Coming of Age With Virgins

Just found this post on Blogger from 2006!

Perhaps catching myself humming ‘My Hair Had a Party Last Night’ by Trout Fishing in America sparked the need.

Maybe the constant exposure to great alternative music on satellite radio tuned me up.

Or, quite possibly, the fact that my last concert involved Lisa Loeb and a vanilla chai latte spurred me on. Both were quite tasty BTW.

Whatever the reason, I had an overwhelming urge to drag myself back into the sweaty pits of a rock show, and like a rash of poison ivy, the more I scratched - the worse the itch got.

I tried seeing the Killers in Atlantic City… too late – sold out.

Next up, Wolfmother played the Theater of the Living Arts in Philadelphia… family commitments killed that opportunity.

Finally, the Virgin Rock Festival emerged like a salve featuring Wolfmother, the Killers, and eight other acts on my ‘must see or must see again’ list.

Excited and relieved, I must have had a strange look about me because when I told Liz that I would need to leave her at home with our 3-year-old while I spent 18 hours at an outdoor concert, she didn't say a word. In fact, she didn’t even blink.

‘Ok,’ she said. “Have fun.”

I’m not so sure I did.

The bands were, for the most part, pretty good. The venue was perfect. Even the parking and shuttle services ran smoothly.

It’s just that it made me feel… old. Or, to quote my generation, “Like, you know”… 37 years old.

I arrived early, anxious to see Kasabian.

Tom Meighan of Kasabian

One of the first couple hundred people in line at 10 am, I easily made my way to the front of the main stage and found myself in the middle of a high school cliché. In front of me were the “teen girls” screaming for Anthony Kiedis fully 12 hours before he was set to take the stage.

To my right were “the jocks” observing the crowd and making insightful comments like, ‘Dude, didn’t we go to middle school with that guy?’

To my left were the “rich-kid partiers” – complete with a friend who had just thrown up on himself and passed out on the ground. Keep in mind it’s now all of 11 am.

Me: “Is that your friend?”
Teen Girl: “No, he came with him.” (points to Rich Partier)

Me to Rich Partier: “You might want to take your friend to the first aid station.”
Rich Partier: “Really?”

Me: “Yeah, he could choke the way he’s laying, and as soon as the band starts, he’s going to get trampled.”
Rich Partier: “Oh. Shit. Where is it?”
Me: “See that huge white weather balloon with a red cross? By the way, you’re probably going to need to get some help carrying him out. Drunk people weigh a ton.”

Teen Girl: “Wow. How old are you?”
Me: “In my 30’s”
Teen Girl 2: “Cool. I wish I was in my 30s.”

Teen Girl: “Would you buy me a beer?”
Teen Girl 2: “I’ll trade you for some pot if you do.”
Me: “Ummm… sorry.

”The thoughts came flying in fast… “I was never that dumb, was I?” and “I can’t believe how messed up that is.” Then again, how did I know what to do with a trashed friend in the front row of a rock concert?

Thankfully, before I could think even more like my parents, I heard the music from A Clockwork Orange kick in - Kasabian was about to take the stage

Jock 1: “Who are these guys again?”

Jock 2: “I dunno – Kashmir or something.”
Teen girl: “I love you Casbah!”
Teen Girl 2: “I want to have Anthony’s babies!”

The gifted and charismatic Tom Meighan used his stage presence to help Kasabian connect with and eventually win over the audience. I got the impression that for the majority of concert-goers, this was their first exposure to the band.

I enjoyed the performance and found myself eager to listen to some of their earlier albums. Unfortunately, the sound was murky – almost as if the board and sound engineer were having a bad day.

In addition, many of the songs, which depend heavily on rhythms and less on melody, closed oddly with seemingly half-baked jams. It sounded as if Kasabian was caught between ‘performing songs’ and using the live venue more traditionally to expand on their music.

Immediately following Kasabian’s set a noticeable buzz started and the crowd surged forward. Wolfmother was about to sink their teeth into the virgins.

While we weren’t looking, the gods of rock took a two-decade vacation.

Sure, they returned for a few weeks now and then and blessed us with some great albums and incredible artists. But let’s face it: for the better part of 20 years, the gods of rock left us listening to a pretty average amalgamation of music.

I found out where the rock gods have been. They were having sex in Australia, and their offspring are the members of Wolfmother.

I cannot find enough superlatives to describe this band. The one that comes closest is exquisite.

I found Wolfmother’s album early on and played it nonstop for months. Awash in the gorgeous music and enchanted by the lyrics, I counted the days until I saw them perform live.

The concert, if possible, was even better.

