Throwdown, Bury Your Dead, For Today, and a gazillion opening bands...
So this is the first time I've seen Bury Your Dead since March '08 - I know this because I update every time I see them. This is clearly too long, but I'm told it shouldn't be that long until they come back to Detroit. Yay!
So I decided screw it, I'm just going to Detroit by myself. I had bought my ticket practically when they went on sale, hoping someone would want to come with me, but no luck. Anyway, after lots of googling and making my plan of attack, I headed out at 4, which should have given me a spare 15 minutes to hang out in the cold. So I'm driving down 96, I figure I won't take the express lanes because although I'm 98% sure the 94 exit is past them, I don't want to miss it and have to figure out where to go in downtown Detroit. But SURPRISE! Guess what's closed? ALL of 96 East. So they force us off at Grand River, and there are signs for the detour, but only like every three miles. So I'm freaking out, driving through the ghetto (seriously, there were dudes possibly do a drug deal out of their Escalade as I drove by). Then I see normal signs for 96, but I'm in the wrong lane to turn, and then suddenly there's 94 so I jump two lanes and turn left and I'm cool again. Except that it's already 5 - aka doors. Arrrrg. But I'm just so happy I know where I am that I almost don't care.
So then I finally get to my exit, and yay there's still spots in the random shady lot behind Harpo's, and there aren't that many people in line. I decide to wear my hoodie in, which was the best idea ever, as it was freezing both inside and outside - I was literally uncontrollably shivering. We had to go through a metal detector, and I got my wristband, and then headed in. Harpo's is the strangest venue ever - there's like, multiple lobby things, and layers of floors. So I hung out on the disco floor at a table, where I could see the stage and the actual main floor. This turned out to be a good plan, because there were SEVEN opening bands. Seriously. It was awful. During the 3rd band I was like, 'eff this' and went a got a beer. That is one thing they do right - it was only $3, as opposed to $9. And then I went back to my seat for a gazillion more shitty opening bands. Honestly, about 2 were decent. The first one was fine, but on the second stage, the second one was sloppy hardcore, the third one was more decent, the fourth was a bunch of 14 year olds pretending to be Between the Buried and Me, the firth was decent again, the 6th was GOD AWFUL 40 year olds playing shitty metal that ended with falsetto - and not even good falsetto. By the 7th I was just like what. the. fuck. (And went to the bathroom. Poor choice.)
But then For Today's drums came out, so I went down to the floor. This is why I will never go back to Harpo's - the stage was like, 6.5' tall, so I had to do some physics and figure out where I could stand to actually see anything that wasn't right above me. (I didn't really, but that would be cool). Except that it turned out to be not For Today, but For the Fallen Dreams, who had come over from Canada because of the two bands dropping off the tour. So they were pretty decent but honestly WHY ARE THERE SO MANY BANDS I JUST WANT THE HEADLINERS MRAW.
So they had another opening band play while For Today got set up, but then finally a band I've listened to started! For Today is awesome awesome awesome, they are so metal but also super Christian and they make me super happy. So they played Saul of Tarus (The Messenger), Joel (The Watchman), Ezekiel (The Visionary),Isaiah (The Willing) and Agape. Probably more, but I didn't listen to them enough beforehand to recognize them. Fail on me. During the set some dudes started fighting, and the lead singer started yelling at them and told us if there was another fight they were leaving, because we were all family and we should love each other. The crowd was surprisingly into it. And then a guy with a drum stick waved over the cute bassist to sign it, so I went over and told him they were awesome, and he gave me a high five. Which was tricky, as my hand barely cleared the stage.
