Phew....just a side note. The batteries on my recorder went out while I was typing this and made a really bad sound. I screamed! I thought it had stopped taping...but it's all good.
I was stoked to find out I had second row seats right in front of Kyle. We got there over an hour early, so we spent a lot of time people watching. Apparently, the bands had arrived late and were still doing the sound checks so we got to hear American Hi-Fi's sound check. Not too interesting...lol. The workers at Journal Pavilion most have been Nazis man! They were giving out these articles about Matchbox 20 (I thought for free, but ended up being a dollar), and the guy wouldn't even make eye contact with me. Then they wouldnâ't give us the lids to the $4 water bottles because they were afraid we would through them at the band. If I was in the band, I'd rather get a closed bottle thrown at me...lol. At least they had cup holders there.
Not too many people showed up for American Hi-Fi, but they played good. I like them a lot better live than recorded. I especially love the drums on "The Art of Losing." Fun stuff! Paul came out during their set and was staring at all the speakers and lights. He looked really scared because they were swaying back and forth and it was supposed to rain. He was talking to Jason and making these swaying motions with his hands...hehe. I saw Mark McGrath in the back. He kinda smiled at me. Rob and Mari came out too. They were mostly sitting behind some of the equipment, but at one point Rob came out and started throwing stuff at American Hi-Fi. I think they were picks, but they might have just plastic pieces. Jason kept giving him more stuff to throw at them too. I don't think he hit any of them though! When Rob was sitting down with Mari, all these people kept running up to the stage and taking pictures of them...lol! I was more excited about Paul coming out.
So on comes Sugar Ray. They are so great live! Mark gave the mike to this one kid in the front row to say hi to Albuquerque. He introduced the bartender, who "No habla ingles!" During the set, I noticed there was some GDers in front of me. Kim (KimLovesMB20) was dancing around with her pink feather boa and screaming "Rodney rocks!" The security guards thought she was nutz, but Rodney threw her a pick. At one point, Mark made a reference to the fuzzy dice hanging on his mike. He said, "Do you guys like the way my dice hang?" I started screaming without thinking, and then paused, and then screamed some more...hehe. Later Mark addressed the "potheads at the back of the lawn." Mark again dedicated "Fly" to the military with a special shout-out to Kirtland Air Force Base for protecting his freedom. He went out into the crowd again to get someone to sing with him. It sprinkled a bit during their set. The drops were huge! But no one got too wet.
So my dad goes off to get a beer, and I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to finally sneak in my hidden life of GDing. So I introduced myself to Susan (FairMagda). And we talked for awhile. My dad came back, and found out about my GD habits, and was really cool about it. And then Kim came back and asked us to watch her beer and not put any date rape drugs in it. That's when we introduced ourselves. (Little side note, Kim never drank her beer!) There was another GDer there (didn't catch name) who was bummed she was so far back at the concert. She had signs and everything to get stuff. Luckily, she got to sneak up to the front during MB20.
The band comes out, and the lights are kinda bright. Kyle steps up to the center and starts into "Cold". At the instant he starts, the lights go out and spotlight him. He does his little solo thing, and Rob comes up from the back onto the platform. All the front row people went up to the divider (I don't know what else to call it) and I ran up there too. I was lucky because after a few minutes, the security guards were real strict about not being by your seat. My dad moved into the aisle and they yelled at him. Somehow, I got stuck on the end, so I had no one on my left, and the girl to my right was kinda just standing there. All the GDers were a little farther over. So I had to party by myself. It always seems to happen that way. I'm just too wild for everyone I guess! Hehe
Then they went into "Real World." Kyle's sound went out during the song and it took awhile to fix. When the sound came back, Rob said, "Welcome back Kyle."
Rob quote, "Thanx so much you guys for coming out for this beautiful evening of music. It's a great night for a show; it's a great night to just forget about everything. We really appreciate it when you come to see us, and we hope that for the next couple of hours we can take away anything that worries you. Everything going on in the world is so harsh. So we're gonna forget about work, school, politics...everything that goes on outside these walls. And we're gonna take a couple of hours and you're gonna shake your ass and do whatever you do. We're gonna take a couple of hours to celebrate life in beautiful Albuquerque, New Mexico. Are you with me baby?!?" Then they went into "All I Need."
Right after the song, my tape sounds like someone was whining/crying lol. No idea what was going on. Rob quote, "You guys rock man! We're gonna do a song off the new record. This is a song about people with a lot of heart; with a lot courage. They always amaze the hell out of us. This is a song called 'Soul.'"
"This is a song for all the sexy people in the back." They started into "Disease."
"Oh, thank you baby. Thank you so much! It feels so good to come out here and feel all this love. I'd like everyone to take a minute, we have a new member in our traveling circus here of Matchbox 20, on the keyboards, the organ, the slide guitar, the guitar, and the piano, and vocals, Albuquerque's own, Matt Beck." Hehe, and I thought it was so cool he was from Phoenix. All I have to say is that he must have been a big baby to be from every city Matchbox 20 tours...lol!
"You guys are great! Are you having a good time? We're gonna do a song off the new record, written by the guy on the drums, Mr. Paul Doucette. It's called "Could I Be You?" Then they went into "3 A.M."
"We're gonna do this song that's off of the record Mad Season. And it's called "Mad Season."
