Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Katharine McPhee - It's Not Christmas Without You + Interview
Doing some much needed promotion for her Christmas album, Katharine McPhee hit the FOX Red Eye Show in New York to perform It's Not Christmas Without You, her co-penned original Christmas song on the Christmas album Christmas Is The Time To Say I Love You. She performed the song effortlessly and it was yet another fantastic vocal from the gorgeous brunette. Of course, McPhee also did an interview with them and it's the most comfortable I've seen her since her interview with Jimmy Kimmel Live in 2008. And in 2007 on the same show.
Biscuit Brothers and Big Boi B This Weekend!
It's really goin' down this Saturday night in the ATX! The Holiday Season hath begun and I can't wait to really kick it off at the Biscuit Brothers Holiday Hoedown. Seriously, we are hitting this up.
It's the 2010 HOMESTYLE HOLIDAY HOEDOWN with the BISCUIT BROTHERS! (aka HO, HO, HO! Or even HO3.) A Handcrafted Holiday Event and Fund-raiser for the Biscuit Brothers Children's Television Project.
Saturday, December 4, 2010 from 6pm-8pm
at Pioneer Farms in North Austin (where they shoot their TV show!)
More info can be found here.
And then of course the one we've all been waiting for, BIG BOI! Live at the East Side Drive Inn.
And of course the after party.
The whole holiday season is poppin' like crazy in AustinSurrealVille...
It's the 2010 HOMESTYLE HOLIDAY HOEDOWN with the BISCUIT BROTHERS! (aka HO, HO, HO! Or even HO3.) A Handcrafted Holiday Event and Fund-raiser for the Biscuit Brothers Children's Television Project.
Saturday, December 4, 2010 from 6pm-8pm
at Pioneer Farms in North Austin (where they shoot their TV show!)
More info can be found here.
And then of course the one we've all been waiting for, BIG BOI! Live at the East Side Drive Inn.
And of course the after party.
The whole holiday season is poppin' like crazy in AustinSurrealVille...
Biscuit Brothers and Big Boi B This Weekend!
It's really goin' down this Saturday night in the ATX! The Holiday Season hath begun and I can't wait to really kick it off at the Biscuit Brothers Holiday Hoedown. Seriously, we are hitting this up.
It's the 2010 HOMESTYLE HOLIDAY HOEDOWN with the BISCUIT BROTHERS! (aka HO, HO, HO! Or even HO3.) A Handcrafted Holiday Event and Fund-raiser for the Biscuit Brothers Children's Television Project.
Saturday, December 4, 2010 from 6pm-8pm
at Pioneer Farms in North Austin (where they shoot their TV show!)
More info can be found here.
And then of course the one we've all been waiting for, BIG BOI! Live at the East Side Drive Inn.
And of course the after party.
The whole holiday season is poppin' like crazy in AustinSurrealVille...
It's the 2010 HOMESTYLE HOLIDAY HOEDOWN with the BISCUIT BROTHERS! (aka HO, HO, HO! Or even HO3.) A Handcrafted Holiday Event and Fund-raiser for the Biscuit Brothers Children's Television Project.
Saturday, December 4, 2010 from 6pm-8pm
at Pioneer Farms in North Austin (where they shoot their TV show!)
More info can be found here.
And then of course the one we've all been waiting for, BIG BOI! Live at the East Side Drive Inn.
And of course the after party.
The whole holiday season is poppin' like crazy in AustinSurrealVille...
Egyptianas! Tribal riddims and isolations from the Port Belly Project at 7 pm, Dec 4, Taylortown Store, Bossier City
"The Winter Hafla is this Saturday, December 4th, at the old Taylortown general store," says Susan Fontaine about the dance party being produced by the sinuous members of the beladi troupe from Lotus Studio. The Port Belly Project will give you a preview of the show you will see if you attend Christmas in the Sky.
8568 Barksdale Blvd. Bossier City, LA 71112
Doors at 6:30, show at 7.
Tickets $10, raffle $5. Door prizes (for the audience) and a raffle (for the dancers) with lots of fun things!
"It's BYOB; we'll have tasty food stuffs after the show," adds Fontaine.
8568 Barksdale Blvd. Bossier City, LA 71112
Doors at 6:30, show at 7.
Tickets $10, raffle $5. Door prizes (for the audience) and a raffle (for the dancers) with lots of fun things!
"It's BYOB; we'll have tasty food stuffs after the show," adds Fontaine.
Thank God for Your Problems
Another gem from John Maxwell's book, Developing the Leader Within You:
We all have a tendency all of our lives to want to get rid of problems and responsibilities. When that temptation arises, remember the youth who was questioning a lonely old man. "What is life's heaviest burden?" he asked. The old fellow answered sadly, "Having nothing to carry."
Nicole Scherzinger - Poison live @ This Morning + Daybreak
Desperate for a hit, Nicole Scherzinger of the Pussycat Dolls hit British breakfast talk show This Morning for a performance of Poison and an interview following a performance on The X Factor. At least you can't fault the girl when it comes to working hard. Vocally, it was a little better than her X Factor performance, probably due to less nerves perhaps. And a smaller stage. Check out the performance above and the interview here.
Besides a performance and interview on This Morning, she also took to the stage of Daybreak for another similar performance of Poison. She's genuinely a sweet girl. Let's hope Nicole gets a hit this time. Check out the interview here.
Do Your Cyber Week Christmas Shopping from Here
So far, I've accumulated 84-cents in royalties received through the Amazon Associates program. When, from this site, people click recommendations I make for books and other items that can be purchased at Amazon, Amazon sends me royalties. At least, they do theoretically. But they won't cut a check to me until I've hit $100 in royalties. By my reckoning, at my current pace, that should happen somewhere around 2047.
But, if you use the box below to do your cyber-shopping--no recommendations from me, just purchasing items you were already going to buy--you can accelerate my timetable. Isn't that nice?
Thank you for your patronage!
But, if you use the box below to do your cyber-shopping--no recommendations from me, just purchasing items you were already going to buy--you can accelerate my timetable. Isn't that nice?
Thank you for your patronage!
SRAC's biennial blow-out, Christmas in the Sky, takes place Sat, Dec 11, La Downs, supports arts programs and artists in region
Some 2,000 guests will motor to Harrah's La Downs on Sat, Dec 11, to see one of the most spectacular parties in the region: the biennial Christmas in the Sky.
Harrah's Louisiana Downs will be transformed, says Julia Foley. Beatlemania will envelope the guests from parking lot through 2 floors of super-colorful rooms. Beatlemania will rock the clock from 7 pm to 3 am.
