US trip part III: Red Scare

Saturday October 25th

Saturday was the day of the big 10th anniversary Red Scare show. In preparation for it, we did nothing in the morning. Just taking it easy. Vic, Blakes dad came and picked us up and after unsuccessfully trying to find an open post office, we went to the Metro. Lots of familiar faces as soon as we walk up. I get my stuff sorted out and check out the venue. Old theater it seems, with an upstairs balcony. The room is wider than deep. Probably 1000 people capacity, its full even though not completely sold out. We missed the first band (I saw like the last song) so the Brokedowns are up next.

The venue runs on the dreaded “First three songs, no flash” rule. That’s how long the photographers are allowed to shoot from the pit. It’s a standard procedure for a venue like this. I could go on a long rant, but whatever. The pit sucked anyways. Narrow, filled with things to stumble over, blocked by stairs at any side, and only like two security guys for the entire thing. This will be problematic later, but for now I just get used to this.

Blake knows a good restaurant a little down the street, that’s where we head next. As you may or may not know, I’m somewhat weird about food. Yet somehow this restaurant has one item on the menu that pretty much has everything on it, that I would eat anyways. That’s never happened to me before. It was good too and very filling. Missed more bands for that, got to take one photo of Direct Hit at least.

The rest of the evening is me going into the photo pit at the beginning of each set, then either see them from the back or balcony, or go outside and talk to people. Facorite sets? Teenage Bottlerocket were fun, they were one of the highlights. We had to leave the pit early for Masked Intruder, at least it got me a bunch of shots from the audience. The Lillingstons were the main reason for me to go and they didn’t disappoint! Throughout their set all they used was red light, and cameras hate that. You know how sometimes photographers convert their photos to black and white, because they couldn’t nail the exposure? Yup, one of these nights. For the Falcon we were kicked out of the pit after just one song. Seriously, what the fuck? The venue needs a proper pit, or just allow people to shoot whatever. Good show. We left kinda early cause Vic and Blake are flying to Florida tonight (They are already there as I type this). And now there’s another secret Lillingtons show announced for today. Yes yes yes!

The Falcon