I caught Mark Eitzel at the Evelyn last night, despite my oncoming cold - fortunately he was on before Machine Translations, who I otherwise would've stayed to see (um. sorry).

I hadn't really counted on him having much of a stage persona, figuring he'd be spending most of his energy on the songs themselves, with those soaring cries and such, but he was really talkative, good-humoured and playful, as well as being bitingly self-deprecating, all at the same time. Unfortunately he didn't make it all the way through Firefly, but that's ok. It was a really bad environment for photos - nothing I could set my white balance off, leaving him looking a little demonic in the red light. I did succumb and use my flash a couple of times. At one point, early on, he said to me "oh, wait, delete that. I'll pose for you." Of course, the shot I took then didn't really work out either. Dammit.

He mentioned he'd be back on the 14th at the Corner Hotel - looking at the gig list, it says he's supported by the "Blackeyed Susans Duo", which I imagine would be Rob Snarski and Dan Luscombe. Double bonus !

[ see all Mark Eitzel pictures. ]