To benefit regional arts activities and artists, Shreveport Regional Arts Council and a large team of volunteers create 16 auction areas, 10 entertainment stages, 12 themed bars, and 11 themed hot and cold buffets.
The 2008 event generated a half million dollars to support SRAC programs throughout Northwest Louisiana, says Foley.
If you love the arts and an evening of well-dressed sensory overload, call SRAC or get tickets online. They're $250 each. Not to worry: remarks overheard after recent editions of this over-the-top event indicate that the party is worth every dollar to the patron class.
(318) 673-6500
Harrah's Louisiana Downs will be transformed, says Julia Foley. Beatlemania will envelope the guests from parking lot through 2 floors of super-colorful rooms. Beatlemania will rock the clock from 7 pm to 3 am.
To benefit regional arts activities and artists, Shreveport Regional Arts Council and a large team of volunteers create 16 auction areas, 10 entertainment stages, 12 themed bars, and 11 themed hot and cold buffets.
The 2008 event generated a half million dollars to support SRAC programs throughout Northwest Louisiana, says Foley.
If you love the arts and an evening of well-dressed sensory overload, call SRAC or get tickets online. They're $250 each. Not to worry: remarks overheard after recent editions of this over-the-top event indicate that the party is worth every dollar to the patron class.
(318) 673-6500
My Stuff Series **Ill Seen, Ill Said**
Jane of ill seen, ill said has the most eclectic taste ever, she is a fabulous lady with an incredibly tasteful blog. I'm sure many of you follow her Where we blog from series and love her Sunday Best where she puts together beautiful and funky outfits and Three of a Kind feature. Her great eye for style is definitely seen in her My Stuff, enjoy now, I certainly did.
Thanks Jane! Love your answers and these beautiful collages you made for us today.
ps: Hope you liked the new My Stuff layout.
Lost Ring Returned to Northlander 51 Thanksgivings Later
John and his buddies loaded up a car and headed to the beach. It was his first time to experience the gulf waters. It was cold in late November, so they didn’t really, swim, but they ran through the water’s edge and played football in the sand.
Sometime that day he noticed his treasured class ring was gone. His ring finger was empty and he couldn’t recall when it had disappeared. Perhaps while he tossed the football or when he and his pals were rough-housing in the sand. It really didn’t matter how. It simply was gone, seemingly forever.
Fast forward 51 years later.
A couple from Idaho recently was visiting a beach outside of Brownsville, Texas. As they strolled the beach, they noticed something dull yet golden nestled in the sand. It was an old-fashioned, distinctive looking class ring that appeared to be from the North Kansas City High School class of 1958.
Block Schedule Remains in Place While Committee Studies More Options
After seven months of preliminary study, a committee comprised of teachers, administrators, parents and students asked the Board of Education for more time to study and recommend an alternative to the block high school schedule.
>>Read more about the high school schedule options under study
>>Read more about the high school schedule options under study
Protect yourself
One of my favorite pieces of jewelry is a small gold evil eye pendant I wear on a gold chain on my eye. I am a firm believer that the evil eye protects you and since very young I have been hearing that one should always carry one and I do (on my hands, in a bracelet form). I love the new creations from young designers like Vanesa Kandiyioti, Ileana Makri or Apriati. They do the most gorgeous evil eyes ever.
Does any of you believe in the evil eye protection?
Quarterly Faves:
So you might have been wondering where I've gotten to. Well, lately life has been so crazy for me and I've been pulled every which way in my life, with work and growing up. I've recently had a LOT of unnecessary drama my way and I've needed to clear my head and deal with these problems, now it appears the drama has "died down" so I can now focus on the more fun side of life for me, so here I am with a QUARTERLY faves post! (I didn't realise it had been 3 months since I last posted anything! The time is going so quickly!!!! Arrggghhh!). Anyways, TO THE BAT MOBILE... UHH, I MEAN, REVIEW! HAHA!
The things I've been loving these past 3 months!
* MAC Style Snob eyeshadow ~ I was very late to the game in getting this! (thank you LJ sales!). I absoloutely LOVE this shade! So pretty, can be dressed down or up!
* Estee Lauder Twilight Petal lipgloss $42 ~ Such a pretty shade. A nice shade to make a nude feel a bit more special!
* Laura Mercier Peacock Sequin eyeshadow $44 ~ First ever LM product and I love it! The perfect teal shade I've come across.
* MAC Imperial Flower nailpolish $22 ~ Awesome Orange!
* MAC Bite Of An Apple blush $44 ~ Okay so I bought this on pure hype (as one does lol) and I'm actually stunned as to how beautiful it really, actually is. No Joke. Perfect "I've just come in from the cold" shade. This is one hyped up product I wholeheartly agree with!
* MAC Undercurrent pearlglide liner $34 ~ My fave pencil was Float on By, until I used this. This is more intense and sparkles. To me it's Float on By but better!
* MAC Jest eyeshadow $32 ~ I've wanted this for a long time, finally obtained it and honestly, why didn't I get this sooner. It's gorgeous!!!
BONUS: 2 Lip Combinations I've been Loving!
Creme 'd Nude lipstick + Fashion Whim cremesheen glass = PERFECT NUDE!
Temperature's Rising lip pencil + Beachbound lipstick + Flurry of Fun lipglass = Sexy Bright ORANGE! *I'm going to try out TR lip pencil with Goes & Goes prolong together for some REAL Orange Magic to see how that looks hahaha. I suggest pairing with Imperial Flower nailpolish for orange overload!*
Products I'm NOT Loving:
Now this is hard for me to say coz I'm a hardcore MAC fan but a couple of their products have been over rated for me *sad face*:
*My Dark Magic eyeshadow ~ Now I own Young Punk (style black) and it's basically the same shade, I couldn't get the pink to stay pink, because of the black streaks, it too came out purple. I'd never use up Young Punk and think it is the better of the two.
*Bad Fairy nailpolish (throws hands up to avoid being hit...) ~ Yeah I know, I wanted to love this so bad but not as great as I thought it was going to be. The shimmery red from OPI's burlesque collection is much better, a bit different but just nicer.
