Ill Nino and 9Electric

 

That's pretty much what the entire drive from Wichita Falls to Lubbock looks like. 

All 4 hours of it. 

Worth it for getting to see my favorite band, Ill Nino, since the first time I saw them, about 10 years ago?

Yes.

Sadly, their drummer, Dave, was the only one who actually showed his face before or after the show. Everyone else went straight to and from the bus. The band that opened for them was fairly amazing though. Their music is 'good', but their stage energy and the fact they wanted to mingle with fans made them 'great'. I went with my bestie, Tayler. I was smart enough to pick someone who I could have a ton of fun with. 

Met a few old friends there, and met a few new ones too! Over all, a great trip.

 

 

Uproar Fest and Rain

Last weekend, Uproar Fest was in Dallas. We went for free. Well, got in for free. 

The stuff they sell inside, and the 4 hours roundtrip is anything but free. :-)

Chuck, the manpiece, has a habit of getting free things from the radio station. You know how they run those contests asking trivia questions about bands and whatnot. On his days off he usually listens to the radio. I can not count the number of free movie tickets and local hockey game tickets we've won. More common than that is 2 free passes into our favorite pub for what ever band may be playing there. (it's normally only 7 or 8 bucks to get in, but still. free is free!!). I'm at work one day and get a text from him asking me to go to Uproar, an all day music festival in Dallas. At what will probably be $40 a person, I tell him I only like a few of the bands playing and lets skip it. Then he tells me it's free. Whaaat?! You know what he did in order to get these ones? They played a few seconds of a song BACKWARDS and he named it.

 That guy has more music knowledge than is probably good for him!

So we went to Uproar. It rained. All. Day. Not that downpour, but that light drizzle. It would take about 2 hours to get completely soaked, but once you are, you're cold and there isn't any drying. We ended up stopping for lunch and skipping the worst of the rain and didn't get there until around 2pm. 

He looks a little happier than I do here. Note the orange poncho. We stopped and picked up two of them at the store outside the venue. By the time I took this photo, you can see it's getting dark. It was around 7pm maybe. It had pretty much stopped raining and I was so sick of being under plastic, I took mine off! 

 

Fozzy was probably the best on the smaller stages. If you recognize him, that's because his name is 

Chris Jericho. Y2J. He used to be a wrestler!! His band was pretty awesome. 

 

I love how you can see the rain coming down in this one!! Deuce. He was kicked out of Hollywood Undead. Looks like he's doing pretty good for himself still. :-)

We skipped P.O.D because I can't stand them. Redlight Kings I was excited about, but they were not impressive at all. So we wandered around after this. Grabbed some overpriced drinks and then headed into the main stage area. Since our tickets were free, they were in the grass area. Way in the back. We picked out a good spot on the grass right over the walkway where we could also people-watch.

 We couldn't even see the individual people on the stage we were so far back!! 

Sat there through Adelitas Way, Staind, and Godsmack. Then something pretty amazing happened.

A couple walked by and motioned us down to them. Chuck went down and they talked for a second, then I watched him leap off the little wall and ONTO the man, giving him a bear hug. 

They were leaving the show early, and gave us their second row seats for the last band. The ONLY thing that would be in between us and the stage is the pit area, and one row. That's it!!!

Oh. Hello. 

Shinedown.

So nice to see you SO CLOSE. Ahhhh!! Shinedown was the main reason I wanted to go. How did we get so lucky that we not only nabbed free tickets, but also got free front row spots!??! That above photo is NOT zoomed in at all. That's how far we were!!!! They were amazing. One of the best shows I've seen.

If you ever are leaving a show early, give your tickets to a few strangers. It can really make their day.

We got to spend the last hour at the venue dry, under a roof, close up, with seats.

A little kindness goes a long way. :-)

Someone keep me mooootivated please!!! haha

I'm terrible at keeping up with this blog. 

Working 50 hours a week and trying to upkeep two etsy shops takes a lot out of you! 

Blogging is a little bit of a relaxing break though, so I know I need to keep up with it better.

 I'll try harder, promise ;-)

Vest: thrifted at Buffalo Exchange
Shirt: lace sleeve boatneck from Rue 21.

Capris: Rue 21.
All three pieces cost about $25 combined. Paired with studded sandals (paprika brand), lots of bracelets, and my brand new necklace from Etsy. (more on that later!!)

Most of last nights outfit. I didn't think about taking a photo until after I got home, at 2am.  Contacts were already out, and shoes were already off. Oh well! This is the first tiny vest I've worn in awhile. I have one or two others, but they aren't as 'tight'. I thrifted this down in Dallas at Buffalo Exchange last week. This is the smallest I've been since about my Junior year in high school.  I'm just now starting to feel comfortable in more body hugging clothes. Maybe more of them to come. I have about 2 sizes left to lose.

