Blur

June 27th '97
@ Clutch Cargo's Pontiac,MI, USA.

WHY THIS IS DIFFERENT FROM MY OTHER CONCERT REVIEW: 1) I was on the right side and was close to Alex 2) I met Graham :) and 3) They played some different songs.

Again, please don't flame me if this is hard to read, because I'm not a pro writer.

GETTING THERE: After my sister, my mom, my friends Sarah and Kristina and I had all piled into the car at around 5:45, we left. This time fortunately we did not get lost, and got to Clutch Cargo's at 7. There was a bit of a line but not a long one yet. We played Asshole (card game) until 7:30 when everyone suddenly stood up, and they let us in the concert at ~8pm.

MEETING GRAHAM:I didn't notice him at first sitting on the couch near the merchandise, because I was so anxious to get a good spot. We all sat down in our spot, while my sister went to see the merchandise. I thought it would be all the same merchandise as the last concert, but it wasn't so I went to look at it. I bought a Blurb book and a poster of them in Iceland. When I was walking back, I spotting Graham...but I didn't really think he was Graham until I saw him sign a ticket and saw black thick rimmed glasses on the table. I speed walked and got my sister (just to make sure I wasn't imagining all this)and she agreed that it was him. So when the guy that was talking to him left, I asked him if he'd sign my picture. He said no. I wasn't sure if he was joking or not so I asked him if he'd atleast look at it. So I took out the sketch I drew of Blur and I think he was suprised that it was an actual drawing and not just a picture out of a magasine or something. He said it was good and that Damon looked kind of spacey. He looked to see if I'd drawn anything else but I told him I hadn't had the time. Finally I found the marker I was searching for endlessly in my bag and gave it to him. He kind of joked around a little bit and didn't know where to sign because he was afraid he would wreck it. But I convinced him that he could just sign at the bottom of the page where the picture ended and it would be okay. So he did, he's the coolest. You can see my drawing at the top of the page.

BEFORE BLUR CAME ON:So I went back to my spot in shock that I'd just met Graham, and then Sarah and Kristina made me feel stupid that I hadn't asked him if he could get the rest of the band to sign my picture. I didn't ask him again though because I would feel stupid coming back to him a second time and don't you think that would be a little out of his way?My mom left to get US money when the concert started. That Dog was the opening band, they sound a heck of alot like Veruka Salt to me, but they were more of my taste then Pappas Fritas was. A girl near me fainted and Vanna, the lead singer said that once a girl fainted just because she saw Damon.

BLUR After about an hour, Blur came on. That's when I really got squished (I was second row). Here's what I remember of the playlist, if you were there and there's a song I got wrong or you remember more songs that I forgot please write me. These aren't necessarily in order BTW.

1-Theme from Retro
2-Movin On
3-M.O.R.
4-Stereotypes
5-Swallows In a head wave (?) 6-Country Sad Ballad Man
7-Popscene
8-Bank Holiday
9-Coping
10-She's so High
11-Chinese Bombs
12-Death Of A Party
13-Jubilee
14-Parklife
15-Killer for Your Love
16-Girls & Boys
17-This Is A Low
18-On Your Own
19-There's No Other Way
20-Beetlebum
21-Advert
22-Song 2

I FLASHED DAMON AND ALEX MY UNDERWEAR!Yeah, that's what I said. At around Parklife, I started losing energy and getting numb in my arm from all the pressure, and when Girls and Boys started I just couldn't hold on anymore so I asked the security guard to help me out. Except he couldn't really clear the way, he had to get people to push me over like in body surfing. But in the process my pants, which are loose around the waist, were falling a little bit, and I knew my underwear was showing (it really showed because it was black and my shirt was white)and I tried to cover up but I couldn't ...finally he got me over on his shoulder (the security guard) and I swear I was a foot,maybe a foot and 1/2 away from Alex... I saw his legs before the guy turned me around and got me out of the crowd. (well, atleast he noticed me!:P ) When I was trying to walk back it was the weirdest experience because I'd never fainted before... and I just sort of blacked out and fell...don't feel bad for me though because it didn't hurt, and I wasn't THAT embarrassed. The only part that really sucked was when they played This Is A Low, while I was outside, and I really like that song :( Then it took me half an hour trying to get my backpack out from the two girls in front row's legs (because no one had the room to bend down) Luckily, this cool guy helped me out and got it out for me:)

THRILLS & LITTLE STUFF: Well, this is pretty much what Alex did, lit up, played bass, smiled once, drank a bunch out of a water bottle (god I wish I'd taken a picture of that!!)smoked some more, played bass some more, lit up, took his lighter from some roadie and shoved it in his pocket (I had a really good view of that because I was near the security guard near the stairs after my little incident, and the guy with his lighter was sitting at the top of the stage stairs.)
After people had started body surfing around the third song, Graham said in between songs :
"Be careful doing that floatie thing, one person already got hurt."
Damon:" yeah it's like doing this *hits himself repeatedly in the head with his microphone* good for your health":B
Then they were supposed to play She's So High so Damon said "this is an old one from our first album" and then they started playing Coping and he was all embarrassed :) I was lucky he threw his bottled water on me like 5 times, it was over 100 degrees in there, and I'm not kidding!

PHOTOS: yes, some of my pictures did turn out,and here are two of them. The first one is Damon and the second one is Alex.