Monday, November 29, 2010
U2 - Viva Italia Stadio Olimpico Roma [BOOTELG] [2CD] [2010]
CD 01
- Intro: Space Oddity
- Return Of The Stingray Guitar
- Beautiful Day
- I Will Follow
- Get On Your Boots
- Magnificent
- Mysterious Ways
- Elevation
- Until The End Of The World / Anthem
- I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For
- Bad / All I Want Is You
- Mercy
- In A Little While
- Miss Sarajevo
- City Of Blinding Lights
- Vertigo / Teenage Kicks
CD 02
- Relax / Crazy Tonight / Two Tribes
- Sunday Bloody Sunday / Get Up Stand Up
- MLK
- Walk On / You’ll Never Walk Alone
- Desmond Tutu Speech
- One / Senza Una Donna
- Amazing Grace / Where The Streets Have No Name
- Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me
- With Or Without You / Shine Like Stars
- Happy Birthday
- Moment of Surrender
- Mothers Of The Disappeared (Istanbul 2010-09-06)
- Yigidim Aslanim Burda Yatiyor (with Omer 3:42 Zulfu Livaneli) (Istanbul 2010-09-06)
MEGAUPLOAD
2SHARED
BADONGO
HOTFILE
Gorillaz - Plastic Beach [2010]
- Orchestral Intro
- Welcome To The World Of The Plastic Beach
- White Flag
- Rhinestone Eyes
- Stylo
- Superfast Jellyfish
- Empire Ants
- Glitter Freeze
- Some Kind Of Nature
- On Melancholy Hill
- Broken
- Sweepstakes
- Plastic Beach
- To BingeCloud Of Unknowing
- Pirate Jet
MEGAUPLOAD
2SHARED
BADONGO
HOTFILE
A food affair
SO yes, as I said yesterday, the weekend was lovely, very very very cold but really lovely. And the visit to Whole Foods was well worth it. The main London store is massive with everything a food lover would love. Now, the cheese room has absolutely everything you (if you love cheese of course) could ever dream. I love how you can try stuff (not really common in England) around the store. Oh Yummy Whole Foods, you definitely know how to please us!
Call me an Islamophobe, please. Seriously.
Oregon: Just another bomb-plotting jihadist yelling “Allahu akbar!”
by Michelle Malkin
Arkansas 'Man' Arrested for Possession of Explosives
The ABC News report only says that an Arkansas "man" was arrested, and charged with multiples counts of manufacturing and possessing explosive devices after a traffic stop in Smyth County. After all, wouldn't want to say anything that even remotely connects Islam with its most frequent activity (violence and the threat thereof), would we?
The perp's name is Emad Hatem Abdullah. If he were a Christian, a Buddhist, a Hindu, or "other" ... my guess is that we'd have been told about it - especially if he Is a Christian. But being that Islam is "special" in the minds of the socialist left and their like-minded friends in the media, all we're given is a nondescript "man" (only important because the omission is meant to cause the public to be less 'aware' of Islam's proclivity towards violence) ... our first clue that the perp is one of Islam's "misunderstanders" that haven't got the word that Islam is a religion of peace.
by Michelle Malkin
Arkansas 'Man' Arrested for Possession of Explosives
The ABC News report only says that an Arkansas "man" was arrested, and charged with multiples counts of manufacturing and possessing explosive devices after a traffic stop in Smyth County. After all, wouldn't want to say anything that even remotely connects Islam with its most frequent activity (violence and the threat thereof), would we?
The perp's name is Emad Hatem Abdullah. If he were a Christian, a Buddhist, a Hindu, or "other" ... my guess is that we'd have been told about it - especially if he Is a Christian. But being that Islam is "special" in the minds of the socialist left and their like-minded friends in the media, all we're given is a nondescript "man" (only important because the omission is meant to cause the public to be less 'aware' of Islam's proclivity towards violence) ... our first clue that the perp is one of Islam's "misunderstanders" that haven't got the word that Islam is a religion of peace.
The Saturdays - Ego + Interview live @ BRMB
The Saturdays were on BRMB recently to give Birmingham a string of performances which include Just Can't Get Enough, Missing You, Ego and Higher. The girls did a solid job as usual and you can check out Ego above with an interview backstage.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Justin Bieber - Somebody To Love/Baby on The X Factor
Tween pop megastar Justin Bieber was on The X Factor to perform a medley of his biggest recent hits Baby and Somebody To Love. The teen lipsynched his way to a performance we've seen a gazillion times before and flirted with Cheryl Cole after his performance. Eeyuck. Fame has gotten to his head. Cheryl Cole's way out of his league, just that The X Factor judge is too nice to say so. Someone needs a rude awakening.. Am I being overly negative? Perhaps. But the boy needs to deflate his ego before it becomes like Kanye's.
The Wanted - Lose My Mind live on The X Factor
To plug their latest single, hit boyband The Wanted (aka the boyband Simon wants One Direction to be) took to the X Factor to perform Lose My Mind. Recreating the bumper cars of the music video, the boys did a solid job as usual. But I'm still not sure they can properly work a big stage. Still, it's another hit for sure, I don't think they're sorry.
Nicole Scherzinger - Poison live on The X Factor
Because Europe seems to be the only place in the world that gives Nicole Scherzinger a slot, the Pussycat Doll singer took to The X Factor (UK) to deliver her first ever performance of Poison. Vocally it was alright, nothing special, but unlike Cheryl Cole, she performed it live and did some solid choreography as well. Just which she put on the white outfit in the Poison, not the black one which includes the.. Cat hair. Ooh, Lewis Hamilton's in the audience as well.
The Wanted - Lose My Mind [Music Video Premiere]
British boyband The Wanted is no stranger to success. After the while #1 debut single All Time Low, they followed it up with #2 single Heart Vacancy. Now they've a new single in the pipeline Lose My Mind. The woah-oh-woah-oh chants at the beginning are a bit intoxicating, and it's yet another earworm/hit for the boys. It's not as good as the bloody brilliant All Time Low or as strangely good as Heart Vacancy, but fans are sure to eat this one up for sure.
Central Fire Station renovation will affect a 9-block district; chat with designer Gregory Free about Texas Ave on Th, Dec 2, 6 to 8 pm, at Holy Cross Episcopal
Share your vision for Texas Ave - a 9-block area around the Central Fire Station - with Gregory Free and SRAC, says April Dahm.
A Listening and Visioning session with Gregory Free will be hosted by the Texas Avenue Community Association on Thu, December 2, 6pm 8pm, at 875 Cotton Street, Church of the Holy Cross Episcopal.
aprildahm@gmail.com
A Listening and Visioning session with Gregory Free will be hosted by the Texas Avenue Community Association on Thu, December 2, 6pm 8pm, at 875 Cotton Street, Church of the Holy Cross Episcopal.
aprildahm@gmail.com
Are You Ready?
[This was shared during worship with the people of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio, this morning.]
Isaiah 2:1-5
Advent, which begins today, is a time for getting ready. Just as many are working themselves into frenzies preparing for Christmas, Advent asks us, “Are we ready, not for Christmas Day, but for the advent of Jesus, for the appearing of Jesus?”
Are we ready for Jesus to show up to bring an end to this world of sin and death and establish a new heaven and a new earth free of sin and death and grief?
