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Blogs / Lounge Act / November 2008 / Simple songs or Bombastic bombshells: Your Choice

Simple songs or Bombastic bombshells: Your Choice

Okay, it's not the actual Pink Floyd. It's the incomprehensibly successful Australian Pink Floyd Show, an arena-sized tribute act that circles the globe making a living by playing other men's music to audiences full of desperate fans of the original.

Not that there's anything wrong with that. Well, maybe a little.

 Classical musicians make a living doing the same thing. It just seems more unseemly when the music's original producers — the real Pink Floyd — are still alive, for the most part, and could do a tour if they wanted to. Instead, you have a bunch of folks touring around, charging $27.50 to $37.50 a ticket. But there are plenty of fans to partake. Tonight, you can be one of them when the Australian Pink Floyd Show does its thing at 7:30 p.m. at West Valley City's E Center. Since I'm not a Floyd fan, I'll go ahead and wait for a tribute band I can get behind, like Hell's Belles or the Iron Maidens.

Many of my friends will undoubtedly be attending the Murray Theater show of Mason Jennings (pictured above), another popular act I can't really get into. The Minnesota-based folk-ish troubador gets props from me for forging an indie career for years before landing on a major label, though.

There was a point in time when I thought I'd be able to get into Jennings' tunes, and that was when he became the first act signed to the Glacial Pace Records, the label started by Modest Mouse lead man Isaac Brock. I hold Brock in pretty high regard, musically speaking, so that counted for a lot for me. And then Jennings toured through Salt Lake with Modest Mouse about a million years ago, and his set was decent, if a little dull compared to the headliner's show.

Jennings had a falling out with Brock's label and landed at Brushfire Records, the label started by Jack Johnson. Anyone who reads this space regularly knows what little regard I have for the surfer-turned-tunesmith, so I might be dismissing Jennings these days though guilt by association. But oh well. Music fans are fickle folks, right? Just ask every one-hit-wonder who ever wondered why there wasn't a second hit coming their way.

Jennings does have a big fan base in the SLC, so be sure to get out to the Murray Theater at 7, when opener Zach Gill will take the stage. Tickets are $25 (!), and almost $10 more if you buy them at Smith's Tix, so get 'em at the door if you can. The Murray Theater is at 4916 S. State.