Misery Loves Company
Nightmare Of You/The Dillinger Escape Plan/A Fire Inside//Roseland//6/22/06
I know! Nikki Corvette @ Cakeshop! Even though I can’t stand Cakeshop! And the Weekenders have a new band, which is good because I didn’t like the Weekenders that one time I saw them (I love it when bands read my mind and adjust themselves accordingly) and the ever-scattershot Some Action, who I thought broke up. But there’s gonna be cake there!
I decided not to go. Since Nikki Corvette's also going to be at Trash on Friday with other bands I want to see but haven’t yet, I figure I could just go Friday and go to my mom’s on Thursday. Of course now I can’t go to the SMUT or Shoppers shows, among others, on Friday but at least I don’t have to choose. I figure making these small sacrifices now will enable me to get out of other small family events down the line, not to mention the good karma. Evan’s 6-mo-bday is on the 22nd and I spent 3 hours running all over Manhattan looking for his present--one of those subway line beanie bears with an E on it—and of course I couldn’t find one. So I had to settle for some toy at KB’s. Not like he would know the difference or know what an effort went into finding the bear in the first place. Of course they were predicting PM T-storms for Thursday and I said that if it’s pouring torrentially, I wasn’t going to go. I left the toy home because it’s big to schlep and what if it starts raining, besides, I thought I turned the damn thing off and when I shifted the bag in my hands, it makes noise. So when my mom called that morning and they were still predicting rain, I said I’d go. I mostly just wanted to get it out of the way. Hmm, lessee, I remember an early version of the Sin-e calendar had the Negatones for the 22nd. $10 is a lot of $ and the gig is to promote some music website that isn’t mine, but the last time the Negatones played—at that awesome record store party w/WW9 and other bands I already like or am bound to like—it was family brunch day. Of course they weren’t playing Sin-e that day. If I were rich I could’ve run out to Trash to see Modrocket, but I figured, save my money. And of course if something happened at the last minute and Nikki dropped off the bill, I’d be screwed all around.
At 11:30, Liz hands me a ticket for AFI. She can’t go. She has to go to London and told whoever she couldn’t go, but they must’ve printed ticket before it was cancelled. If I can’t use it, give it to someone. “And you’re in the Rock Star Section. The Mezzanine.” And I just happen to have my camera on me, anyway.
Obviously I had no plans of ever seeing AFI, but it’s like finding out someone brought donuts to work—except they’re vanilla frosted, not chocolate kremes, vanilla kremes, Boston creams, or even chocolate frosted. (Mmmm, donuts.) A $25 ticket has just fallen from the heavens and landed in my lap. Hmm, the show is sold out so I’ll have no problem hocking it and I could use the money. But oh my God, the mezzanine! I have dreamed of getting in there, and wonder how one goes about that. But, great. It’s not like I don’t have enough writing to do, I’m going to have to write about this, and I’m trying to work ahead.
Here I am, trying to do the right thing. Liz practically sits right next to me, so I couldn’t call my mom and go into a whole big thing. I write an email saying that I could sell the ticket, but that would make me late. I ended with, Besides, I can’t disappoint you any more than I already have. Meaning, I’m such a screwup here so what’s one more thing that I’m doing wrong? And then again, it’s like I’m over 21 and I have to ask my mommy if it’s ok to go out. I could lie. I have in the past. Cramps, headaches, sinus pressure with the humidity, backaches—all are plausible. But I figure lying would only make things worse. I’m going to have to tell her something she doesn’t want to hear, so the least I could do is tell the truth. I don’t send the email because I know she’s going to call me and tell me she doesn’t understand the situation. Or she’ll say Do what you want to do. Which in my family means Do the right thing or I will remember this for a very long time and remind you of it from time to time. (She’d also remind me that my grandmother once met someone at a dance there. See, I knew there was a reason why I am the way I am. It’s in my blood.)
So when Liz left and in the afternoon and I still had no idea what I was doing and she said, “I really wanted to go! Tell me all about it!” I felt terrible. Of course, if I did go I’d probably feel terrible about not being with my family. This is the story of my life: Every day I disappoint somebody.
