What you've all been waiting for...
Oh, man. The Tampa concert was essentially the best thing ever. Sure, Panic’s Homocircus was amazing and wonderful, but this was a whole day of awesome. We saw 9 and a half bands (I’ll explain) all of which were at least somewhat enjoyable, and no major injuries were incurred. Erin and I managed not to implode from over-fangirling, though it wasn’t easy.
I’m really, really sorry this is over a week late, but sometimes that stupid thing called Life gets in the way, and also the fact that the Photoshop on my laptop no longer wants to work. Sigh. D:
I’m not going to talk about the events of Friday night because I don’t want to make this post friends only (And uh, I can’t really remember most of what happened anyway) so we’ll skip to the part where I’m really glad we got to drive Erin’s car to Tampa instead of Philip’s, because it’s sooooo much nicer. We made great time on I-4, flying along at a good 80 mph or so, (and still getting passed occasionally) and then we got off on the wrong exit on I-275 and lost all the time we’d gained backtracking. Oh well, we made it there in one piece.
I felt a little embarrassed because Erin just about demanded Aunt Sandy cook dinner for us when we arrived, but eh, that’s Erin for you, and the food was worth the shame. That’s definitely one of the perks of staying there, she’s really an amazing cook. The house is gorgeous; there’s a lake in the front and in the back, and a nifty game room on top of the garage complete with pool and ping pong tables. It’s kind of good she lives so far away, or we’d be bugging her all the time.
Erin also not-so-subtly asked for pancakes in the morning, which Sandy made (she really shouldn’t encourage her, it doesn’t help, but…pancakes…and also turkey bacon, which I LOVE. :3) and then we set off for the Ford Amphitheater, managing to find our way there with hardly any trouble. Amusingly enough, there was a gun show going on at the Fairgrounds (which are right next door to the Amphitheater) and Erin and I wondered if any of the band members were hanging out there before the show. Parking for the gun show was $5, but the concert parking was free, which was awesome. Funny how we had to pay for parking at the Hush Sound show and not this one, but that’s downtown Orlando for you.
There were already plenty of people there by the time we got in, and the crowd in front of the merch booth was huge. They had merch for all 12-ish bands there, and probably only 3 people working it, so unfortunately I never got a chance to buy anything, which sucks because there was an absolutely wonderful MyChem hoodie and some really cool Kill Hannah shirts, but I’ll track them all down eventually. (Bizarrely, Red Jumpsuit Apparatus was offering hot pink booty shorts with “Do you feel like a man?” on the back, wtf? XD)
Inevitably, when you tell people you’re going to a concert, they will ask you what band you’re going to see. Erin’s relatives asked her, of course, and her answer would be “Every band under the sun,” which wasn’t far from the truth, but then they’d look at me for an explanation and I’d sigh and rattle off the list, which was:
Say Anything
Kill Hannah
Red Jumpsuit Apparatus
Plain White T’s (on the side stage, we half-watched/listened to their set as we ate lunch)
Ok Go (Got moved to the main stage when Blue October cancelled, score!)
Three Days Grace
Angels and Airwaves
30 Seconds to Mars
Taking Back Sunday
My Chemical Romance
Two local bands (Truly Sunday and Trace of Day, the latter I’d seen back in April when they opened for TAI at Pierfest, lolz) were also playing the side stage, as well as the Shiny Toy Guns, but we had no interest in the locals and the Shiny Toy Guns were on at the same time as Red Jumpsuit, so we didn’t get to see them. Also that guy from Seether was doing an acoustic set, but I don’t think anyone cares about him anymore-not even his band, as it was just him there doing the set. XD (I had, um, seen them with Evanescence once anyway, and it’s funny because their new single “Call Me When You’re Sober” was actually written about him) Officially, this show was called The Next Big Thing 6, sponsored by Tampa’s 97X, the coolest radio station in Florida, sorry, ORock; I give you points for the No Snow Show (and I bet AFI sure was nifty) but you really had nothing on these guys. We’ve got a long way to go before we attain KROQ coolness though, but we’re makin’ some progress.
They were much stricter about letting people on the floor than I thought, we had to get wristbands (which read “entering crowdsurfing and/or mosh pit area” in bold, ominous letters) AND show our tickets every time we wanted back on, it was a little annoying, but it’s good that they kept it from getting too crowded. It seemed a lot smaller than it looked at the Goo Goo Dolls concert, even without the chairs. There weren’t very many people on the floor when we got there, so I was glad we didn’t bother to wake up any earlier.
Here’s me on the floor, waiting (patiently) for the show to start:
Say Anything, however, probably should have woken up a little earlier, because the lead singer was definitely not awake when they took the stage at 11:00. I’ll agree with Edward (Gasp!) and say that their performance was much better than when we saw them with Dashboard over the summer, but I still don’t think they’re going to convert me fully. I’m still amused by the fact that there are inexplicably six members in this band, and I am also amazed at how the tiny little bassist could support himself on the toothpicks he had for legs. Seriously, the bass must weigh more than this kid does, and it was downright funny to look at him next to the lead singer, who, although he’s lost weight, still looks waaay out of place amidst his collection of pretty, skinny emo boys. The prettiest of which was the guitarist/keyboard player on our side of the stage, and Philip and I were thinking that TAI should consider drafting him to replace Tom Conrad, as Say Anything has too many guitarists and TAI is now short one, and he’d fit right in among Beckett and co. for sure. I guess I probably should have used my one Say Anything picture (needed to save room for more important bands) on him instead of the singer, but eh. They played a standard half-hour set, including the song that goes “I called her on the phone and she touched herself,” which I guess I should learn the title of because it seems to come up a lot. (Could it secretly be written about Dashboard’s Chris? Scandal! Gym Class Heroes’ song “The Queen and I” is obviously about Beckett, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise) They ended with their single, “Alive With the Glory of Love,” which admittedly is pretty catchy. All in all, better than I expected.
The lead singer:
And oh, the day was just getting started. Next up was Kill Hannah, who I was still sort of on the fence about, but their live performance won me over. They looked good (Blue eyeshadow on the guitarist? Sign me up!) and sounded even better (strangely, they didn’t play their single “Lips Like Morphine” last, but a lot of other bands didn’t play their singles last either, I dunno what was up with that) and overall were a lot of fun to watch. They covered a Billy Idol song, too, I think they said it was “Rebel Girl,” but unfortunately I don’t really know. [Edit: Edward informs me that it's called "Rebel Yell," so there you have it.] What really made me a fan, however, was the guy I spotted on the side of the stage watching their set, holding a giant Starbucks cup and wearing an adorable purple-and-white striped hoodie and oversized designer sunglasses. If Kill Hannah are good enough for Mikey Way (ohyes, definitely, unmistakably him) they are most certainly good enough for me. We wondered if Mikey’s appearance had anything to do with the fact that the lead singer came onstage wearing a blazer with no shirt under it, almost like he didn’t quite have time to get dressed all the way, hmm… But I digress. Shirt or no shirt, Mat (yep, that’s how he spells it) was plenty entertaining, and obviously has not spent much time in Florida, because he must have dumped two and a half water bottles on himself throughout the set, and asked the crowd “What’s that big bright thing you guys got up in the sky? We don’t have that in Chicago. It’s under 15 inches of snow right now, we sure are glad to be here.” The concept of 15 inches of snow seemed just about inconceivable to me; I dunno what the maximum temperature hit on Sunday, but it was HOT. In DECEMBER. Florida, you FAIL. Although it was plenty amusing to see all the emo kids sweating to death in their black hoodies, and the nifty MCR one ended up selling out, despite the heat. But yeah, a makeup-wearing troupe of emo boys from Chicago? Did anyone really think I wouldn’t be a fan? They’re coming back in January to the Social with one of my other favorite pretty emo bands, The Pink Spiders, and OH, I am excited. Anyone want to take bets on how much Philip gets molested? :3
The eyeliner-wearing guitarist:
Mat shows off his interesting fashion sense:
Then gets down & dirty:
And spends some personal time with fans:
Oh, Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. Though you claim none of you actually own a red jumpsuit, and that your band name is just something you thought sounded cool, I think there are real jumpsuits involved somewhere and you just don’t want to tell us about them. But that’s okay, because you’re awesome anyway. Ronnie, I can’t believe you’re 23 and married, you look like you’re about 16 years old in your video, and I really hope you don’t ruin that nice voice of yours by screaming too much. I also wonder if Rae has ever listened to you, because you got some strange vowels too, dude. XD Whoo. Anyway, I absolutely loved RJA. They started out strong with the first track on the CD, “In Fate’s Hands,” a great show-starter if I’ve ever heard one. I was a little worried because Edward had said that they scream a lot more at shows than on the CD, but once again, it’s been proven that Edward doesn’t really know what the heck he’s talking about, because they really didn’t. In fact, they even played their slowest song, “Guardian Angel,” which made me so, so happy. (They didn’t play it at the Orlando show! Hahaha!) It’s such a beautiful song, and before the chorus, the line “It’s okay” is repeated a few times, and Ronnie changed it up by singing “It’s okay… to sing along,” which was great and I wish there had been more people singing. They played both their singles (“False Pretense,” the new one, and “Face Down”) early on in the set, which I really, really don’t understand. I could see playing the new one early on, but “Face Down” would have been great to end on; especially since the song they DID end with was disappointing (“Grim Goodbye,” never one of my favorites). But I didn’t mind too much because they played my other favorite songs (“Seventeen Ain’t So Sweet” and “Damn Regret”) and the crowd stayed wonderfully tame throughout their set, so I could fully enjoy it. Before “Atrophy” Ronnie talked briefly but effectively (Tom Delonge, I am looking at YOU, you crazy, monologue-ing mofo) about our soldiers in Iraq, his words drawing both cheers and boos from the crowd. He said “I don’t care how much your ticket cost, don’t you fucking forget about them,” and the passion in his words surprised me, I wonder if maybe he knows someone overseas. Hmm. Most people say that RJA is either from Gainesville or Jacksonville, but apparently they’re from somewhere in between--a town called Middleburg, appropriately, and I can imagine on that “Welcome to Middleburg” sign in front of the town, the population gets marked down from 634 to 629 whenever these five boys go on tour. The especially cool thing about RJA was that Philip even said that he really liked them, and it is very, very difficult for a non-visual band to win his approval, so you know they’re awesome. :3
Ronnie lectures the audience on the finer points of being awesome:
And shows off his wedding ring:
While a RJA guitarist has some fun of his own:
The other guitarist looked a teeny bit like Pete from Heroes:
Next on the main stage was that Seether guy (eww) so we high-tailed it out of there and got some lunch. The Plain White T’s were starting up on the side stage as we waited in line, and we could hear them pretty clearly. And as if by magic, there was a $20 bill on the ground right near the food stand, so we pretty much had lunch paid for, which was way cool. We found a picnic table near the side stage and listened/half-watched as the PWT’s did their thing. They played “Hey There Delilah,” obviously, and then ended with “Hate,” which annoys me because I love the guitar chords in it, but the lyrics are SO DUMB. “Hate is a strong word/But I really really really don’t like you?” Come on, guys! “Delilah” is such a good song, but then you go and write stuff like that? Argh. After that, we still had some time to kill before Ok Go took the stage at 3:15, so I thought I’d try my luck at waiting in the merch line, but after a good 15 minutes of not-moving, I realized I wouldn’t make it in time to see Ok Go, and gave up. While in line, I overheard a conversation about how at the recent Aerosmith show they’d had two merch booths just for Aerosmith alone, so why the heck couldn’t they have two for the 12 bands at this show? Geez. I guess in the end it’s better I wasn’t able to buy things, as I’d brought plenty of cash and it would have been all gone. >_>
We didn’t have much trouble reclaiming our spot on the floor for Ok Go, as it was still early in the day and most people didn’t arrive until later. I dunno why anyone would pay $60 for a floor ticket and not spend the whole day there, but it suited our purposes just fine.
This is what the crowd looked like at that point:
Philip said he forgave Ok Go for ditching us over the summer when he saw their treadmill video, but my broken heart was not so easily mended. (Truthfully, I don’t think Philip remembers how bad the replacement band, Lovedrug, was.) They won me back with this show, because let’s face it, Damian is one of those guys that you’d always go back to, even if he cheated on you with uh, Spain. (Fine, I’ll explain: Ok Go was supposed to be at our Panic! date in June, but they got called away to do a festival in Spain, which I think was thinly veiled excuse Damian made up to try and avoid getting arrested again…) They opened with “Television, Television,” and mostly stuck to their new material, only playing “Get Over It” and “Don’t Ask Me” from their older CD. Interestingly enough, they had played the Next Big Thing show back in 2002, and I honestly had no idea they’d been a band for that long, lolz. One day I will emerge from DYW and learn things about other bands, maybe, especially since Damian is just so wonderful. (And tall! And he can wear a paisley shirt like no one else!) In the middle of the set, he said, “We’re going to take a vote now, and I know Florida isn’t good at voting fairly-sorry to any Republicans out there, but we need to know which cover to play. You can have the Violent Femmes, or you can make the old stogy fucks happy with some Electric Light Orchestra,” he paused, grinning, “Now, Electric Light Orchestra is actually the better choice, so let’s make the old fucks happy, shall we?” Damian, your parents must be so proud. Anyway, we “voted” by cheering and obviously they ended up playing Electric Light Orchestra, and I have no idea what song it was, but I liked it because there was much rolling of R’s, which I am such a sucker for. (Listen to “House of Wolves” again, won’t you? According to Gerard, there’s totally an R in ‘ashes,’ and I am completely okay with that.) Now, obviously it’s impractical for Ok Go to tote around eight treadmills with them on their tours, but as Damian said, “As you know, we in Ok Go are very concerned about your fitness, and so are the people at 99X, so we’ve gotten you a treadmill,” they wheeled it out onto the stage, “Er, 97X, that is. And we’ve got one lucky winner who gets to come up here and run during the next song.” They brought her out onstage, a cute blonde girl named Danielle, and Damian harassed the heck out of her, it was so funny. XD
“So are you a good runner?” he asked, charming smile in place.
“I will be today,” she said, doing a good job playing it cool.
“What?” he gasped in mock horror, “You haven’t been practicing for weeks?”
They started the song, and she got on that treadmill and started running, going pretty fast at first but slowing down when Damian wasn’t looking at her. He went over to her during an instrumental break.
“How are you doing, Danielle?”
“I’m tired,” she admitted.
“What? You’re tired? It’s only the bridge of the song! And we’re not even doing the extended jazz version like we’d planned to!”
Oh, man, good times. They played out the rest of their set, ending with “Do What You Want,” and then, of course, doing the “Million Ways” dance, which I will probably never, ever get tired of seeing. It’s glorious. We got some good pictures of it, too.
Mr. Damian J. Kulash, I hear the J stands for jailbird:
I like the drummer’s hat:
Not sure what’s going on here, but we’ll go with it:
And oh, I will always be amused by how much the bassist looks like Mr. Eissler:
Next time, I hope we’re on the proper side of the stage for up close & personal fun:
And oh, the dance. It was amazing:
This is my favorite:
After their set, the radio deejays came out and said that they kept a list of the top ten moments of all the Next Big Thing shows, and that was definitely gonna make it in the top five. The radio guys weren’t terribly annoying throughout the show, thankfully; it was cool to have something to watch while they were setting up for the next band, and sometimes they had those awesome t-shirt cannons, and man, those things can shoot t-shirts to like the second level of seats, it was crazy. It was about 4:00 by the time Ok Go was done, which meant we still had 6 hours left, with no breaks, no time to sit down, and the crowds were only gonna get crazier. We’re so hardcore. Erin never complained though, I was very surprised. (OH! I almost forgot to mention it, but the Creepy Guy was there, on the barricade for most of the show, in fact. That dude is everywhere, it’s seriously weird.)
Overall, the people around us during the show were pretty nice, but there was this one short little Hispanic kid, who was freaking DETERMINED to make it to the front, because he had “friends” there. People around us had gotten annoyed and forcibly crowdsurfed him over the barricade twice, but he just didn’t know when to quit. He tried to push his way between Philip and the guy next to him, and so in order to block him, the guy put his arm around Philip. Seriously. I was in too much shock to be jealous. XD It’s great because Philip totally got another guy’s email address after the Panic! show, and this is all without even trying. Geez.