Are we ready to meet Jesus face to face should our lives end before Jesus returns?
The last thing that any human being should want is to be ready for Christmas or for things like tomorrow’s special project, school assignment, or big game, yet not be ready to meet Jesus.
So, are you ready?
Each of our appointed lessons for this first day of the new Church Year can help us to be ready for Jesus’ return or, should we die before His return, for the moments we first see Jesus face to face. (1)
Please pull out the Celebrate inserts for this morning. Our first lesson is Isaiah 2:1-5. Verse 4 is probably the most famous passage here. It's a verse that promises that, beyond these days when sin drives human beings to warfare and factionalism, there will be a day when God will destroy war itself and turn our weapons into implements put to better and more productive use. That will happen on the day of the risen, ascended Jesus' return to this world!
This vision of a new creation at peace is one that would have especially appealed to Isaiah’s likely first listeners and readers.
Isaiah started his work as a prophet of God in about 740BC. At that moment, the Assyrian Empire threatened the destruction of first-century Judah.
(Judah, you’ll remember, was the southern portion of what had once been a larger nation, Israel. After King Solomon’s death, Israel split into two kingdoms, the northern one with its worship and national life centered in Samaria, the south remaining focused in Jerusalem. Seven-and-a-half centuries after Isaiah began prophesying, Jesus was born and raised in Judah, also called Judea.)
In Isaiah’s day, the people of Judah were terrified of the strong, menacing Assyrians. And their fear proved well founded: In 722BC, Israel would fall to the Assyrians, just as God had revealed through Isaiah would happen. God used the Assyrian army to chasten His people, calling them to repent for sin, especially their dalliances with false gods, and to trust, have faith, only in Him.
In our lesson, God declares a moment when people from around the world would acknowledge the God of the Jews as the one true God of the universe. They would stream to worship Him along with the Jews, He says. According to God’s words here, Mount Zion, the humble hill in Jerusalem where the Temple then stood, would be acknowledged as “the highest of mountains.” People would turn to the God Whose presence once lived in the Temple’s “Holy of Holies,” saying (look at their words in Isaiah 2:3 in our first lesson):
God also is telling us how to prepare for the final scenes in human history, when, as Jesus puts it in our Gospel lesson, at a moment known only by the Father, the risen and ascended Jesus will return. It's then, that Jesus will, as we confess each week during worship, “judge the living and the dead.”
God's words here also tell us how to be prepared for the final scenes in our own lives, whether they come years from now or they happen this very day.
Now, it’s important to understand that what God says in Isaiah is, in a way, metaphorical. Let me explain.
Yesterday, as I was about to eat breakfast, already dressed in some of my Buckeye gear, I found Ann reading the newspaper, and said to her, like any good Ohio State alum anticipating the afternoon game must have said when first facing the day: “We must annihilate them!”
Now, I didn’t literally mean that. To annihilate something is to reduce it to nothing. If the team from up north were annihilated, who would the Buckeyes beat on certain Saturdays in November each year? I meant simply that I wanted the Buckeyes to soundly thump the Wolverines. I spoke metaphorically.
Some eight-hundred years after Isaiah shared the words of our first lesson with the people of Judah, Jesus sat by a well in the Samaritan village of Sychar. His disciples, in spite of their shared distaste for the citizens of the breakaway northern kingdom of Samaria, had gone into the village to get some food.
A Samaritan woman shows up at the well and among the things that Jesus tells her is this: “Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain (Mount Gerizim in Samaria) nor in Jerusalem (on Mount Zion). You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews (more accurately translated, “the Judeans”). But the hour is coming and is now here, when we true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship Him.”
The point is that while salvation has come to the world through the Jews, you don’t have to be a Jew to have God in your life. While God’s presence came to the temple at Jerusalem, now “in these last days,” as the New Testament book of Hebrews tells us, “[God] has spoken to us by a Son, Whom He appointed heir of all things, through Who He also created the worlds.”
Our lesson from Isaiah then, foretells a time when people throughout the world won’t necessarily book flights on El Al Airlines in order to stream to Jerusalem, but a time when people from throughout the world will turn to the God first revealed to the Jews and then definitively, to everybody, through Jesus Christ. “For God so loved the world,” Jesus famously told Nicodemus. People from throughout the world today stream to Mount Zion every time they...
First: We turn to the God made known in Christ. “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,” our lesson says.
In Isaiah’s time, God upbraided His people for failing to acknowledge Him as the only means of wholeness and hope in their lives. “I reared children and brought them up,” God says in Isaiah 1, “but they have rebelled against Me.”
In these last days, God has shown that the only remedy for sin, death, and purposeless living is to turn in repentance and trust to Jesus Christ.
During His time on earth, Jesus denounced villages that refused to repent and believe in Him.
“Repent,” Jesus says elsewhere in Matthew's gospel, “for the kingdom of heaven is near.”
To repent and to believe (or trust) in Christ is nothing other than agreeing with God about our sin, on the one hand, and agreeing with God about His grace and forgiveness, on the other.
To be ready to meet Jesus, we can repent, that is, turn back to God, and trust in the grace of God to grant us forgiveness and the powerful Holy Spirit to help us live differently from day to day.
Second: We place ourselves under the authority of God’s Word. Out of Zion, where God revealed Himself to Israel and then to the world in Jesus, our lesson from Isaiah says, comes God’s “instruction, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” Through His Word, the lesson says in verse 3, God will teach us His ways.
Jesus, of course, is the ultimate Word of God, of course, and the Bible is God’s Spirit-inspired, perfect witness to that Word. Many spurn the authority of Christ over their lives. Many reject the authority of God's Biblical Word over their lives. “But to all who [receive the Word of God],” the Gospel of John says, God gives the power to become children of God.
God’s Word is the truth against which everything we do, say, and are is to be measured. (2) To build our lives on anything else, whether it’s our own experiences or the latest scientific research, is to build on quicksand.
The Lutheran Confessions says that the Word of God in the Bible is to be treasured as a precious jewel. (3)
The psalmist said that God’s Word is a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path.
And in today’s lesson from Isaiah, God invites us to walk in that light.
In God’s Word, we are enlightened to see God’s passionate love for each of us, God’s desire to set us free from our bondage to sin and death, and the lengths to which He goes—even to a cross—in order to make it possible for us to return to Him.
We also see that God will not force or coerce us to return to Him or stand under His life-giving Word. God woos us. God is wooing us still.
To take hold of the life that only comes through Jesus Christ, we must stand under the authority of Scripture even when we don't and never will fully understand it.
My two heroes of the faith are Martin Luther and Billy Graham. Early in his career, Billy Graham was an evangelist with an organization called Youth for Christ. He often traveled and became pals with another Youth for Christ evangelist, Chuck Templeton. Graham says that Templeton remains the best preacher he ever heard.
