Another awesome weekend

On Friday afternoon, I got done with the final project hanging over my head at work and it felt really good. It was a big relief because I knew I had another fun-filled weekend coming up.

Another intern and I took off from work a little early on Friday and headed out to Chapel Hill for "Late Night With Roy," which is the University of North Carolina's annual pep rally for the impending basketball season. We first went to South Point Mall to get some food. My friend is a big fan of Panera, so that's where we went. I had been to a Panera when it first opened in Redmond, but didn't think much of it. This, however, was pretty dang good...much better than I remembered! We then headed out to campus, getting there at about 7. We parked in a centrally-located parking garage and walked over to the "Dean Dome," where they play basketball. It was a little bit of a walk, but it was nice to see the campus. I was very impressed with Duke's campus last weekend, but I think I like UNC's better. Lots of brick...big, beautiful trees...the quintessential college feel.

We got into the Dean Dome (which is really called the Dean E. Smith Center) at about 7:15, thinking the event started at 7:30. But when we got in, the women's basketball skits were already underway and we determined that the event must have started at 7. Missing part of the women's portion was actually good though, considering I'd rather watch paint dry than women's basketball (note: unless Madi's playing).

The arena is huuuuuuuge! With a capacity of 21,750, it's much bigger than the Key Arena, which holds 17,098. So, needless to say, I've never seen so much baby blue in my entire life! We had to sit in the very top row, which gave my legs a workout! Despite not knowing a lot about UNC's basketball team, it was a lot of fun. The men's team is ranked first in the country in preseason polls, which isn't surprising considering they have all five starters from last year returning—including three probable first-round draft picks in Ty Lawson, Tyler Hansbrough & Wayne Ellington. The place was absolutely electric, I got some goosebumps and it was a good time.



After that was over, we walked through campus again and headed up to Franklin Street—the happening street near the school with lots of bars, clubs, places to eat and little shops. It's sort of like The Ave in Seattle, only a lot nicer. My buddy wanted to take me to a frozen yogurt place called The Yogurt Pump (or the YoPo, as it's often called). I knew it would be good when there was a line out the door. We waited in the line for about 10 minutes before finally getting inside and seeing a sign that said "Cash Only." Neither of us had cash, so we got out of line and headed up the street to Ben & Jerry's. C'mon YoPo...get with the now! After some ice cream, we headed back to the car and headed home. It was a great time

Because I didn't get to bed until about 5, I did some serious sleeping in on Saturday. I woke up at about 2, but them came out to my recliner in the living room and slept for another couple hours. I'm such a lazy bum. At about 4:30, I got up and made some coffee and oatmeal while I got directions up to Toad's Place in Richmond, Virginia, where I was heading to see an awesome concert.

When I got the tickets, I didn't realize how far away Richmond was. Despite driving through on my way up to DC, I didn't realize it was two and a half hours from Durham. Oh well, the lineup was worth it. The bill included NOFX, Dillinger Four, Teenage Bottlerocket and The Flatliners...all awesome bands and certainly worth the drive.

I headed out at about 5:30 and got into Richmond at about 8. The club was very easy to find and Richmond seemed to be pretty nice. Granted, I didn't see a lot of it, but I liked the cobblestone streets and there was a little canal that ran right by the club.

I got in just as a band called Fake Problems were finishing up. The Flatliners took the stage after them and it was the second time I've seen them. They're from Toronto and I saw them open for A Wilhelm Scream a while back at Studio Seven. I thought they were pretty good that time, but I thought they were awesome this time around. They play really fast in-your-face punk with a little bit of ska (sans horns) mixed in for good measure. If you like the Suicide Machines, you should check out The Flatliners. They're on Fat Wreck Chords and I need to check out their albums because I've certainly enjoyed their live show.

Up next was Teenage Bottlerocket from Laramie, Wyoming. They play really bouncy, bubblegum pop punk, similar to The Ramones and Screeching Weasel. It's catchy, it's fun and they played a good set. I was just reminded by checking them out on Interpunk.com that I need to check out a band called The Lillingtons.

After Teenage Bottlerocket, Dillinger Four took the stage. It was the last show on the tour (called the Paddy vs. Fatty tour, as Paddy is the singer for D4 and Fatty = Fat Mike from NOFX). Paddy from D4 was trashed. Not only did the guys come out already really drunk, I don't think I've seen a band drink more on stage. Beers after every song...some whiskey...the guitar player was drinking a bottle of wine...it was pretty crazy. They're also the only band I've ever seen that sets up lawn chairs on the stage so they can sit down when they get tired. As a fat guy who gets tired easily, I can appreciate that! They ripped through an awesome set and, although I've like them for a long time, I realized I really need to get their newer albums and listen to them more often. They're a really great band and Paddy lived up to expectations by taking off most of his clothes during the set. They had a big crew on the side of the stage that was also rocking out and getting naked.