I told my mom that I was going to sell the ticket and then be on my way. Or I could always go, since it’s a free ticket. She tells me to go and have a good time. Perhaps out of obligation, I apologize up and down, I wasn’t expecting this, it’s an opportunity, yet I really wanted to be there since we make big deals out of half-birthdays. “Well, do what you want to do. We'll talk later about Saturday.”
What Saturday? I said I couldn't do Saturday days ago.
While CBGB may not be my favorite place to see a show, I hate Roseland. Doors were at 6:45, so I went straight up there. What else could I do? I was thinking I’d need to buy sunscreen just to stand out there. When I went to Roseland for Shane McGowan straight from work I was like, fifth on line. When I went to Roseland for Rancid straight from work, I was a quarter of the way up Broadway. True, that was toward the end of November. When I went to Roseland straight from work to see the Dropkick Murphys, I was on the corner. True, that was the beginning of February. When I went to Spirit straight from work to see Flogging Molly, I was first on line. When I went to Nokia straight from work to see Flogging Molly, I was third on line. So when I got to Roseland and was about to take my place in front of The Color Purple Theatre, I figured it still wasn’t bad for a ticket I just got that morning. Then a security guard comes up to me and asks if I’m going to Roseland. “The line’s over there.” It continued past Color Purple, all the way up Broadway, and around the corner on 53rd, halfway down the block. Pretty much on the opposite side of the front entrance. Probably by the time I get in there, the first band would’ve started. And maybe I should just leave my backpack, because I don’t want to futz around with having them look through it and I don’t want to stand on a coat check line. Then again, maybe by the time I get in there, they’ll be so bored of looking through bags so maybe they won’t think I’m packing a bomb and let me go. Right across the street from where I’m standing is the back door to the Letterman studio. Yellowcard’s gear is on the street. “I hope you guys brought your earplugs, cuz that shit’s loud, says a guy who comes out the side door. “I’ve worked a lot of shows, and they’re not holding anything back.” A woman with a clipboard works the line and asks us if we know of any high school bands. At least one member has to be in high school and we have to know a member’s phone number in order to sign them up for whatever she’s soliciting them for. A kid goes by trying to sell a compilation to benefit the dirt-poor record label that put it out. The women in front of me didn’t look particularly dressed for the show and since I didn’t, either, I wonder if someone handed them the ticket that morning as well. As the line inched along, the girl behind me told someone on her cell: “My mother didn’t believe me that people were going to get here at 12.”
I was right; they didn’t even look in my backpack. All they said was “bags open,” so I opened my handbag. When I was there for the Dropkicks, they confiscated my green plastic spikes. I almost let it go because they take your name and part of your phone number, write this on an envelope, and put your contraband in it and then in a big box that you then have to wait on line to reclaim and it wasn’t all that expensive in the first place. So not only could I have brought in a bomb, I did bring in my camera. There were signs on the door last time I was there, but I think Roseland is if they don’t see you bring it in, then you didn’t bring it in.
Here’s the weird thing about the mezzanine. I was looking at that side bar, wondering how you get up there. I was walking around and saw a staircase with a mezzanine placard next to it. Do I dare? But I have the ticket that says mezzanine, which was the whole point of going, and besides, Roseland is one of those venues where, if you’re not right up front, you’re just in the same venue as the band and you can’t see shit. AFI isn’t my band, so it didn’t matter that I wasn’t going to be right up front and at least I don’t have to work. The small glitch: you have to surrender your ticket to get into the mezz. Seriously, if there wasn’t a chance for me to get it back when I leave, I wasn’t going to go in the first place. What’s the point of my getting a free ticket to a soldout show if I’m not going to leave with said ticket? I thought maybe I’d hear angels on harps and celestial choruses and a beam of light would highlight my path, but no.