Anyway, it was a pretty big shift to go from Ok Go to Three Days Grace; I wouldn’t say they’re polar opposites, but there certainly isn’t a distinct similarity in the way they sound. They were the first band to get a backdrop, which pleased Philip, and I guess it’s a good thing because I don’t think a single member of the band qualifies as pretty. XD The guitarist was downright scary-looking, in fact, and there were a couple of times when he made eye contact with me and I hoped he wasn’t interested in stealing my soul. (Technically Pete Wentz already has it anyway.) Their set was fun because everyone knew all the words to the songs, and when they started up “I Hate Everything About You” the singer said “Even if you don’t know the words, you’ll know them halfway through, so you better sing them,” and predictably, the crowd got pretty crazy during their set. They played “Home,” “Riot,” (I still think the song by The Sounds is better) “Scared” (which was written about a creepy girl outside their studio, apparently) “Animal I Have Become,” and the supremely emo (Supremo? Hee!) “Pain,” and it was fun. It seems like a lifetime since I saw them with Evanescence and had Nathan burn me a copy of their CD, but I guess it’s really only been three years or so. I feel so old. At least all the band members at this show were my age or older, (I think so, anyway, not sure about Say Anything) sometimes the 19-year olds in Panic! start to bother me.
This is the only decent pic we got:
I really, really wish we had seen Angels and Airwaves at that show over the summer, back before I got a little overexposed to them and found out that +44 is so, so, so much better. I think I would have enjoyed the set a lot more, because I just wasn’t feelin’ it this time around. I never did get to see Blink 182 live before they broke up, and hearing Tom sing the first few lines of “I Miss You” just as a lead-in for “The Adventure” was really kind of sad. And I know I like to make jokes about how crazy he is and how he’s trying to save the world, but truthfully, I’m not exaggerating that much. O_o I wish we’d have gotten a video of him “dancing,” it was uh, interesting, to say the least. It certainly did not make me want to take his long, self-righteous monologues about saving the world (of which there were two) seriously. But it wasn’t all bad. Their backdrop was pretty cool, and it was finally starting to get dark, so the stage lights were finally starting to matter. And despite being crazy, Tom is still a good guitarist/singer, so the music was good. They opened with “Valkyrie Missile,” and made it through most of the songs on the CD, including “It Hurts,” which I think is an experiment to see how many times you can repeat those two words before they lose all meaning. (Approximately 14, according to my count) Anyway, I don’t mean to be a hata, AVA is not really a bad band, I’m just bitter. In the immortal words of Tyson Ritter, let’s Move Along.
Oh, Tom:
One day, the aliens will take you where you belong, I’m sure.
Jared Leto has probably been watching too much Naruto, and I am completely okay with it. Have you seen his new video for the song “From Yesterday?” Man, if I wasn’t so wrapped up in the Black Parade, I’d be writing a novel about that too, it’s just so cool. Anyway, the band took the stage in ninja costumes (yeah, really) complete with masks, the two guitarists carrying big white flags with the band’s logo on them. Amusingly, the drummer is actually Jared’s brother, and his name is Shannon, and I wonder they’re really half-brothers or something, because Shannon is not half as pretty as Jared is. Jared came onstage last, of course, in his white ninja costume (because he did not stand out enough already) and carrying a dozen red roses, which he tossed one by one to his adoring fans. Oh, Jared, you so good to us. He was NOT easy to photograph though; I don’t think he stopped moving for more than a split second, and seemed to favor the right side of the stage much more than the left. The other photographical difficulty was his impossibly blue eyes; as you can see, he has some pretty bad red-eye goin’ on here. I don’t want to talk too much about how pretty he is though, because I’m betting my MCR section is going to read like a love letter to Gerard, so I should cut down on my fangirling elsewhere. But rest assured, he is very pretty, (At one point, he addressed the audience and said that he and his band felt right at home in Tampa, because everyone was so pretty. He must have seen Philip…) and his guitar was downright AWESOME, and wow, I regret not listening to their whole CD obsessively before the show, because I only knew the lyrics to 2.5 songs, which sucked.
What was cool though was that now that it was finally dark, we could see the big projected screens on either side of the stage, (you could send text messages to be displayed on them, people wrote some pretty amusing stuff) which was very convenient when Jared decided to hop off the stage and take a little jaunt over to the area between the pit and the first row of seats, and, I dunno, perform an entire song there? Dude has no regard for his personal safety! XD We saw him going for it, grabbing the mic stand and striding confidently to the edge of the stage, and the security guards were all shaking their heads vehemently, trying to talk him out of it, but he just kinda brushed them aside and went for it. Props, J, props. The song he performed was “Capricorn,” off the old CD, and I am totally a Capricorn. Score. He made it back to the stage with no harm done except to the guards’ blood pressure, and continued rocking out normally, until the last song (“The Fantasy”) when he went into the crowd and was molested by thousands of happy girls and boys. (No, none of us touched him, he was on the right side, aka the wrong side, sigh) One of the guards had his hand in the back pocket of his pants, presumably to keep Jared from being swallowed up by the crowd entirely, but he totally smacked his hand away. Hee. I wonder how many ninja costumes he goes through on a tour, because it was not exactly white and pretty when he finally emerged from the crowd. Then again, he’s Jared Leto, and I’m sure he has an army of fans ready with those nifty Tide bleach pens, making sure he stays pretty. Anyway, I was very, very impressed with 30 Seconds to Mars as a whole, and I would definitely see them again if they do a headlining tour. (Admittedly, the set has left me with a near-overwhelming urge to go and rent Alexander for more Jared-in-eyeliner action, if any of you love me, PLEASE intervene before I make the mistake of watching this movie again… XD)
This is the only shot we got of the ninja mask, unfortunately:
Check out his awesome guitar:
And the waaaay creepy backdrop:
Ohhhh yeah.
Now, I’ll admit I’m not the biggest fan of Taking Back Sunday, (TBS, hee) but I do like them a lot. I do not understand where their bitter rivalry with Brand New came from (did Adam sleep with Jesse’s girlfriend? Can’t say I blame her…) but there were certainly a few die-hard Brand New fans in the crowd, one of which had a sign that said “Jesse Lacey says go home,” and come on, that’s just mean. But the lovers definitely outnumbered the haters, because man, the crowd went crazy during their set, it was just about raining crowdsurfers. And really, I’d love to see the list of casualties resulting from Adam’s mic swinging, because he wields that thing like a weapon, seriously. He’s practiced a lot, obviously, and is very good at judging the length of the cord and how close he can get to Fred without knocking him out, but there must have been some mishaps at their earlier shows, I can just imagine. He also likes to wrap the cord around his throat, which is a little weird, I think. There was also a point in the set where he was gleefully rolling around on the front of the stage and making faces at the camera, it was cute. Unfortunately, the way the Ford Amphitheater is set up, (I need to abbreviate that somehow, how about FAmph? I like it. :3) there wasn’t any way he could climb up the sides of the stage and sing upside down like we know he all loves to, but that’s okay. The set was pretty much all new material, and I was more than a little disappointed that they didn’t play “You’re So Last Summer,” but “Liar” and “Makedamnsure” were plenty fun. When it came to the end of the set, Adam told us, “We’ve only got two left, and the question isn’t ‘do you know them?’ it’s ‘are you ready for them?” So we braced ourselves for what would end up being the craziest part of the show, and TBS played “Cute Without the E” and “A Decade Under the Influence,” and it was good, fearing-for-your-life times. :D
Adam, being Adam:
The only shot we got of him with the mic around his neck:
It seemed like it took FOREVER for MyChem to set up, but it was really only because we were all so excited. As soon as TBS got off the stage, they put up a big black curtain with “The Black Parade” written on it, so we couldn’t see them setting up. After what felt like the longest half hour of my life, (keep in mind this was after almost 10 solid hours of rocking out, I was starting to feel it) the lights dimmed and it was showtime.
“Now come one, come all, to this tragic affair…”
They kept the curtain up through the first few lines of the song, and then dropped it dramatically after “I’d encourage your smiles, AND EXPECT YOU WON’T CRY!” and the effect was fabulous. They had the biggest backdrop of the night, an enormous black curtain with their name written on it in huge white letters, in case, y’know, we might forget what band we were seeing. They weren’t wearing their Black Parade costumes, but it was a radio show, after all, and they looked plenty good anyway, as you can see in the following slew of pictures that I took. Yes, me, not Philip, who understood my obsessive need to document this experience fully. (And he finally explained to me how to properly use his camera! Omg!)
The way the stage was set up, Frank was on the far, far left (and essentially impossible to get a good shot of) Mikey was directly in front of us (d’aww, Mikey. I bet you bought those boots at Hot Topic) Gerard’s mic stand (wrapped in white tinsel, which I KNOW was his doing) was to the right a bit (not that he stood at it all that much) and Ray was on the far right. Taking pictures at concerts is hard, kids, especially if you’re not on the barricade, and especially if your lead singer has never learned the meaning of the words “Stand still for more than a split second,” but I did my best.
