August 11, 2013

This morning my friend and his sister came and picked me up around 7:45AM and we headed out of town. My friend was driving but we made a stop not too long after so his sister could take over and he could take a nap in the back. He went to the reunion at the bar last night and had only ended up getting about four hours of sleep. That is why I avoided that portion of the reunion. I have had enough of the bars in the past week or so and I wanted sleep.

We switched out driving a couple more times, each taking turns, and we stopped for lunch at a Subway in Goodland, before driving the final stretch (maybe with one gas stop) to the Denver area. On the way we listened to the new Sublime with Rome album a couple times and several episodes of This American Life, with a little bit of radio thrown in the mix.

We were staying with his cousin and luckily managed to find his place, nearly on the first try. We hung out there, talking, listening to music, and I played Corn Hole for the first time. I think it is called different things in different places maybe but it's the game where you throw beanbags at a board that has a hole cut in it. My friend pretty well kicked my ass but I had a couple decent rounds. I was also almost completely lost when it came to the scoring aspect of the game so I could just pretend he was fudging the numbers a bit. Even though he wasn't.

My friend's cousin's girlfriend was flying in from a job thing in Alabama and when she got home we headed out to Red Rocks, stopping along the way to get a bunch of beer and a few energy drinks. After picking up our tickets at Will Call we headed up to the parking lot we were directed to and set up camp. Which just involved putting up a couple chairs and putting the cooler out. The view from the parking lot was spectacular and the people watching was even better. So many unique individuals, which isn't surprising for a Sublime show, I guess. Lots of hippies. There was one dude selling tie-dye everything and he had a kitten on his shoulder. Jared's cousin was saying at a show yesterday the guy had been throwing the kitten at people.

The walk from the parking lot up to the amphitheater was a bit of a bitch. It was all uphill, a lot of it was steep, and the altitude had winded me right off the bat. But the view once we got up there was pretty great and my calves didn't burn for too long. We stopped off to get some food before going to our seats and I got a small cheese pizza, a pretzel, and a water. Thankfully the cheese pizza was mostly crust and not a lot of cheese.

Our seats were a little past halfway up and I thought I was going to die on the stairs but thankfully I didn't. There aren't seats or anything, and it wasn't a sold-out show, so we found our row but didn't bother finding our seats because my friend's cousin said they were pretty laid back about that. My friend's cousin and his girlfriend didn't even have tickets anywhere near us, we just sat down right in the center.

When we got there, Iration was playing as the first opening act. I want to say the name was familiar and I have stumbled across them at some point, but I can't be entirely sure. Regardless, I really liked them. They have that laid back reggae/rock sound and it was a good way to start the night. I will definitely be looking into their stuff when I get home.

After their set we took a bathroom break and walked through the little museum they have underneath the amphitheater. On the walls they have a list of everyone who has ever performed at Red Rocks, all the way back to 1908. My favorite one that I saw was Cremation Of Care & The Arrival Of The Goddess Of Prosperity on June 29, 1913. I want to know what in the hell that was.

When we got back up to the top our seats were moved over a little bit but they were still good. The Descendants had taken the stage and boy were they unrelenting. Old-school punk music, with short songs, no real breaks in between, and just a wall of noise. The volume was way too high so it hurt to listen to them. I like some of the old punk stuff so I think I might actually like the Descendants if I had control over the volume. And could take a little breather in between songs.

And then there was Sublime With Rome. I missed a song or two chasing after my friend's sister. She wanted to go to the bathroom and ran off and my friend wanted me to follow her. This meant a trip all the way to the top of the place, then down underneath it, then up, and back down to our seats. Once again I thought I was going to die. There was another bathroom break and beer run later that involved the same trip but we also went all the way down to the entrance area because my friend wanted to get a t-shirt and they were sold out of his size at the top tent. That trip all the way down meant having to climb all the way back up. It was painful. But I didn't pass out. As for Sublime, I'm not really that surprised but they mostly played old stuff. I know they played one one song from their new CD, maybe two, but everything else was just classic Sublime. And the crowd loved it. Marijuana is legal in Colorado now and a Sublime concert is the perfect place to take advantage of that fact. From the time in the parking lot and then all the way through the concert, I don't think I breathed in without smelling pot. In fact, I don't think I saw or smelled an actual cigarette, just pot, and heard mention of some other substances which are still illegal, but people like to get high while listening to Sublime.

I drove us all home and I did it flawlessly. Years of practice. I'm screwed up on which time zone my devices are showing but I think we got back to my friend's cousin's place around 12:30AM Colorado time, so 1:30AM our time. I was feeling it, after only getting about six hours of sleep last night and then driving across the state, and all those stairs at Red Rocks. The couch here is ridiculously comfortable.