The mezzanine is not the side bar, it’s that balcony level. There’s a separate bar up there, tables which were reserved, and the level has its own bathrooms, but nobody’s there and I feel stupid. Like a poseur. I don’t feel special at all. It’s so far away and so far up and so isolated that I consider going back down. It’s higher up than the balcony at Irving. I’m not going to be able to see a damn thing. I feel like I’m at MSG. I see the scaffolding and lighting framing the stage. I try different spots in the balcony. The tables alongside the mezzanine are all reserved. A couple sits down at one of the reserved tables, but then discuss heading “over there.” The bar. They get up and go toward the back staircase. I have no idea where it goes and I don’t want to follow them because I don’t want to look like I’m following them. So I go back to my spot in the balcony that faces the stage. This sucks. How can you get a feel for a band from all the way up there? How can you tell if they’re assholes? How does anybody write about a band from all the way up there? You’re just phoning in a review like for the front section of Rolling Stone and you just making generalizations while in real life you got drunk and hit on chicks, trying to impress them by telling them you’re a reporter. Maybe I’ll go downstairs for AFI. This totally fucking sucks. This is the suckiest suck that ever sucked.
New York City’s Nightmare Of You sound very Mercury Lounge/Sin-e, playing that mopey, gloomy 80s indie rock, and when they started a song that sounded like the start of the Cure’s Lovesong, I wonder if I’ve seen them before. I get the feeling that I have, but can’t remember what I thought of them. Which should say it all right there. If I did see NOY in the past, they’re the type of band that I would’ve called good—but then again, “good” in my book don’t mean a whole lot. A lot of bands are good, compared to a band that would have, say, me, in it, because a band with me in it would undoubtedly suck. Yeah, they’re good, but that doesn’t exactly mean I like them. They announced Dillinger Escape Plan up next and then AFI. Everyone went “Wooo!” and the singer (who used to be in the Movielife) said when they did that the other day, it sounded like testosterone. “It didn’t sound like people; it sounded like balls.”
Admittedly, the only thing I knew about Dillinger Escape Plan is that I’ve heard the name. I kinda liked that part right before the band took the stage because at least there was so much potential and anticipation in those few moments. At least for me. I thought about that article in the Voice, about the aggressive, noisy bands that played a recent anti-war show and they freaked out one of the guest speakers, who referred to one of the bands as the music they play in tanks and didn’t know how a band that aggressive could be anti-war. I just did not get them. Loud, bombastic, strobe lights flashing, I couldn’t understand a single word, and the singer was flinging the mic stand around a lot. The two mosh pits looked like a fight broke out. How can a band that has a song called Panasonic Youth be this bad? They raised NOY to higher levels. And it turns out you can suss out a shitty band from the nosebleed section: Influences: “Influences? Buy T-Shirts and CDs and influence us to keep releasing music instead of just recording it and never putting it out! Go to the following website, steal one of your parents’ credit cards (yes we endorse that sort of thing), and buy some shit. Wait for the CD or shirt to arrive, and then listen to or wear your purchase feeling far superior to all others you see. Because you will be. Those other people are without worth.” Sounds like: “Sounds just like the songs that are streaming in that little player up there asshole. Just like them. Yup. Same band.”
Uhm, that would be comma, asshole.
So I considered going downstairs for AFI, since they were the headliners, but then again, I didn’t exactly want to have to look at the people downstairs. The mezzanine filled up and I didn’t feel so isolated. A worker climbed up the ladder made of cables and poles next to me, and walked into this little cage hanging from the ceiling. Holy shit. I had to hold my breath. No rope. Then another guy went up and went to another cage, and there was a rope next to the ladder. Someone tied a bottle of Minute Maid to the rope and they raised it up. Finally, something cool happened in the mezzanine.
Also, admittedly, I didn’t know much about AFI. I know they just had an album out. I didn’t know until recently that AFI stood for A Fire Inside. Or maybe I did; I just didn’t pay too much attention to it/put two and two together, since all their shirts just have logos that say AFI. I know they’re wildly popular. I mean, they sold Roseland out 2 nights in a row. They’re on the list of popular bands on Interpunk, right up there with A Wilhelm Scream, Blink 182, The Clash, Panic! At The Disco, Silverstein, etc., so I thought they were a punk band. One of their shirts had the HXC logo. (Later, Liz told me that they started out by ripping off the Misfits.) They’re now on Interscope, so it’s like I don’t have to see Nine Inch Nails. They’re kinda sophomoric, as in for high school sophomores—the type who wear fishnets, black nail polish, and think that Edward Scissorhands speaks to them because it’s a metaphor for their lives. “I promise to depart/Just promise one thing/Kiss my eyes and lay me to sleep” from their first song, Prelude 12/21. Song titles like Fallen Like The Sky, and Miss Murder: “Can I make beauty stay if I take my life? /What’s the hook, the twist within this verbose mystery?/I would gladly bet my life upon it that the ghost you love/your ray of light will fizzle out without hope./We’re the empty set just floating through, wrapped in skin, ever searching for what we were promised/ Reaching for that golden ring we’d never let go/Who would ever let us put their filthy hands upon it?”