The stage setup, with Frank, Mikey, Bob (on drums) and Gerard. I couldn’t fit Ray in too, sadly:
I can’t remember the exact set list, but these are definitely all the songs they played, if not in perfect order:
*The End: Kudos to Ray for backup vocals, he really does a good job complimenting Gerard. And like I said, dropping the curtain midway through the song was just awesome. (And yes, I couldn’t help but laugh when Gerard said “piggies,” it still amuses me. I really miss Invader Zim.)
*Dead!: Such a good way to open the show, seriously. This song’s gleeful morbidity (is that a word? XD) is what MyChem is all about, after all.
*Cemetery Drive: A pleasant surprise, as this isn’t one of their more popular songs, but it’s one of my favorites and I’m really glad they played it.
*This is How I Disappear: I still don’t really like this song all that much, but I tried to use my not-favorite songs to concentrate on picture-taking so I could enjoy the show more.
*I’m Not Okay: Ohhh, another pleasant surprise to see this song so early in the set, I put the camera away and rocked the heck out. I love how Gerard extends the spoken line in the bridge: “But you really need to listen to me, because I’m telling you the truth and I mean this ever so much I really do-trust me!” I wish I’d done the logical thing and become a die-hard MyChem fan when I first fell in love with this song back in the day.
*Welcome to the Black Parade: I’m not sure who they’ve got playing the piano during this song, as he wasn’t one of the band members, but the crowd went crazy when they heard those distinctive first few keys. I think every single person in the FAmph must have been singing along. I don’t know if the show definitely sold out or not, but by the time MyChem took the stage, there certainly didn’t look like there were any empty seats.
*I Don’t Love You: This was the perfect song to take pictures during, since I don’t really like it AND Gerard stood still for most of it. Score! Honestly I wish they could have swapped this song for “Disenchanted,” as they’re similar and I like the latter infinitely more, but eh, it’s all good.
*Give ‘em Hell, Kid: This song embodies the old-school MyChem style, and it’s proof of how far they’ve come, I think. I love the line “This is how we like to do it on the murder scene,” and of course hearing Gerard call out “You’re beautiful!” will always be lovely.
*You Know What They Do to Guys Like Us in Prison: During the opening chords of this song, Gerard added the lines “We all got to go,” and had the audience repeat it after him a few times before starting the song. This is the only song from their old material that Philip will admit to liking, probably because of the subject matter. My favorite part was the line “My cellmate’s a killer,” during which Gerard pointed at Mikey (who is his brother) and I just about died laughing.
*House of Wolves: Oh man, I’d say this is my favorite track off the new album, but there’s no way I could ever pick a favorite, but geez do I love this song. “Ashes” with an R, people! It gets me every time. Pete may have my soul, (guys, don’t let me bring any money to the Fall Out Boy show, I don’t need any more Clandestine stuff…) but Gerard has my heart. Philip understands, mostly; largely because he knows I like ‘em young. :3 …Anyway, I really hope they make this their next single and give it an appropriately awesome video, that’d be great.
*Mama: Another pleasant surprise! I wasn’t sure they’d play this one, and I really wasn’t sure it’d sound halfway decent live, but it was AMAZING. Admittedly it was a little strange hearing Gerard sing Liza Manelli’s lines in the bridge, but it didn’t detract from the song because he can imitate her decently. Hmm. He was especially entertaining to watch during this song, because it’s slower and he can be as theatrical as he wants, which, evidently, is pretty theatrical-lots of grand arm gestures, which he encouraged the audience to join him in making. :3 I would absolutely love to see them do this song with a troupe of dancers (I’ve got it aaall planned out in my head; unsurprisingly, it involves a lot of Katie Kay) but this isn’t the Homocircus, sadly. For the record, I don’t read or write MyChem slash; I just don’t really like it. Unless it’s Pete/Mikey, that is, but that’s essentially canon anyway. Heh. Gerard, on the other hand, thinks that Waycest (yeah, Gerard/Mikey, eww) is funny, but he used to be a fanfic writer himself (nope, not kidding, although I’m not sure which fandoms he wrote for) so I guess he understands, or something. xD
*Thank You for the Venom: This song is pretty much the early version of “House of Wolves,” so of course I love it. It was especially fun live because of the “Fire at will!” lines and the gun-shaped hand gestures that accompanied them. At the end of this song, Gerard made a big show of dramatically clutching his heart and falling over, laying down on the stage until the cheers of the audience revived him. I swear I saw a disapproving-yet-amused shake of the head from Mikey, which made it even better.
*Teenagers: “This song,” Gerard drawled in that inexplicable Southern accent he tends to adopt on stage, “Is about the most dangerous people in the world-” one long index finger, extended towards the audience, “-And that’s you guys.” Oh, this song is another top favorite from the new CD, and probably a top favorite of all time, it’s just wonderful in every aspect. I love the lyrics, I love the music; my little heart could barely handle the live performance. Oh. *is the biggest dork ever*
*Cancer: Before this song, Gerard sang the first few notes, (not the words, it was more like he just vocalized the piano chords; if I knew more about music I could probably phrase this more succinctly) but wasn’t entirely clear that he wanted the audience to sing them back to him, so their timing was way off. “Okay guys,” he said, amused, “We’re gonna try that again.” So we did, and it was better, but still not good enough, (Perfectionist much, Gee?) so he made us do it a third time, singing the notes and then counting us off so the timing would be perfect. The battery on the camera was long dead by this point, unfortunately, I would have loved to get a video of it. Anyway, I am still very bothered by “Cancer,” so I just tried to sing the words without thinking about what they meant.
*Famous Last Words: Obviously, this song meant we were just about at the end of the set, but oh, what a glorious ending it would be. The chorus of this song is so much fun: “I am not afraid to keep on living,” you tell those emo kids, Gerard. :3
*Helena: The big finale. It’s kind of a mixed blessing that bands don’t do encores at radio shows; you don’t have to waste time waiting for the band to leave the stage and inevitably return to it, but there also isn’t the added suspense of waiting to hear those last favorite songs get played. Either way, every single person in the FAmph was singing along, the energy was just great.
Overall, it was essentially everything my hopes and dreams indicated it would be. I know I don’t need to fangirl Gerard anymore, but he’s just so cool. And he certainly invites the fangirling anyway-he’s not blatantly sexual like Brendon is, but I think his subtlety makes it even more effective. (There was also a not-exactly-subtle part during an instrumental break where he ran his tongue up the palm of his hand; it was hot, but I couldn’t help but think “that can’t possibly taste good.” XD) I love his weirdo Southern accent (the boy was born and raised in Jersey, it makes no sense) and how he actually looks like he enjoys being on stage, and most of his band does, too. From what I’ve heard, MyChem is planning their big headlining tour for April/May, and I wish they’d hurry up and release the dates so I can start looking forward to it. :P
And now, lots and lots of pictures. Frank and Mikey:
Probably my favorite shot of Mikey, he looks like an angel: (Erin says “an angel OF SEX,” but that’s Erin for you…)
Gerard is an evil genius:
And also a Baptist preacher:
And just generally awesome:
But we can’t neglect the other guys, even if they were terribly hard to take pictures of. Frank!
Tambourine action!
Please observe Mikey’s shoes. Please.
Also, Gerard can count. I have no idea what context this was in, but it’s good to know he’s got brains AND looks. :3
Tell me I’m an angel. Anytime, Gee.
Except, yanno, you’re not, because sometimes you look like this. XD (This shot would be PERFECT if he wasn’t mid-blink…)
So after just about 12 hours of concert fun, I figured we were all going to be exhausted, but we were all so high on adrenaline that we didn’t even feel it at all. Philip hadn’t worn good shoes (nooot a good idea, kids) so his feet were pretty beat up, but otherwise, we were all largely unhurt. We even managed to make it out of the parking lot with no trouble, the FAmph (I just like saying it, I’m sorry) is good about directing traffic, even if you have to drive through the grass. We rocked out to Fall Out Boy and Jack’s Mannequin in the car, and stopped at our beloved Lakeland Steak & Shake (exit 32, we love it so) for a midnight-ish snack. Philip wanted to go to Downtown Disney for our usual post-concert slushies, but that would have probably involved speeding to get there before it closed at 12:00, so we didn’t. :P
Eventually, the iPod ran out of batteries, so we switched to the radio, and what did we hear playing on ORock but the new Fall Out Boy single, “This Ain’t a Scene!” Oh, it was wonderful. I am so, so, so excited about their show, you don’t EVEN know. Actually, if you’ve made it this far, you probably do. :3 This monstrosity is topping off at 6,900 words before I’ve even gone and added the pictures and their captions to it, wow. I feel a little more justified in taking forever to post it now.
