SHARING THE SHOWS
I love hitting shows on Fridays; capping off the work week always makes me feel like I’ve really fought for my right to party. Maggie and I met at my place and took the arduous two-minute walk to get in, where we immediately saw Dean, who accompanied us on our journey to the front, right near the stage. Dave greeted me by doing that thing where you poke someone on one shoulder and then appear on the other side (I did that to him at Marcus King, so what goes around, comes around I suppose). He was filled with one-liners that night. “Special Guest is playing tonight” (an allusion to Gary’s, Drew’s, and my hilarious joke from Marcus King) and “Are we under surveillance?” (a response to my note-taking for this blog). Dean had some knowledge about Roosterfoot. Apparently, the singer, Seth Stainback, has a day job as a welder, and he writes his lyrics on his bolthead (side note: should I have chosen a trade?) Anyway, the opening band was called Roebuck (heirs to the Sears-Roebuck fortune, perhaps?). It consisted of a guitar player (Phillip) and a stand-up bass player (his wife, Phoenix) and they were very talented. One had a riff that seemed inspired by Phish’s “Guelah Papyrus.” They also played “Bring Sally Up” (why does it sound like “Green Sally Hut” to me? Thank God for Google). Between Roebuck’s and Roosterfoot’s sets, I discussed summer plans, which include a trip to see Widespread Panic at Red Rocks in Colorado (a long-held bucket list item). Dave recommend Mt. Evans and Black Canyon. Check. Somehow, live Black Crowes came up, and I remembered my first concert, which was the Black Crowes at SUNY Plattsburgh’s Field House on October 22, 1996, and attended with Jeffrey Butz. It rocked pretty hard; it was a slow go, but it led me down the dark path of “notenoughconcertdom.” Roosterfoot rocked pretty hard for the first set, and every note had my permagrin going. Then, they switched to country, which made me think of that scene in The Blues Brothers where the band passes themselves off as a country band called The Good Ole Boys at Bob’s Country Bunker (“we got both kinds, country AND western). I wasn’t angry enough to throw beer bottles at the band like those disenfranchised fans at the Bunker, but I was a little disappointed. Maggie was so dismayed she left. I did smile for a couple of the songs, but I was psyched when they went back to the blues. I did get over this disappointment pretty quickly when I was accosted by a drunk lady, saying “I have two teenagers! Having kids changes you like nothing else! And I have it easy, my friend here has five!” Now, I understand parenting is hard, and these stressed Moms needed a night off (I sympathized with and rooted for the heroines in “Bad Moms” for that reason, and I know I stressed my own Mom out many a time). And the fact that that woman said that without any provocation or suggestion from me is probably due to the fact that she hasn’t been drunk since her children reached puberty. And I’m proudly Childfree (CF) by Choice, yet I felt the need to indulge her. “Yeah, I feel you,” I said. “I have a son at home.” My son is a cat named Chester, so I wasn’t lying. I later gave her a sticker I got for free with the purchase of two Roosterfoot CDs saying, “You deserve this. One parent to other!” And all the wild, I was laughing with Maggie, a fellow CF by Choice, and in my head, I was doing that thing where I was laughing for 10 minutes in a row. Drunk people are so fun to mess with, and my Childfree & Single and Community of Single People group would be happy that what we would perceive as a self-righteous parent got “punk’d.” Hahahhahahahah… I had tuna and a protein bar for some late-night munchies when I got home, and I promptly crashed out. A Friday night well-spent.
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It had been three weeks since my last show (I’m getting old, what can I say?). After recuperating from a lipoma surgery, I was ready to go back in action, with the exception of this cold I’d been battling, but I’d already paid for my ticket, so I wasn’t missing Marcus King habnabit!
Just as good as the show itself IMO is the “pregame,” by which I mean the preshow meal and socializing that comes before the show. Drew and Maggie met at my place, which is a grueling two-minute walk from the Boathouse. I was in the mood for some fancy sushi rolls, so I proposed Hayashi, the Japanese/Habachi restaurant next door to the venue, which is a popular choice among my tribe. Gary met us there, and the conversation flowed. I’ve been pondering giving stand-up a try, and I thought of a skit inspired by the dinner conversation around the idea of “Special Guest.” I had gotten my ticket in December, before the band decided on an opener, so the ticket read “Special Guest.” We joked about how we had seen “Special Guest” before, and how there had been singing and instruments, and there was a crowd at that show. For an even better joke on the idea of the “Special Guest,” check out Fear of a Black Hat. Sadly, I couldn’t find the actual clip. At any rate, we finished dinner and got to the venue a little after 9, where Special Guest, aka Bennett Wales & The Relief. They were pretty awesome. So awesome that I yelled, “Special Guest!” a couple of times and got no reaction. It would have been funnier if Gary, Mark, and Maggie had all been right by me, but we ended up splitting off in the crowd, which was the largest I had ever seen in The Boathouse, host to internationally reknowned bands such as Skydog, Last Fair Deal, and Touch of the Nile; despite those bands’ notoriety, they only bring in small crowds, so the Boathouse wasn’t quite used to such volume. When Maggie and I found each other and we attempted to move toward the front, Chelsea, fellow show vet, passed by us as she moved in the opposite direction and said, “It’s not worth it.” Packed like sardines indeed. We found a happy medium in the center, a little bit back from the stage. Maggie and I had stayed in the front for Special Guest, but I hadn’t procured earplugs and my ears were a little sensitive from being so close to the speakers, so I had to move back. During the night, I ran into Dave, Dean, John, and Wes, all at separate points. I was told by Facebook and others that Mark, Sheila, and Ashley had been in attendance, but they must have been wearing their invisibility cloaks when I passed by them, so alas, no sightings L 12:30 marked the end of the show, and my last memory was passing out on the couch while my son/cat Chester laid on his favorite pillow, my stomach. |
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April 2024
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