Concert review

  • Article

This is a combination concert preview/review, so it will all fit in one post. But first, a few comments on the incorrect choices:

  • The Stones. The only Stones album I own is Hot Rocks. Some great songs, but they don't click with me musically. I'm a much bigger Who fan. Though I do understand that the Stones put on a great show.
  • ColdPlay. No album of theirs, but I've been considering it. No.
  • BeeGees. Ummm... No... I did have a boss who sang in a BeeGees cover band, but I didn't even see Saturday Night Fever when it came out (though I did see Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band...)
  • U2. I own Joshua Tree, but beyond that, no.
  • Neil Diamond / Jethro Tull.  Neil? Definite no. Jethro? Well, I do have a soft spot for rock flute and I do own Aqualung (great lyrics), but no                                                           
  • Paul McCartney. It may be heresy for somebody from my generation, but I own no Beatles albums. No.
  • Cream. No. Nor "A Taste of Honey", or any other hot beverage accoutrement.
  • Depeche Mode. No.
  • MeatLoaf. No.
  • Alice Cooper. No
  • REO Speedwagon. Not only is High Infidelity one of the quintessential albums of my high school years (Three others: The Cars (The Cars), Escape (Journey), and Permanent Waves (I shouldn't have to tell you who did this one)(the first album I ever bought)), but it still something I listen to 25 (ouch) years later. But I don't really have any desire to pay lots of money to see old people play music they wrote that long ago. Same reason that I haven't been to see STYX when they've been in town. Maybe if I liked to gamble I'd pop in for a bit of "Lorelei" before hitting the slots.
  • Uncle Bonsai. Hmm. A concert on November 19th in Kirkland. That would be worth going to.
  • Air Supply Reunion Tour. What? Air Supply is back together? Why didn't anybody tell me. And the concert is... Last Saturday night. Darn...
    In the spirit of full disclosure, I owned "Lost In Love" back when I was in high school. Chicks dug it.

The winner is my friend Nick, who picked Green Day. I may be old, but I'm not dead yet, and Billie Joe is only 8 years younger than I am. Oh, and the opening act is Jimmy Eat World, and they're sooo cute, and they do that song, "The Middle", right, that's soooo cool. Our 11-year-old daughter isn't happy that she doesn't get to go with us, but at 11, she's a few years too young for a Green Day concert yet.

I went and looked at the Tacoma Dome information site today to see when the doors open, and it said:

"Parent's room will be available in the Exhibition Hall starting at 6:30pm."

Unfortunately, my parent's won't be able to make it, as they're both in their 70's, but I appreciate the gesture.

Oh, and for trivia buffs, the last concert we went to was Rush on the Roll The Bones tour.

So, enough of the preview. On to the concert....

Well, it's the morning after. I'm not going to write a detailed review, both because I'm lazy and because it will either bore people or annoy them (strangely, *not* doing that goes against two pillars of my blog writing creed - "To Inform, Bore, and Annoy").

So, here are a few random thoughts:

  • Merch sales are long, and very inefficient. If people can buy something in 5 minutes rather than 25 minutes, they buy more stuff. (No programs, so Nick gets a packet of stickers...)
  • The Tacoma Dome is a great venue.
  • 10 year-olds are two young to go to a Green Day concert. As are 9, 8, 7, 6, and 5 year-olds, but we saw all of them there last night. You *have* heard their music, right? Read some of the lyrics? Did you get confused on which tickets you were buying?
  • If your husband/boyfriend/date just lost his dinner, two hours of very loud rock music is not the preferred therapy. He's not "okay". Just let the nice firemen come and take him to somewhere to lie down, and get out of the way so the event staff can clean up.
  • Longview is named after Longview.
  • Mirrored balls are throwback of the disco era of the 1970s. But take a big one, put some smoke in the air, and shine about twenty thousand watts of high-intensity light on it, and you get an effect worthy of Blade Runner.
  • Earplugs don't appreciably reduce my enjoyment of the concert (though I do wish I'd thought to get some like this ahead of time), and it's nice not to have your ears ringing after the concert (though I did take my plugs out for the encore...).

Jimmy Eat World played for about 45 minutes. Green Day played for two hours without any real break (though I guess you can rest a bit while you're lying on the stage, even if you do have to keep singing harmony...) Production values were professional, stage show was great. In other words, it, well, "rocked", which I guess is what you want in a show. Definitely recommended.