Halloween 2010 in the TC

In years past, Flavio and I have celebrated a number of memorable Halloweens together.  On our first Halloween, in the Fall of 2003, Flav and I went to the annual West Village Halloween Parade where our view was obstructed for most of the evening by a paper mache Howard Dean.  We had another politically themed Halloween in 2008 when I dressed up as Sarah Palin, hands down my best Halloween costume of all time.  And most memorable of all, Halloween 2009 when our beloved Lucy won 2nd place at the Paulus Hook Pet Costume Contest with her adorable Princess Leia costume that was thrown together in about 10 minutes.  So after so many memorable Halloweens past in NYC, I wanted to make sure that our first Halloween in Minneapolis would be one to remember.

So, oddly enough, I figured out where we would be on "Halloween Eve"when I passed Brit's Pub on my way to the YWCA for my daily workout.  By way of background, one of the biggest guilty pleasures in my life is that I love 90's Brit Pop - Blur, The Verve, Elastica, early Radiohead, you name it, I'm probably into it.  But as much as I love the aforementioned bands, my favorite Brit Pop band of all time, hands down, is Oasis.  So, when I passed Brit's Pub and saw that their Anniversary/Halloween Celebration would be featuring an Oasis tribute band, I knew our plans were set.

Yeesss!!!

On Saturday night, Flav and I headed on over to our favorite local watering hole, Brit's Pub for a night of poor man's cheesy Brit Pop.  We had a pint or two of Newcastle, enjoyed some zany people watching (it was Halloween after all) and waited for the show to begin. 

Then, at 9:30, a band we presumed to be the Oasis tribute band took the stage and began to play.  But, the strange thing was that while the music was vaguely familiar, it was most certainly not Oasis.  Soon enough, we learned that the band on stage was actually E.L.nO., a tribute to the Electric Light Orchestra (aka E.L.O.).

You are not poor man's Oasis!!!
You are impostors!!!!

Now, I'm sure I'm not the only one who thought it was odd for a band to devote itself exclusively to the catalogue of E.L.O.  Granted, I wasn't alive during E.L.O.'s hey day, but I don't think I've ever actually met an E.L.O. fan.  Turns out, E.L.O. was very popular in the 70's and even had 27 Top 40 Singles in the US.  Needless to say, during E.L.nO.'s set I recognized many songs from the soundtracks of indie movies set in the 70's (e.g. "Livin Thing" from Boogie Nights, "Strange Magic" from the Virgin Suicides).  Who knew E.L.O. sang so much stuff I vaguely know and kinda like.  The downside is that one of the songs I recognized, "Do Ya", has been stuck in my head for the past 5 days. (do ya, do ya want my love?? do ya, do ya want my face??) 

Thankfully, after the end of E.L.nO.'s set, we moved on to the main event - Solid Gold performing as Oasis.

Poor Man's Oasis!! What, What!!

I will say, the band was not bad.  Granted, I think someone needed to tell the lead singer that he was not, in fact, Liam Gallagher.  And, we could have done without the random guy in our line of view dressed as Cookie Monster who felt the need to adjust his Cookie head for 20 min during Solid Gold's set.  But all in all, it was very enjoyable, mostly because the band only played covers of songs by my favorite band.

Compared to Saturday's Halloween Eve, Brit Pop adventures, Sunday was pretty low key, complete with pet trick or treating in our building.  Since we don't have a child to dress up, we once again humiliated our dog by making her wear a costume in honor of the holiday.  This year, she dressed up as her favorite Argentine soccer star, Lionel Messi.



Unfortunately, turn out was limited to a few of Lucy's friends: Bear (Snuggle Bear Stunt Double), Freud (Bassett Hound) and Snoopy (Terrier).  However, Lucy didn't seem to care about such things because...well...she's a dog.  Enjoy the group picture below.




Hope you all had a fun, candy filled, Halloween!!!