"Albuquerque, how ya doin now baby?!?" They went into "Feel."
"I want say thank you, thank you very much to a wonderful band, a great group of guys, and a great ****ing band, the guys in American Hi-Fi. I'm very proud to have them out with us and it's great to get to watch them every night. And our brothers in rock, the boys in Sugar Ray. The boys in Sugar Ray!"
"Our friend coming out, he's sitting on the drums, the world's greatest drum tech Mr. Tony Adams. We're gonna do a song called "Hand Me Down." Some girl came up to the front, and the security guards were yelling out her to go sit down. She messed up my audio! Hehe...Matt starts on the slide guitar. During this song, Kyle plays the keyboard set up by his mike. At the end Rob said, "Hey everybody. This is Kyle Cook on the guitar."
"I wanna take a second really quick to just say that we all want to welcome, on his first night with us...We've had the same soundman for about the last five years or more, and tonight is our first night with someone that we are really happy to be with, who we're really confident in and we're really happy about. So if you like what you hear give a big round of applause to our new soundman Mr. (something like Jimmy Happy Buckley..lol). And if you don't, Jimmy Happy Buckley everybody!"
So then we notice it's just Kyle and Rob out there. Rob pulls his mike stand over to Kyle's and they start into "If You're Gone." So amazing! I really never liked the version on the record, but this almost made me cry! People were clapping along. Rob and Kyle singing at the end together! At the end, Rob and Kyle smiled at each other (::melt:: And they did this little knuckle, high-five thing (no idea what you would call it!) and I wasn't prepared with the camera...oh well!
"Kyle Cook on the guitar everybody! You guys are crazy! I guess that beautiful New Mexico weather does it to ya." They went into "Bright Lights." Rob does this little "Hey!" when they go into the second verse.
"We've still got so much show left. How ya feeling right now?" They went into "Bent."
"Ya know, tonight we're in Matt Beck's hometown, so tonight we're gonna let Matt pick the song. We're gonna do a cover song. But we don't know what cover song we're gonna do yet, so we're gonna let Matt decide what song we're gonna do tonight. We'll let you know though." Some deliberating...¦"That's the one I'm in the mood for. We're gonna give you guys a little Black Crowes song. Are there any Black Crowes fans in the house? This song's called 'Remedy'." I love the part were Rob says "Remedy" over and over again. He gets so into it!
After the song, Kyle's guitar tech brings out the banjo and plugs it in. Kyle steps forward and starts into "Unwell." After Kyle's banjo part, his tech brings Kyle his guitar while Rob starts singing.
"We're gonna do a song that's from our first record. It's a song that comes to ya at when hanging out in a bar, at like 2:30 in the morning. This guy up here's the man. I'm like hanging in a bar and he goes "Yeah!" So this is kinda like a sad portrait of something that goes on across America. It goes on at every like 2:15, right around closing time. So this song is called 'Back 2 Good'."
At the beginning of "Back 2 Good," Paul threw a drumstick at Adam. It didn't even come close to hitting him, but they were laughing at each other. Adam was saying something to the effect of "You're dead!" For a long time after that, Adam was smiling and shaking his head.
Next they went into "Downfall". I really love all the little sangs they have on the screen. They get faster at the end. I noticed this concert that the two big screens join together sometimes, and sometimes they move apart.
So at this point, Rob introduced his friend Pookie to everybody. He said, "Oh Pookie, Pookie!" Then they went into "You're So Real". Then Paul, Kyle, and Adam threw out some stuff to the crowd, and they went backstage. You could see Kyle's tech; he was laughing and smiling at everyone going crazy. So then the band came back out. They got situated and went into "So Sad, So Lonely".
Next they did "Long Day." They didn't do the extra verse this time though and Rob didn't talk during the song.
Rob thanked everyone and hoped that everyone had had a good time. He thanked American Hi-Fi and Sugar Ray again. He then thanked the crowd for "giving them a job." They went into "Push". During the song, Rob sang about 10 seconds of the chorus with me! I was so stoked. I was really afraid I would mess up the words though. Except it would have been funny if I had made Rob mess up. Now that would be a memory!
My favorite highlights were that I got a Kyle pic. Everyone was scrambling to find it, and my dad just happened to step on it. He didn't even know until Kim told him. He gave it to me, and Kim was bummed she didn't get it. So before they started "Remedy" Kyle threw out another one. I dug it out of the grate and gave it to her. That felt good! Even though I know she was still bummed it wasn.t one that Kyle meant particularly for her, she was happy and got a pic!
Also during one song, Adam was sitting up on the platform, and he looked over at me and smiled at me having fun...hehe. Then later he came over and posed for me to take a picture of him. I thanked him and he nodded his head. He was so great...he kept giving people pics when they asked him.
At the end, I got to talk with Kim and Susan a lot up the trek back to the cars. The trek was like two miles uphill! They were great! It's so nice to talk to obsessed people; no one else understands! I didn't talk to any other Gders, but I know there were a ton there.
So then we headed back to my grandma's house for some R and R. Being right in front of the speakers made my ears ring...lol. And by the way, standing right in front of the speakers gives the audio a screeching sound when you play it back. And there's tons of people screaming, "I love you Rob!" hehe I had a hard time sleeping too; I was still so pumped. Next, on the road to El Paso...to be continued!