You know—the type of shit I would’ve quoted in my journal if I were 17.
From all the way in the balcony you can see all the illuminated rectangles of cell phones. The entire crowd swayed as one, in one surge of humanity. I knew I’d never get anything with my camera from where I was, but I tried anyway, since I snuck it in. Singer Davey Havok thanked us and our city repeatedly, thanked Sick Of It All for being such a huge influence, and asked who would adopt him because he loves it here. He ended in the classic mope pose, on all fours hunched over, kissing the ground. “New York City! Thank you so very, very much!”
Dude, you’re from Cali. Make fun of our sports teams or something.
In the balcony, there was no line for the restrooms. Downstairs, a girl had on an AFI shirt that said We dance together in misery. Their latest offerings featured each band member and had such sayings as He met his love before he was born. All he wanted was love. As I try to shove my way out, the bouncer who warned us about the earplugs was now yelling for us to get out. “Get your shirts and get out of here! Why do you guys always wait until the last minute to get shirts?” A woman with long, pink hair and black eye shadow was causing a stir by the front door. She was signing autographs and a guy asked another girl to take their picture. Another girl waited patiently for her turn and when the woman turned to her, I thought this kid was going to wet her pants. If Pinkie asked me if I was waiting for her autograph, I would’ve told her how old I am.
So it’s a good thing nobody had any gigs on the 29th, cause I couldn’t go. I don’t care how awesome it would be or who was playing.
I know! Nikki Corvette @ Cakeshop! Even though I can’t stand Cakeshop! And the Weekenders have a new band, which is good because I didn’t like the Weekenders that one time I saw them (I love it when bands read my mind and adjust themselves accordingly) and the ever-scattershot Some Action, who I thought broke up. But there’s gonna be cake there!
I decided not to go. Since Nikki Corvette's also going to be at Trash on Friday with other bands I want to see but haven’t yet, I figure I could just go Friday and go to my mom’s on Thursday. Of course now I can’t go to the SMUT or Shoppers shows, among others, on Friday but at least I don’t have to choose. I figure making these small sacrifices now will enable me to get out of other small family events down the line, not to mention the good karma. Evan’s 6-mo-bday is on the 22nd and I spent 3 hours running all over Manhattan looking for his present--one of those subway line beanie bears with an E on it—and of course I couldn’t find one. So I had to settle for some toy at KB’s. Not like he would know the difference or know what an effort went into finding the bear in the first place. Of course they were predicting PM T-storms for Thursday and I said that if it’s pouring torrentially, I wasn’t going to go. I left the toy home because it’s big to schlep and what if it starts raining, besides, I thought I turned the damn thing off and when I shifted the bag in my hands, it makes noise. So when my mom called that morning and they were still predicting rain, I said I’d go. I mostly just wanted to get it out of the way. Hmm, lessee, I remember an early version of the Sin-e calendar had the Negatones for the 22nd. $10 is a lot of $ and the gig is to promote some music website that isn’t mine, but the last time the Negatones played—at that awesome record store party w/WW9 and other bands I already like or am bound to like—it was family brunch day. Of course they weren’t playing Sin-e that day. If I were rich I could’ve run out to Trash to see Modrocket, but I figured, save my money. And of course if something happened at the last minute and Nikki dropped off the bill, I’d be screwed all around.
