steppin' out with frantic666

maandag 12 juli 2010

who needs greedy record companies...

... when then fans themselves come up with this:

donderdag 8 juli 2010

ROCK WERCHTER 2010: GREEN DAY, THE GASLIGHT ANTHEM, EDITORS... Werchter (BEL) July 2, 2010

The second day of the Rock Werchter Festival (the only day I attended), ended up in a recordbreaking day: it was the hottest festival day ever. The day before, I drove to Amsterdam, straight after work, to see The Gaslight Anthem's club show at Melkweg (see previous blog). After that concert, I drove back to Belgium and had to get up at 6:30am again to get to work again for a few hours before I'd move on to Rock Werchter.

All forecasts predicted the hottest day of the year so far. And for once, they weren't wrong. I parked my car, did the 30 minute walk to the festival grounds and it was terrible. I was thinking how anyone could be shaking and dancing with that heat, let alone how 80000 people could do that all smashed together on a meadow in the burning sun. At the entrance there was a temperature clock that said: 38°c. It was 1:20pm, which meant the worst had yet to come.

Everytime I enter Rock Werchter, I'm amazed how professional the whole thing is. It really is the best organized festival in the world. At every drinks/food tickets counter, you could pay with your bank card. Because of extreme heat, tapwater was made available for free. I had a few bottle caps with me, so when I got drinks and they removed the caps, I could use mine. Very handy if you're planning on staying in the pit for a long time.
My first real goal was gonna be Rise Against at the mainstage, but the scedule didn't match with "my main band" of the day The Gaslight Anthem. If I wasn't able to the see complete Rise Against show in front, I wasn't gonna see them at all. It gave me some extra time to get to Pyramid Marquee early for Gaslight's gig. I got a center front row spot and didn't want to give that up so I also saw the whole concert of The Morning Benders. It was a decent show, with a typical lazy sunny afternoon feel to it. I was hoping that would change when The Gaslight Anthem was on because last year at Dour, the band was playing a fantastic set and there were hardly any people at the mainstage, and only a few seemed to 'get' what they were about.

Anyway, Gaslight takes the stage and only the front really responds to the band. The rest of the Marquee seemed to just stand there and check them out if they were cool. There was so much energy onstage that by the 3rd song the whole Marquee joined in the cheering. VICTORY. Apart from the first 2 songs, there seems to be no system in the setlist which is great too. Lots of different songs and orders again. Last song was Drive and it was a request from the front row. Belgium is finally ready for Gaslight. I hope, Belgium might also very quickly forget, especially because their fantastic performance got 0 media attention on TV. Booh.

After the concert, my plan was to eat and move on to the mainstage pit for Paramore and 30 Seconds To Mars. I decided to skip that plan and catch some rest and occasionally some shade near the food stands. It's simply impossible to be in there in the bright sun for so many hours and with limited drinks.
I watched half of the Paramore show and half of the 30 Seconds To Mars show from a big distance in the back. It seemed all pretty decent, but average.

If I wanted to see Green Day from really close, I would have to be in the pit for Editors too. Not a problem at all because I love Editors, especially the latest album. Editors played a wonderful set, and it's clear that Belgium is Editors country: Papillon -with pyro- was definitely one of the greatest moments of the day.

Everybody's talking good things about the Green Day show and their concert was voted the 2nd best of the whole 4 days (after no1 Muse, who played on the first day). I thought it was a fantastic show, but the one in Antwerp had a lot more pace and continuity. On the other hand, this Werchter setlist a whole FUCKING lot better than the one from Antwerp. The Werchter setlist contained 1hour and 10 minutes of pre-American Idiot songs, including 2000 Lightyears Away and Welcome To Paradise from the album Kerplunk! From the album Dookie, we got Basket Case, When I Come Around, She, Longview. and Burnout! Another of my GD-favorites was Nice Guys Finish Last. All this was great but there was too much breaks between songs and in the songs for audience participation. I can't count how many fans ended up onstage for singing along, stagediving, receiving a guitar, dancing. It's great to watch and it gave me goose bumps many times, but it there was a bit too much of the good stuff.
But I had a lot of fun as usual and nobody else seemed to mind the crazyness onstage. Green Day ended up being one of the Werchter winners. If you're voted higher than other headliners Rammstein, Pear Jam, Editors, Pink, Alice In Chains, Them Crooked Vultures, you did really well.

My 1 hour drive home was hell. At 15 minutes before I would be home, I had to stop and catch some sleep. My legs cramped up, and singing along with the cdplayer didn't work either because my lips refused to move. My body just said it had enough over the passed 2 days. I decided to save my life and stop, even though I was so close to home.

Werchter 2010 : hotter than hell.

