all that noise & all that sound

COLDPLAY...after two years of anxious, patient waiting, i got to see coldplay again. live, in concert. it was so fucking amazing.

i've been a hardcore fan since 2000, basically senior year of college. i've listened to each album about 4,000 times and been to four concerts, which includes flying 2,000 miles to see them at Red Rocks, in 2003. they've played a few teaser shows throughtout california this year, however i've missed each one due to some stupid setback and been royally pissed each time.

almost three months ago, their new album X&Y came out and concert tix went on sale...immediately i snatched up the album and two lawn tix, for their sunday show in Irvine at Verizon Wireless Ampitheatre. it's not exactly close to Venice, but fuck that, it's Coldplay. I LOVE YOU CHRIS MARTIN!!!!!!!!!!

they had two shows this weekend, sat & sun. Mark (from the blog) was able to grab four tix, two for him and his lady and two for rocco. since his were actually in the ampitheatre seats, i opted to be rocco's guest and gave my tix to two close friends.

after months of waiting and anticipation, the magical weekend was before me. i was surprisingly un-excited and spent the early half of sunday frying myself to a crisp at santa monica beach. granted i didn't realize i was burnt til rushing around for the concert....un-pleasant.

i packed some snacks and a cooler full of coors light, rounded up the ladies and we zoomed too anaheim in the civic. clearly we would be tailgaiting prior to showtime, i can't remember a concert where i haven't thrown back a few brews before rocking out. well Irvine said "fuck you missy". yeah. we cracked open our 24 ouncers, poured them into our handy red solo cups right as the concert rent-a-cops strolled up and announced they were ready to arrest us for open container laws. "uh, what? that's absurd. surely you're joking." they were not.

so we had to pour it all out, b/c southern california needs to suck a dick. highly aggravated, but not quite deterred, bess, lara & i met up with rocco, mark and kristen to enter the magic that is verizon wireless ampitheatre. in all reality it's actually a crappo venue. #1. no tailgaiting. #2. cops everywhere. #3. i pounded a beer anyway, then ditched the can prior to entry. #4. everyone has to climb ONE huge fuckin hill to get in. they clearly don't believe in spreading out the entrances.

geniusly, i went with bess/lara to scout out a great lawn spot, which unfortunately doesn't exist since the lawn area was SO DAMN SMALL. well thank the Lord in heaven, that all changed when we left our blanky to get three cups of the sacred sacrament. lara and i walked toward the beer station when suddenly lara thought she was getting propositioned to buy drugs....well turns out "mr. cool" wasn't sellin her any white lines, just FREE WRIST BANDS FOR THE PIT!!!!!!!!. skeptically, yet immediately, we accept wristbands and interrogate him to ensure this isn't a sick joke. i've had friends who were lucky enough to get free upgrades, but how does this happen to regular people?!?! WHO CARES! with robin's egg-blue wrist bands we head to the land of the blessed....FRONT FUCKING ROW. free g.d. upgrade for my most favorite band ever -- HAPPY EARLY BIRTHDAY MISSY!!!!

it was un-fucking-believable.

finally, others could enjoy coldplay as i've always seen them. chris, a lyrical genius and incredibly talented musician, surrounded by three equally amazing bandmates. it was phenomenal. like a total, complete, raging idiot, i had loaned my digi camera to a coworker this weekend....BUT knew lara would have hers. thank GOD she did. never in a million years would i have guessed we'd be front row. i am still a shit though b/c i basically high-jacked her digi-elph and made her delete photos of her grandmother & family so that i could have "just one more" close-up photo of the band. believe me, they're worth it!

i can't wait to go download all of them tomorrow night. i took FANTASTIC video footage of four or five songs..all of which will be too big for the blog, but maybe jermie can teach me how to link them. coldplay is all about light. they use light & colors fantastically within all of their sets, which works so well visually... sometimes looks great on camera. sometimes not.

ahh point being. it took us forever to get home from Irvine, but i could care less, b/c it was such a great concert. there are more stories with this, but don't want to make it any longer...... OH RIGHT and, make trade fair, MTF. =)