And here’s the best for last, my veryfavorite picture:
Oh, man, it was good times. Whoo.
*Amy*
I’m really, really sorry this is over a week late, but sometimes that stupid thing called Life gets in the way, and also the fact that the Photoshop on my laptop no longer wants to work. Sigh. D:
I’m not going to talk about the events of Friday night because I don’t want to make this post friends only (And uh, I can’t really remember most of what happened anyway) so we’ll skip to the part where I’m really glad we got to drive Erin’s car to Tampa instead of Philip’s, because it’s sooooo much nicer. We made great time on I-4, flying along at a good 80 mph or so, (and still getting passed occasionally) and then we got off on the wrong exit on I-275 and lost all the time we’d gained backtracking. Oh well, we made it there in one piece.
I felt a little embarrassed because Erin just about demanded Aunt Sandy cook dinner for us when we arrived, but eh, that’s Erin for you, and the food was worth the shame. That’s definitely one of the perks of staying there, she’s really an amazing cook. The house is gorgeous; there’s a lake in the front and in the back, and a nifty game room on top of the garage complete with pool and ping pong tables. It’s kind of good she lives so far away, or we’d be bugging her all the time.
Erin also not-so-subtly asked for pancakes in the morning, which Sandy made (she really shouldn’t encourage her, it doesn’t help, but…pancakes…and also turkey bacon, which I LOVE. :3) and then we set off for the Ford Amphitheater, managing to find our way there with hardly any trouble. Amusingly enough, there was a gun show going on at the Fairgrounds (which are right next door to the Amphitheater) and Erin and I wondered if any of the band members were hanging out there before the show. Parking for the gun show was $5, but the concert parking was free, which was awesome. Funny how we had to pay for parking at the Hush Sound show and not this one, but that’s downtown Orlando for you.
There were already plenty of people there by the time we got in, and the crowd in front of the merch booth was huge. They had merch for all 12-ish bands there, and probably only 3 people working it, so unfortunately I never got a chance to buy anything, which sucks because there was an absolutely wonderful MyChem hoodie and some really cool Kill Hannah shirts, but I’ll track them all down eventually. (Bizarrely, Red Jumpsuit Apparatus was offering hot pink booty shorts with “Do you feel like a man?” on the back, wtf? XD)
Inevitably, when you tell people you’re going to a concert, they will ask you what band you’re going to see. Erin’s relatives asked her, of course, and her answer would be “Every band under the sun,” which wasn’t far from the truth, but then they’d look at me for an explanation and I’d sigh and rattle off the list, which was:
Say Anything
Kill Hannah
Red Jumpsuit Apparatus
Plain White T’s (on the side stage, we half-watched/listened to their set as we ate lunch)
Ok Go (Got moved to the main stage when Blue October cancelled, score!)
Three Days Grace
Angels and Airwaves
30 Seconds to Mars
Taking Back Sunday
My Chemical Romance
Two local bands (Truly Sunday and Trace of Day, the latter I’d seen back in April when they opened for TAI at Pierfest, lolz) were also playing the side stage, as well as the Shiny Toy Guns, but we had no interest in the locals and the Shiny Toy Guns were on at the same time as Red Jumpsuit, so we didn’t get to see them. Also that guy from Seether was doing an acoustic set, but I don’t think anyone cares about him anymore-not even his band, as it was just him there doing the set. XD (I had, um, seen them with Evanescence once anyway, and it’s funny because their new single “Call Me When You’re Sober” was actually written about him) Officially, this show was called The Next Big Thing 6, sponsored by Tampa’s 97X, the coolest radio station in Florida, sorry, ORock; I give you points for the No Snow Show (and I bet AFI sure was nifty) but you really had nothing on these guys. We’ve got a long way to go before we attain KROQ coolness though, but we’re makin’ some progress.
They were much stricter about letting people on the floor than I thought, we had to get wristbands (which read “entering crowdsurfing and/or mosh pit area” in bold, ominous letters) AND show our tickets every time we wanted back on, it was a little annoying, but it’s good that they kept it from getting too crowded. It seemed a lot smaller than it looked at the Goo Goo Dolls concert, even without the chairs. There weren’t very many people on the floor when we got there, so I was glad we didn’t bother to wake up any earlier.
Here’s me on the floor, waiting (patiently) for the show to start:
Say Anything, however, probably should have woken up a little earlier, because the lead singer was definitely not awake when they took the stage at 11:00. I’ll agree with Edward (Gasp!) and say that their performance was much better than when we saw them with Dashboard over the summer, but I still don’t think they’re going to convert me fully. I’m still amused by the fact that there are inexplicably six members in this band, and I am also amazed at how the tiny little bassist could support himself on the toothpicks he had for legs. Seriously, the bass must weigh more than this kid does, and it was downright funny to look at him next to the lead singer, who, although he’s lost weight, still looks waaay out of place amidst his collection of pretty, skinny emo boys. The prettiest of which was the guitarist/keyboard player on our side of the stage, and Philip and I were thinking that TAI should consider drafting him to replace Tom Conrad, as Say Anything has too many guitarists and TAI is now short one, and he’d fit right in among Beckett and co. for sure. I guess I probably should have used my one Say Anything picture (needed to save room for more important bands) on him instead of the singer, but eh. They played a standard half-hour set, including the song that goes “I called her on the phone and she touched herself,” which I guess I should learn the title of because it seems to come up a lot. (Could it secretly be written about Dashboard’s Chris? Scandal! Gym Class Heroes’ song “The Queen and I” is obviously about Beckett, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise) They ended with their single, “Alive With the Glory of Love,” which admittedly is pretty catchy. All in all, better than I expected.
The lead singer:
And oh, the day was just getting started. Next up was Kill Hannah, who I was still sort of on the fence about, but their live performance won me over. They looked good (Blue eyeshadow on the guitarist? Sign me up!) and sounded even better (strangely, they didn’t play their single “Lips Like Morphine” last, but a lot of other bands didn’t play their singles last either, I dunno what was up with that) and overall were a lot of fun to watch. They covered a Billy Idol song, too, I think they said it was “Rebel Girl,” but unfortunately I don’t really know. [Edit: Edward informs me that it's called "Rebel Yell," so there you have it.] What really made me a fan, however, was the guy I spotted on the side of the stage watching their set, holding a giant Starbucks cup and wearing an adorable purple-and-white striped hoodie and oversized designer sunglasses. If Kill Hannah are good enough for Mikey Way (ohyes, definitely, unmistakably him) they are most certainly good enough for me. We wondered if Mikey’s appearance had anything to do with the fact that the lead singer came onstage wearing a blazer with no shirt under it, almost like he didn’t quite have time to get dressed all the way, hmm… But I digress. Shirt or no shirt, Mat (yep, that’s how he spells it) was plenty entertaining, and obviously has not spent much time in Florida, because he must have dumped two and a half water bottles on himself throughout the set, and asked the crowd “What’s that big bright thing you guys got up in the sky? We don’t have that in Chicago. It’s under 15 inches of snow right now, we sure are glad to be here.” The concept of 15 inches of snow seemed just about inconceivable to me; I dunno what the maximum temperature hit on Sunday, but it was HOT. In DECEMBER. Florida, you FAIL. Although it was plenty amusing to see all the emo kids sweating to death in their black hoodies, and the nifty MCR one ended up selling out, despite the heat. But yeah, a makeup-wearing troupe of emo boys from Chicago? Did anyone really think I wouldn’t be a fan? They’re coming back in January to the Social with one of my other favorite pretty emo bands, The Pink Spiders, and OH, I am excited. Anyone want to take bets on how much Philip gets molested? :3
The eyeliner-wearing guitarist:
Mat shows off his interesting fashion sense:
Then gets down & dirty:
And spends some personal time with fans:
Oh, Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. Though you claim none of you actually own a red jumpsuit, and that your band name is just something you thought sounded cool, I think there are real jumpsuits involved somewhere and you just don’t want to tell us about them. But that’s okay, because you’re awesome anyway. Ronnie, I can’t believe you’re 23 and married, you look like you’re about 16 years old in your video, and I really hope you don’t ruin that nice voice of yours by screaming too much. I also wonder if Rae has ever listened to you, because you got some strange vowels too, dude. XD Whoo. Anyway, I absolutely loved RJA. They started out strong with the first track on the CD, “In Fate’s Hands,” a great show-starter if I’ve ever heard one. I was a little worried because Edward had said that they scream a lot more at shows than on the CD, but once again, it’s been proven that Edward doesn’t really know what the heck he’s talking about, because they really didn’t. In fact, they even played their slowest song, “Guardian Angel,” which made me so, so happy. (They didn’t play it at the Orlando show! Hahaha!) It’s such a beautiful song, and before the chorus, the line “It’s okay” is repeated a few times, and Ronnie changed it up by singing “It’s okay… to sing along,” which was great and I wish there had been more people singing. They played both their singles (“False Pretense,” the new one, and “Face Down”) early on in the set, which I really, really don’t understand. I could see playing the new one early on, but “Face Down” would have been great to end on; especially since the song they DID end with was disappointing (“Grim Goodbye,” never one of my favorites). But I didn’t mind too much because they played my other favorite songs (“Seventeen Ain’t So Sweet” and “Damn Regret”) and the crowd stayed wonderfully tame throughout their set, so I could fully enjoy it. Before “Atrophy” Ronnie talked briefly but effectively (Tom Delonge, I am looking at YOU, you crazy, monologue-ing mofo) about our soldiers in Iraq, his words drawing both cheers and boos from the crowd. He said “I don’t care how much your ticket cost, don’t you fucking forget about them,” and the passion in his words surprised me, I wonder if maybe he knows someone overseas. Hmm. Most people say that RJA is either from Gainesville or Jacksonville, but apparently they’re from somewhere in between--a town called Middleburg, appropriately, and I can imagine on that “Welcome to Middleburg” sign in front of the town, the population gets marked down from 634 to 629 whenever these five boys go on tour. The especially cool thing about RJA was that Philip even said that he really liked them, and it is very, very difficult for a non-visual band to win his approval, so you know they’re awesome. :3
Ronnie lectures the audience on the finer points of being awesome:
And shows off his wedding ring:
While a RJA guitarist has some fun of his own:
The other guitarist looked a teeny bit like Pete from Heroes:
Next on the main stage was that Seether guy (eww) so we high-tailed it out of there and got some lunch. The Plain White T’s were starting up on the side stage as we waited in line, and we could hear them pretty clearly. And as if by magic, there was a $20 bill on the ground right near the food stand, so we pretty much had lunch paid for, which was way cool. We found a picnic table near the side stage and listened/half-watched as the PWT’s did their thing. They played “Hey There Delilah,” obviously, and then ended with “Hate,” which annoys me because I love the guitar chords in it, but the lyrics are SO DUMB. “Hate is a strong word/But I really really really don’t like you?” Come on, guys! “Delilah” is such a good song, but then you go and write stuff like that? Argh. After that, we still had some time to kill before Ok Go took the stage at 3:15, so I thought I’d try my luck at waiting in the merch line, but after a good 15 minutes of not-moving, I realized I wouldn’t make it in time to see Ok Go, and gave up. While in line, I overheard a conversation about how at the recent Aerosmith show they’d had two merch booths just for Aerosmith alone, so why the heck couldn’t they have two for the 12 bands at this show? Geez. I guess in the end it’s better I wasn’t able to buy things, as I’d brought plenty of cash and it would have been all gone. >_>
We didn’t have much trouble reclaiming our spot on the floor for Ok Go, as it was still early in the day and most people didn’t arrive until later. I dunno why anyone would pay $60 for a floor ticket and not spend the whole day there, but it suited our purposes just fine.
This is what the crowd looked like at that point:
Philip said he forgave Ok Go for ditching us over the summer when he saw their treadmill video, but my broken heart was not so easily mended. (Truthfully, I don’t think Philip remembers how bad the replacement band, Lovedrug, was.) They won me back with this show, because let’s face it, Damian is one of those guys that you’d always go back to, even if he cheated on you with uh, Spain. (Fine, I’ll explain: Ok Go was supposed to be at our Panic! date in June, but they got called away to do a festival in Spain, which I think was thinly veiled excuse Damian made up to try and avoid getting arrested again…) They opened with “Television, Television,” and mostly stuck to their new material, only playing “Get Over It” and “Don’t Ask Me” from their older CD. Interestingly enough, they had played the Next Big Thing show back in 2002, and I honestly had no idea they’d been a band for that long, lolz. One day I will emerge from DYW and learn things about other bands, maybe, especially since Damian is just so wonderful. (And tall! And he can wear a paisley shirt like no one else!) In the middle of the set, he said, “We’re going to take a vote now, and I know Florida isn’t good at voting fairly-sorry to any Republicans out there, but we need to know which cover to play. You can have the Violent Femmes, or you can make the old stogy fucks happy with some Electric Light Orchestra,” he paused, grinning, “Now, Electric Light Orchestra is actually the better choice, so let’s make the old fucks happy, shall we?” Damian, your parents must be so proud. Anyway, we “voted” by cheering and obviously they ended up playing Electric Light Orchestra, and I have no idea what song it was, but I liked it because there was much rolling of R’s, which I am such a sucker for. (Listen to “House of Wolves” again, won’t you? According to Gerard, there’s totally an R in ‘ashes,’ and I am completely okay with that.) Now, obviously it’s impractical for Ok Go to tote around eight treadmills with them on their tours, but as Damian said, “As you know, we in Ok Go are very concerned about your fitness, and so are the people at 99X, so we’ve gotten you a treadmill,” they wheeled it out onto the stage, “Er, 97X, that is. And we’ve got one lucky winner who gets to come up here and run during the next song.” They brought her out onstage, a cute blonde girl named Danielle, and Damian harassed the heck out of her, it was so funny. XD
“So are you a good runner?” he asked, charming smile in place.
“I will be today,” she said, doing a good job playing it cool.
“What?” he gasped in mock horror, “You haven’t been practicing for weeks?”
They started the song, and she got on that treadmill and started running, going pretty fast at first but slowing down when Damian wasn’t looking at her. He went over to her during an instrumental break.
“How are you doing, Danielle?”
“I’m tired,” she admitted.
“What? You’re tired? It’s only the bridge of the song! And we’re not even doing the extended jazz version like we’d planned to!”
Oh, man, good times. They played out the rest of their set, ending with “Do What You Want,” and then, of course, doing the “Million Ways” dance, which I will probably never, ever get tired of seeing. It’s glorious. We got some good pictures of it, too.
Mr. Damian J. Kulash, I hear the J stands for jailbird:
I like the drummer’s hat:
Not sure what’s going on here, but we’ll go with it:
And oh, I will always be amused by how much the bassist looks like Mr. Eissler:
Next time, I hope we’re on the proper side of the stage for up close & personal fun:
And oh, the dance. It was amazing:
This is my favorite:
After their set, the radio deejays came out and said that they kept a list of the top ten moments of all the Next Big Thing shows, and that was definitely gonna make it in the top five. The radio guys weren’t terribly annoying throughout the show, thankfully; it was cool to have something to watch while they were setting up for the next band, and sometimes they had those awesome t-shirt cannons, and man, those things can shoot t-shirts to like the second level of seats, it was crazy. It was about 4:00 by the time Ok Go was done, which meant we still had 6 hours left, with no breaks, no time to sit down, and the crowds were only gonna get crazier. We’re so hardcore. Erin never complained though, I was very surprised. (OH! I almost forgot to mention it, but the Creepy Guy was there, on the barricade for most of the show, in fact. That dude is everywhere, it’s seriously weird.)
Overall, the people around us during the show were pretty nice, but there was this one short little Hispanic kid, who was freaking DETERMINED to make it to the front, because he had “friends” there. People around us had gotten annoyed and forcibly crowdsurfed him over the barricade twice, but he just didn’t know when to quit. He tried to push his way between Philip and the guy next to him, and so in order to block him, the guy put his arm around Philip. Seriously. I was in too much shock to be jealous. XD It’s great because Philip totally got another guy’s email address after the Panic! show, and this is all without even trying. Geez.
Anyway, it was a pretty big shift to go from Ok Go to Three Days Grace; I wouldn’t say they’re polar opposites, but there certainly isn’t a distinct similarity in the way they sound. They were the first band to get a backdrop, which pleased Philip, and I guess it’s a good thing because I don’t think a single member of the band qualifies as pretty. XD The guitarist was downright scary-looking, in fact, and there were a couple of times when he made eye contact with me and I hoped he wasn’t interested in stealing my soul. (Technically Pete Wentz already has it anyway.) Their set was fun because everyone knew all the words to the songs, and when they started up “I Hate Everything About You” the singer said “Even if you don’t know the words, you’ll know them halfway through, so you better sing them,” and predictably, the crowd got pretty crazy during their set. They played “Home,” “Riot,” (I still think the song by The Sounds is better) “Scared” (which was written about a creepy girl outside their studio, apparently) “Animal I Have Become,” and the supremely emo (Supremo? Hee!) “Pain,” and it was fun. It seems like a lifetime since I saw them with Evanescence and had Nathan burn me a copy of their CD, but I guess it’s really only been three years or so. I feel so old. At least all the band members at this show were my age or older, (I think so, anyway, not sure about Say Anything) sometimes the 19-year olds in Panic! start to bother me.
