Ramblings From Justin Penney

Probably slightly unbelievable but until this past Sunday I had never seen Social Distortion. My friend Nathan invited me last week! Awesome friend!

The tickets said 7:00 p.m. but Nathan said that he always missed the opener when he showed up a ticket time so we got to the Beaumont Club at 6:00. It was lightly raining, annoying but not unbearable. After many false alarms of people walking toward the door two security guys finally come out. They of course won't let us in, but they will go ahead and check ID and give out the alcohol bracelets. At this point the rain is bad. We are already soaked and cold and these jackasses wouldn't even let us into the foyer area.

During this time there is some sound checking by Social D, then a long pause, then another quick line check, followed by another. The last one has a short sound check. So at 7:25 we're drenched and they let us in. We head up to the elevated bar area to grab some seats. The roof of the Beaumont is not actually a solid structure and there was pretty much the same amount of water coming down inside as there was outside. So we go to the lower level and grab some stools off to stage right. The view was pretty good, we had seats and there was only one dripping area.

The Black Halos opened and were one of the most embarrassing bands I've ever seen. They were one of the most unoriginal, derivative bands that I have ever seen. The juvenile banter from the singer just capped off the cheese that was oozing from the stage. He compared himself to the mechanical bull in the back of the room by calling himself the "mechanical Billy." Then he made some remark about danger and skateboarding when you ride him. Stupid. Oh yeah, he also made mention about how you should dance with a woman and brought out this chick in a black dress... and convulsed in her direction... then she exited. Blech.

The second band was a dance-punk band named I Hate Kate. They were pretty enjoyable. Much less cheesy than the first band. The drummer was amazing! He played right handed but every now and again you would catch him playing open left handed. He was really tight and furious, just a joy to watch a good musician. The singer had really good stage presence without being a douchebag.

Social Distortion was Social Distortion. I'm glad I've seen them. There are a lot of good songs from those guys and hearing them big and in person really makes them. The drummer rushed the fills and builds quite a bit, this however, was the only marr on the show. Other than not being able to see over the crowd of 6 footers that always end up congregating in front of me.

I really enjoyed myself but I have a hard time justifying the ticket prices (even though this one was a nice gift) and the merch prices ($25 T-Shirts). It's also frustrating to see so many people out to see punk-influenced bands... and none of them are familiar from local shows.

# posted by Justin @ 11:41 PM