And then... we waited for Bury Your Dead to come out! I was trying to plot where Bubble was going to be, as he doesn't sing, and there were microphones set up all over. But then the lights went out and music started coming on - NOT Losin' It, which was sad, but some random mishmash of stuff. Definitely not as cool. Anyway, I just stood in the middle, close to the stage, and gave my neck a workout trying to see. So Myke and Slim came out and they opened with Broken Body, off their newest one - one of the three that I know off that cd, because ... well, it doesn't suck, but it's SO different from their other stuff it depresses me to listen to it. Anyway, it's very difficult to see anything besides Myke and whatever guitarist you're in front of, but I realized that the bassist wasn't Bubble - SAD! So that was a bit worrying.
They luckily played a really good mix of songs. I definitely don't remember the order, but they played Hurting Not Helping and Without You off It's Nothing Personal, Sympathy Orchestra, Fever Dream, and maybe Disposably Yours from Bury Your Dead, House of Straw and Twelfth Stroke of Midnight from Beauty and the Breakdown, and Vanilla Sky, Eyes Wide Shut, and the Color of Money from Cover Your Tracks. Throughout the whole thing, I had this cute little scene kid bouncing around next to me - there was like a line of us at the front, and then people being douchbags aka hardcore dancing behind us, and then people standing on the sides past where the stage was.
Even with the ridiculous stage height, Myke still managed to try and work the crowd. He shoved the mic down to us, took my hand for a little bit, and sat on the edge of the stage for Hurting Not Helping. Chris also sat down on the edge for a bit, right in front of me, but not for long - I suppose guitar is trickier with people grabbing at your legs. They got a Wall of Death going, which was fine as I was in front of it, but it turned into crazy moshing and I caught an elbow to my side that left me gasping - seriously had to tell myself to breath, it hurt so bad. Luckily no lasting damage, just kind of hid behind the bouncer for a moment. The bouncers were somewhat obnoxious, though, once definitely got a good grab of my stomach when he wanted to get past me. Grar. Anyway, Myke actually came down onto the floor for Color of Money, which was slightly deadly, and then the band ran through quickly guarded by the bouncers, which was cute. So Myke got back up on stage, and then ended up kneeling down and leaning towards us to finish the song, and he like, ruffled my hair or something. Ha, it sounds weird typing it out, but it was awesome. They ended with Losin' It, thankfully, with all us of piling up and screaming it at the mic, which then ended up in the crowd so Myke had to use Slim's.
So that was the set! And then Myke hopped off stage and went to the merch table, but I stuck around for Throwdown. Chris came back out to hand out water bottles, and I waved for one (so much talking about waving, but honestly, I doubt they would even know I was there otherwise). Another guy went over, too, and grabbed at his hand, but Chris shook him off and handed me a guitar pick. So that was cool, apparently he could see me! And I thanked him and told him how amazing they were.
Aaaand then waiting around for Throwdown. Again, I love their old stuff, but haven't really listened to the two new ones - I preordered Venom and Tears and that was a mistake. But they were definitely a huge part of me getting into hardcore, and I needed to hear 'Forever' - still want that tattoo. So they finally got set up, and they came out to Intro (Never Back Down). Dave is pretty intimidating. He's not large, but I would not want to mess with that guy. I was standing to the left this time, but ended up moving closer as they played some old stuff. They did Nothing Left and Forever from Haymaker, Vendetta and Burn from Vendetta, at least Holy Roller and SCUM from Venom and Tears, and This Continuum from Deathless.
At some point this dude, who was probably pretty wasted, pointed to me and this other girls and was all like, 'rock on mrrraw' which was annoying, especially since the other girl spent the whole time epically headbanging by bending at the waist and flinging her hair around like some hair metal band - but taking twice as long, so she was totally not on beat. Arrrrrg! Dude then tried to jump on stage, and the bouncers pulled him off, so he fell backwards on his ass and then his head... his friends tried to get him out of there after that, thankfully. Throwdown closed with Forever, which was awesome awesome awesome and we were all piling up and screaming it again. That song is just so epic.
