Diggz at the Nexus of the Universe

I like to say it was Micky’s Christmas present, but I had such a great time visiting New York that it sure felt like a present for both of us.   It was quite a whirlwind trip.  Left Orlando at 6am on New Year’s Eve morning and took Jetblue up to JFK.  Airtrain to the Metro A line to the F line and got off near the Nexus of the Universe at 1st Ave and 1st Street.

Walked a few blocks to meet up with Mojo.  Snowing the whole time…real blizzard-like conditions.  She took us to get some chocolate bobka and we did some shopping and touring of the Lower East Village, SOHO and Chinatown.  Napped for a couple hours before we headed over to Brooklyn and Amanda Palmer’s New Year’s Eve Party, where we met lots of cool people, including the cats from the Danger Ensemble.

Amanda played some songs on her Ukulele, including an awesome cover of “In Between Days” by the Cure.

At midnight we all wrote down something we were relinquishing for the new year on a piece of paper and threw them into a bucket and burned them. I played some songs on a very cool old piano. Then we trekked it back to Manhattan to the Bowery to see Amanda’s show.  I have more pics and video…just need to go through them still.

And thanks to Tora Hylands, I will forever pronounce metro card,  “Meetro Kayed”.     I did muster up the courage to introduce myself to her.  *blush*

Props to the Walrus

Woke up late New Year’s Day and we headed to Strawberry Fields to pour one out for my homie.  Did a little pause at Time’s Square to look at the pretty lights.  Dinner with Mojo and Itzik and then home again on Friday morning.   It was mini-vacation crammed into about 36 hours and I loved every bit of it!

Happy New Year…2009 starting off on the right foot!

The Lovely Tora Hylands of the Danger Ensemble

Some more video I shot at the Amanda Palmer show in Atlanta in November 2008. The low-end frequencies of her keyboard just overpowered the tiny built-in microphone in my Cannon SD-440 camera, so the audio is kinda splattery.

But, you get a pretty good idea of how the Danger Ensemble really brings the audience into the show. I believe this performer’s name is Mark Hill and, as you can see, he came off the stage and hung out next to me for quite a lot of the song….never leaving character once. It was kinda creepy yet very surreal and really brought you into the performance. I’m looking forward to (hopefully) meeting them on Wednesday in New York at AFP’s New Year’s Eve party. And you never know…around midnight…I might just be standing near Tora

I shot this in Atlanta last month at the Amanda Palmer Show. This was during her encore…it was a fantastic show. We’re flying up to New York for New Years Eve to party like rock stars with Amanda Palmer and the Danger Ensemble.