meet me at the corner of third and fairfax.: 10/01/2010

it was literally a dark and stormy night. lightning was in the distance, and rain pouring sobering buckets on a drunken euphoria of the thought of belle + sebastian playing at hollywood forever cemetery, after a screening of "trainspotting." really? did i want to be doing this?

however, an $8 tarp from target, a long underused anorak (hello my boyish days!), and the luck o' the scottish (snort) got us to the graveyard in the nick of time, parking right in front, and prime seating for both the screening and the band.

miraculously, it was clear and mostly dry in the cemetery itself. the rains kept away the crowds and we got prime seating--better than an cinespia outing--and bundled up with a blanket and because--"picnicking is encouraged during the screening"--some provisions. now the thought of dinner during "trainspotting" seemed sort of unlikely to me, unless it included smack and lucozade, but we made due with a bottle of wine and a lot of chocolate and cheese. with the brisk winds and the wet chill in the air it was almost perfect scottish weather, in an almost perfect scottish surrounding, albeit with big palm trees and police helicopters buzzing overhead. seriously, though, if you ever get the chance, choose life, choose a career, choose a family, choose a big fucking television, choose to see "trainspotting" should it ever be screened in a celebrity cemetery because it is the perfect non-squalid surrounding for that film. i've probably seen it a hundred times, but not in almost a decade, and the film held up better than i would have ever expected.

and then to belle & sebastian. i thought that the show at the hollywood bowl was phenomenal, but this was something else in another league of awesome. intimate and engaging, casual, relaxed yet energizing, and with probably the best sound and sight lines of any concert i have attended. i know i've said it before but this was magic, pure magic. belle & sebastian bring it every time. magicians, musicians, morticians, storytellers, storm quellers, graveyard dwellers....