Damien Rice

Damien was fantastic, everything we'd expected and more. He did most of our favorites (minus Insane/Grey Room) and they were beautiful. Personally, I missed Lisa Hannigan as she'd been a huge draw for me. But Damien still managed to pull it off alone and the songs they'd done together that he was now performing solo were still excellent. Just not the same, that's all.

We arrived to find that our seats kinda sucked and we were up pretty high, despite the fact that I was at Ticketbastards before they opened and had asked for the best seats available. But, by the time the clown had punched things in with his only working finger (and the urgency of a slug in long grass), the best seats had been snapped up. Plus, he'd advised me when I purchased them that I shouldn't take the best ones showing because they were in the bottom row balcony and there was a rail that obstructed the view. Maybe if we were midgets. Turns out that those were the best balcony seats and I'd foolishly listened to him and passed them up. He probably did it on purpose and was saving those for his aunts and cousins.

And so it was that we ended up in the second row balcony and our seats might've been o.k. if the two basketball players hadn't plunked themselves in front of us. Plus, the 19 year olds behind us were annoying as shit. One very immature guy directly behind Linds was obviously desperate for attention - LOUD & stupid. He never shut up and I think his chant of "RICE" before the show's start was the breaking point for me. Damn it, I didn't have my anthrax OR my bazooka on me. (Didn't I learn to "Be Prepared" somewhere? Yet, I was totally unprepared for "dude"). So, since maiming him was out of the question, moving was the only alternative.

Turns out Linds is a stickler for rules (didn't get that from me). It took a lot of prompting for me to convince her to ditch our seats in favor of some that didn't have fat heads and uncaged monkeys to contend with. We moved into some that were fairly decent, only to be moved as the "real" ticketholders arrived. We then moved over to some others and remained there for the night. Linds was a little disappointed, as a huge speaker blocked the view of some of the band. But we had a bird's eye view of Damien so I was good. I know we could've gone down to the floor and snagged some of the FRONT ROW seats that were empty (yes, they were...there should be a law against that). But Linds was too nervous and didn't want to keep moving around. (I'll have to teach her the fine art of jostling for position that I've perfected over the years. She has yet to accept that "rules" and morals go out the window at concerts. "Elbows out girl".)

So, back to the show. An entertaining little tidbit happened during a silent moment that followed a very moving, quiet song. All of a sudden a guy with a very booming voice yelled out "GO CANUCKS" and Damien obviously didn't hear it correctly and misinterpreted it. "What?" "Go nuts?"...and he proceeded to do so - a frantic little jig with some crazy arm/leg movements (that would've made Barb proud). He then realized that he'd heard it wrong and we proceeded to fill him in on what "Go Canucks" was all about. The interaction with the crowd was great - I love that in a show...it just makes it for me.

I didn't take many pictures....the flash nazis were out in full force and one actually came straight over when we did and told us to not take any more. I did get a snippet of video but it's not very good because I was so into the show that I didn't really care. But at one point a couple of girls yelled out "Damien, can we take your picture?", to which he orchestrated a brief photo op that resulted in the picture (above). It was dark (candle lit), so it turned out pretty grainy.

So, all in all, a great night. Linds was as impressed with the setting as anything...we wandered across the street to the library and she was blown away by it. We snapped a lot of pictures there, I'll post them later. But, for now, I have to get ready for work (blah) and then MY CANUCKS ARE ON!!! Woot. Looks like they read my letter and took it to heart.

Later cats.