After that was the band everyone came for...NOFX. Last night marked (I think) the seventh time I've seen them live (four Warped Tours—Kingdome parking lot, San Diego and twice at the Gorge) and three clubs (DV8, Showbox SoDo & Toad's Place). They always put on a great set and last night was no exception. I quickly found out that my trek from Durham was weak compared so some other people. In line, I heard some girl say that she drove out from Colorado Springs and I talked to a couple before D4 played that said they drove 12 hours from Montreal for the show. Awesome! I was in the crowd for the other four bands and had made my way up to about the third row by the time they took the stage. They said they hadn't played Richmond in about 10 years, so that was pretty cool. They also made fun of Richmond and Virginia the entire time, which was funny. The pit got a little too wild, so after a couple songs I headed up to the balcony and found a place where I could see. The thing about Toad's Place is that they serve alcohol there, but they don't restrict people drinking to a certain area. So, there were people trying to mosh with full beers, which just doesn't work too well. My shirt was soaked with beer and sweat by the end of the night.

Here's the most-accurate setlist I could put together. Some of the songs might be out of order and they may have played one or two that I forgot, but here it is...

• Intro
• It's My Job To Keep Punk Rock Elite
• (half of) 180 Degrees—during this song, the crowd surged forward, pushing the barrier that separated the crowd from the stage, thus squishing the security guards. NOFX had to stop playing to get everyone to scoot back to unsquish the guys. They tried to pick up where they left off, but that didn't work, so they just moved on...
• Seeing Double At The Triple Rock
• Reeko (after this song, Fat Mike said, "That was the worst song you'll hear all night. Sometimes we play all good songs, but we usually only do that in good cities...so you're getting a lot of duds.")
• F*ck The Kids
• Perfect Government
• Eat The Meek—Mike introduced this song by saying, "This song is for those two guys (pointing to two black security guards). This is black people music, played by white people, for white people."
• Dying Degree
• Drugs Are Good
• Soul Doubt
• Murder The Government—I love how Mike always changes the first verse of this song. The album version goes: "I wanna see the Constitution burn...wanna watch the White House overturn...wanna witness some blue blood bleed red." On their second live CD, he say "I wanna see Dick Cheney have a heart attack...wanna see Jenna and Barbara go to Iraq...wanna see our president do time." When I saw them at the Showbox in May, he said something like, "I wanna see Dick Cheney have a heart attack...wanna see pretty much everyone home from Iraq...wanna see George Bush take a nine iron to the head." Last night, he said, "I wanna see Dick Cheney have a heart attack...I wanna see the White House full of black (again pointing to the two security guards)...I wanna see George Bush deepthroat Obama!" Awesome...
• Louise
• Radio (Rancid cover)
• Quart In Session
• Bob
• She's Nubs
• Linoleum
• The Brews
• Bottles To The Ground
• Whoops I OD'd

Encore:
• Kill All The White Man
• Theme From A NOFX Album—then Melvin stayed on stage playing accordion for about 20 minutes. Good times!

They said they have about 20 new songs and were going to play one of them, but when they said that, some kid booed and Fat Mike was like, "Fine, we're not playing a new song because of that guy." That kid's an idiot and I hope he got punched in the face. So I went and found a YouTube video of the new song, called "The Quitter." Enjoy...




It was an awesome show and, after the set, I found NOFX's tour manager, Kent, at the sound booth and asked him if their show, "Backstage Passport" will be coming out on DVD. He said that it will be released next year on Fat...so, that's awesome!

The drive home went well. I got to my car and heard the last two innings of the game (damn Phillies!), got home, made some food and cleaned up my kitchen with the anticipation that I may be getting a new roommate (with two cats) today. Hasn't happened yet, though, so I'm not sure what's going on...

Last weekend was awesome, this weekend was great and next weekend's going to be even better!

As a side note, all this talk about music reminded me that Matt put up his list of his top 25 favorite albums of all time. Now I want to see what Mike and Kelly's lists would look like. Also, Fernando...you need to start a blog already! C'mon...everybody's doing it! I even took some time to think of some blog names for you. Just pick one...

dudeguys.blogspot.com (whoops, already taken)
chileanlikeavillian.blogspot.com
keeptrackoflaco.blogspot.com
thebronzefonz.blogspot.com