kickin' it in the chill out tent

Even if Mother Nature hasn't gotten the memo yet, warm weather is not terribly far away. And what does warm weather mean?

Concerts! Alternatively known as "an open drain on my financial resources that is oh! so very worth it."

So far this spring I've seen Scissor Sisters, Kaiser Chiefs with the Walkmen and Of Montreal. I have tickets for Peter Bjorn and John, Bloc Party (with good enough seats that I almost don't mind it's at DAR, where rock goes to waft into the rafters and die), A Prairie Home Companion, stage seats for Spring Awakening in New York (which I would argue is a rock concert with more sex and Germanic schoolboy costumes). There are rumblings of a Decemberists showing with the Baltimore Philharmonic, which I will be first in line for. I missed out on Arcade Fire tickets and am a little bummed about it, but 1) it's at DAR, and I believe my feelings on that venue have been established and 2) I saw them when I was backpacking through Amsterdam in winter 2005, the kind of experience that cannot really be topped or replicated even with the best contributing efforts of the pharmaceutical industry. Although Neon Bible is a really excellent album. But alas.

There are also lots of outings from local bands, starting with the Six Points Music Festival, whose press preview I'll be attending tonight. My favorite DC band The Roosevelt will be playing at DC9 on Saturday April 20th with Two If By Sea and Alfonso Velez of the departed Monopoli. Full disclosure: a member of The Roosevelt is a good friend and in fact once helped me move AND get a job, which means I owe him a life debt. But I actually really, really enjoy their music. As do the Going Out Gurus. I'll also be checking out my friends in The Known Unknowns at DC9 on April 16th, because they've been endorsed by Donald Rumsfeld. Seriously.

So it's time to decide what else to see, and I'm having a tough time. Ben Folds is coming to Verizon Center, which is awesome, but he's coming in support of John Mayer which is not awesome. I just don't know if I can make myself pay good money to see John Mayer in concert. I hated his last two albums, I hate how he's turning into a Jack White lookalike who still plays Jason Mraz music, and whatever good will he won with both his admittedly amusing blog and his request for a Dundie award went out the window once he hooked up with Jessica Simpson. Plus, I already paid money to see John Mayer when I was nineteen and I kind of have this personal policy of not doing things I did when I was nineteen. Trust me, everyone is better off that way.

It's always frustrating when a band you like is opening for a band you either don't want to see, or worse, actively detest. I'm in a similar situation with the Fray/OK Go/Mae concert at Merriweather this summer. I really, really love Mae's album The Everglow and find that OK Go video really charming even though I've seen it more times than my mom has seen Terms of Endearment (I'm not going to link to the video. Really. You know it. Don't be lazy). But I'm so very sick of The Fray and their constant whining about How To Save A Life gunking up my morning radio, endless commercials and I swear, every single goddamn episode of Scrubs. We get, you're doctors. Who like gentle indie pop. And save lives. Connection established.

Jenny and I have discussed going to Bonnaroo, where the lineup looks fantastic and from which we'd be lucky to escape with only epic hangovers and a merciless case of BO. Four days of concerts? Camping? With my little sister? And fifty thousand rednecks and hippies? In an open field in Tennessee in July? That wouldn't be a music festival, it'd be Survivor: Pretentious Indie Snobs.

However, the lineup for Lollapalooza came out today-- and minus Ben Folds and Bloc Party, it's pretty much every band I want to see or have already seen and loved enough to see again. Plus it's in Chicago, where Jenny lives and more importantly, where I can stay for free. Now, to try to get off a day in August.

What concerts are you seeing this summer? Any recommendations?