Templeton, a learned man, underwent a crisis of faith in the late 1940s. He came to reject the Bible's teachings about miracles, the virgin birth of Jesus, the resurrection, and so on. (Ultimately, he became an atheist.) Because he had been so close to Graham and because Graham was impressed by Templeton's mind, personality, and preaching, Billy Graham was shaken by Templeton's rejection of the authority of the Bible. As a consequence, Graham himself began to question the reliability of the Bible. Templeton's challenge to Billy Graham--"People no longer accept the Bible as being inspired the way you do"--taunted Graham.
One evening, during a retreat in southern California, Graham took a walk into a nearby woods. He dropped to his knees by a tree stump, where he set his Bible. In the gathering darkness, he couldn't read his Bible, but he could cry out to God. Though he can't recall the exact words he used as he prayed that night, Graham does say he told God honestly that the Bible was filled with many things he couldn't comprehend or explain. But he told God, "I am going to accept this as Thy Word--by faith! I'm going to allow faith to go beyond my intellectual questions and doubts, and I will believe this to be Your inspired Word."
As Graham explains in his autobiography, not all his questions were answered, but "a major bridge had been crossed." He knew that a great spiritual battle in his heart and mind had been fought and won. It is the same battle you and I need to fight, and, by the power of God's Spirit, can win, when we place ourselves under the authority of God's Word.
This past week, I had an appointment with the cardiologist who performed my heart stent procedure five months ago. He checked me over and asked lots of questions. "I feel optimistic about your recovery," he told me. Then, he fell into a long silence as he clicked through and considered my case history on his laptop computer. I wondered what he was thinking. Finally, he broke his silence: "I still don't know why you had a heart attack."
Folks, everyone in this sanctuary knows that, as happened to me five months ago, inexplicable things happen in life. And they can happen in a hurry. You have to be ready for anything!
But above all, you have to be ready for the advent of Jesus, for the moment when you come into His presence. If you will turn to God in repentance and faith in Jesus and if you will stand under the authority of God's Word, you will be ready for Christ's return. You will be ready for anything!
(1) The appointed lessons for this First Sunday in Advent are: Isaiah 2:1-5, Romans 13:11-14, and Matthew 24:36-44. The psalm is Psalm 122.
(2) The Formula of Concord, a basic confessional statement promulgated by Lutherans in 1577, expresses a Lutheran understanding of the Bible and its authority:
Isaiah 2:1-5
Advent, which begins today, is a time for getting ready. Just as many are working themselves into frenzies preparing for Christmas, Advent asks us, “Are we ready, not for Christmas Day, but for the advent of Jesus, for the appearing of Jesus?”
Are we ready for Jesus to show up to bring an end to this world of sin and death and establish a new heaven and a new earth free of sin and death and grief?
Are we ready to meet Jesus face to face should our lives end before Jesus returns?
The last thing that any human being should want is to be ready for Christmas or for things like tomorrow’s special project, school assignment, or big game, yet not be ready to meet Jesus.
So, are you ready?
Each of our appointed lessons for this first day of the new Church Year can help us to be ready for Jesus’ return or, should we die before His return, for the moments we first see Jesus face to face. (1)
Please pull out the Celebrate inserts for this morning. Our first lesson is Isaiah 2:1-5. Verse 4 is probably the most famous passage here. It's a verse that promises that, beyond these days when sin drives human beings to warfare and factionalism, there will be a day when God will destroy war itself and turn our weapons into implements put to better and more productive use. That will happen on the day of the risen, ascended Jesus' return to this world!
This vision of a new creation at peace is one that would have especially appealed to Isaiah’s likely first listeners and readers.
Isaiah started his work as a prophet of God in about 740BC. At that moment, the Assyrian Empire threatened the destruction of first-century Judah.
(Judah, you’ll remember, was the southern portion of what had once been a larger nation, Israel. After King Solomon’s death, Israel split into two kingdoms, the northern one with its worship and national life centered in Samaria, the south remaining focused in Jerusalem. Seven-and-a-half centuries after Isaiah began prophesying, Jesus was born and raised in Judah, also called Judea.)
In Isaiah’s day, the people of Judah were terrified of the strong, menacing Assyrians. And their fear proved well founded: In 722BC, Israel would fall to the Assyrians, just as God had revealed through Isaiah would happen. God used the Assyrian army to chasten His people, calling them to repent for sin, especially their dalliances with false gods, and to trust, have faith, only in Him.
In our lesson, God declares a moment when people from around the world would acknowledge the God of the Jews as the one true God of the universe. They would stream to worship Him along with the Jews, He says. According to God’s words here, Mount Zion, the humble hill in Jerusalem where the Temple then stood, would be acknowledged as “the highest of mountains.” People would turn to the God Whose presence once lived in the Temple’s “Holy of Holies,” saying (look at their words in Isaiah 2:3 in our first lesson):
Come, let us go to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; that He may teach us His ways and that we may walk in His paths. For out of Zion shall go forth instruction and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.”The lesson ends at verse 5, with these words:
O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!In these words, God wasn’t just telling the descendants of Jacob how to get ready for the restoration He wanted to bring to them once the Assyrians had conquered their land and, as a result, became desperate enough to once more realize their need of God.
God also is telling us how to prepare for the final scenes in human history, when, as Jesus puts it in our Gospel lesson, at a moment known only by the Father, the risen and ascended Jesus will return. It's then, that Jesus will, as we confess each week during worship, “judge the living and the dead.”
God's words here also tell us how to be prepared for the final scenes in our own lives, whether they come years from now or they happen this very day.
Now, it’s important to understand that what God says in Isaiah is, in a way, metaphorical. Let me explain.
Yesterday, as I was about to eat breakfast, already dressed in some of my Buckeye gear, I found Ann reading the newspaper, and said to her, like any good Ohio State alum anticipating the afternoon game must have said when first facing the day: “We must annihilate them!”
Now, I didn’t literally mean that. To annihilate something is to reduce it to nothing. If the team from up north were annihilated, who would the Buckeyes beat on certain Saturdays in November each year? I meant simply that I wanted the Buckeyes to soundly thump the Wolverines. I spoke metaphorically.
Some eight-hundred years after Isaiah shared the words of our first lesson with the people of Judah, Jesus sat by a well in the Samaritan village of Sychar. His disciples, in spite of their shared distaste for the citizens of the breakaway northern kingdom of Samaria, had gone into the village to get some food.