At 11:30, Liz hands me a ticket for AFI. She can’t go. She has to go to London and told whoever she couldn’t go, but they must’ve printed ticket before it was cancelled. If I can’t use it, give it to someone. “And you’re in the Rock Star Section. The Mezzanine.” And I just happen to have my camera on me, anyway.
Obviously I had no plans of ever seeing AFI, but it’s like finding out someone brought donuts to work—except they’re vanilla frosted, not chocolate kremes, vanilla kremes, Boston creams, or even chocolate frosted. (Mmmm, donuts.) A $25 ticket has just fallen from the heavens and landed in my lap. Hmm, the show is sold out so I’ll have no problem hocking it and I could use the money. But oh my God, the mezzanine! I have dreamed of getting in there, and wonder how one goes about that. But, great. It’s not like I don’t have enough writing to do, I’m going to have to write about this, and I’m trying to work ahead.
Here I am, trying to do the right thing. Liz practically sits right next to me, so I couldn’t call my mom and go into a whole big thing. I write an email saying that I could sell the ticket, but that would make me late. I ended with, Besides, I can’t disappoint you any more than I already have. Meaning, I’m such a screwup here so what’s one more thing that I’m doing wrong? And then again, it’s like I’m over 21 and I have to ask my mommy if it’s ok to go out. I could lie. I have in the past. Cramps, headaches, sinus pressure with the humidity, backaches—all are plausible. But I figure lying would only make things worse. I’m going to have to tell her something she doesn’t want to hear, so the least I could do is tell the truth. I don’t send the email because I know she’s going to call me and tell me she doesn’t understand the situation. Or she’ll say Do what you want to do. Which in my family means Do the right thing or I will remember this for a very long time and remind you of it from time to time. (She’d also remind me that my grandmother once met someone at a dance there. See, I knew there was a reason why I am the way I am. It’s in my blood.)
So when Liz left and in the afternoon and I still had no idea what I was doing and she said, “I really wanted to go! Tell me all about it!” I felt terrible. Of course, if I did go I’d probably feel terrible about not being with my family. This is the story of my life: Every day I disappoint somebody.
I told my mom that I was going to sell the ticket and then be on my way. Or I could always go, since it’s a free ticket. She tells me to go and have a good time. Perhaps out of obligation, I apologize up and down, I wasn’t expecting this, it’s an opportunity, yet I really wanted to be there since we make big deals out of half-birthdays. “Well, do what you want to do. We'll talk later about Saturday.”
What Saturday? I said I couldn't do Saturday days ago.
While CBGB may not be my favorite place to see a show, I hate Roseland. Doors were at 6:45, so I went straight up there. What else could I do? I was thinking I’d need to buy sunscreen just to stand out there. When I went to Roseland for Shane McGowan straight from work I was like, fifth on line. When I went to Roseland for Rancid straight from work, I was a quarter of the way up Broadway. True, that was toward the end of November. When I went to Roseland straight from work to see the Dropkick Murphys, I was on the corner. True, that was the beginning of February. When I went to Spirit straight from work to see Flogging Molly, I was first on line. When I went to Nokia straight from work to see Flogging Molly, I was third on line. So when I got to Roseland and was about to take my place in front of The Color Purple Theatre, I figured it still wasn’t bad for a ticket I just got that morning. Then a security guard comes up to me and asks if I’m going to Roseland. “The line’s over there.” It continued past Color Purple, all the way up Broadway, and around the corner on 53rd, halfway down the block. Pretty much on the opposite side of the front entrance. Probably by the time I get in there, the first band would’ve started. And maybe I should just leave my backpack, because I don’t want to futz around with having them look through it and I don’t want to stand on a coat check line. Then again, maybe by the time I get in there, they’ll be so bored of looking through bags so maybe they won’t think I’m packing a bomb and let me go. Right across the street from where I’m standing is the back door to the Letterman studio. Yellowcard’s gear is on the street. “I hope you guys brought your earplugs, cuz that shit’s loud, says a guy who comes out the side door. “I’ve worked a lot of shows, and they’re not holding anything back.” A woman with a clipboard works the line and asks us if we know of any high school bands. At least one member has to be in high school and we have to know a member’s phone number in order to sign them up for whatever she’s soliciting them for. A kid goes by trying to sell a compilation to benefit the dirt-poor record label that put it out. The women in front of me didn’t look particularly dressed for the show and since I didn’t, either, I wonder if someone handed them the ticket that morning as well. As the line inched along, the girl behind me told someone on her cell: “My mother didn’t believe me that people were going to get here at 12.”