Pictures below, scroll further down for my video's
All the videos at my Youtube channel:
www.youtube.com/frantiek

The Gaslight Anthem at the Marquee

Editors, main stage

Green Day, main stage

Green Day: 2000 Lightyears Away

Editors: Papillon

The Gaslight Anthem: The Boxer

Lots of concerts can still be viewed here:
http://www.skynet.be/generation-nl/festivals/vod/Rock+Werchter

zaterdag 3 juli 2010

THE GASLIGHT ANTHEM @ Melkweg Amsterdam (NET), July 1 2010

This is a heavy touring week. I only got back from London on Sunday evening and got back to work on Monday. On Wednesday, I was supposed to go to Antwerp to see KMFDM at Trix Club, but I skipped that. What lies ahead is too exhausting, especially because I have to drive to work every morning on weekdays. I'm doing all this in between and with the extreme heat that all wheatherforecast are announcing, I decided to focus a 110% on The Gaslight part of this.
On Thursday morning, I felt fully recovered and totally ready for it.

I left work an hour early and started my drive to Amsterdam shortly after 3pm. It was very hot, over 30°C, and July 1, which means a lot of people leaving for their holiday vacation. To my surprise, there was absolutely NO traffic jams from Brussels all the way to Amsterdam. Lucky I'm driving in a north direction. On the opposite south direction of the highway I saw enourmous jams.
I enterred Amsterdam around 5.30pm and there, hell broke loose: I arrived when everybody left work. It took me another hour to do the final 5 miles. I got sick of the traffic and saw on the map that I was pretty close to the venue. I decided to not look any further and just park my car in the first available spot. That took me about 5 seconds. I parked near the water, but hey, in Amsterdam, everything is near the water. I had about 90 minutes before the doors opened. I actually didn't expect arriving so soon here, so I took my lunch and placed myself on a bench near the water to have a city pic nic. Summertime is great. The walk to the venue was a lot shorter than I thought: not even 10 minutes. I decided to take the extra time and do some more walking. I walked around but stayed close to the venue because there's a lot in the neigbourhood anyway: the Paradiso and Leidseplein with all the bars in full World Cup frenzy, only day before the Netherlands Vs Brazil. I had a drink in a rock n' roll bar there, and yes, this toilet is the no 3 on my list (see previous blog).

The venue is called the Melkweg and I've been here before for Bullet For My Valentine and I saw Corrosion Of Conformity in the small room in '96. I love this venue and its location is great, just around the corner of Leidseplein and still it looks like it's in a quiet neighbourhood.
Another thing that wasn't really a luxury today: the airco at the Melkweg was perfect. It was cool and stayed like that pretty much all through the show, even thought the gig was sold out.
I dislike the extra high stage there and decided to go for a great front row view on the balcony. After a while I changed my mind and got back to front row because I that's where I belong and I was already on the balcony at the Brixton Academy. The extra high stage had an advantage too: no crush barriers and no front stage security. Just like Trix Club, the first half meter of the stage belongs to the fans.

Twin Atlantic was support band again, and even though I didn't like them at Brixton, I thought they did a good job here. Still far from a fan though, but hey, respect for the good performance, even though nobody seemed to pay any attention apart from a fan or 3 right behind me.
That all changed after the break when lights dimmed for The Gaslight Anthem. Holland is Springsteen country and that showed: people of all ages and everybody knew the words and sang along to each and every song, even in the first half of the set where the pace was a lot slower than the second half. In the first half, there were a lot more new songs from American Slang and The '59 Sound, but in the second part, there was a lot more from Sink Or Swim, and Senor And The Queen. Hardly anything for the new album towards the end. The second half was one big explosion of energy with its peak during the Pearl Jam cover State Of Love And Trust.
Sweaty smaller club gigs are different from bigger venues and Gaslight seems to get that. It resulted in a totally different setlist from the one at the Brixton Academy. Different order and a lot of different songs. The encreasing of the pace is also something you can do for your hardcore fans only.
My personal highlights: again 'Blue Jeans And White T-Shirts', 'Boomboxes And Dictionaries' and wow to: 'We're Getting A Divorce, You Keep The Diner' and the Pearl Jam cover.

After the gig, there was no time to hang around and just as I was about to turn my back to the stage to leave the front row, a roadie puts a guitar pick of Brian Fallon in my hands. It says 'Spirit Of Jazz', which is a song of the latest album. Thanks a lot, Mr Roadie-Of-Brian!

The drive home went as smooth as the drive to Amsterdam. Isn't it great to drive at night with your car windows down and a strong gas station coffee and some water in the cupholders? Again: hot summer nights are so cool. And this band is the perfect soundtrack to that.

Pics below, scroll down for videos.
All the videos at my Youtube Channel: www.youtube.com/frantiek

The city picnic view