Hidden Track Staff

We linked this morning to the New York Times’ review of the first performance of the two-night American Beauty Project. But we like to do things a bit differently than the Gray Lady, so we sent HT reporter Specs Toporczer down to the World Financial Center for a first-hand account of the latest Grateful Dead tribute.

Who schedules anything during the middle of the AFC championship game?

I had to put the Brady-Manning Bowl on pause to hit the second night of the American Beauty Project — a cover tribute to the Grateful Dead’s album of the same name — in the Winter Garden of the World Financial Center. The trip down to Battery Park City was extremely strange; the streets were empty, save for neglected women, Asian delivery boys and the handfuls of frozen old hippies scurrying across the West Side Highway. Everyone else was watching the NFL.

Read on for more of Specs’ review and a few photos snapped from the event…

Hey, look! It’s another clever name for a glorified link dump! Those two cats really know how to slip the easy ones past the goalkeeper…shut up, Richard. It took a

The New Year’s reviews and Trey overload continue: Our friend Ashley Griffin left for Atlantic City with a Trey Anastasio ticket, a set of loaded dice and a giant sack of cash. She returned with this review and a shiny new Cadillac.

New Year’s Eve has always provided Phish fans a window of time bathed in the light of hippie mysticism. Dysfunctional holiday family fun traditionally left one longing for a stronger drink than a mug of eggnog, and a holiday run of shows was the festive cocktail of choice for improvisational junkies. Hmm, maybe “junkies” was a poor choice of words there given recent events.

Photo by Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic.com

Anticipation of the tidal wave of cheers as the lights dimmed at MSG made suffering through painful conversations with distant relatives over turkey almost enjoyable. A New Year’s run was more than a string of shows. It was a celebration of the potential of the new year, both musically and communally.

Sadly those days are over now, but Trey still offered the promise of a new beginning this year with a string of holiday shows, culminating in a two-night run in the crown jewel of the Jersey shore. Atlantic City may be a cubic zirconium when compared to the debaucherous glitz of the Vega, but it sparkles nonetheless, shining brighter than ever on this evening as the newest incarnation of Trey’s horn-driven solo outfit tore through three sets to bring in the new year…

This post has been updated since its original publication…new information has come to light, maaan. That’s what we call follow-fucking-through. The Allman Brothers Band have officially announced its annual 744-show run at New York’s

The Benevento/Russo Duo celebrated five great years on Wednesday night, throwing a late entry into the ring for Show of the Year. This was a case of two pros coming back to the ol’ playground and fuckin’ around for awhile, showcasing the greatness that’s propelled them to bigger things. Our friend Neddy‘s The Duo’s biggest fan out there — literally, he even got a sweet shout-out from Marco — and he was kind enough to reflect on the night, and the history.

Is five years a long time? When I think back on what my life was like half a decade ago, it feels like a geological epoch. I’m sure the same can be said for Joe Russo and Marco Benevento, who have gone from a pair of who-dats playing for free every week in a quonset hut of a venue to becoming a critical darling of the scene….not to mention play-acting as the latter half of Phish this summer, amongst other adventures and misadventures.

So, yeah, five years seems like a good time to pause and reflect. It’s also a good excuse to get shitty drunk in the dank underbelly of the Knitting Factory. And so it was: a 5th anniversary Duo party, not even in the Tap Bar, but all the way down in the 88-person capacity Old Office.

I got there a bit early, not sure what kind of zoo the crowd would be. As it turns out, the audience size was utterly manageable, and there was an incredibly friendly vibe from front to back. Unfortunately, the show started pretty late, all things considered, and standing around in a bar for two hours with a friendly crowd meant many, many, many whiskeys before the first notes were played. It’s probably fitting that much of the crowd was deep in party mode all night long…

‘Twas the day after Christmas, when all through the city
Ace and Scotty thought a list would make them seem witty
But the pair quickly realized that they couldn’t hack it
Disliking most popular bands, save My Morning Jacket

The bloggers all posted their Best Ofs to dissect
While thoughts of The Hold Steady made them erect
But up on our high horse, as we saw it this year
My Chemical Romance gets pwned by Bob Weir

So here in our list, you won’t find Cat Power
We favor the folks that jam for an hour
Scroll down below for our highlights of 2006
Better than Pitchfork! Fuckin’ pretentious pricks…

We could probably continue the above poetic debacle for the remaining nine verses, but as it stands this thing’s already longer than black dong. As we plod ahead with all things Year End, piggybacking on The Four Questions and our Year in Mostly Crappy Photos, allow us to present a distorted look back at a truly fantastic year for being a smarmy douchebag ogling closely from the sidelines.

Read on for the the best of the best from the Year of Our Lord 2006…

Sure it ain’t Passover, but we’ve got four questions for you anyway… 1. What was your single favorite musical experience of 2006? 2. What band are you most excited to

It’s been two weeks since Tenacious D rocked New York City with its patented brand of fuck-your-face acoustic rock. But since the vibration of death that The D left behind is still reverberating throughout Manhattan, our buddy Hal Hansen decided to retroactively inform you of what you’ve been feeling for a fortnight…

Overheard in New York, December 1^st, 2006

“I check my dipstick, you need lubrication”
“Twas I who fucked the dragon, fuckalize sing-fuckaloo”
“Burrito supreme and a Chicken supreme and a Cutlass supreme”
“When I’m snackin’ on a tasty boosh, right after the show”
“I’m shooting my juice right in your caboose”
“Have you ever been worked on by two guys who are hot for your snatch”
“And then I’ll fuckin’ fuck you discreetly”
—34^th Street & 7^th Avenue

If any of the exclamations above seem a little out of place for a show review, or even the aforementioned and awesome Overheard in New York, please do not fret. They were all majestically sung at the most famous venue in the world, Madison Square Garden, by the greatest band in the world, Tenacious D — an incredibly rare combination of forces that left few asses intact.

Before we continue with the review, it should be painfully obvious by now that this is all just a big joke. Kyle Gass (KG, Kage, Rage Kage) and Jack Black (JB, Jables), who first met more than a dozen years ago as members of the Actor’s Gang troupe in Los Angeles, are undoubtedly actors first and musicians second.

Although Gass does have some serious chops on the acoustic guitar, and Black is arguably the closest thing to a rock star I’ve ever seen live, Tenacious D as the “greatest band in history” cannot be taken seriously. The key to thoroughly enjoying one of these ridiculous spectacles is to just go along with the joke: Accept that they are in fact the greatest band ever and indeed were born from Satan and slayed dragons on their way to this achievement. If you can tweak your sense of humor enough to get this far, you are ready for The D…

We sent our resident left-coast photographer and good friend Felonious Monk down to the 12/3 Primus show in the California capital to snap a few shots of the action and deliver us a brief report of the evening…

Monk’s cherry-popping experience in the pit was so bizarrely overwhelming that he decided to share with us the ridiculousness of being a credentialed photographer. Maybe that lead-in sounds a little boring, but when a half-naked girl magically appears in the story, you’ll realize how interesting a night up front can be.

Using cliché-riddled math, the pictures he sent over should be worth exactly 7,000 words. But because he’s such a good guy and he took such exquisite pictures, I think we can bump that up to, like, 7,150. Check these puppers out…