I was right; they didn’t even look in my backpack. All they said was “bags open,” so I opened my handbag. When I was there for the Dropkicks, they confiscated my green plastic spikes. I almost let it go because they take your name and part of your phone number, write this on an envelope, and put your contraband in it and then in a big box that you then have to wait on line to reclaim and it wasn’t all that expensive in the first place. So not only could I have brought in a bomb, I did bring in my camera. There were signs on the door last time I was there, but I think Roseland is if they don’t see you bring it in, then you didn’t bring it in.
Here’s the weird thing about the mezzanine. I was looking at that side bar, wondering how you get up there. I was walking around and saw a staircase with a mezzanine placard next to it. Do I dare? But I have the ticket that says mezzanine, which was the whole point of going, and besides, Roseland is one of those venues where, if you’re not right up front, you’re just in the same venue as the band and you can’t see shit. AFI isn’t my band, so it didn’t matter that I wasn’t going to be right up front and at least I don’t have to work. The small glitch: you have to surrender your ticket to get into the mezz. Seriously, if there wasn’t a chance for me to get it back when I leave, I wasn’t going to go in the first place. What’s the point of my getting a free ticket to a soldout show if I’m not going to leave with said ticket? I thought maybe I’d hear angels on harps and celestial choruses and a beam of light would highlight my path, but no.
The mezzanine is not the side bar, it’s that balcony level. There’s a separate bar up there, tables which were reserved, and the level has its own bathrooms, but nobody’s there and I feel stupid. Like a poseur. I don’t feel special at all. It’s so far away and so far up and so isolated that I consider going back down. It’s higher up than the balcony at Irving. I’m not going to be able to see a damn thing. I feel like I’m at MSG. I see the scaffolding and lighting framing the stage. I try different spots in the balcony. The tables alongside the mezzanine are all reserved. A couple sits down at one of the reserved tables, but then discuss heading “over there.” The bar. They get up and go toward the back staircase. I have no idea where it goes and I don’t want to follow them because I don’t want to look like I’m following them. So I go back to my spot in the balcony that faces the stage. This sucks. How can you get a feel for a band from all the way up there? How can you tell if they’re assholes? How does anybody write about a band from all the way up there? You’re just phoning in a review like for the front section of Rolling Stone and you just making generalizations while in real life you got drunk and hit on chicks, trying to impress them by telling them you’re a reporter. Maybe I’ll go downstairs for AFI. This totally fucking sucks. This is the suckiest suck that ever sucked.
New York City’s Nightmare Of You sound very Mercury Lounge/Sin-e, playing that mopey, gloomy 80s indie rock, and when they started a song that sounded like the start of the Cure’s Lovesong, I wonder if I’ve seen them before. I get the feeling that I have, but can’t remember what I thought of them. Which should say it all right there. If I did see NOY in the past, they’re the type of band that I would’ve called good—but then again, “good” in my book don’t mean a whole lot. A lot of bands are good, compared to a band that would have, say, me, in it, because a band with me in it would undoubtedly suck. Yeah, they’re good, but that doesn’t exactly mean I like them. They announced Dillinger Escape Plan up next and then AFI. Everyone went “Wooo!” and the singer (who used to be in the Movielife) said when they did that the other day, it sounded like testosterone. “It didn’t sound like people; it sounded like balls.”
