TAG's Blog

Van Halen!

I was excited on Tuesday because on Wednesday after school I was going to see Van Halen!Tuesday night, we get crazy winds out of the blue and messes a few things in town up a bit. Nothing bad, but they closed the school to fix a few things up! I get to sleep in and not worry about tests and homework on the day of Van Halen! Wednesday is already a great day!

The concert was incredible! Eddie Van Halen, David Lee Roth, and Alex Van Halen all still had it! Eddie's son, Wolfgang, was the new bass player. He's only 16, but he can really play!
It was great to hear classics live like Panama and Runnin' With the Devil. They told a few stories and jokes. Eddie at one point got down on his knees and played his guitar amazingly (but he played amazingly the whole concert). David Lee Roth still knows his martial arts stuff and I don't think he's lost any of his voice. If he has, they hid it well, because I never caught it (I've heard that the singers of older bands have lost some of the highs they used to have). Alex played a great drum solo (that wasn't too long).

Near the end, the stage was empty except for Eddie. He came up to the edge of the stage. He hadn't played it yet, and the crowd started chanting "Eddie! Eddie! Eddie!"
Then he started playing a great guitar solo, and he ended it with Eruption. I saw Eruption! Live
It's hard to describe the concert. It's something that needs to be seen and heard.

Here's a video someone took of the finale from an earlier show in the tour (if you're planning to see them, don't watch, it's worth waiting and seeing it for the first time live):




We got home at about 2:00 in the morning. I hadn't done all the homework and studying I was supposed to do on Tuesday night (now Thursday morning). I was little worried, but I had just seen Van Halen, so oh well!

I woke up this morning to find out that school has been closed again, this time because of snow.

It doesn't get much better!

-----
I wrote the original blog earlier, but it wouldn't go up on C3, so I saved it. I've since learned that school will also be closed Friday! Sweet!

The Who

I got to witness the greatness that is The Who. What a great show. Those old farts definately can play with the young'uns still. They did such a great job. Won't Get Fooled Again was spectacular, but the crowd helped make it so great. They had the best encore I've ever seen. They came back out singing Pinball Wizard, and the crowd was awesome during that song, shouting "Sure plays a mean pinball!"

No, it wasn't all the original band, but it had Peter Townshend and Roger Daltry. The replacement drummer is Ringo's son and was trained by the original drummer for The Who. The other guitarist, bassist, and keyboardist did a great job too, but it's not like Townshend and Daltry are going to let poo people play with them

I'm not sure I'd say it was better than the Blue Man Group concert I saw about a week earlier though. A lot of it is just preference in the style of music, and the BMG put on a very good show, where as The Who is mainly awesome music with only the musicians being "the show" by dancing and grooving and playing and what not. BMG is a little more theatatrical. Plus they had an amazing light show to go their music, where as The Who was more or less standard concert lights. Both great concerts though.

Also on a sidenote, in my quest of trying to learn guitar, I printed off the tabs for Behind Blue Eyes. I can the intro more or less now. That's good for me

Styx fix

Lil' pointless rant about Styx:

Styx is my favorite band. Why? Firstly, the quanity of quality music is big. I have I think some 70 Styx songs (not counting songs I have more than once from live albums and an anthology album), and there might be 3 or 4 that are "average." Not bad, average. The rest are good, with maybe a dozen or so great. Another reason is simply because of preference. They're anthem/arena type rock, which I usually like a lot.
A big reason though is the "Styx fix." I'm going through one right now. I tend to go through these phases of listening to a certain type music to the point I tire of it (usually only temporary, btw). I feel drained, I really don't feel like listening to any music as I scroll through my list of music, until I come across Styx. I can always listen to Styx, and when I'm exhausted, I feel so much better afterwards. Only a few other songs, and no band as a whole can do this ("Don't Fear the Reaper" by BOC, "Ask the Lonely" by Journey, "Ballroom Blitz" and "Action" by Sweet, and "It's My Life" by Bon Jovi come to mind as other songs).

And right now, I'm listening to one of their most magical songs, "Come Sail Away", a great song that makes me feel so much better.

I'm sure part of the reason I like them so much is simply nostalgia. When I was first getting into music, I guess around two years ago, this was probably the first band I liked a lot. I listening to my uncle's music, and he had some Styx, where I first them. The "Styx Anthology" was the second album I bought that wasn't country (the first was "Have a Nice Day" the day before, because Walmart had that and not the Styx album). I'm listening to the Styx Anthology right now (or the music ripped from it).