A Samaritan woman shows up at the well and among the things that Jesus tells her is this: “Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain (Mount Gerizim in Samaria) nor in Jerusalem (on Mount Zion). You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews (more accurately translated, “the Judeans”). But the hour is coming and is now here, when we true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship Him.”
The point is that while salvation has come to the world through the Jews, you don’t have to be a Jew to have God in your life. While God’s presence came to the temple at Jerusalem, now “in these last days,” as the New Testament book of Hebrews tells us, “[God] has spoken to us by a Son, Whom He appointed heir of all things, through Who He also created the worlds.”
Our lesson from Isaiah then, foretells a time when people throughout the world won’t necessarily book flights on El Al Airlines in order to stream to Jerusalem, but a time when people from throughout the world will turn to the God first revealed to the Jews and then definitively, to everybody, through Jesus Christ. “For God so loved the world,” Jesus famously told Nicodemus. People from throughout the world today stream to Mount Zion every time they...
- confess their sins in Jesus’ Name,
- confess their faith in Jesus, and
- strive, by the power of God's Holy Spirit living within them, to live as His redeemed and saved people in their every day moments.
First: We turn to the God made known in Christ. “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,” our lesson says.
In Isaiah’s time, God upbraided His people for failing to acknowledge Him as the only means of wholeness and hope in their lives. “I reared children and brought them up,” God says in Isaiah 1, “but they have rebelled against Me.”
In these last days, God has shown that the only remedy for sin, death, and purposeless living is to turn in repentance and trust to Jesus Christ.
During His time on earth, Jesus denounced villages that refused to repent and believe in Him.
“Repent,” Jesus says elsewhere in Matthew's gospel, “for the kingdom of heaven is near.”
To repent and to believe (or trust) in Christ is nothing other than agreeing with God about our sin, on the one hand, and agreeing with God about His grace and forgiveness, on the other.
To be ready to meet Jesus, we can repent, that is, turn back to God, and trust in the grace of God to grant us forgiveness and the powerful Holy Spirit to help us live differently from day to day.
Second: We place ourselves under the authority of God’s Word. Out of Zion, where God revealed Himself to Israel and then to the world in Jesus, our lesson from Isaiah says, comes God’s “instruction, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” Through His Word, the lesson says in verse 3, God will teach us His ways.
Jesus, of course, is the ultimate Word of God, of course, and the Bible is God’s Spirit-inspired, perfect witness to that Word. Many spurn the authority of Christ over their lives. Many reject the authority of God's Biblical Word over their lives. “But to all who [receive the Word of God],” the Gospel of John says, God gives the power to become children of God.
God’s Word is the truth against which everything we do, say, and are is to be measured. (2) To build our lives on anything else, whether it’s our own experiences or the latest scientific research, is to build on quicksand.
The Lutheran Confessions says that the Word of God in the Bible is to be treasured as a precious jewel. (3)
The psalmist said that God’s Word is a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path.
And in today’s lesson from Isaiah, God invites us to walk in that light.
In God’s Word, we are enlightened to see God’s passionate love for each of us, God’s desire to set us free from our bondage to sin and death, and the lengths to which He goes—even to a cross—in order to make it possible for us to return to Him.
We also see that God will not force or coerce us to return to Him or stand under His life-giving Word. God woos us. God is wooing us still.
To take hold of the life that only comes through Jesus Christ, we must stand under the authority of Scripture even when we don't and never will fully understand it.
My two heroes of the faith are Martin Luther and Billy Graham. Early in his career, Billy Graham was an evangelist with an organization called Youth for Christ. He often traveled and became pals with another Youth for Christ evangelist, Chuck Templeton. Graham says that Templeton remains the best preacher he ever heard.
Templeton, a learned man, underwent a crisis of faith in the late 1940s. He came to reject the Bible's teachings about miracles, the virgin birth of Jesus, the resurrection, and so on. (Ultimately, he became an atheist.) Because he had been so close to Graham and because Graham was impressed by Templeton's mind, personality, and preaching, Billy Graham was shaken by Templeton's rejection of the authority of the Bible. As a consequence, Graham himself began to question the reliability of the Bible. Templeton's challenge to Billy Graham--"People no longer accept the Bible as being inspired the way you do"--taunted Graham.
One evening, during a retreat in southern California, Graham took a walk into a nearby woods. He dropped to his knees by a tree stump, where he set his Bible. In the gathering darkness, he couldn't read his Bible, but he could cry out to God. Though he can't recall the exact words he used as he prayed that night, Graham does say he told God honestly that the Bible was filled with many things he couldn't comprehend or explain. But he told God, "I am going to accept this as Thy Word--by faith! I'm going to allow faith to go beyond my intellectual questions and doubts, and I will believe this to be Your inspired Word."
As Graham explains in his autobiography, not all his questions were answered, but "a major bridge had been crossed." He knew that a great spiritual battle in his heart and mind had been fought and won. It is the same battle you and I need to fight, and, by the power of God's Spirit, can win, when we place ourselves under the authority of God's Word.
This past week, I had an appointment with the cardiologist who performed my heart stent procedure five months ago. He checked me over and asked lots of questions. "I feel optimistic about your recovery," he told me. Then, he fell into a long silence as he clicked through and considered my case history on his laptop computer. I wondered what he was thinking. Finally, he broke his silence: "I still don't know why you had a heart attack."
Folks, everyone in this sanctuary knows that, as happened to me five months ago, inexplicable things happen in life. And they can happen in a hurry. You have to be ready for anything!
But above all, you have to be ready for the advent of Jesus, for the moment when you come into His presence. If you will turn to God in repentance and faith in Jesus and if you will stand under the authority of God's Word, you will be ready for Christ's return. You will be ready for anything!
(1) The appointed lessons for this First Sunday in Advent are: Isaiah 2:1-5, Romans 13:11-14, and Matthew 24:36-44. The psalm is Psalm 122.
(2) The Formula of Concord, a basic confessional statement promulgated by Lutherans in 1577, expresses a Lutheran understanding of the Bible and its authority:
We believe, teach, and confess that the prophetic and apostolic writings of the Old and New Testaments are the only rule and norm according to which all doctrines and teachers alike must be appraised and judged, as it is written in Psalm 119:105, "Thy word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path." And Saint Paul says in Galatians 1:8: "Even if an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to that which we preached to you, let him be accursed."(3) Martin Luther writes this in The Large Catechism, another of the core confessional documents which every Lutheran congregation and pastor claims as true confessions of faith:
Other writings of ancient and modern teachers, whatever their names, should not be put on a par with Holy Scripture. Every single one of them should be subordinated to the Scriptures and should be received in no other way and no further than as witnesses to the fashion in which the doctrine of the prophets and apostles was preserved in post-apostolic times...
