13 Concerts I Have Attended
I have of course attended way more than 13 concerts, so I'll just choose what comes to mind.
1. Erasure's Wild Tour at the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavillion when I was 12. That was my first concert and my best friend Sarah's Aunt Stephanie took us. It was awesome. Andy wore a tutu and danced and frolicked around with hot gay men in little shiny underwear. Perhaps this concert is what turned me--into a fag hag that is:) Louie Louie, some horrible pop flash in the pan was the opening act. (I saw them again when I was a sophomore in college with Tim and his sisters Caroline and Christine. Fun, but certainly not as out there as the first concert.)
2. Depeche Mode's Songs of Faith and Devotion Tour at the Summit when I was a junior in high school. Sarah and I went with her Mom (since it was in kind of a sketchy part of town). We had 8th row tickets and I swear to God that David pointed me out to Martin when I mouthed "I love you" and gave him my best 16-year-old sexy look. and TheThe was the opener and their bass was so loud I stuffed tissues in my ear and I swear my heart was beating in time to the beat. I saw them twice more, once on that tour when it came back around at Cynthia Woods, and once shortly after Tim and I got married on the crappy album tour at that crappy Verizon Wireless Ampitheatre outside San Antonio.
3. The Cranberries' No Need to Argue Tour at the Astrohall. Sarah, Frank and I went, even though Frank and I had to get up at like 5:30am to go to a speech tournament the next morning. I think I was a senior in high school. We wound up partying all night and I slept like maybe an hour. I barely made it through the next day. Not my best work. I saw the Cranberries again when they swung back through and played Cynthia Woods in the Spring. Toad the Wet Sprocket, one of my favorite bands at the time, opened for them that time and were awesome.
4. Lollapalooza 1992, August before my sophomore year, I went with Sarah, her boyfriend John, and a friend from school I had a crush on for some reason, Chris. Sarah and I had had to have our parents lie for us and say that our families were going on a picnic together so that we could miss Colorguard practice. Sarah and John disappeared to go do God knows what (okay, I do know what, she told me in excrutiating detail), and Chris and I hung out and watched the show. We had a lot of fun. Pearl Jam was awesome, Eddie Vedder climbed up to the top of the stage while he sung, Ice Cube made me feel very white, Red Hot Chili Peppers brought the house down, and Ministry did my goth soul good as Al Jourgenson danced with a skeleton.
5. Morrissey in London at the Royal Albert Hall, June 2004. One of the best concerts ever. Period. I paid a ridiculous amount to win tickets off ebay, but it was well worth it. To see Morrissey in his native land, with a bunch of soccer hooligans chugging pints and singing along to every word behind us? And the sound was amazing! It was a symphony hall and only sat around 2,000 people, so it was intimate too. Plus at the door they kept asking Tim if he had a mobile (they aren't allowed in because they can take pictures), and Tim totally couldn't understand him, so finally I had to go, "do you have a cell phone?" like such an American idiot.
6. REM with Radiohead opening at Southpark Meadows, Fall 1995, the Monster tour for REM and The Bends tour for Radiohead. Wow wow wow. The day I fell in love with Radiohead. REM puts on one of the best live shows I've ever seen and Radiohead nearly blew them out of the water. RIP Southpark Meadows. I've seen REM one more time, great, and Radiohead twice more, the Kid A tour at Cynthia Woods, which was a transcendent experience where the audience was just one in enjoying the music and the Hail to the Thief tour at Cynthia Woods where some A-holes on cell phones tried to ruin the experience.
7. Nine Inch Nails and David Bowie at Southpark Meadows, also 1995. Trent blew David Bowie off the stage, poor guy. Went with Sarah, Elizabeth Z., and George. Interesting group. Sarah was in town and we had to hunt her down a ticket. We went to all the kiosks at UT until we found a poster for someone selling tickets, then went to their house to buy just ONE ticket, which I think pissed them off. They kept trying to sell us both.
8. Camper Van Beethoven at SXSW 2004, I believe. La Zona Rosa. We got there like at 8 to make sure we'd get in since we were just paying cover. I made it through all the crappy bands before, but I thought I was going to be overcome by all the smoke and stuff in the room, and the packed in people. But thankfully, I made it to see CVB and it was well worth it. My high school dream had come true, to see CVB, who'd broken up by the time I got into them, and they didn't disappoint.
9. The Pixies at Stubb's, Fall 2004. Also a band that I'd never seen live because of a break-up. They were amazing, more high school dreams coming true. And I'd also spent a pretty penny on this show, but worth every cent.
10. The Cure's Wish Tour at Cynthia Woods, summer before my freshman year of high school, the Wild Mood Swings Tour at the Summit after freshman year of college, and the Curioso tour August 04 at Cynthia Woods. Always incredible, always worth seeing, will never disappoint. I dressed up totally goth for the first two shows, but I felt I'd grown a little past that by the Curioso tour. At the Wish Tour, my friend Philip died his hair with Kool-Aid and it was dripping down his neck. Good times.
11. Dave Matthews Band, Erwin Center, Sophomore year of college. Damn those guys can put on a show! Christi, Daniel and I went and had like 6th row or something tickets, and we were just blown away. (I'm running out of adjectives, sorry) Daniel could always get us the best seats. Damn you Daniel for moving to D.C.!
12. The Lemonheads with Redd Kross and some other band opening at a place in Houston that's not even there anymore, junior or senior year of high school. My friend Marissa and I stood in the very front, bracing and bruising our knees against the wood that separated the stage from the audience in the hopes of getting close to Evan Dando. Then the a-hole came out and he was too stoned to even play more than a song. He was in his PAJAMAS! I was so mad.
13. The Violent Femmes, Numbers, 1994 or 95. They worked that show, played for nearly 3 hours, I just loved it. Played all my favorites, and at one point I hid from my friends because they wanted to go home (or perhaps had to go home because of curfew), but I didn't want to miss a second of the show. I also nearly had my neck broken because a girl who'd been crowd surfing came down on me, I had to hurl her off with all my might. Excellent!
Oh, dude, I forgot Ben Folds at La Zona Rosa who led the audience in a beautiful sing along, and Counting Crows, and so many more!
2 comments:
Okay, you've been to way cooler shows than I have. :) I did see Radiohead, forgot about that one, in Deep Ellum when they were the openers for Belly.
oh, wow, Radiohead opened for Belly? I remember them! They had that "Feed the Tree" song that was everywhere! Can't believe Radiohead OPENED for them! I think you do win, because you saw them in a much smaller venue before they were big!
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