mumford & sons! / 24 before 25

yesterday, randy and i went to see mumford & sons at the san manuel amphitheater in san bernardino, ca! [now i'm half-way done with #4!]

i had never been to this venue before, but i actually really liked it! it's right near the san manuel indian casino, so it is surrounded by mountains. when we were in the actual amphitheater, it felt like such a secluded area. randy and i had lawn seats, so even though the bands were little ant people (monitors helped), getting to sprawl out on the grass was quite nice!

 

sorry about the dirty feet! a 2-mile trek across dirt roads in itty bitty sandals was a blast..

mumford & sons put on such a great show! they're an amazing band live. marcus mumford has arguably the world's best voice. i would definitely recommend seeing them if you can get your hands on tickets.

jason mraz/23 before 24

on friday randy and i went to a concert! i can't tell you how long it's been since we've gone to see a show, but it was definitely worth the wait :]

we saw jason mraz at the hollywood bowl. christina perri opened the show, but because of the heinous amount of traffic, we missed her set. she did come out at the very end and sang a duet with jason, which was phenomenal, so i'll definitely have to check out her other stuff.

jason mraz was unbelievable! he's such a great live performer. a funny tidbit - i've actually seen him before in san diego. i went with some friends to a secret show that was at a massage therapy school. it was this guy bushwalla, who is really good friends with jason mraz (if you've ever seen the old episode of la ink when jason and 2 friends get tattooed, bushwalla is the guy friend). anyway, jason came out and sang a couple of songs. flash forward probably 3 or 4 years ago and i'm sitting at the hollywood bowl watching him perform for thousands of people!

*please note: the dark spot on randy's face is a shadow i made with the phone while taking the picture. sorry babe!

*this is another item crossed off of my 23 before 24 list!

wedding wednesday

randy and i decided we wanted two 'performers' for our wedding: a guitarist to welcome guests, perform at the ceremony, and during cocktail hour..
and then a DJ to spin during dinner and the reception.

randy has a friend who is a DJ and has graciously agreed to work at our wedding, but we don't have any guitarist friends, so i consulted google.

somehow i happened upon this website called gig masters. it's actually a really cool thing - it's a website where you can hire performers of all different sorts - bands, acoustic singers, DJ's, balloon twisters, belly dancers..

you set up your event and give some basic details, and then you can select artists to get quotes from. most of them responded fairly quickly, in my experience, but it's cool because it puts everybody side by side and you can accept or deny people's offers. each artist's profile lists details about them like their musical influences, and they can even post videos or tracks of samples of their work. there are standard reviews of each performer, but you can also see the events they have booked in the past and future through gig masters.. so if they don't have any jobs coming up in the next few months, you know they probably suck..

if you're looking for any performers for your wedding and haven't had luck with referrals, i highly suggest checking our gig masters!

*i was not asked to write this review.

countdown

a little something to brighten up your monday : ]

slow ride

an awesome sublime cover done by an old friend

enjoy your saturday!

rock in booty shorts

babes on a train

i was driving home from work yesterday and heard the most awesome thing on kroq

edward sharpe & the magnetic zeros
mumford & sons
AND
old crow medicine show

are going on tour with this amazing thing called the railroad revival tour.

the bands travel by train for the entire tour and hit 6 cities in 6 days! tour dates are april 21-27.

tickets go on sale today! but don't tell me if you're going, because i will be insanely jealous of you.

until next time..

<3 alaina

reflections: grammy awards 2011

i finally got through watching the grammy awards from what, 2 sundays ago?? it's a little hard with work, school, and a life to make it through a 3 and a half hour block of television.

overall, i was a little 'eh' about this year's show. were there even awards being handed out? i felt like it was just performance after performance after performance....

that being said, i finally decided which was my FAVORITE performance at this year's grammys. hands down, mumford & sons, avett brothers, and.. we could have done without bob dylan. no offense, the man is a legend, but he kept getting drowned out by the music! maybe it was the mic tech's fault or just time not being too kind on his voice anymore.

here is a semi-shotty video of the performance in case you missed it:

look at how much fun they're having! it made me want to jump through the screen and join those boys on stage. and bonus: they're easy to look at ; )

if you like what you've seen, you should check out their albums.

until next time..

<3 alaina