REM in concert - Columbia, MD June 11

Wednesday night's concert was fantastic. REM really rocked it--a lot of uptempo songs, michael stipe was very energetic. I had seen them back in high school on mosnter tour, and dr. wintermute had been waiting to see the, well, pretty much her whole life. She's been listening to them since their very early albums. a story that she can (now) laugh at is that in college, she was due to see them in tallahassee. a freak tornado ripped through town, and the only building that it hit was the civic center. several years ago, REM came back to atlanta, and it was the same night as one of my friend's wedding. suffice to say, this show was long-awaited. we lucked out with the weather, too. although it has been in the 100s in dc (no exaggeration), we had a really cool evening, and we found a spot on the lawn about half way up, center stage.

first, the opening acts: the national and modest mouse. modest mouse was really excellent. their singer is all over the place--very expressive, with a really unique vocal delivery. he sing / yells his way through every song. and having johnny mar (from the smiths) was great.

during the break, we listed the five songs that we had to hear. at the top of my list was 'the final worksong.'

REM comes out, and sure enough, final worksong is the opening number! it made my night. the entire set list is below (courtesy dr. wintermute). hightlights for me (besides final worksong) were an acoustic version of 'let me in' (very haunting), supernatural superserious, mr. richards, and ignoreland. and bringing johnny mar out for the encore was great. stipe seemed to really being a lot of fun--he danced a lot, had some good banter, and was ecstatically celebrated obama's nomination.

1. Finest Worksong (Document)

2. Living Well is the best Revenge (Accelerate)

3. Bad Day (In Time: Best of REM 1998-2003)

4. What’s The Frequency, Kenneth? (Monster)

5. What’s The Frequency, Kenneth? (Monster)

6. Drive (Automatic for the People)

7. Ignoreland (Automatic for the People)

7. Man-Sized Wreath (Accelerate) Little America (Reckoning)

8. Hollow Man (Accelerate)

9. 10. Walk Unafraid (Up)

10. Houston (Accelerate)

11. 12. Electrolite (In Time: Best of REM 1998-2003)

12. (Don’t Go Back To) Rockville (Reckoning)

13. Pop Song 89 (Green)

14. Horse to Water (Accelerate)

15. The One I Love (Document)

16. Driver 8 (Fables of the Reconstruction)

17. Until the Day is Done (Accelerate)

18. Let Me In (Monster)

19. These Days (Life’s Rich Pageant)

20. Orange Crush (Green)

21. I’m Gonna DJ (Accelerate)

Encore 1: Supernatural Superserious (Accelerate)

Encore 2: Losing My Religion (Out of Time)

Encore 3: Mr. Richards (Accelerate)

Encore 4: Fall On Me (w/Johnny Marr) (Life’s Rich Pageant)

Encore 5: Man On The Moon (w/Johnny Marr) (Automatic for the People)

the finest worksong

freaking amazing show last night. will post more pics and video soon. here's a good shot of stipe, rocking it.

orange stickers

on my way to yakima, washington. long flight through salt lake city today. even longer flight on the red eye back from seattle tomorrow.

had a fantastic weekend in bumpass at lake anna. mcgruber made some sweet shirts for us. after quoting from beerfest extensively last week, it was no surprise that i had a picture of barry on mine. the orange stickers nickname comes from an old skit on 'the state' where a dude shows up for an orgy and announces that anything that has an orange sticker means that he has reserved it for sticking up his rectum. proceed to shots of tv remotes, utensils, vacuum cleaner, etc. small side joke: unbeknown to mcgruber, the cheese had snuck into his bag and put orange stickers on virtually everything after he had packed. pretty freaking funny, as he kept finding article after article with an orange sticker on it. i have to give the cheese a big shout out for doing a ton to help make some things happen for bachelor party, including helping with the t shirts, helping some folks with their travel, and even driving two of the guys from the airport to the lake house at 10 friday night (and two hour plus round trip).

we grilled us some good food. filet mignon and brats from omaha steaks, organic beef burgers, hebrew national hot dogs, and deeply marinated chicken drumsticks. i ate chicken four meals in a row, as i'm halfway through my year of not eating any red meat or processed meat. the cheese made some fantastic turtle brownies; they lasted about 23 minutes, as we devoured them. i'm a bit embarrassed to admit that i passed out while we watch beer fest friday night.

a lot of beer, some nice cigars, and even some 15 year old single malt scotch on saturday night while we sat around the fire pit at night. so we virtually achieved mcgruber's goal of grilling every meal.

saturday we actually got up by 8:00 to go get the pontoon boat and head out on to the lake. it was hot as a mofo. we went swimming and fished (well, i learned to cast. not sure i lay claim to actually fishing). no bites, unfortunately, but not for lacking of trying. i was just happy that no one hooked a face or foot.

i had planned some beer-olympics for saturday, but it was too freaking hot to do anything, and we were pretty wiped after being on the boat for almost four hours. we did play one-handed beer ball (standard touch football, but you have to play with a beer in one hand at all times) and some wiffle ball. we also played a lot of guitar--i picked up some good sabbath, nirvana, and soundgarden riffs.

foremost, we had a fantastic house. everyone had their own bed, it was right on the lake with a great backyard that had a deck, horse shoe pit, and pier on the lake. and thankfully, a/c, which was a lifesaver. a really cool aspect was the family room, with huge ceilings and a gigantic couch.

sunday was pretty chill. i was definitely feeling my age, as everyone else was feeling pretty spry, and couldn't drag by my ass out bed until eleven.

all in all, a great weekend.

next stop: bumpass

tonight is j-town's bachelor party. we're going to have a great guys weekend. sweet lake house rented in bumpass, pontoon boat, lots of grilling out, guitars, fishing poles, and plenty of cold beer.

we've got a great crew, and it should be a blast.

will blog a lot more after the weekend...about to run out of the house for bumpass, VA (yes, that is actually the name of the town).