we build and burn

Continued from here

On Sunday, I woke up still in NYC with friends, got Starbucks, got on the train back to NJ, napped for like, five minutes, and then drove back to Philadelphia for The Loved Ones show.

Oh my god, these two days could not have been more different. Oh, the pretentious indie/punk kids. I overheard the guy standing in front of me tell his friend he was ashamed to say that for a time he was huge Blink182 fan. Seriously. I will say it again. These two concert experiences could not have been more different.

The opening bands were Amateur Party, The Ergs, and The Gaslight Anthem. I don't have much to say about Amateur Party other than I remember really liking their guitar riffs, because about three songs in I got a most inconvient nosebleed and spent the rest of their set in the bathroom with tissue paper stuff up my nose. Fun times.

The Ergs were really cool, even though I didn't know any of their music, I liked them a lot. For the first few songs the tallest guy in the world decided he wanted to stand in front of me, and I was only able to see the guitarist who my friends and I decided was an Andy Hurley look-a-like. Their bassist was crazy good, and their drummer does the lead vocals which I thought was awesome and had never seen before.

The Gaslight Anthem were amazing and I will definately be picking up their cd sometime in the near future. My friend described them as like "Bruce Springsteen, but punk," which I think is a very apt description. The lead singer has a growly sort of quality to his voice which I really liked. Also, they're from New Brunswick, and I'm not gonna lie, I love bands from my home state a tiny bit more. (They also have a full page in this month's AP so you should check that out.)

The Loved Ones were once again, awesome. This show was crazy. The last time I saw them, it was at the North Star Bar, where they have a no stage-diving/moshing/crowd-surfing rule. They don't have that rule at the church, apparently, and their was a ridiculous amount of it going on. I stayed out of the way, off the the side, where I had a reasonably good view and didn't get trampled. I am skinny and bruise easily. No moshing for me. It was fun to watch everyone having so much energy, both the band and the audience, even if I was about to fall over I was so tired.

When they did their encore at the end of the show, they had turned the lights back on and waited a minute, so about half of the crowd had cleared out before they came back on stage so I got a much better view for that and that was pretty awesome. I am so not used to going to shows and having to worry about the tall punk boys blocking my view. I generally am trying not to elbow the obnoxious 13 year-old trying to worm their way in front of me. At any rate, The Loved Ones = AWESOME. If you get a chance to see them, do it, because they put on a fantastic show.