Communal Listening

The members of Ganas, the proprietors of our friendly neighborhood coffee shop, furniture store, and vintage clothing place (no irony intended, they are extremely friendly places to shop), Everything Goes were written up in a New York Magazine article last week: Big Love on Staten Island. They had a few copies of the magazine on the counter and let us borrow one to read.

Actually, I should mention that CvB and I were down at the cafe on Bay St. Saturday night to see Trish and Cristophe, our new favorite local musical duo. In their own words, "we only sing original songs about the North Shore of Staten Island," and if that's not what we're into, then nothing is. On Saturday, their composure was rattled by the inexplicable disappearance of their bass player, and perhaps it taxed their performance, which was a bit tentative at times, with a few difficult moments (for the musicians). My intent isn't to criticize at all though, because their hearts were very much in the right place and I loved them. If you demand more polish, the recordings on their website and myspace profile sound a little fuller and give the songwriting a better chance to speak through the music.

There was a certain sincerity about these two that was irresistible, plus, we really enjoyed the projections of photographs displayed on the screen behind Cristophe. The pictures they had chosen uncannily represented all the places we love to look at around here, and both the images and Christophe's accompanying commentary could have come right off the Forgotten New York website. If these guys don't know each other, I hope they meet soon. Especially funny was Christophe's deadpan delivery of two slides comparing a toad indigenous to Hawaii's North Shore to a particularly toad-like photograph of Borough President Guy Molinari. Throughout the show, Trish payed the straight woman, a constant, pleasant, sweetly-singing backup singer and percussionist to complement Christophe's commentary, singing, and guitar. Some of the lyrics are spot on slices of Staten Island life, but rather than me trying to quote them from memory, I recommend you listen for yourself to the stream on their website.