Apple Tree cut through with raw power while The White Unicorn mixed heady psychedelic guitar and lyrics. The Joker and the Thief, with its synthesizer and rhythmic guitar blend, further entranced the audience.

When they finally played Woman, it was clear that even the teenagers realized they were witnessing something special—they were so wrapped up in the show that it actually took them 20 seconds to start moshing.

As they are noted for, the band had energy to spare. Stockdale played his guitar upside down, over his head, and ended the set with a 25-foot-high guitar toss. Chris Ross moved seamlessly from synthesizer to bass and attacked both with the same intensity and vigor. Finally, Myles Heskett kept the rhythms tight and building with a perfect crescendo.

In fact, the whole performance was so tight I couldn’t believe they were still in their teens.

I’ll lay it on the line here. If Wolfmother’s sophomore effort even comes close to matching their debut album, we will have the first true power rock band to emerge since Pearl Jam. The only sour note regarding their performance involved more murky sound.

I started thinking that perhaps the murkiness was caused by my location and/or my 37-year-old ears. After all, they had taken more than their share of abuse from a decade-plus of concerts and DJing.

It was neither. The Raconteur’s sound mix was perfectly crisp. While that made me feel good about my ears, for the second time in two months, the Raconteurs did not make me feel good about being 37.

Let me explain.

A few months ago, I went into a Hot Topic store looking for a Panic! At the Disco t-shirt. (Okay, I know, going into a Hot Topic store was my first mistake.) Upon entering, I heard a song (Level) with a sweet groove and Jack White’s vocals. It was not a White Stripes song, however.

I asked a kid at the counter with a hole in his earlobe big enough to fit a corn cob if it was a new song by the Raconteurs.

“Who?” he said.

“The Raconteurs,” I replied.

Totally annoyed he went to the black box that pipes in their music. Stunned, he turned around and looked at me… “uhhh, yeah it is.” Perhaps it was my RL polo shirt and khaki slacks that threw him off but he was visibly shaken that this ‘old dude’ knew of a band he had never heard before

I was equally shaken that he hadn’t heard of the band, and unfortunately for the Raconteurs, neither had the kids at the festival.

The Raconteurs came out with a strike against them – no one around me knew their music. The second strike was the unevenness of their set. In this case, Generation X-Box only gave them two strikes. While the Raconteur’s sound was crisp, the crowd was not impressed. For example:

- Teenagers quickly started body surfing their way to the sides to exit the performance.
- The high school partiers used the set to switch between getting stoned and moshing (a mix more lethal than a speedball I would think.)
- The jocks were trying to figure out who the band was and why they were invited

What was more frustrating than the lack of interest in the band was the fact that I had to spend ½ of my time looking over my shoulder to avoid having a body surfer drop on my head. Now, before I sound too much like an old fart, please be advised that I and some friends *may have started the mosh pit that instigated the great mud fight with Green Day at Woodstock.

That said, at Woodstock, I spent 90% of my time enjoying the artists on the stage—not worrying about having some over-sexed teenage girl crash down on my wrist and hyper-extend my thumb.

For their part, the Raconteurs sounded great. Jack White, arguably as intense as Billy Corrigan on stage placed the band on his broad shoulders and gave an incredible performance. Unfortunately for the band, the music didn’t connect with the audience.

Jack White of The Raconteurs

Sandwiched between rabid Wolfmother fans and groupies for pop acts like Gnarls Barkley and the Killers, the Raconteurs fell as flat as a college kid body surfing in steel-toed work boots (what the hell was he thinking anyway?)

So, one screwed-up thumb, a bruised nose, and two shattered sunglass lenses later, the Raconteurs ended their set.

To be honest, I couldn’t have been more grateful.

Driving down to the show at 5:30 a.m., I had the good fortune to observe the sunrise. Unlike a sunset, where the earth darkens gracefully, a sunrise is uneven in its composition. You blink, and it’s as if the day has become three keys brighter instead of just one.

Much like a sunrise, most festivals progress in a similar manner. The bands generally improve in large degrees as the day moves on. This was not the case at the Virgin festival where the early morning stars of Wolfmother outshone their afternoon rock peers.

The Killers were perhaps the biggest disappointment. Don’t get me wrong. They weren’t bad. I just expected so much more from them as performers and their new album. Specifically, I went to the festival expecting two things from the Killers:

One, they would rock out their infectious and addicting songs from Hot Fuss.
Two, they would debut great new music from their upcoming album Sam’s Town.

I didn’t expect their set to be so… forgettable.

Now, before I go into detail, I have to disclose a couple of things.

