3 shows in a week. High On Fire, White Rabbits and Straighten The Crooked

Posted in Concert Reviews on April 28th, 2010 by corpo

My groin injury was preventing me from skating so what better time to go to some concerts and enjoy a few cold ones?  The first show was High On Fire on 4/20.  Yeap.  On the hill in Boulder on 4/20.  Zach thought the metal music would keep the hippies away.  Nope.We may have missed the opening band, but the band that was on was bad enough we went to drink tall cans in the alley. Dave, Zach, Jason and PJ.Everyone went to this show.  Jason and Gordon.  I didn’t listen to much of Priestess.  What I heard reminded me of why I didn’t make an effort to hear them.High On Fire.  I’m not going to claim I was much of a fan before this show.  I thought after how much I enjoyed Tauntaun it would be worth it to see another metal band.  To say I was let down is an understatement.  I tried to enjoy them and I think during the encore I finally saw what people like about this band, but it wasn’t what I like in metal.  Not enough chords.  Not enough sludge/grunge.  A boring ass drummer.  Seriously, how can you have a boring drummer in a metal band?  Not enough big powerful riffs, etc.  Oh well, my friends that like them said the show was good so there you go.The next night Liz and I went back to the Fox to see White Rabbits.  We arrived early enough to see the opening act Here We Go Magic.  They were decent.  At times great.  They have the potential to be a really good indie rock band, but it’s not there yet.  Good opener though.White Rabbits came on and established immediately that they were gonna put on a fantastic show.  It’s funny how the drumming in a pop/indie rock band like White Rabbits could blow away the drumming from metal heads High On Fire.  It completely did though.  At times there would be 3 Rabbits beating the hell out of the drums.  It was amazing.  I’ve only mentioned the drums, but everything was on point.  The singing was perfection as well.During the encore most of Here We go Magic joined the Rabbits on stage.  Everyone was having a blast and the music was still kicking.  Yes, that is Beaver from Leave It To Beaver on the guitar.Look at all the dudes beating up the drums!  Show of the year so far!  Not only was the show so great, but it quickly established White Rabbits as a new favorite and a band I will never pass on seeing live again.A few nights later Liz, Carleigh, John and I went to see my friend Zach’s first ever show with his new band Straighten The Crooked.  I had heard some mp3s beforehand so I knew the show would be decent, but it ended up surpassing all expectations quickly.  The music is kinda like Kyuss or something.  Grungy metal or whatever you call it.  I was impressed with the bass and how it didn’t just play along with the guitar.  The whole show was more creative and impressive then I thought it would be and I went in with somewhat high expectation.  And yes I thought they were way better than High On Fire.   Kudos Zach!Liz and Carleigh thinking about the two hot dudes moshing by themselves and running into Zach’s parents.  Or maybe they were thinking about throwing their drinks at the barricade in front of the drums.Proof that Liz actually thought I was funny that night.  Unheard of.

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skate journal: skated to/from Abo’s with Ollie (April 27, 2010)

Posted in Skate Journal on April 28th, 2010 by corpo

Ollies Birthday!  He’s 8.  Wow!  For his birthday he wanted pizza at Abo’s and to play a few video games.  On top of that he wanted to skate there.  Awesome.  We started off to the bikepath and I felt a weird pain in my groin.  Oh no.  It ended up not coming up again and we had fun.  Ollie stopped and hit a couple little things on the way.  We hit a bump near Abo’s and I got a kickflip and Ollie did, well, an ollie.  Ollie ollie.  After dinner we went the same way, but it’s mostly downhill.  Ollie almost did a wallride to fakie on the banked wall at 1st Bank.  It’s crazy because it’s steep and you have to wallie in.  The ride home was fun.  Ollie was having a blast and doing 10 – 15′ manuals like nothing at speed.  So sick!  I fakie ollied a bunch of cracks.  Not a long session, but I needed a bread from a long night anyway.  Happy birthday Ollie!

skate journal: Longmont with Nate, John and Jake (April 26, 2010)

Posted in Skate Journal on April 28th, 2010 by corpo

After a long day at work, dinner and a nap I picked up Jake and Nate and we cruised to Longmont to meet John.  He was at the checkerboard manny pad so we me him there.  John was doing nose manny 180s into the bank when we arrived.  Nate quickly manny and nose mannied it as well as manual front 180 out to straight leg landing.  Ha.  Jake went to work on some lines.  Front 180 up, frontside halfcab off.  Front 180 up, sw front 180 off.  Ollie up, nollie off. John tried nose manny slappy tail back to nose manny and got kinda close.  I never got a clean manny or nose manny.  The only thing I did I was hyped on was getting close to a front bluntslide on the parking block.  We left after some dude at a nearby apartment went on a rampage swearing at us asking us if we could read the no skateboarding signs.  Oh well.We went to the park which was more crowded than I thought it would be considering it was pretty chilly.  The four of us started off with a game of SKATE.  I haven’t skated flatground in awhile, but luckily it didn’t show as bad as I would have thought.  The elders (John and I) made quick work of the young ones (Ha).  The tricks were decent.  3 flip, fakie flip, heelflip, sw flip, b/s flip, halfcab flip, fakie bigflip and more.  John beat me in the end with the b/s flip.For awhile everyone was kinda doing their own thing.  I wasn’t skating well, but was at least skating harder than I’ve been able to lately.  I noseslid the bank to tall ledge, b/s flip on the flat bank, kickflip fakie on the bank.  After awhile a ledge session ensued.  John has such a cool bag of old guy meets young guy tricks.  Slappy sw noseslides shoves out.  Stuff like that which is awesome.  Jake did a bunch of back 50s and put down some crooks and front 5-0 front 180 out.  I got some slasher grinds (smith attempts not dipped enough), back 50s, back 5-0, halfcab noseslide, crooks and a lot of tries on front 5-0 shove out.  Nate was trying to back lip the whole darn ledge.  So sick.  he almost got it.Next up a hip ollie session went down.  John won that one.  Nate came in second and I clearly took last.  I love how I’ve been skating 20 years or something and can’t ollie over a hip and get more than a foot of air.  Oh well.  At the end of the session Nate and John ollied up and down the step up, I ollied the step up and I did 3/4 360flips before the light shut off.  I landed the last one as the lights shut off.  Felt cool and a fun way to end a fun session.