 

Above mentioned necklace. I have a love for anything Stephen Gammell. He's the guy who did all the art in the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark books. You may recognize this from the cover of the first book. I found an Etsy shop who had it in her shop. I'm not quite sure if that's copy write infrindgement or not, but, I wanted it. Not too happy with the illegal use of a priority mailer turned inside out to ship it 1st class.... but.. yeah.

Nakia. I saw he was coming to Iron Horse and had no idea who he was, but someone said he was famous so I googled. He was on The Voice. He sounded awesome, so since it's a normal weekend place for us, we decided to go check it out. Very glad we went! Since all I heard on youtube were covers he played on The Voice, I really didn't know what to expect. It was blues. GOOD blues. Sadly, I really do not like music that makes me want to fall asleep while I'm drinking a beer, so about half of what they played I was fairly bored while watching. The more upbeat songs had my attention though. You can't tell from the photo, but Nakia is wearing sunglasses here. Wearing sunglasses while playing in a bar at night is kind of like wearing an Ed Hardy shirt to me... you don't do it unless you want to look like a Dbag. Thankfully, he ditched them a few songs in. Their guitar player is where it's at though. That guy was fantastic. Very fantastic. 

They didn't play too much that I recognized. A good amount was original. 

I did manage to snag a 1 minute video of a cover of Sex is on Fire though. (kings of leon)

I like it better than the original!

Instagram Roundup

I haven't had too much time to update the past few days. So you can see what I've been up to!

1. Iced coffee. Cupcake. The cupcake was fantastic- bacon, beer, and creamcheese. Yeah.

2. The boyfriends band played. The Minor Prophets.

3. My parents fat cat, Batman. (yes, there is a Robin in the house too!)

4. Gouda and wine for dinner Friday evening.

5+6. Me trying to be artsy. bahahaha

7. A very good friend is in town from LA. Her and her pink hair!

8. Me, and two very fun boys.

9. The coolest tattoo a biker could get? Possibly yes.

10. Terry Allen Band. Well, 2 of them. My bff Tayler on drums Saturday night. 

Music Monday - Dan Tedesco and Colossus of Rhodes

I wrote this yesterday. Apparently, I hit save instead of publish.
So this is music Monday, as seen on Tuesday. heheh
A small taste of who I saw live this past Friday.

Colossus of Rhodes
A little bit of a funny story. While these guys were performing, they mentioned that "The Minor Prophets cd has been in my car since they came to town and I got it". The minor prophets is the band my boyfriend is in, and they played with these guys in Lubbock, TX a few weeks ago. While at that show, me and Chuck (the bf) picked up a copy of CORs cd. Funny enough, their cd hasn't left my car cd player since then.
I like good metal. I really like good local metal.
This is the only cover song I've heard them do, but they do it like a boss!
What's better than a good cover song? One with a video of zombies... fast zombies.
Find them on facebook and give a few songs a listen on reverbnation.

Dan Tedesco
I had no idea this guy was opening Friday night up until a just a few hours prior to the show. It's a little folk rockish. I was wondering how well that would fit with the other band. Also, I wondered if it would bore me. Lets face it, most slow moving guitar stuff like this just isn't high energy enough for me while at a pub. I want to move around and get up and dance, not cry into my beer, which a lot of similar music feels like.
I went in with my doubts, and they were turned over quite quickly.
 I was highly impressed.
This guy is am absolutely amazing guitar player, and has a fantastic voice. I loved all his originals, but I must say this above video I found was the best cover he did. I even had to grab a Tshirt before leaving. He was that good! If you like lighter rock, check him out. Especially if you're in his hometown area of Chicago, IL.
Find him on facebook, twitter, as well as his own website.

Shirley

Photo by ME! taken at Edgefest in Frisco, TX.

Ah. Shirley Manson. The front woman for Garbage.

Last weekend in Dallas was Edgefest. An all day music festival put on by the local hard rock radio station there. I didn't know who half the bands were, but the ones I did know of were a mix of ones I didn't care about either way, and ones I loved. Garbage, Cake, Blue October, Arctic Monkeys, Foxy Shazam, Ting Tings, Cage the Elephant, Black Keys, Evanescence, Switchfoot, and many more were there. With pieces of the lineup, it almost seemed like a 90's music festival. The main reason I wanted to go was... GARBAGE.

When I watched MTV on in the 90's, it was hoping to catch a glimpse of 'Happy When It Rains', or 'Stupid Girl'. When  Romeo and Juliet came out? I flipped out about '#1 Crush' being a part of that.
I was one of the many girls who didn't just like their music, I wanted to BE Shirley Manson. Her beauty, her voice, and her style can't be matched by anyone I can remember from that time.

 

Photo from the Dallas Observer 

Clearly, you can see she still has that unique style that's always caught the attention of many.

       

     

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