momebie and i went to see our lady peace tonight. those of you who have been with me from the start (back on open diary) may recall how much i lived and died by our lady peace shows. how every time there was a near miss i sat in my room and cried all night, and how that one time i got to see them it was the best fucking moment my 18 year old self had ever had.
i used to have shirts and stickers and pins and bags and bootlegs of their shows and bootlegs of their videos and singles and canadian releases and radio edits and and and and and. i still have a lot of that stuff, but i miss that fucking bootleg dvd of their videos like burning.
(also, i think this might be the first icon i ever made for myself. i reuploaded it because it is important.)
i could sit here and talk about how much their music means to me. how they were the first band i ever fell completely in love with. how they are still the only band i can comfortably discuss the discography and progression of. how listening to
happiness... gives me flashbacks to that bus i practically lived on when i was 16 because i listened to it constantly. how they helped me make my first friend in college. how they introduced me to the canadian music scene. how they are one of the very few things that all of randy shares a love of. how i still think
spiritual machines is a perfect album. how their music made me feel like i wasn't alone.
but it's already 1am, and, as much as i love it, i do not want to sing "4 am" at 4am today. but this band did and does and probably always will mean the world to me.
so anyway: the show. the openers, skindred, were wretched. well no. that doesn't cover it. they weren't a terrible band, if you are into generic angry men and loud guitars. i mean, they could play their instruments decently enough, and the singer wasn't horrible when he actually sang. but it's been so long since i've paid any attention to a band that had no respect for their fans that i was kind of shocked when he told the ladies in the crowd to "shake their double d's!" i mean, really? REALLY? it was a pretty sausage heavy show at that point, but there were a fair amount of women out their thrashing along to the music, and they
threw their arms up and cheered. i am so fucking baffled by this.
but then we wormed our way up front and ended up behind some very nice people and in front of some drunk dumbasses, which was at least entertaining while we waited for olp. (their tech looked like luigi. when the drunks finally noticed, they started shouting "IT'SA ME, MARIO!" at him and asking where yoshi was. wee!) and then they came out.
steve can fucking rip it up, let me tell you. and he was wearing suspenders! and they REALLY know how to light that boy. duncan is adorable and always manages to look like he loves what he's doing, which always makes me happy. jeremy can rock a ponytail like no other man on earth, but the boy needs to smile more. and raine. oh raine. he called tiger woods a dumb motherfucker. i will love him forever.
and it was such an awesome, unexpected setlist. raine said, "we just put a new album out, and we are going to play you some songs from it!" and i turned to kl and said, "what are the odds of them playing 'paper moon'? slim to none, right?" AND THEN THEY PLAYED IT. LIKE, IMMEDIATELY. kl and i high-fived. then later when i was thinking, "play something from
spiritual machines, i neeeeeed it!" they launched into "in repair". they played "automatic flowers" (SO RANDOM, SO WONDERFUL) and "bring back the sun" (dedicated to everyone's favorite dumb motherfucker) and just. so much. i called katia when they played "4 am", because how could i not? ♥
i don't know if i ever posted this here, but i said a while ago that covering MGMT's "kids" was the surest way to get your band on my shit list. i have to take that back now. fuckers.
the show was fantastic. the boys are so gracious, and the majority of the fans were wonderful. (the girls in front of us were very sweet when i gave them duncan's pick, which landed on my shoe. aw.) there is a reason i have been in love with these guys for the past however many years, and there is a reason i will stick by them even when they make questionable albums. this whole thing was made of win.
kl and i are now trying to figure out how 2010 could possibly top 2009 musically. it would have to involve mcr playing the social and jenny owen youngs coming to town and like, julia nunes playing a set from our couch. idek.
we are seeing these guys again on fucking saturday though. with say anything and panic! at the disco and everyone else on earth. i. cannot. wait.