And then I headed over to the merch tables, and there's Myke still there. And he says "Hey you! How've you been? Come over here and give me a hug!" And he steps out from behind the table and gives me a hug, and we talk a bit about how long it's been, and I tell him how great they are and they're my favorite live band, and he puts his arms out like all 'woo!" and says "I'll take that!" Then other people leaving the floor start talking to him as they walk out, and this group of guys gets a picture with him, with like, 19 different cameras, and they think they're done and this bitch just commands "ONE MORE" and I'm like, hey, manners. But then Myke turns back to me, and we keep talking. He says Bubble is working the Hatebreed/Unearth tour, so it was just the the tours didn't work out right. And that BYD is coming back in February, so I'll get to see them again. And the whole time he's like, holding my hand, or whatever, and then finally I ask if he's selling merch, so he passes me over to the merch girl, but says something like "Take care, darling, thanks for coming out" and gives me another hug and I tell him I'll see him later.
And then I get a shirt from the merch girl, and Slim shows up. So I wait while he signs something for another guy, who feels the need to tell him his life story of metal, and then I finally get to talk to him. I've never talked to Slim before, so I just tell him how awesome they are and I love them so much, so he says "Aw, thanks, sweetheart, c'mere and give me a hug," so yay! And then we're talking about when they're coming back, and he says it'll probably be at the Magic Stick, which is even better! So I tell him I'll see them there, and go to get a For Today shirt, and tell the merch guys how they blew my mind. Unfortunately they didn't have any smalls inside of the hoodie I wanted, so one of them goes out to the trailer to get them, so I ended up talking to the other merch guy for like, a good 10 minutes, about Detroit being scary, and the crazy transmission problems of the tour, and whatever I could think of because waiting in silence was awkward. Finally the other guy comes back, but by then I'm locked in, so I have to go out the band exit, which the other merch guys assures me is 'perfectly safe'. Ha. And my car is still there!
So I head home, get stopped at a red light, and the guys in the car next to me are all waving their fingers at me, so I'm just praying for the light to change. And then I get on 94 and I'm home free! Today I'm just totally sore, and my knee hurts when I touch it, but no new bruises to report. I do have two wristbands now, so that's exciting! So that's BYD number five, tying them in second with My American Heart. Can't wait for February/March!
So I decided screw it, I'm just going to Detroit by myself. I had bought my ticket practically when they went on sale, hoping someone would want to come with me, but no luck. Anyway, after lots of googling and making my plan of attack, I headed out at 4, which should have given me a spare 15 minutes to hang out in the cold. So I'm driving down 96, I figure I won't take the express lanes because although I'm 98% sure the 94 exit is past them, I don't want to miss it and have to figure out where to go in downtown Detroit. But SURPRISE! Guess what's closed? ALL of 96 East. So they force us off at Grand River, and there are signs for the detour, but only like every three miles. So I'm freaking out, driving through the ghetto (seriously, there were dudes possibly do a drug deal out of their Escalade as I drove by). Then I see normal signs for 96, but I'm in the wrong lane to turn, and then suddenly there's 94 so I jump two lanes and turn left and I'm cool again. Except that it's already 5 - aka doors. Arrrrg. But I'm just so happy I know where I am that I almost don't care.
So then I finally get to my exit, and yay there's still spots in the random shady lot behind Harpo's, and there aren't that many people in line. I decide to wear my hoodie in, which was the best idea ever, as it was freezing both inside and outside - I was literally uncontrollably shivering. We had to go through a metal detector, and I got my wristband, and then headed in. Harpo's is the strangest venue ever - there's like, multiple lobby things, and layers of floors. So I hung out on the disco floor at a table, where I could see the stage and the actual main floor. This turned out to be a good plan, because there were SEVEN opening bands. Seriously. It was awful. During the 3rd band I was like, 'eff this' and went a got a beer. That is one thing they do right - it was only $3, as opposed to $9. And then I went back to my seat for a gazillion more shitty opening bands. Honestly, about 2 were decent. The first one was fine, but on the second stage, the second one was sloppy hardcore, the third one was more decent, the fourth was a bunch of 14 year olds pretending to be Between the Buried and Me, the firth was decent again, the 6th was GOD AWFUL 40 year olds playing shitty metal that ended with falsetto - and not even good falsetto. By the 7th I was just like what. the. fuck. (And went to the bathroom. Poor choice.)