...the Holy Scripture remains as the only judge, rule, and norm according to which as the only touchstone of all doctrines should and must be understood and judged as good or evil, right or wrong...
The Word of God is the true holy thing above all holy things. Indeed, it is the only one we Christians acknowledge and have. Though we had the bones of all the saints or all the holy and consecrated vestments together in one heap, they could not help us in the slightest degree, for they are all dead things that can sanctify no one. But God's Word is the treasure that sanctifies all things. By it all the saints themselves have been sanctified. At whatever time God's Word is taught, preached, heard, read, or pondered, there the person, the day, and the work are sanctified by it...Accordingly, I constantly repeat that all our life and work must be guided by God's Word if they are to be God-pleasing or holy...
Conversely, any conduct or work done apart from God's Word is unholy in the sight of God, no matter how splendid and brilliant it may appear...
Deftones - Diamond Eyes [2010]
- Diamond Eyes
- Royal
- CMNDCTRL
- You’ve Seen The Butcher
- Beauty School
- Prince
- Rocket Skates
- Sextape
- Risk
- 976-EVIL
- This Place Is Death
- Rocket Skates (M83 Remix)
Sunday Outfit
Hello my dears, oh they come fast these Mondays, don't they? Anyway I try to embrace it as much as possible. We had a great weekend, with some Zara shopping! Every time I go to Zara I realise how much I love it. We also went to Whole Foods, aaah blissful, everything one might want and probably a bit more. We had some friends over for diner on Sunday and N made the most fab beef fillet. I hope our friends enjoyed their evening. I also had fun putting the table together and making desert. Multicolored and fun was my theme (not really, I just put everything I had together but having a theme sounds better).
and of course there is Sunday outfit, thanks for your lovely feedback last week, so happy you enjoy these cause I really love doing them :) and I especially love this one with the sequins making me happy happy. I bought some stuff fro J.Crew and the fab Alaina send them over, thank you so so so much, love you!!
Necklace: Whistles
Boots: Steve Madden
Belt: Asos
and of course there is Sunday outfit, thanks for your lovely feedback last week, so happy you enjoy these cause I really love doing them :) and I especially love this one with the sequins making me happy happy. I bought some stuff fro J.Crew and the fab Alaina send them over, thank you so so so much, love you!!
Skirt: J.Crew
Tee: OyshoNecklace: Whistles
Boots: Steve Madden
Belt: Asos
Have a great week! xo
White dresses
Amidst the Kate Middleton bridal craze, I spent some time looking at bridal gowns, how does one decide what bridal salon to visit when the moment comes? What will Kate Middleton pick? More on that later this week, promise.
Would you go somewhere where you can get many designer wedding dresses or just one brand? I came across this lace beauty in the middle and it kind of rocked my wold. If I was to marry tomorrow, I would definitely struggle!
Here are some of my faves right now.
Would you go somewhere where you can get many designer wedding dresses or just one brand? I came across this lace beauty in the middle and it kind of rocked my wold. If I was to marry tomorrow, I would definitely struggle!
Here are some of my faves right now.
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Danzig - How The Gods Kill (R Version)
Year : 1992
Genre : Heavy Metal with Doom/Rock Influences
Uploaded by Wintersun
Danzig - It's Coming Down (Totally Uncensored Version Directed by Jonathan Reiss)
Year : 1993
Genre : Heavy Metal with Doom/Rock Influences
Uploaded by Wintersun
Danzig - I'm The One
Year : 1990
Genre : Heavy Metal with Doom/Rock Influences
Uploaded by Wintersun
Danzig - I Don’t Mind The Pain (Band Performance)
Year : 1994
Genre : Heavy Metal with Doom/Rock Influences
Uploaded by Wintersun
Danzig - Her Black Wings
Year : 1990
Genre : Heavy Metal with Doom/Rock Influences
Uploaded by Wintersun
Danzig - Five Finger Crawl
Year : 1999
Genre : Heavy Metal with Doom/Rock Influences
Uploaded by Wintersun
Danzig - Dirty Black Summer
Year : 1992
Genre : Heavy Metal with Doom/Rock Influences
Uploaded by Wintersun
Danzig - Devil's Plaything
Year : 1990
Genre : Heavy Metal with Doom/Rock Influences
Uploaded by Wintersun
Danzig - Can't Speak
Year : 1995
Genre : Heavy Metal with Doom/Rock Influences
Uploaded by Wintersun
Danzig - Bodies (Camera1 Unreleased)
Year : 1992
Genre : Heavy Metal with Doom/Rock Influences
Uploaded by Wintersun
Danzig - Am I Demon
Year : 1988
Genre : Heavy Metal with Doom/Rock Influences
Uploaded by Wintersun
Friday, November 26, 2010
Who Causes You the Most Trouble?
In his book, Developing the Leader Within You, John Maxwell tells the following story:
A reporter once asked the great evangelist D.L. Moody which people gave him the most trouble. He answered immediately, "I've had more trouble with D.L. Moody than any man alive."
Crossing Border 2010!AustinSurreal Show with Nive Nielsen in Session!
Man it went down once again! Forgive me for the late blog post but I was at the Crossing Border Festival in The Hague, Netherlands and Antwerpen, Belgium, till this past Monday and then had to hit the ground running upon return. Between work deadlines and Thanksgiving and such, there was no blog time. But man, Crossing Border really is one of my favorite festivals. They combine music, literature and art into one big cultural mish mash of brilliance in one place at one time and it's unlike any event I have ever experienced.
Michael Madsen was interviewed on stage and read passages from his books in both The Hague and Antwerpen. And was basically around the event the entire time. He's a real kick ass dude and I had no idea he was such a writer until meeting him at Crossing Border. Seen here with Michel Behre, the heir to the Crossing Border Throne. And a kick ass dude himself.
Michel seen here with his father Louis, the man who founded the Crossing Border Festival, seen here in the library of the City Hall building, strategizing. This is my people right here. Brilliant dudes.
The schedule was crazy! Manic even!
Wednesday night, as you may have seen a couple posts ago, they presented the 3 local bands who will travel to Austin for SXSW 2011 from The Hague.
Pop Up Animal Kids
Pitch Blond
And The Deaf
Then Thursday night was a special performance by Rufus Wainwright, who did an amazing piece for his mother who had recently passed. And on Friday and Saturday it was four buildings and multiple stages of music and readings.
My favorite stage was in this tent, where this girl and her cohorts served beer and Gluhwein (this warm wine that was lekker),and most of the more up and coming indie bands played. More on that later.
But every room was incredible. The Royal Theater played host to multiple stages, including this one where I saw Nive Nielsen and Deer Children perform for the first time.
