weekend antics
this weekend has been really fun, and with a lot of kids out of town, i didn’t have such grand expectations. but it’s been awesome. primarily because i’ve gotten to spend time with people who are close to me, or who have been really supportive of me, but that i’ve kind of neglected.
on friday, i called steven to see what was going on, and he said that becca was planning on going to the strike anywhere show at the newport (big, dumb concert hall across from campus) and that he was going to sneak in. i asked if i could come along, and he said it was no problem. we hung out for a little bit and becca told us about the vegan potluck that she was having next weekend which was exciting. we even made a flyer for it. so after a little while, we headed over to the concert hall. the lines were huge, the show had sold out, it was crazy. tons of kids just rabid for afi. we didn’t have to spend much effort sneaking in after all, as a friend helped us get in really easily. strike anywhere sounded good, and they played with energy, but in a hall that size, it just seemed hollow. the kids were kind of ambivilant to the whole thing which i thought was disappointing because i like strike anywhere, and i think their lyrics are really good and intelligent. the kids where so out of it that after the show, when becca and her friend were hanging out at the merch table with the roadie for strike anywhere, a bunch of kids assumed that her friend was in the band just because he was wearing tight jeans and had that floppy indie-rocker haircut. hilarious.
the explosion was just lame. the music is tolerable, i guess, but the guys just come off as such bro-dogs. i couldn’t handle it. the whole set exhuded sleaze.
i have always thought afi was pretty ok. i saw them a couple of times at krazyfest and had a good time, but i never fealt any kind of connection with their music. i thought a lot of the lyrics were pretty simplistic or ambiguous and their music was getting more and more typical. so, seeing kids just rabid for them was crazy. and you had a real mix of the hipster hardcore kids and the gothed up kids. it was strange. the best comment i heard all night was, “davey’s [the singer for afi] all queer and fem, but he’s totally badass at the same time”. classic. but not paying and being detached from the whole experience worked out really well in the end as watching them was just like watching some ridiculous arena rock band and the sheer over-the-topness made it fun.
after we got tired of watching afi, steven, brett, and i went to the party at derek and emmet’s house. shannon and katie’s band played their first show and i liked it a lot. it was fun and pretty interesting. then some metal band played and i liked them a lot more than i did the last time i saw them. i got to say hi to matt from cincinatti, and jamie and eric luck stopped by which was cool. after the metal band, brett and i walked home while stephen stayed to drink and mingle.
yesterday i was going to help dave shoot his self-portrait video for art school, but then i realized that everybody was out of town so i should help with food not bombs. i went to jonnies and sort of hung out with bz and justin before we all decided that there wasn’t enough interest/people to do fnb. this sucked, but oh well. i went to make flyers for jessika dissaster’s midwest zine fest. after that, i rounded up jonnie, justin, and kevey to go play “punk rock soccer”.
we had always played soccer when the weather got nice, but recently there were 100s of flyers up for “punk rock soccer” and i had no idea who the kids were who were doing it. we got there, and of course the punks were late. gabe came, but other than that, i knew none of the other kids. still, it was really fun and we played punks vs. pickup kids against a few soccer jocks, and some mexicans. it was fun, and even though the game was pretty intense only a few guys took things too seriously.
after the game i was pretty warn out, but we stopped by steven’s work and he gave us the hook-up so at least we had a way to reload. i talked to kevey for a while and then headed home. when i got home, i talked to mandy for a long while. this was rad, because mandy really likes to talk and i feel like i’m often dismissive because i’m often running late to somewhere or really not in the mood to talk. but that night, there was nothing better to sit on the couch and chat with my roommate. my friends all consider her the “good roommate” or “the fun roommate” and i admit that she’s a pretty interesting person who has a perspective that i might not totally agree with but that is at least enlightening.