Music Monday

I enjoy alliteration.

Originally, this new blog theme was going to be called New Music Monday, but since today’s band isn’t new, and “new” doesn’t start with the same letter as “music” and “Monday,” that idea has been scrapped.

Since music is such a big part of my life, I decided it needed to play a bigger role in my blog.  If my blog is any kind of reflection of me, I have to talk about music.

We all remember our first concert experience.  The excitement builds for days (or even weeks) and if you’re a girl you plan what you’re going to wear down to the last ring and fingernail polish.  The week you purchase the tickets, you listen to their album(s) for days – but you didn’t watch youtube videos of their live shows because youtube didn’t exist during your first concert.  (If it did, we’re in un-relatable generations)  During my first concert experience, I also listened to their album over and over the week and day of the concert (even though I’ve since learned NOT to do this).

For your first concert, you make sure to get there on time because you want to make sure you’re in your seat (if there are seats) so you don’t miss a single moment.  You even enjoy the opening band because they might be the first performers you’ve ever seen live (except for that rock band in your local high school that plays at the Elk’s Lodge, and that doesn’t really count).  Between bands, if you see any performer while you’re wandering around the venue, it’s “so cool!” and you stand in a line of 348646135498765 people to have them sign your ticket, even if you never heard their music before that night.

When they come on stage, you’re impressed at the lights, the colors, and the fact that the people on the stage below you are just a whole new breed – there is no way they’re the same species as you.  They’re enigmatic and you kind of set into a trance, enjoying the variations in the songs you’ve memorized and raspy realness of the voice coming through the speakers.  Each second melts into the rest as each song transitions – and all the sudden each melody is your favorite.

So maybe if the description above doesn’t reflect your first concert experience, hopefully you can relate to a metaphor or two.  That was my first concert experience.  I got to see A Perfect Circle.

A little background….I didn’t like Tool.  I was never quite into them, and still dislike them to this day.  Yes, I know I’m the only person in the world who can’t stand to listen to an album of Tool, but it’s true.  I’ve tried many times over the years to like (or even tolerate) them – thinking that if I can love APC with such a passion, that I was faking my dislike for Tool.  But, I’m not.  Don’t read: “I think Tool is a bad bad,” because that’s NOT how I feel.  They’re an incredible group of musicians who play with incredible passion – but it’s not the stuff I like to rock out to in the comfort of my own space.  My passion and love for APC had absolutely no relation to Tool.

Before blogs and Napster, new music came to South Florida via Miami radio stations.  If you liked top 40 – this was great.  If you were a little ball of rebellion with black nails, fishnet, and a passionate aversion to anything “mainstream”, you scoured the record stores for interesting looking cover art.  Mer de Noms fit this description, and $11 later I was waiting to get home and give my new treasures a shot.

I think upon first listen this was my favorite song:

But as time went on, this was my favorite:

I’m so incredibly stoked to be seeing them live TOMORROW and again on Friday.  They broke up for years, and although I was among the thousands begging for them to get back together, they finally listened 🙂

Who was your first concert?