Life Of A Blogger #51

Weekly feature created by Jessi at Novel Heartbeats to discuss one non-bookish topic per week. For more information about this feature click here

This week’s topic: Concerts (that you’ve been to)

That’s a long list! I was once a pretty bad concert junkie. I haven’t been a lot lately due to the fact that they aren’t cheap and most of my money has gone to running all around the eastern part of USA to get to book signings.

My very first concert was Britney Spears. In my tween years, I was a pretty big pop junkie and Brit was the queen. It was in her Oops! I Did It Again tour, so before she went crazy and shaved her head. We were so far back that Britney was about a inch tall. Thank goodness for those massive screens or we wouldn’t have seen anything at all. I was pretty excited about it at the time. Now I wonder what the hell was I thinking in my pop days, but it is what it is.

After that, it was a big Nickelback/3 Doors Down show. Yeah, I’m not much of a Nickelback fan anymore because their music has gone hill rather drastically. It’s all sex, sex, sex now and I find that annoying. If I wanted that, I’d listen to rap or country. I don’t. But, at the time, I was a big fan. It was right after The Long Road (which is still my favorite of their albums) came out and 3 Doors Down’s Away From The Sun. I’ll admit it was a pretty awesome show. I was 15 and so excited to have the opportunity to go. My cousin actually bought the tickets for himself and his girlfriend, but couldn’t go due to work conflicts, so YAY me.

My next one was Nickelback again. My then boyfriend now husband, Russell, bought me tickets to their All The Right Reasons tour. It was them and Trapt and Chevelle. I actually wish I could go back and relive that concert because I’m a much bigger Trapt fan now than I was then. It was awesome all around.

Then I bought tickets to a Breaking Benjamin/Seether/Three Days Grace show for Russell as a birthday gift. All three bands were amazing. It was an experience I loved immensely.

Somewhere in between those three concerts, I saw 3 Doors Down and Seether and Three Days Grace at a local NASCAR event called Speed Street. Basically downtown Charlotte is closed down for three days for street vendors and shows. It’s completely free. It was awesome. The first time I saw TDG was the best. They were so full of energy and amazing. 3 Doors Down was epic because I was right up front. Nowadays, no one good comes or it’s all country acts that I don’t care about, but when I was in high school, it was my favorite time of year. It’s always in the middle of May.

I wasn’t truly bit by the concert bug, though, until my first Sick Puppies show. This is actually difficult for me to think about and talk about since their recent split. How the hell Mark & Emma plan to move forward after more or less kicking Shim out of the band is beyond me, but I wish you luck. Anyway, I’m a huge fan of their Dressed Up As Life album and when I saw they were coming to a local concert hall, I couldn’t resist. When I saw that tickets were only $14 per person? Nothing on this Earth could have kept me away. They played at Amos’ Southend, which is this little hole in the wall bar and I was hooked instantly. Not just to them, but to concerts in small bars. Suddenly I’m not just a face so far back in the crowd that I couldn’t even see the singer’s face. I was right in front. I can’t describe it perfectly, but it’s a much more intimate experience. And the band’s almost always have signing sessions after the shows. Beyond that, Shim is just amazing. He has so much energy and they whole band was just so excited to be there and had so much enthusiasm. Even the opening acts were better. They were preceded by Dropping Daylight, a band that never got commercial success but is awesome and completely unique. And between DD & SP, was Saving Abel, a then unknown band with an amazing sound.

After that, concerts were all I wanted. Concerts at small venues if possible. Amos’ is still my favorite venue, though not many bands I want to see show up there now. There is also this place called The Visulite Theater where I saw The Pretty Reckless that was cool. I saw so many shows between then and now I couldn’t even name them all. I’ve seen Sick Puppies over and over and Theory Of A Deadman and Shinedown and My Darkest Days and sssooo many amazing bands.

Then there was the big one: the first annual Carolina Rebellion. It was the Saturday before my wedding. Theory Of A Deadman, Seether, My Darkest Days, Cavo, Skillet, and Three Days Grace. Plenty of other bands I don’t even care about. It went all day long. Dumbass me didn’t realize it would be outside with no shade and $5 per bottle charge for a 20 oz bottle of water. In the middle of the day, I would have paid more for it if they had demanded it. I literally almost passed out from a head stroke and I was so sunburnt by the end of the day that my strapless wedding dress didn’t look so great. But it was so worth it and I don’t regret a moment of it.

What about you? What concerts have you been to? Let me know in the comments!