Everyone needs a band like this. A band that makes you feel good, a band you never get tired of-ever. I don't at all think everyone should like Styx (like I do about some bands ), but if you haven't heard much by them I suggest you find these songs (especially if you like bands like Journey, Boston, etc):
*Come Sail Away
*Suite Madame Blue
*Man in the Wilderness
*Rock and Roll Feeling
*Boat on the River (they say it's their biggest hit outside of the U.S., because it reminds other countries of their own folk songs).
*Shooz
*Rockin' the Paradise
*Renegade

Good songs, but I doubt you'll like them as much as me.


Okay, my rant's over. Get back with your real life.

Journey

I was able to see Journey in concert. And it was awesome
Oh, and Def Leppard was there too, but they didn't put on as good of a show. Shame Def Leppard closed it.
Me, my girlfriend, another girl, my brother, and my mom (who likes Def Leppard more, shame!) got floor seats even! We saw some of our other friends, but they were way up in the stands and had to look at the stage from the side. Not us!


First off, anyone who knows a little backround about Journey knows Steve Perry (the singer everyone identifies with Journey) is no longer apart of Journey. The new singer is Steve Augeri or something like that. He does a good job though, imo. But he had a throat infection and had to drop out of the tour. So there was a replacement. Something Soto. But he did great! He seemed more comfortable on stage and got into the music way more than Def Leppard's singer, Joe Elliot, and he's been with Def Leppard since it started.
And the girls apparently like Soto. A girl who went with me was in agony when he left. And about five bras made it on stage at the end of Journey's performance (in comparison, Def Leppard got zero).

Then Journey did a quick encore and played Separate Way (probably my 2nd or 3rd favorite Journey song).

A guitarist from Journey started the show by playing an awesome Star Spangled Banner. Then they played some cool song I didn't know, and then they played my favorite Journey song, Ask the Lonely. They put on one heck of a show. I didn't know the drummer sang a couple songs, but he sang Faithfully and another song that I can't remember while playing the drummer. Being a person with absolutely no multi-tasking whatsoever, I was very impressed. Of course, I was impressed by Def Leppard's one-armed drummer. That was really cool watching him live.

I got my money's worth. I'm still really tired and my voice is still raspy. And by the way, I have a low voice, not a Journey, but I was singing anyways
But it was no fun trying to give a speech in oral comm during first period this morning


The concert was great. Everyone should've been there. One of the best nights of my life

School

Today was our first day of school since May 28th or something like that. American summer vacation rocks
But it needs to be so much longer

Well anyway, I've got two homework assignments due tomorrow, one in history and one in a speech/debate type class. And that'll be fun...a few of you know that I have a rather different political view than a lot of members on here. Well so does half my grade and the teacher, so debate will be a fun
On any moral/philosophical grounds, I feel I can back up my ideas fairly well. But I really don't pay enough attention to politics (that's why I tend to stay out of some debates on C3). I watch about half an hour of news, but not much else really, and that's not near enough. Maybe I'll have to start paying attention more.
As far as debating against my class, I think I could support myself. A lot of them don't really know anything at all, they just have those opinions and beliefs because their friends and their parents do. Which is fine if they could support it at any length, or if they can't, stop being so defensive and jumping down people's throats when someone has an different idea (Cubed3 is mature about such things, and I love that).

I'm worried that the teacher will jump in a bit, and in which case I will probably get my butt fried and most of the class will feel smart beause they have the same beliefs as the teacher. If I wasn't 15 and had more of a voice, I bet I could keep up with him, but my peers don't understand that. A lot of them are so shallow, it's unbelievable.

We were talking in church about dating. The youth pastor and a college student in there had always felt that if you didn't think there was any chance in your mind you were going to marry the person, then there was no point going steady. That's the way I've always felt (with that idea and the fact I'm looking for a Christian woman who shares the most important values as me, I never have a girlfriend :roll.

Dates and one nighters are fine if you're into that, but going steady should be something deeper, right?

Well anyways, the girls argued for a second and then wheels started turning and they were like "wow that makes so much sense! I've never thought if it like that." Now some of you may have reasons why you disagree, that's great, but for these people it was very obvious that they just weren't that deep and just had a boyfriend "just because." A couple of them said they did it because they liked hanging out with the person, but isn't that what a friend is?

Anyways, this turned into a huge rant, so if you read all of it, pats for you

Now I got to go over to walmart and pick up school supplies. 1 2 Next