This is the only decent pic we got:
I really, really wish we had seen Angels and Airwaves at that show over the summer, back before I got a little overexposed to them and found out that +44 is so, so, so much better. I think I would have enjoyed the set a lot more, because I just wasn’t feelin’ it this time around. I never did get to see Blink 182 live before they broke up, and hearing Tom sing the first few lines of “I Miss You” just as a lead-in for “The Adventure” was really kind of sad. And I know I like to make jokes about how crazy he is and how he’s trying to save the world, but truthfully, I’m not exaggerating that much. O_o I wish we’d have gotten a video of him “dancing,” it was uh, interesting, to say the least. It certainly did not make me want to take his long, self-righteous monologues about saving the world (of which there were two) seriously. But it wasn’t all bad. Their backdrop was pretty cool, and it was finally starting to get dark, so the stage lights were finally starting to matter. And despite being crazy, Tom is still a good guitarist/singer, so the music was good. They opened with “Valkyrie Missile,” and made it through most of the songs on the CD, including “It Hurts,” which I think is an experiment to see how many times you can repeat those two words before they lose all meaning. (Approximately 14, according to my count) Anyway, I don’t mean to be a hata, AVA is not really a bad band, I’m just bitter. In the immortal words of Tyson Ritter, let’s Move Along.
Oh, Tom:
One day, the aliens will take you where you belong, I’m sure.
Jared Leto has probably been watching too much Naruto, and I am completely okay with it. Have you seen his new video for the song “From Yesterday?” Man, if I wasn’t so wrapped up in the Black Parade, I’d be writing a novel about that too, it’s just so cool. Anyway, the band took the stage in ninja costumes (yeah, really) complete with masks, the two guitarists carrying big white flags with the band’s logo on them. Amusingly, the drummer is actually Jared’s brother, and his name is Shannon, and I wonder they’re really half-brothers or something, because Shannon is not half as pretty as Jared is. Jared came onstage last, of course, in his white ninja costume (because he did not stand out enough already) and carrying a dozen red roses, which he tossed one by one to his adoring fans. Oh, Jared, you so good to us. He was NOT easy to photograph though; I don’t think he stopped moving for more than a split second, and seemed to favor the right side of the stage much more than the left. The other photographical difficulty was his impossibly blue eyes; as you can see, he has some pretty bad red-eye goin’ on here. I don’t want to talk too much about how pretty he is though, because I’m betting my MCR section is going to read like a love letter to Gerard, so I should cut down on my fangirling elsewhere. But rest assured, he is very pretty, (At one point, he addressed the audience and said that he and his band felt right at home in Tampa, because everyone was so pretty. He must have seen Philip…) and his guitar was downright AWESOME, and wow, I regret not listening to their whole CD obsessively before the show, because I only knew the lyrics to 2.5 songs, which sucked.
What was cool though was that now that it was finally dark, we could see the big projected screens on either side of the stage, (you could send text messages to be displayed on them, people wrote some pretty amusing stuff) which was very convenient when Jared decided to hop off the stage and take a little jaunt over to the area between the pit and the first row of seats, and, I dunno, perform an entire song there? Dude has no regard for his personal safety! XD We saw him going for it, grabbing the mic stand and striding confidently to the edge of the stage, and the security guards were all shaking their heads vehemently, trying to talk him out of it, but he just kinda brushed them aside and went for it. Props, J, props. The song he performed was “Capricorn,” off the old CD, and I am totally a Capricorn. Score. He made it back to the stage with no harm done except to the guards’ blood pressure, and continued rocking out normally, until the last song (“The Fantasy”) when he went into the crowd and was molested by thousands of happy girls and boys. (No, none of us touched him, he was on the right side, aka the wrong side, sigh) One of the guards had his hand in the back pocket of his pants, presumably to keep Jared from being swallowed up by the crowd entirely, but he totally smacked his hand away. Hee. I wonder how many ninja costumes he goes through on a tour, because it was not exactly white and pretty when he finally emerged from the crowd. Then again, he’s Jared Leto, and I’m sure he has an army of fans ready with those nifty Tide bleach pens, making sure he stays pretty. Anyway, I was very, very impressed with 30 Seconds to Mars as a whole, and I would definitely see them again if they do a headlining tour. (Admittedly, the set has left me with a near-overwhelming urge to go and rent Alexander for more Jared-in-eyeliner action, if any of you love me, PLEASE intervene before I make the mistake of watching this movie again… XD)
This is the only shot we got of the ninja mask, unfortunately:
Check out his awesome guitar:
And the waaaay creepy backdrop:
Ohhhh yeah.
Now, I’ll admit I’m not the biggest fan of Taking Back Sunday, (TBS, hee) but I do like them a lot. I do not understand where their bitter rivalry with Brand New came from (did Adam sleep with Jesse’s girlfriend? Can’t say I blame her…) but there were certainly a few die-hard Brand New fans in the crowd, one of which had a sign that said “Jesse Lacey says go home,” and come on, that’s just mean. But the lovers definitely outnumbered the haters, because man, the crowd went crazy during their set, it was just about raining crowdsurfers. And really, I’d love to see the list of casualties resulting from Adam’s mic swinging, because he wields that thing like a weapon, seriously. He’s practiced a lot, obviously, and is very good at judging the length of the cord and how close he can get to Fred without knocking him out, but there must have been some mishaps at their earlier shows, I can just imagine. He also likes to wrap the cord around his throat, which is a little weird, I think. There was also a point in the set where he was gleefully rolling around on the front of the stage and making faces at the camera, it was cute. Unfortunately, the way the Ford Amphitheater is set up, (I need to abbreviate that somehow, how about FAmph? I like it. :3) there wasn’t any way he could climb up the sides of the stage and sing upside down like we know he all loves to, but that’s okay. The set was pretty much all new material, and I was more than a little disappointed that they didn’t play “You’re So Last Summer,” but “Liar” and “Makedamnsure” were plenty fun. When it came to the end of the set, Adam told us, “We’ve only got two left, and the question isn’t ‘do you know them?’ it’s ‘are you ready for them?” So we braced ourselves for what would end up being the craziest part of the show, and TBS played “Cute Without the E” and “A Decade Under the Influence,” and it was good, fearing-for-your-life times. :D
Adam, being Adam:
The only shot we got of him with the mic around his neck:
It seemed like it took FOREVER for MyChem to set up, but it was really only because we were all so excited. As soon as TBS got off the stage, they put up a big black curtain with “The Black Parade” written on it, so we couldn’t see them setting up. After what felt like the longest half hour of my life, (keep in mind this was after almost 10 solid hours of rocking out, I was starting to feel it) the lights dimmed and it was showtime.
“Now come one, come all, to this tragic affair…”
They kept the curtain up through the first few lines of the song, and then dropped it dramatically after “I’d encourage your smiles, AND EXPECT YOU WON’T CRY!” and the effect was fabulous. They had the biggest backdrop of the night, an enormous black curtain with their name written on it in huge white letters, in case, y’know, we might forget what band we were seeing. They weren’t wearing their Black Parade costumes, but it was a radio show, after all, and they looked plenty good anyway, as you can see in the following slew of pictures that I took. Yes, me, not Philip, who understood my obsessive need to document this experience fully. (And he finally explained to me how to properly use his camera! Omg!)
The way the stage was set up, Frank was on the far, far left (and essentially impossible to get a good shot of) Mikey was directly in front of us (d’aww, Mikey. I bet you bought those boots at Hot Topic) Gerard’s mic stand (wrapped in white tinsel, which I KNOW was his doing) was to the right a bit (not that he stood at it all that much) and Ray was on the far right. Taking pictures at concerts is hard, kids, especially if you’re not on the barricade, and especially if your lead singer has never learned the meaning of the words “Stand still for more than a split second,” but I did my best.
The stage setup, with Frank, Mikey, Bob (on drums) and Gerard. I couldn’t fit Ray in too, sadly:
I can’t remember the exact set list, but these are definitely all the songs they played, if not in perfect order:
*The End: Kudos to Ray for backup vocals, he really does a good job complimenting Gerard. And like I said, dropping the curtain midway through the song was just awesome. (And yes, I couldn’t help but laugh when Gerard said “piggies,” it still amuses me. I really miss Invader Zim.)