But then For Today's drums came out, so I went down to the floor. This is why I will never go back to Harpo's - the stage was like, 6.5' tall, so I had to do some physics and figure out where I could stand to actually see anything that wasn't right above me. (I didn't really, but that would be cool). Except that it turned out to be not For Today, but For the Fallen Dreams, who had come over from Canada because of the two bands dropping off the tour. So they were pretty decent but honestly WHY ARE THERE SO MANY BANDS I JUST WANT THE HEADLINERS MRAW.
So they had another opening band play while For Today got set up, but then finally a band I've listened to started! For Today is awesome awesome awesome, they are so metal but also super Christian and they make me super happy. So they played Saul of Tarus (The Messenger), Joel (The Watchman), Ezekiel (The Visionary),Isaiah (The Willing) and Agape. Probably more, but I didn't listen to them enough beforehand to recognize them. Fail on me. During the set some dudes started fighting, and the lead singer started yelling at them and told us if there was another fight they were leaving, because we were all family and we should love each other. The crowd was surprisingly into it. And then a guy with a drum stick waved over the cute bassist to sign it, so I went over and told him they were awesome, and he gave me a high five. Which was tricky, as my hand barely cleared the stage.
And then... we waited for Bury Your Dead to come out! I was trying to plot where Bubble was going to be, as he doesn't sing, and there were microphones set up all over. But then the lights went out and music started coming on - NOT Losin' It, which was sad, but some random mishmash of stuff. Definitely not as cool. Anyway, I just stood in the middle, close to the stage, and gave my neck a workout trying to see. So Myke and Slim came out and they opened with Broken Body, off their newest one - one of the three that I know off that cd, because ... well, it doesn't suck, but it's SO different from their other stuff it depresses me to listen to it. Anyway, it's very difficult to see anything besides Myke and whatever guitarist you're in front of, but I realized that the bassist wasn't Bubble - SAD! So that was a bit worrying.
They luckily played a really good mix of songs. I definitely don't remember the order, but they played Hurting Not Helping and Without You off It's Nothing Personal, Sympathy Orchestra, Fever Dream, and maybe Disposably Yours from Bury Your Dead, House of Straw and Twelfth Stroke of Midnight from Beauty and the Breakdown, and Vanilla Sky, Eyes Wide Shut, and the Color of Money from Cover Your Tracks. Throughout the whole thing, I had this cute little scene kid bouncing around next to me - there was like a line of us at the front, and then people being douchbags aka hardcore dancing behind us, and then people standing on the sides past where the stage was.
Even with the ridiculous stage height, Myke still managed to try and work the crowd. He shoved the mic down to us, took my hand for a little bit, and sat on the edge of the stage for Hurting Not Helping. Chris also sat down on the edge for a bit, right in front of me, but not for long - I suppose guitar is trickier with people grabbing at your legs. They got a Wall of Death going, which was fine as I was in front of it, but it turned into crazy moshing and I caught an elbow to my side that left me gasping - seriously had to tell myself to breath, it hurt so bad. Luckily no lasting damage, just kind of hid behind the bouncer for a moment. The bouncers were somewhat obnoxious, though, once definitely got a good grab of my stomach when he wanted to get past me. Grar. Anyway, Myke actually came down onto the floor for Color of Money, which was slightly deadly, and then the band ran through quickly guarded by the bouncers, which was cute. So Myke got back up on stage, and then ended up kneeling down and leaning towards us to finish the song, and he like, ruffled my hair or something. Ha, it sounds weird typing it out, but it was awesome. They ended with Losin' It, thankfully, with all us of piling up and screaming it at the mic, which then ended up in the crowd so Myke had to use Slim's.