Admittedly, the only thing I knew about Dillinger Escape Plan is that I’ve heard the name. I kinda liked that part right before the band took the stage because at least there was so much potential and anticipation in those few moments. At least for me. I thought about that article in the Voice, about the aggressive, noisy bands that played a recent anti-war show and they freaked out one of the guest speakers, who referred to one of the bands as the music they play in tanks and didn’t know how a band that aggressive could be anti-war. I just did not get them. Loud, bombastic, strobe lights flashing, I couldn’t understand a single word, and the singer was flinging the mic stand around a lot. The two mosh pits looked like a fight broke out. How can a band that has a song called Panasonic Youth be this bad? They raised NOY to higher levels. And it turns out you can suss out a shitty band from the nosebleed section: Influences: “Influences? Buy T-Shirts and CDs and influence us to keep releasing music instead of just recording it and never putting it out! Go to the following website, steal one of your parents’ credit cards (yes we endorse that sort of thing), and buy some shit. Wait for the CD or shirt to arrive, and then listen to or wear your purchase feeling far superior to all others you see. Because you will be. Those other people are without worth.” Sounds like: “Sounds just like the songs that are streaming in that little player up there asshole. Just like them. Yup. Same band.”
Uhm, that would be comma, asshole.
So I considered going downstairs for AFI, since they were the headliners, but then again, I didn’t exactly want to have to look at the people downstairs. The mezzanine filled up and I didn’t feel so isolated. A worker climbed up the ladder made of cables and poles next to me, and walked into this little cage hanging from the ceiling. Holy shit. I had to hold my breath. No rope. Then another guy went up and went to another cage, and there was a rope next to the ladder. Someone tied a bottle of Minute Maid to the rope and they raised it up. Finally, something cool happened in the mezzanine.
Also, admittedly, I didn’t know much about AFI. I know they just had an album out. I didn’t know until recently that AFI stood for A Fire Inside. Or maybe I did; I just didn’t pay too much attention to it/put two and two together, since all their shirts just have logos that say AFI. I know they’re wildly popular. I mean, they sold Roseland out 2 nights in a row. They’re on the list of popular bands on Interpunk, right up there with A Wilhelm Scream, Blink 182, The Clash, Panic! At The Disco, Silverstein, etc., so I thought they were a punk band. One of their shirts had the HXC logo. (Later, Liz told me that they started out by ripping off the Misfits.) They’re now on Interscope, so it’s like I don’t have to see Nine Inch Nails. They’re kinda sophomoric, as in for high school sophomores—the type who wear fishnets, black nail polish, and think that Edward Scissorhands speaks to them because it’s a metaphor for their lives. “I promise to depart/Just promise one thing/Kiss my eyes and lay me to sleep” from their first song, Prelude 12/21. Song titles like Fallen Like The Sky, and Miss Murder: “Can I make beauty stay if I take my life? /What’s the hook, the twist within this verbose mystery?/I would gladly bet my life upon it that the ghost you love/your ray of light will fizzle out without hope./We’re the empty set just floating through, wrapped in skin, ever searching for what we were promised/ Reaching for that golden ring we’d never let go/Who would ever let us put their filthy hands upon it?”
You know—the type of shit I would’ve quoted in my journal if I were 17.
From all the way in the balcony you can see all the illuminated rectangles of cell phones. The entire crowd swayed as one, in one surge of humanity. I knew I’d never get anything with my camera from where I was, but I tried anyway, since I snuck it in. Singer Davey Havok thanked us and our city repeatedly, thanked Sick Of It All for being such a huge influence, and asked who would adopt him because he loves it here. He ended in the classic mope pose, on all fours hunched over, kissing the ground. “New York City! Thank you so very, very much!”
Dude, you’re from Cali. Make fun of our sports teams or something.
In the balcony, there was no line for the restrooms. Downstairs, a girl had on an AFI shirt that said We dance together in misery. Their latest offerings featured each band member and had such sayings as He met his love before he was born. All he wanted was love. As I try to shove my way out, the bouncer who warned us about the earplugs was now yelling for us to get out. “Get your shirts and get out of here! Why do you guys always wait until the last minute to get shirts?” A woman with long, pink hair and black eye shadow was causing a stir by the front door. She was signing autographs and a guy asked another girl to take their picture. Another girl waited patiently for her turn and when the woman turned to her, I thought this kid was going to wet her pants. If Pinkie asked me if I was waiting for her autograph, I would’ve told her how old I am.
So it’s a good thing nobody had any gigs on the 29th, cause I couldn’t go. I don’t care how awesome it would be or who was playing.
posted by heather @ 12:24 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home