*Dead!: Such a good way to open the show, seriously. This song’s gleeful morbidity (is that a word? XD) is what MyChem is all about, after all.
*Cemetery Drive: A pleasant surprise, as this isn’t one of their more popular songs, but it’s one of my favorites and I’m really glad they played it.
*This is How I Disappear: I still don’t really like this song all that much, but I tried to use my not-favorite songs to concentrate on picture-taking so I could enjoy the show more.
*I’m Not Okay: Ohhh, another pleasant surprise to see this song so early in the set, I put the camera away and rocked the heck out. I love how Gerard extends the spoken line in the bridge: “But you really need to listen to me, because I’m telling you the truth and I mean this ever so much I really do-trust me!” I wish I’d done the logical thing and become a die-hard MyChem fan when I first fell in love with this song back in the day.
*Welcome to the Black Parade: I’m not sure who they’ve got playing the piano during this song, as he wasn’t one of the band members, but the crowd went crazy when they heard those distinctive first few keys. I think every single person in the FAmph must have been singing along. I don’t know if the show definitely sold out or not, but by the time MyChem took the stage, there certainly didn’t look like there were any empty seats.
*I Don’t Love You: This was the perfect song to take pictures during, since I don’t really like it AND Gerard stood still for most of it. Score! Honestly I wish they could have swapped this song for “Disenchanted,” as they’re similar and I like the latter infinitely more, but eh, it’s all good.
*Give ‘em Hell, Kid: This song embodies the old-school MyChem style, and it’s proof of how far they’ve come, I think. I love the line “This is how we like to do it on the murder scene,” and of course hearing Gerard call out “You’re beautiful!” will always be lovely.
*You Know What They Do to Guys Like Us in Prison: During the opening chords of this song, Gerard added the lines “We all got to go,” and had the audience repeat it after him a few times before starting the song. This is the only song from their old material that Philip will admit to liking, probably because of the subject matter. My favorite part was the line “My cellmate’s a killer,” during which Gerard pointed at Mikey (who is his brother) and I just about died laughing.
*House of Wolves: Oh man, I’d say this is my favorite track off the new album, but there’s no way I could ever pick a favorite, but geez do I love this song. “Ashes” with an R, people! It gets me every time. Pete may have my soul, (guys, don’t let me bring any money to the Fall Out Boy show, I don’t need any more Clandestine stuff…) but Gerard has my heart. Philip understands, mostly; largely because he knows I like ‘em young. :3 …Anyway, I really hope they make this their next single and give it an appropriately awesome video, that’d be great.
*Mama: Another pleasant surprise! I wasn’t sure they’d play this one, and I really wasn’t sure it’d sound halfway decent live, but it was AMAZING. Admittedly it was a little strange hearing Gerard sing Liza Manelli’s lines in the bridge, but it didn’t detract from the song because he can imitate her decently. Hmm. He was especially entertaining to watch during this song, because it’s slower and he can be as theatrical as he wants, which, evidently, is pretty theatrical-lots of grand arm gestures, which he encouraged the audience to join him in making. :3 I would absolutely love to see them do this song with a troupe of dancers (I’ve got it aaall planned out in my head; unsurprisingly, it involves a lot of Katie Kay) but this isn’t the Homocircus, sadly. For the record, I don’t read or write MyChem slash; I just don’t really like it. Unless it’s Pete/Mikey, that is, but that’s essentially canon anyway. Heh. Gerard, on the other hand, thinks that Waycest (yeah, Gerard/Mikey, eww) is funny, but he used to be a fanfic writer himself (nope, not kidding, although I’m not sure which fandoms he wrote for) so I guess he understands, or something. xD
*Thank You for the Venom: This song is pretty much the early version of “House of Wolves,” so of course I love it. It was especially fun live because of the “Fire at will!” lines and the gun-shaped hand gestures that accompanied them. At the end of this song, Gerard made a big show of dramatically clutching his heart and falling over, laying down on the stage until the cheers of the audience revived him. I swear I saw a disapproving-yet-amused shake of the head from Mikey, which made it even better.
*Teenagers: “This song,” Gerard drawled in that inexplicable Southern accent he tends to adopt on stage, “Is about the most dangerous people in the world-” one long index finger, extended towards the audience, “-And that’s you guys.” Oh, this song is another top favorite from the new CD, and probably a top favorite of all time, it’s just wonderful in every aspect. I love the lyrics, I love the music; my little heart could barely handle the live performance. Oh. *is the biggest dork ever*
*Cancer: Before this song, Gerard sang the first few notes, (not the words, it was more like he just vocalized the piano chords; if I knew more about music I could probably phrase this more succinctly) but wasn’t entirely clear that he wanted the audience to sing them back to him, so their timing was way off. “Okay guys,” he said, amused, “We’re gonna try that again.” So we did, and it was better, but still not good enough, (Perfectionist much, Gee?) so he made us do it a third time, singing the notes and then counting us off so the timing would be perfect. The battery on the camera was long dead by this point, unfortunately, I would have loved to get a video of it. Anyway, I am still very bothered by “Cancer,” so I just tried to sing the words without thinking about what they meant.
*Famous Last Words: Obviously, this song meant we were just about at the end of the set, but oh, what a glorious ending it would be. The chorus of this song is so much fun: “I am not afraid to keep on living,” you tell those emo kids, Gerard. :3
*Helena: The big finale. It’s kind of a mixed blessing that bands don’t do encores at radio shows; you don’t have to waste time waiting for the band to leave the stage and inevitably return to it, but there also isn’t the added suspense of waiting to hear those last favorite songs get played. Either way, every single person in the FAmph was singing along, the energy was just great.
Overall, it was essentially everything my hopes and dreams indicated it would be. I know I don’t need to fangirl Gerard anymore, but he’s just so cool. And he certainly invites the fangirling anyway-he’s not blatantly sexual like Brendon is, but I think his subtlety makes it even more effective. (There was also a not-exactly-subtle part during an instrumental break where he ran his tongue up the palm of his hand; it was hot, but I couldn’t help but think “that can’t possibly taste good.” XD) I love his weirdo Southern accent (the boy was born and raised in Jersey, it makes no sense) and how he actually looks like he enjoys being on stage, and most of his band does, too. From what I’ve heard, MyChem is planning their big headlining tour for April/May, and I wish they’d hurry up and release the dates so I can start looking forward to it. :P
And now, lots and lots of pictures. Frank and Mikey:
Probably my favorite shot of Mikey, he looks like an angel: (Erin says “an angel OF SEX,” but that’s Erin for you…)
Gerard is an evil genius:
And also a Baptist preacher:
And just generally awesome:
But we can’t neglect the other guys, even if they were terribly hard to take pictures of. Frank!
Tambourine action!
Please observe Mikey’s shoes. Please.
Also, Gerard can count. I have no idea what context this was in, but it’s good to know he’s got brains AND looks. :3
Tell me I’m an angel. Anytime, Gee.
Except, yanno, you’re not, because sometimes you look like this. XD (This shot would be PERFECT if he wasn’t mid-blink…)
So after just about 12 hours of concert fun, I figured we were all going to be exhausted, but we were all so high on adrenaline that we didn’t even feel it at all. Philip hadn’t worn good shoes (nooot a good idea, kids) so his feet were pretty beat up, but otherwise, we were all largely unhurt. We even managed to make it out of the parking lot with no trouble, the FAmph (I just like saying it, I’m sorry) is good about directing traffic, even if you have to drive through the grass. We rocked out to Fall Out Boy and Jack’s Mannequin in the car, and stopped at our beloved Lakeland Steak & Shake (exit 32, we love it so) for a midnight-ish snack. Philip wanted to go to Downtown Disney for our usual post-concert slushies, but that would have probably involved speeding to get there before it closed at 12:00, so we didn’t. :P
Eventually, the iPod ran out of batteries, so we switched to the radio, and what did we hear playing on ORock but the new Fall Out Boy single, “This Ain’t a Scene!” Oh, it was wonderful. I am so, so, so excited about their show, you don’t EVEN know. Actually, if you’ve made it this far, you probably do. :3 This monstrosity is topping off at 6,900 words before I’ve even gone and added the pictures and their captions to it, wow. I feel a little more justified in taking forever to post it now.
And here’s the best for last, my veryfavorite picture:
Oh, man, it was good times. Whoo.
*Amy*