Ken Andrews at the Belly Up

I think everyone knows that the Belly Up in Solana Beach is one of my favorite venues. I also think everyone knows that Ken Andrews is one of my favorite artists. The combination of both were outstanding as Ken Andrews performed for a FM 94.9 sponsored "About The Music series". I missed most of Buckfast Superbee who happen to be a local San Diego band that plays quite a bit in the area. It sounded like a power pop punk band when I was at the bar.




First Wave Hello came up next and delievered a fine set. I have been listening to their album "The Lord & It's Penguin" in between a lot of Ken Andrews and the Failure Essentials double disc CD. As I described before, they play an excellent blend of space rock that is reminiscent of Failure, Hum, and the angular guitar work of Burning Airlines. I particularly like the duel keyboard players that would add ambient effects and synth basslines to the dueling guitar work. Some tracks I would recommend are "Everything Automatic", "Falling Apart" and "Lay Down".








One of the cool things on Ken Andrews website is that it lists his recording policy. He allows the audiotaping of his shows. I decided to invest in a Zoom H4 digital recorder. This show was tape worthy as I captured 94% of the show on a 2gb SD card in 96kHz. Ken was a man of his word as he had the Mu-Tron Octave Divider pedal on stage coupled with his Boss GT-3 multi effect pedal. The show started with a blistering version of "Undone". The first surprise of the night was when Ken mentioned that he forced the members of First Wave Hello(the backing band) to learn "Something" off of the first Failure album. The second surprise was when Ken debuted "Revolution" off of his On album "Make Believe". The setlist was a veritable career greatest hits as Ken covered a lot of albums. The band and Ken sounded great which was verified upon multiple playbacks of my recordings. I strongly recommend you pick up "Secrets of the Lost Satellite". I have problems picking a favorite song because every song sounds great. I also strongly recommend you email amchemistcontest(at)gmail.com for your chance to win a Ken Andrews autographed lithograph. One grand prize winner will receive a special "Secret" bonus prize. Don't delay, enter today!

Ken Andrews setlist for the Belly Up (5/17/2007)
"Undone"
"Secret Things"
"Up or Down"
"Write Your Story"
"C'mon Collapse"
"Soluble Words"
"Magnified"
"Something"
"Sergeant Politeness"
"Absent Stars"
"Revoultion"
"In Your Way"
"Stuck On You"
"The Nurse Who Loved Me"