Minor Greek Tragedy

The boys are back in town. Tonight they are playing at Mandalay Bay for the upcoming VH1 Rock Honors show. So why, you may ask am I here and not there? Good question. I saw that the show was coming to town this weekend, but I honestly had no idea until today that Keane was performing. Pays to read the guest list, I guess. Ah well. The show isn’t airing until the end of this month, so I’ll just record it if I feel I really need to see it.

So, last night in Los Angeles was the first show of their North American tour. It was originally scheduled to be performed in Griffith Park at the Greek Theater. However, those of you that have been paying attention may know that there was a fire this week in the park. The theater was undamaged, but the fire department decided to make the theater their command center while they battled the blaze. So yesterday morning I woke up and checked the site to see if the show had been moved. It had. It was moved to Universal City to the Gibson Amphitheater. Thank God there was another venue. If they had cancelled on me again, well I shudder to think of the possibilities.

So, off I went. I had to leave a little earlier than I planned yesterday since I needed to exchange my tickets for new tickets. It had me a little worried. I had pretty good seats at the Greek, and I had no idea how they might be planning to make this exchange. Calling the box office got me exactly nowhere, so the best I could do is make it to LA by 5 and stand in line and see what happened. I got to Universal City Walk at 10 til 5. There was already a line.

Luckily, they seemed to have things well under control. I ended up in a similar seat location to my original one, so I suppose that was fair. Not as great if I had been on the floor, but it would have to do. At about 10 after 5 I suddenly found myself with a lot of time on my hands before the show at 8:30. Good thing there was plenty to do. I don’t know if you have ever been to the City Walk, but it’s pretty amazing. It opened back in 1993 and that was also the last time I visited. At the time, the big attraction was seeing the giant gates from the Jurassic Park movie. Things have changed a bit since then. The only thing I recognized from back then was the Tony Roma’s. So, I had some dinner and walked around and waited for the show.

The opening band was Rocco Deluca and the Burden. If you know anything by them, it is probably the single, “Colorful.” I like the song, so I hoped the rest of the set would be good. Wow. What a nice surprise when you go in with low expectations and you get blown away. The group was awesome. I can’t say that I loved all the songs, but there were a couple I am planning on downloading. This guy can really play guitar. There was so much bass I felt like the hair on my head was vibrating. Got to love music that drowns out the beat of your own heart.

In between Rocco and Keane, there was some good people watching. I love seeing Keane perform in really large cities. There is always such a surprising mix of people that come out. For instance, in the row across from me were four girls, probably no older than 15 and they were all in self-made Keane tank tops. They had written things like lyrics and other interesting messages on the shirts. In front of me were 3 Asian women, and at least 2 of them were in their late 40’s early 50’s. The most interesting and ultimately annoying person was Dave. Dave was drunk. Dave was someone you didn’t want to make eye contact with because you were afraid he was going to talk to you. Dave was wandering up and down the aisle randomly talking to people and generally being a total ass. He was probably in his early 20’s and it was readily apparent that he had no idea who Keane was. I say this because I made the mistake of looking in his direction and he decided to sit down and talk to me.

He told me his name and tried to shake my hand. No way. He then proceeded to have some sort of conversation with me that didn’t really require my participation. He did ask me about Keane and if they were any good. Good grief, was he kidding me? I told him it greatly depended on the type of music that he liked and that if he was expecting the same thing as the opening band, he probably wouldn’t care for them. That didn’t seem to faze him, although I don’t think much would at that point. He later tried to get down on to the floor, but was stopped by security. Of course he stood there and chatted with them for awhile too, but ultimately he was sent away like the rest of the people that tried.

I will only mention Dave once more and that is to say that at some point he did 2 really stupid things. The first thing I didn’t really see until the smell alerted me and the people around me. No, he wasn’t sick, he was now getting high. I hate the smell of pot. I always have. Anyway, after he was good and baked, he goes running for the front again. I honestly thought he might try to run over the security guy, but he just stopped right in front of him, turned and threw his arms up and gave a shout like he was getting ready to go down the first big hill of a roller coaster. Then he ran back up the aisle. That was the last I saw of him, thank goodness. I imagine security finally caught up with him.

The show was awesome. It was nice to see Tom looking healthy. He’s lost weight and he had a lot of energy. The set was new, so that was a treat for me to see new things. Tom also played guitar on one of the songs. I had heard it performed that way, but I was excited to see it. A little Keane history for you: before the 3 of them got the record deal, there were 4 members and 3 of them played guitars. Once the 4th person left, they ended up changing their sound to the one they have today.

The biggest change that I noticed was their attitude. All 3 were singing and for once they were interacting with each other more. It finally felt like a trio and not a lead singer with a band. They looked like they were having fun and having fun together. It made a big difference.

Today is like all other “day after” days for me. I have come to know this feeling as my “Keane hangover.” I am always depressed not knowing when I get to see them again.

Up next: Digby, Nova Scotia. Stay tuned!!