 | The Benefaction of Bridges and Schools
Current mood:  ecstatic Alright people. For those of you that didn't make it to Bridge School Benefit this weekend, I feel very sad for you. Not only do I feel very sad for you, but I view you as largely unintelligent when it comes to music and attending concerts. For 50 dollars (that's right, the price of an eighth), we saw the following concert.......
It started at 4. We weren't there...Kevin, Charles, Derek, Jordan, Keenan and myself. We were busy drinking Mickey's 40s in traffic. But we parked and made it in for the last half of Devandra Banhardt's (or however you spell that) set. It was decent. The crowd was thick...we managed to poach a spot dead center stage about halfway up the lawn. After Devandra, someone else came on. This too was mediocre. And then came the bands....I'm missing songs in almost every set list, but that's because they were ones I didn't know the names of...the rest I got...
Death Cab for Cutie. Y'all know them. Hadn't seen these guys live before, but it was an excellent venue. The melancholy hopefulness of their songs fit perfectly in my mind with the Bridge School theme. They came out and played one song I didn't know, Title and Registration, Brothers on a Hotel Bed, Summer Skin and Soul Meets Body...so, mainly new stuff, but Title and Registration was by far my favorite.
Then came the highlight of the show. Everyone in the group was excited for Trent Reznor, but no one was prepared for him. Our thoughts were a band, some acoustic, probably a lot of him on piano. Well, we got a lot of him on piano, but no one would have predicted that he would come out with a full string quartet playing arrangements of his songs as he sang and played the keys. These string players were amazing...the drums, the pounding pulse of a lot of his songs, were all brought out on these instruments. He started with an intro off the Fragile, Something I Can Never Have, Pig, La Mer, The Fragile, Right Where I Belong, a song I didn't know and then closed with, of course, Hurt. We were hurt when he left...by far the most amazing and spectacular performance of the evening.
Following Trent came the Foo Fighters. They played two or three songs that I missed because of the outrageously long bathroom lines (this was a problem ALL evening. The songs I caught were Hero, Big Me, Skin and Bones and Times Like These. A decent, spirited performance that the crowd seemed to like.
Next came Mr. Wilson from the Beach Boys. He asked if people had heard of this album called Pet Sounds and then proceeded to rip off a set of old favorites that kept the baby boomers happy (after Trent and Foo Fighters, they were probably wondering why they had bought tickets to the show)...Wouldn't It Be Nice, Sloop John B, God Only Knows (most of us remember this as the Big Love theme song now), Do You Wanna Dance, I Get Around, Help Me Rhonda, Good Vibrations, Johnny B. Goode, Surfin' USA and Daddy Took the Tbird Away (not really sure what the name of that one is, but I think you're picking up what I'm putting down)...He had by far the most complete band of the evening, over 7 people on stage singing and playing various instruments.
Pearl Jam came on next. Vedder looked less drunk than I expected of him, but I guess Bridge School brings out the moderate in all of us. They played several songs I didn't know, as well as Daughter, Better Man and Elderly Woman Behind a Counter in a Small Town, the last of which is my favorite due to memories of Jaclyn Zimmerman's house and the overall feeling of it. They played a great set, as well as playing Throw Your Hatred Down with Neil off the Mirror Ball album.
Then came that band that some of us know, some of us like, and a few of us used to think had incredible promise to be the best band ever......Dave Matthews Band. Dave's set was decent, but really, for the setting and the feeling of the show, I thought they didn't play as many rares and acoustic type songs as they should have. They played Loving Wings, easily one of my new favorites (reminds me of a more up tempo Seek Up in the texture), followed by a stream of radio hits that kept me vomiting in my mouth....Grace is Gone, Warehouse, Ants Marching and Cortez the Killer with Neil Young.
We stayed for the beginning of Neil's set, but he didn't even come on until like 12:30 or so. It was 12:45 when we walked to the parking lot and he was still playing, and trust me, after seeing all those bands play all that incredible music, when Neil came out, it was, to be honest, a bit of a buzz kill.
But, for anyone who's ever spent 50-60 dollars on a ticket to see one band, you gotta know that the concert I just described was worth it. 8 + hours of incredible music, acoustic style, with fantastic bands and a great crowd (we smoked a lot of pots)...If you've never been to Bridge School, remember this blog when it comes time to buy tickets next October. |
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