Nive is an incredible singer songwriter from Nuuk, Greenland, who will blow yo' mind. More on this later as well.
Her set was a great way to start the night.
Ed Harcourt performed solo in a church just up the street from the other venues. The ambiance and acoustics were magical.
Got to see Low in the same room I saw Nive in, they're one of my favorite bands of all time. I don't think I've seen them since I saw them at the Axiom back in the day.
Scroobius Pip blew the roof off the mother sucker. I wish I had a recording of the last poem he did, in which he took the perspective of God... wonder if it's available. I have no idea.
There was so much going on and I was running in and out of shows every 3-4 songs. I think this is Bruce Behrman.
And I believe this is John Grant.
I know for sure this is BP Fallon...
And Band.
And this is the Smoke Faires, whose intricate guitar work had me trippin'. I have got to get their record.
They also played in the church, which was pretty perfect.
My good friends Robyn and Pete met me on Saturday to kick it. Always a pleasure to see them. Pete plays keys with the Blind Boys of Alabama, and he was also the man on the keys on that Gym Class Heroes song that freaks that Supertramp song. Among other things. And Robyn is the co-host of the show The Busted Halo on Sirius Radio.
There was a full moon over the old city.
Kern Koppen was the festivals sole hip-hop act, and they rocked the house in front of a full Cuatro.
Dudes jammed, it really went down.
So all that went on into the night in The Hague, and the next morning we took a bus out to Antwerpen, Belgium where I linked with Nive Nielsen and her boyfriend and bandmate Jan de Vrode to record an interview and a bit of a live session for the AustinSurreal Show.
Live in my hotel room.
After a bit of tuning,
She kicked out the jams and killed it. You can hear, download or stream the show here. Nive's live set starts at the top of the second hour.
Peep the view out the window, that's how I'm livin' when I'm in Antwerpen!
Wim was in the house!
That evening I hit the shows up in Antwerpen at yet another beautiful theater building. Michael Madsen was in the house once again, seen here with Michel and Louis Behre. Rumor is that Madsen broke 3 ribs at the end of the night. Possibly drunk?
Anyway, I always love coming to this festival because while taking in some great music, you are fully surrounded by great art, and culture, and literature.
And that's a really nice change of pace.
Here's a shot of part of the crew that makes it all happen, after a very successful weekend.
Though before Michael Madsen fell and broke his ribs I suppose.
Anyway the party went on well into the night, but I had an early flight from Brussels to catch, so I rolled with my good friend (and Houston rap afficianado)...
LEAN SIPPA! Down to his place just a few kilometers from the Brussels airport, where we finished off the stuff I could not bring home and caught up after not seeing each other for like a year or some shit.
And this is me in an elevator. I hope to never miss a Crossing Border Festival. What a treat. See y'all in Austin soon!
Michael Madsen was interviewed on stage and read passages from his books in both The Hague and Antwerpen. And was basically around the event the entire time. He's a real kick ass dude and I had no idea he was such a writer until meeting him at Crossing Border. Seen here with Michel Behre, the heir to the Crossing Border Throne. And a kick ass dude himself.
Michel seen here with his father Louis, the man who founded the Crossing Border Festival, seen here in the library of the City Hall building, strategizing. This is my people right here. Brilliant dudes.
The schedule was crazy! Manic even!
Wednesday night, as you may have seen a couple posts ago, they presented the 3 local bands who will travel to Austin for SXSW 2011 from The Hague.
Pop Up Animal Kids
Pitch Blond
And The Deaf
Then Thursday night was a special performance by Rufus Wainwright, who did an amazing piece for his mother who had recently passed. And on Friday and Saturday it was four buildings and multiple stages of music and readings.
My favorite stage was in this tent, where this girl and her cohorts served beer and Gluhwein (this warm wine that was lekker),and most of the more up and coming indie bands played. More on that later.
But every room was incredible. The Royal Theater played host to multiple stages, including this one where I saw Nive Nielsen and Deer Children perform for the first time.
Nive is an incredible singer songwriter from Nuuk, Greenland, who will blow yo' mind. More on this later as well.
Her set was a great way to start the night.
Ed Harcourt performed solo in a church just up the street from the other venues. The ambiance and acoustics were magical.
Got to see Low in the same room I saw Nive in, they're one of my favorite bands of all time. I don't think I've seen them since I saw them at the Axiom back in the day.
Scroobius Pip blew the roof off the mother sucker. I wish I had a recording of the last poem he did, in which he took the perspective of God... wonder if it's available. I have no idea.
There was so much going on and I was running in and out of shows every 3-4 songs. I think this is Bruce Behrman.
And I believe this is John Grant.
I know for sure this is BP Fallon...
And Band.
And this is the Smoke Faires, whose intricate guitar work had me trippin'. I have got to get their record.
They also played in the church, which was pretty perfect.
My good friends Robyn and Pete met me on Saturday to kick it. Always a pleasure to see them. Pete plays keys with the Blind Boys of Alabama, and he was also the man on the keys on that Gym Class Heroes song that freaks that Supertramp song. Among other things. And Robyn is the co-host of the show The Busted Halo on Sirius Radio.
There was a full moon over the old city.
Kern Koppen was the festivals sole hip-hop act, and they rocked the house in front of a full Cuatro.
Dudes jammed, it really went down.
So all that went on into the night in The Hague, and the next morning we took a bus out to Antwerpen, Belgium where I linked with Nive Nielsen and her boyfriend and bandmate Jan de Vrode to record an interview and a bit of a live session for the AustinSurreal Show.
Live in my hotel room.
After a bit of tuning,
She kicked out the jams and killed it. You can hear, download or stream the show here. Nive's live set starts at the top of the second hour.
Peep the view out the window, that's how I'm livin' when I'm in Antwerpen!
Wim was in the house!
That evening I hit the shows up in Antwerpen at yet another beautiful theater building. Michael Madsen was in the house once again, seen here with Michel and Louis Behre. Rumor is that Madsen broke 3 ribs at the end of the night. Possibly drunk?
Anyway, I always love coming to this festival because while taking in some great music, you are fully surrounded by great art, and culture, and literature.
And that's a really nice change of pace.
Here's a shot of part of the crew that makes it all happen, after a very successful weekend.
Though before Michael Madsen fell and broke his ribs I suppose.
Anyway the party went on well into the night, but I had an early flight from Brussels to catch, so I rolled with my good friend (and Houston rap afficianado)...
LEAN SIPPA! Down to his place just a few kilometers from the Brussels airport, where we finished off the stuff I could not bring home and caught up after not seeing each other for like a year or some shit.
And this is me in an elevator. I hope to never miss a Crossing Border Festival. What a treat. See y'all in Austin soon!
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