

There were 3 video screens, one at the top and two on the side, showing videos and background visuals for the songs. At one point, while doing "Hand in My Pocket," there was video playing of a litlte white dog sticking his head out the window of a moving car, tongue hanging out and having a great time. After the song was over the dog came bounding out from behind the stage (well, on the side), did a lap around the stage and ran backstage - it was too cute. Alanis went and got him, introduced him to the crowd, put him down and he tore like a bat outta hell off stage.

There were a few encores, "You Oughta Know," "Ironic" and .... shit I forget the other one!

All in all a great show!!


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Tomorrow I start dog/house-sitting for a week, so I might not be around as much as normal.... work's been hella busy (we're converting our entire case management system and yours truly was dubbed the "project manager," so I gots me a lot of work ahead). I'll do as much as I can, I love reading all your blogs!