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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dannyalcatraz" data-source="post: 8394759" data-attributes="member: 19675">I have seen so many great shows, it’s really hard to narrow down to 5.1)  1990s Dallas.  First Lollapalooza tour: Epic lineup- Jane’s Addiction, Siouxsie & The Banshees, Rollins Band, Living Colour, Ice T, B-Hole Surfers were among the highlights.  NiN was supposed to be there, but skipped that date.  I was disappointed, but not for long- Fishbone filled in their slot, and put on a hell of a show.  Between the blue haze from the pot smoking going on and a touch of dehydration, the night had an almost surreal quality to it.2) 1990s Austin.  Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, Monster Magnet, Swervedriver:  It was $10! PJ & Soundgarden were co-headlining, swapping nights as the closing act.  Eddie Vedder was briefly thrown out of the venue for stage diving and crowd surfing.  More drugs were smoked at that show than any other I’ve been to before or since, including hashish (which, BTW, smelled like someone lit an evergreen car freshener on fire). The venue, long since destroyed, was a converted airplane hanger from the 1950s, so it was all concrete and metal.  There was no place for the earthshaking sound to go except through human bodies, so we felt every throbbing pulse.3)  1980s San Antonio.  My first ever metal/rock concert- Dio, Megadeth, Savatage: unforgettable because it was first, because of the bands, and because it was essentially a Spïnal Tap cosplay all night long.  Savatage’s bass player’s instrument cut out every few bars throughout their 40 minute set.  When their set ended, he threw his bass 2-handed overhead tomahawk style at the ineffectual road crew in frustration.  Megadeth went on, and announced the show was being filmed for MTV.  In the middle of the chorus for “Devil’s Island” the stadium suddenly went dark and quiet.  Everyone thought it was part of the show and cheered.  10 minutes later, when the house lights came up, Dave Mustaine announced “We blew a f’in fuse!”  Dio came on last, with his million-dollar stage show featuring fire breathing and laser shooting robotic dragons and such.  When the dragon was fighting the spider, it’s breath set the speaker tower on stage left alight.  Everyone cheered, thinking THIS was part of the show. The fire crews with the C02 extinguishers proved this otherwise.  It was so comedic, I wondered if I would ever go to another show.  (I did.)4) 1990s Austin.  Blue Öyster Cult, Galactic Cowboys, Black Pearl:  Black Pearl, a local Austin band, snagged the opening slot on this NIGHTCLUB show.  They were great!  (The band broke up years ago, but the lead singer, Lisa Tingle, still rules the Austin scene, last I checked.) Houston natives Galactic Cowboys had JUST signed a major label deal, so they were stoked.  Unfortunately, their keyboard player was drunk off his ass- he spent Black Pearl’s set leaning on me while hitting on my friend- and when they took the stage, he did NOTHING right.  He was fired shortly thereafter.  And BÖC?  It was essentially a “best of” show by rock royalty, played on a stage only 3’ high in a bar.  I could have touched Buck Dharma.  It was the kind of venue they probably hadn’t played in more than a decade, so it was kind of bittersweet.5)  1990s Dallas.  California Guitar Trio: The band is made up of three graduates of Robert Fripp’s League of Crafty Guitarists.  They were touring the USA supporting their Pathways album, doing shows at Borders bookstores.  They were seated in a semicircle cleared near the store’s coffee shop, with the audience positioned JUST a hair more than arm’s reach away.They did some Q&A after, too. I didn’t realize until YEARS later the Somogyi acoustic guitars they were playing (pictured in the album cover art) cost upwards of $20k each. I knew they were quality, but... One song, they each took turns playing lead while the others played complex, interwoven rhythm…and the quality of the guitars and the skill of their playing was such that you couldn’t tell who was doing what without watching and listening carefully.</blockquote>

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