weathermantom

Jesus fucking christ, that was an amazing show.
Summary:
It took us almost two and half hours to get there, but it was kinda fun sitting in traffic and yelling out the window to see who else was on their way to the show.

We sat down around 7:30, and I was amazed by how empty the place was. Even after Isis finished (I thought they were pretty bad; the vocals were worthless, and the music sounded kind of repetitive), the place was still mostly empty. It wasn't until ~2 seconds before Tool came on that I looked around and noticed that there were no empty seats.

I got wicked excited when the band came out on stage, but when they launched into Stinkfist, it wasn't as amazing as I had expected it to be. I enjoyed laughing at the people who sang 'I'll keep digging', though. The drum solo in Forty-Six and 2 was great; that was one of the things I had been looking forward to most. Anyway, I didn't really get into the music until 10,000 Days, at the climax ("give me my wings"). I actually thought the lasers were really neat, and was amazed at how bright they were -- a green one hit the pillar behind us, and it lit up the entire section. The non-musical highlight for me was the break, when the lighters were up in the air. Even though it was cliche, it was incredibly powerful to see the entire place alight.
I agree with everyone else who says that Lateralus should be the closing song; it felt like the end of the concert when Lateralus was over. And Jesus, that gong really is loud.
Aenema was probably tied with Lateralus for my favorite song of the night, just because it was last, and it's such a great song. And then at the end, the band hugged and the lights went down... and it was over.

The crowd was pretty good; I could hear them singing on every song (even though they were pretty quiet on songs like Rosetta Stoned or 10k Days, I loved it during Aenema, when everyone was singing at the top of their lungs). There were absolutely no assholes around me (section 5), which I appreciated. However, only three or four people knew the words to every song (myself included). It did seem to me that a lot of girls were there just to be with their boyfriends, which made me angry. I can't really judge, though, because I had to put on a preppy sweatshirt -- the only one I had that was clean -- and I probably looked just like one of those girls.


Overall, probably the best night of my entire life.