:)



I should have bought the tee shirt. But damn. Thirty-five dollars for a freaking tee shirt? They used to be $20 (at least at the concerts I went to), and THAT was hugely overpriced. Oy. Eighty-five dollars apiece for tickets, and then $30 for the cheapest tee shirts. Entertainment is not cheap these days. ;)



Last night I took Joe to see Van Halen. :) I did NOT spend $85 apiece for tickets though, but we sat in the $85 section! (I love ebay!) Seriously, our seats were fantastic! We were close enough to see facial expressions and fingers moving and everything that went on.



The band was excellent! They were full of energy and really played the crowd. They jumped all over the stage and you could tell they were having fun! Audience members kept throwing shirts and hats on stage, which Sammy would wear for a minute or two and then throw back. Somebody threw him a sign (spray-painted on a sheet) that said "Hey beautiful! Will you marry me?" and he tied it around his waist and wore it for the rest of the concert. :) The stage was shaped like their logo with two 'pits' in the middle (if you can't picture it I probably can't describe it) and a bunch of lucky radio listeners got to watch the concert from there. In the middle of the stage. As in, the concert was going on AROUND them. :) As the radio announcers said, if you were any closer you'd be in the band! They got high fives and guitar picks and all. It is great when the band really interacts with the crowd like they did! We fed on their energy and they played on ours and the whole place was just having the greatest time!



Hehe, and the music! I can't say I'm a die-hard fan of Van Halen. (To be fair, I can't say I'm a die-hard fan of ANY band. I know a few songs by many bands, and many songs by a few bands.) Anyway, Van Halen happens to be a band that I know a number of songs by, but I don't know the words to most of them. Actually it has surprised me the number of songs I know by them. You know... songs you've heard on the radio that you recognize but you don't really KNOW, and then you hear them and go 'Oh THAT'S who sings this!'. Yeah, that's me and Van Halen. :) So I would say I recognized probably at least half of the songs they played, which was neat! Concerts are always better when you know some of the music!



Joe of course knew most of the songs, and more than that, most of the words to most of the songs he knew. So he was singing right along a lot of times (along with the rest of the crowd of course!) besides clapping and yelling and cheering and bopping around! He was smiling and laughing and having so much fun! Even if I didn't know ANY of the songs it would have been fun going just to watch Joe. There is just nothing more fun than seeing the one you love all happy and excited. :)



Sidenote (moment of pride): I actually knew one song that Joe didn't know. ;) How messed up is that! As it turns out Joe has never seen the movie Twister, which has a Van Halen song on the soundtrack. Hehe. (Hmm... according to Amazon, there are actually TWO Van Halen songs on the soundtrack: the one we heard (Humans Being) and one by just Eddie and Alex. There's also music by the Goo Goo Dolls, Tori Amos, and Stevie Nicks. Honey, it looks like you've been missing out!) :D



But anyway. :) It was all just too much fun. Plus Alex and Eddie did solos on drums and guitar and wow. Talk about talent! How do they do that! This is just a speculation, but I think Joe particularly enjoyed the guitar solo. ;) I know I did! The things Eddie can do with an electric guitar are quite frankly amazing. I didn't even know you could make it sound like that! (Like what you ask? Well I think you'd have to have been there. Or you could buy the bootleg DVD on ebay and hear for yourself.) ;) Excellent show. I may have mentioned that previously. :D



Quick recap of the day so I don't forget anything that happened. :)

- seeing Joe at 6am as he stopped by on his way to work to leave a sweet surprise in my car

- seeing Joe after work when he came to pick me up

- finding a parking space :)

- riding the rail up to the theater district and then walking back down to find a restaurant

- discovering the mall in the middle of the city (I had no idea there was such a thing... wasn't much of a mall though)

- the sticky table and the ceiling fans at the Pearl Street Grill and Brewery (ah, atmosphere!) :)

- trying to identify songs by their bass lines during dinner

- meeting up with the guy who had our tickets

- keeping an eye the ticket guy until we'd gotten inside so that Joe could beat him up if they were duds ;) (Joe was keeping an eye on him that is... I was oblivious...)

- finding the Pour Man's Aud Club as we walked around the arena

- checking out the actual boards from the 95-96 Sabres season which used to reside at the Aud (sidenote: Leslie has never been to the Aud :( )

- finding our seats and realizing how good they were!

- listening to Joe reminiscing about his track and soccer days :)

- the opening act (I think their name was Silvertide)

- Silvertide's lead singer whose pants were dangerously close to falling off

- Silvertide's crazy guitarist (he was cool though!)

- compliments on my Cow (but of course) (he really has been around hasn't he!)

- the light monkeys up in the rafters

- crazy people who bring their children (born or unborn) to shows like this ;)

- pondering how they were going to make their entrance (helicopter? no, probably not...)

- Joe saw them coming out to the stage before they came on :)

- VAN HALEN! :)

- knowing a song Joe didn't know ;)

- hearing some of Joe's faves!

- knowing most of the songs!

- the bass solo (he looked like he was making love to the speakers with it or something) :)

- Eddie smoking on stage

- Joe pointing out at least one song as one of his favorites! (Pound Cake? I think...)

- Mike throwing Sammy's sunglasses into the crowd

- the drum solo (holy maloley! crazy coolness!)

- Sammy's new sunglasses :)

- Eddie's ponytail (it was funny) and I liked Sammy's hair too (massive amounts of curly hair really works for some people)

- the idiots in the audience who were trying to smoke secretly and getting caught

- Sammy drinking on stage, not sure what it was exactly, but at one point he walked around behind Mike and made him have some too

- Sammy running around way up high and making the light monkeys bounce (I noticed his mic was attached to his wrist so he wouldn't drop it on anyone's head)

- Eddie's guitar solo (crazy coolness again! insanity!)

- chanting "Eddie! Eddie!" to get him to play more :)

- Sammy's solo dedicated to Hunter Kelly (I thought that was sweet, yes, I might be a dork)

- Sammy not being able to untie the sheet with the marriage proposal on it

- some girl on the other side flashing the stage (well, flashing her underwear at it, anyway)

- screaming to get them back out for an encore

- PANAMA! (Joe said Sunday he really hoped they'd play this so I'm glad they did!)

- the twinkling of lighters in a dark sky of people

- finally getting Joe to concede on the tee shirt and then realizing I didn't have cash :(

- sore hands, sore feet, ringing ears, laryngitis, and exhaustion... but boy it was fun :)

- being tucked in

- 10 minutes of cuddle time before work today... even though we were both wishing for a day of it :)



I am SO glad I got those tickets! They were a last-minute purchase (I bought them Sunday for a Monday night concert) but, that is because I am so thick-headed that it took me until Saturday to realize that Joe really wanted to go to this concert. After he's been talking about it for at least a month, and how Buffalo wasn't originally on the tour schedule but one of the radio stations petitioned to get them here, and then the other rock station was trying to take credit for it, and how outrageous the box-office prices for the tickets were, and what a great show it was going to be. :) Yes, I am slow. But I caught on eventually! And for once, I got to be the one to treat my wonderful, amazing boyfriend to something he really wanted to do. He doesn't let me treat very often but I love to be able to do it. :) The smile on his face it is worth everything I could put into it (monetarily or otherwise) and more. I love him! I really, really do! Nothing is cooler than seeing him happy and knowing I had a part in it!



Last night was a great night. I didn't get any pictures and I didn't get the shirt, but we have some great memories! Van Halen puts on an excellent show! If you ever get a chance, go see them!