Nice pants, Robyn Hitchcock

On Friday evening, Gina and Uyen and I had dinner reservations at Largo for a night of Jon Brion goodness. As usual, we got even more than we'd bargained for. Our table was in a good spot - straight back from the stage, but near the bar area ... nice view of the performance, and prime people-watching. Jon played a great first set, with Grant Lee Phillips (dressed like a retired guy vacationing in Florida, if you can picture that) sneaking up on stage to help out a couple of times. One of the most amusing moments came when Jon segued from a toy piano cover of "Norwegian Wood" (part of the "ice cream truck music" portion of the set) into a groovy piano-based version of "Let's Get it On." I also really enjoyed "Ruin My Day" and "Walking Through Walls." I do love it when Jon lays down a drum track. You don't necessarily know what's coming right away, but you know it'll be good. (He also gets major points for having 'Max Headroom' request some Van Halen to close out the set.)

During the second set, Jon rotated even more friends onto the stage. Grant Lee Phillips returned to sing and play a few songs with him, and Robyn Hitchcock was summoned in all his lime-green pants glory to play a few as well. Fiona Apple came up and sang one of her new songs with Jon on guitar, which I enjoyed very much. She is an extremely tiny person. (She is also very into her new boyfriend, whom she joined at the booth next to ours after she was finished.) Sean and Sara Watkins from Nickel Creek rounded out the evening. Mmmmm, Jon Brion shows. I'd include more detail about what was played, but that's Uyen's forte.

In addition to the night at Largo, we had a great time in L.A. Earlier on Friday Gina and I went to Santa Monica. We spent a few hours on the beach, where I reacquainted myself with the waves of the Pacific for about an hour and a half, and then proceeded to get sunburned in some weird stripey pattern on my upper arms while soaking up the sun. Hmmm. We had lunch on the pier. Saturday Uyen showed off her skills as a tour guide, and we saw all the neighborhoods we could have hoped to see. We also had lunch at Roscoe's House of Chicken and Waffles (I was a veteran this time) and hit our second Amoeba Records of the trip. My cashier was a very cute-in-a-rocker-boy-sort-of-way transplant from Chicago, with relatives in Wisconsin. He slipped some free Amoeba swag into my bag. (Which isn't a euphemism.) Nice! Now I'm at home, and should have a few more photos to share soon.