A few
years ago we saw a little known (to Americans) Swedish band, the Shout Out
Louds, at the 9:30 Club. It was a Sunday night concert and the band didn’t go
on until past midnight. It was probably a poor decision since I had
Constitutional Law on Monday mornings that semester, but that was a time filled
with poor decisions, such as going to Aruba for a wedding three days before
final exams. My grades were not stellar that semester, but that concert was
amazing and until Sunday night, my favorite show ever.
We saw the
Shout Out Louds on a Sunday at the 9:30 Club again. This time, however, the
crowd was about six times as large and the show was several hours earlier. And
instead of our usual vantage point on the second floor of the club, we stood
three rows from the front of the stage. All the better for the band to see the
wonderful sign we made (well, the sign Eric asked me to make).
I’m not
sure who brought it up first, but when we listen to the Shout Out Louds song,
Impossible, we always hear your love is in pasta bowls instead of the actual lyrics (your
love is impossible). On
Sunday afternoon, Eric concocted a story about two young lovers and their pasta
bowls: A young
Swedish woman and a young American man from the Midwest end up as housemates
during a period of study abroad in Tuscany. They both love to cook and start
going to markets together where they find amazing ingredients. One afternoon
they stumble upon these beautiful pasta bowls in an antique shop and buy them
for their little house. They fall in love (obviously) but eventually have to go
back to their home countries. It is winter and they no longer have access to
the best Tuscan food and they miss each other. They are sad. Of course, the song In Pasta Bowls, is about them and features the
line: olives are something I cannot remember. “Can you imagine forgetting the
way something tastes?” I thought Eric was going to cry while telling the story.
(He cries every time we watch Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution so it wasn’t a stretch to think
that he would cry over this made up story.) When he asked me to make a
poster based on his story that we could bring to the concert I couldn’t say no.
Eric held
up his poster when the band played Impossible during the encore. A couple guys
in front of us gave him a high five; I think that counts as success. The
concert was amazing and definitely my all-time favorite show. You can listen to it on NPR. (Freelance Whales, the opening band, blew me away. More on them later this week)
Have you
ever made a poster to bring to a concert?