So that was the set! And then Myke hopped off stage and went to the merch table, but I stuck around for Throwdown. Chris came back out to hand out water bottles, and I waved for one (so much talking about waving, but honestly, I doubt they would even know I was there otherwise). Another guy went over, too, and grabbed at his hand, but Chris shook him off and handed me a guitar pick. So that was cool, apparently he could see me! And I thanked him and told him how amazing they were.
Aaaand then waiting around for Throwdown. Again, I love their old stuff, but haven't really listened to the two new ones - I preordered Venom and Tears and that was a mistake. But they were definitely a huge part of me getting into hardcore, and I needed to hear 'Forever' - still want that tattoo. So they finally got set up, and they came out to Intro (Never Back Down). Dave is pretty intimidating. He's not large, but I would not want to mess with that guy. I was standing to the left this time, but ended up moving closer as they played some old stuff. They did Nothing Left and Forever from Haymaker, Vendetta and Burn from Vendetta, at least Holy Roller and SCUM from Venom and Tears, and This Continuum from Deathless.
At some point this dude, who was probably pretty wasted, pointed to me and this other girls and was all like, 'rock on mrrraw' which was annoying, especially since the other girl spent the whole time epically headbanging by bending at the waist and flinging her hair around like some hair metal band - but taking twice as long, so she was totally not on beat. Arrrrrg! Dude then tried to jump on stage, and the bouncers pulled him off, so he fell backwards on his ass and then his head... his friends tried to get him out of there after that, thankfully. Throwdown closed with Forever, which was awesome awesome awesome and we were all piling up and screaming it again. That song is just so epic.
And then I headed over to the merch tables, and there's Myke still there. And he says "Hey you! How've you been? Come over here and give me a hug!" And he steps out from behind the table and gives me a hug, and we talk a bit about how long it's been, and I tell him how great they are and they're my favorite live band, and he puts his arms out like all 'woo!" and says "I'll take that!" Then other people leaving the floor start talking to him as they walk out, and this group of guys gets a picture with him, with like, 19 different cameras, and they think they're done and this bitch just commands "ONE MORE" and I'm like, hey, manners. But then Myke turns back to me, and we keep talking. He says Bubble is working the Hatebreed/Unearth tour, so it was just the the tours didn't work out right. And that BYD is coming back in February, so I'll get to see them again. And the whole time he's like, holding my hand, or whatever, and then finally I ask if he's selling merch, so he passes me over to the merch girl, but says something like "Take care, darling, thanks for coming out" and gives me another hug and I tell him I'll see him later.
And then I get a shirt from the merch girl, and Slim shows up. So I wait while he signs something for another guy, who feels the need to tell him his life story of metal, and then I finally get to talk to him. I've never talked to Slim before, so I just tell him how awesome they are and I love them so much, so he says "Aw, thanks, sweetheart, c'mere and give me a hug," so yay! And then we're talking about when they're coming back, and he says it'll probably be at the Magic Stick, which is even better! So I tell him I'll see them there, and go to get a For Today shirt, and tell the merch guys how they blew my mind. Unfortunately they didn't have any smalls inside of the hoodie I wanted, so one of them goes out to the trailer to get them, so I ended up talking to the other merch guy for like, a good 10 minutes, about Detroit being scary, and the crazy transmission problems of the tour, and whatever I could think of because waiting in silence was awkward. Finally the other guy comes back, but by then I'm locked in, so I have to go out the band exit, which the other merch guys assures me is 'perfectly safe'. Ha. And my car is still there!
So I head home, get stopped at a red light, and the guys in the car next to me are all waving their fingers at me, so I'm just praying for the light to change. And then I get on 94 and I'm home free! Today I'm just totally sore, and my knee hurts when I touch it, but no new bruises to report. I do have two wristbands now, so that's exciting! So that's BYD number five, tying them in second with My American Heart. Can't wait for February/March!