erika and i blew off work early on a tuesday night in july and headed across the border to catch a rock show in jersey. i am retarded and couldn't find any info on the concert as far as what time the show started and if there were any opening acts. this resulted in a shortened pregame in the parking complex and us stumbling into the arena just in time for the first of 2 opening bands. who saw that coming?
year long disaster was pretty okay, it took me a few minutes to get in the mindset of a "rock show". for some reason this one just struck me in a different way than the rock shows i typically find myself at. this was straight up easy-to-digest mainstream arena rock n' roll. it was kinda cool. after a month i can't recall many details about year long disaster, but i have in my notes: great white / soundgarden / southern rock. also, i really wished their drummer would have worn a shirt.
we were good little consumers and bought some beer, water, and pretzels. tempting as it was, i decided against a bacardi silver raz malt liquor. it's one of my few regrets from the night.
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supergrass- well, at least i'd heard of them. they were pretty good and put on a good show. my notes say: rush / elvis costello / crowded house / pink floyd / u2. oh, also we decided that supergrass was a cool name for a band ("dude... you know what a cool name for a band would be? ... supergrass.").
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foo fighters. well, it's the foo fighters! the foo fighters are just awesome, aren't they? yes. they are bonafide rockstars now and dave grohl is a bonafide frontman- complete with spastic sprints and rockstar poses- good stuff. the stage design was cool, with 4 giant screens constantly shifting position and flashing images of the band and some album artwork/music video footage. i'm not a huge fan of the music video footage behind a band while they are playing live. i think it reinforces said music video into the live music experience where they should usually be kept separate. specifically- i don't need to see the video for 'the pretender' and animated riot police on the big screens- that song is such a balls out angry protest song- let it stand on it's own for fuck's sake! let's ROCK OUT to the performance! but big fat 'WHUT EVS', right?
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the first half of the set was set up at the opposite end of the arena to rock shit out. then about halfway through, a small circular stage descended from the ceiling and they did a more acoustical chunk of the set before heading back to the opposite end of the arena. for a mainstream arena rock act, they played a long set, which i totally appreciate.
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it was the last show of the tour so dave was a wild man, drunk as fuck, screaming the shit out of his voice, telling some great stories and using the word "fucking" even more than i fucking do, which is fucking saying something. there was a particularly funny story, but i don't remember it, so forget i fucking mentioned anything.
i DO remember that sometime during the foo fighters, i caught a whiff of two distinct smells but both at once, turned to erika and said, "i smell... ketchup... and weed." ? so she looked around, pointed at the guy in front of us eating french fries, "ketchup!" and looked around again, pointed across the aisle from us where a plume of smoke was rising, "weed!" gave myself a nice pat on the back for that one- nose like a hound dog!
as far as people watching goes, this place was top notch. the worst faux-hawk i've ever seen was worn by a 16 year old with a full head of hair but the long mohawk hair much longer and dyed blue- a modern day mullet. a 15 year old sneezed on the back of my arm while i was walking back to the car, it was an unfortunate event. i sped up my pace and doused my arm in baby-wipes to try and rid myself of the disease. oh and there was a 16 year old future stripper wearing a bra and micro mini with a face full of makeup yelling at people for looking at her- ahhhh, jersey.
again, kickass, but over a month ago, so you're not gonna get many more details from me other than i fucking loved the foo fighters live and would definitely see them again. foo fighters, & co., 7/29/08, brendan byrne arena, rutherford, nj: 8.5 HUZZAHS!
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