At this point, the body surfing was out of control. It was so bad that I had to pack my camera for virtually the entire performance. Accordingly, I and the people around me were very distracted, keeping bodies from crashing to the ground and our skulls from getting cracked.

Also, the amount of weed in the air from the high school partiers was so thick it may have impacted my opinion of the show.

Oh, and I had a serious issue getting over the fact that Ronnie Vannucci, the drummer, looked like the guy from Earl on TV.

As for the Killer’s set, as expected, they covered a lot of material from Hot Fuss and Sam’s Town.

The music from Hot Fuss was done extremely well. In fact, Jenny was a Friend of Mine, and All These Things were flat-out spectacular. Besides a few vocal hiccups, Brandon Flowers sounded great, and the band was tight.

However, the on-stage performance for these songs was lame—really lame. In fact, I got more excited watching Dave Navarro and Brook Burke exchange pleasantries during the opening of Rock Star Supernova.

How bad was it?

- The camera guy kept focusing on the crystal ball on Flowers’ synth set-up as it was more interesting than anything going on onstage.
- The big finish included Flowers climbing on the piano with the mic. (ooohhh… ahhhh….)
- The woman beside me (when not avoiding body surfers) spent her time identifying celebrity look-alikes in the audience and band. (I am now cursed seeing the aforementioned Earl, and have images of Brandon Flowers with his mustache as Freddie Mercury)

Speaking of lame. Based on what I heard at the show, Sam’s Town will be disappointing. Unlike the tracks on Hot Fuss that were instantly recognizable and singable, the songs from Sam’s Town were as forgettable as the Killers' on-stage performance.

As the Killers departed, so did a number of the teenagers. This meant only one thing… The Who was waiting in the wings, and the teens needed more beer before the Red Hot Chili Peppers came on.

Two great things occurred when the roadies for the Who came on stage.

One, I felt instantly young. I swear half of the guys tuning the instruments had been with The Who at the original Woodstock. Two, I got to hear The Who’s music in the context of some of the best-selling, hottest modern rock going.

It more than held its own. It rocked.

For me, their performance of Won’t Get Fooled Again was the hallmark of the day. Artfully set against striking peace graphics without being overtly political, Daltrey and Townshend powered through an utterly unforgettable, passionate performance.

With a library of musical masterpieces known by everyone ages 16 to 66 The Who could have easily stayed with a greatest hits approach. And while they included classics such as Baba O’ Reilly they also mixed in a variety of songs, such as works from Tommy, to keep diehard Who fans content.

To be fair, they did lose the teenagers at this point, and I swear they accidentally hit an auto-bodysurf button as soon as Pinball Wizard drew to a close, but for the most part, there was relative calm and respect during their set.

If I had to find any areas for improvement in their performance, I would pick on one fine point. As much as I love Townshend’s trademark windmill, it seemed quite a bit overdone—I would even say staged.

The Trademark Windmill of Pete Townshend

When I saw the Who on their first final farewell tour the windmill was used sparingly and to punctuate important moments or out of Townshend’s raw energy/ expression. Not so this time – it was done because it had to be done.

Along the same lines, when you attack guitar strings, there is an angry bite to the sound. That sound was missing in the mix. In fact, there was no audible change at all when he would wind up and crash the strings. It was almost as if the engineer had knocked his guitar all of the way down.

Like I said, minutia.

In the end, despite their age, the fact that just two original members were on stage and that they were playing to a crowd that could say, “Dude, The Who is my dad’s favorite band,” the band proved that great songwriting is ageless.

They showed that getting on stage and performing is an art. They commanded the young and old alike – and those of us coming of age.

When the Who’s set was done, the crowd surged forward with the power of a volcanic eruption. The Chili Peppers were next, and certain teenage girls were more than ready to see them.

This time, I didn’t have it in me. I didn’t want to get hit on the head anymore. I missed my family. I was hungry, and damn it, if my left calf muscle wasn’t cramping up.

Like a salmon swimming upstream, I fought my way out of the pit and eventually found myself on the shuttle back to my car.

On the bus were a couple of 30-somethings.

Me: “Not sticking around for the Peppers?”
Woman 1: “Nah, we got tired of getting jostled. It was just getting too nuts down there."
Man 1: “It’s not the getting hit that bothers me, it’s the fact that they don’t apologize. It’s like they are entitled to smack into you.”

Me: “I’ve seen the Peppers a couple of times already and everytime Kiedis disappoints me. The band’s always great but I swear he can’t sing on key.”
Man 1: “I wasn’t that impressed the one time I saw them.”
Woman 1: “We decided just to go home and have sex.”

I smiled. You know what? The virgins can keep their festival.