FrenchieKingOrlando

Frenchie King does Orlando!!
Sept. 28, 2005

Ho hum, another year and another Alice-concert. My, how the time flies. It had actually been about a year and a half since I had last seen Mr. Cooper. I tell you, the time was right. What with the new "Dirty Diamonds" CD and all. Apparently, a "return to form", but we have all heard that one before.
So now I have an "Alice-buddy" with Tracy, who fearlessly accompanied me to the two Christmas Puddings. I'm not really sure how much Tracy likes Alice, but he is really in to "the scene" and inadvertantly knows more about Alice Cooper (not to mention having met Alice Cooper and band mates, etc) than your average Joe.
So one month after seeing the "Dirty Diamonds" show at Chastain, Tracy and I packed up and headed to Orlando, Florida to see the Coop.   And we had good reason! It was at the Hard Rock Live AND front row! Yep, I said front row. I had snagged two front row tix off of ticketbasturd about two weeks in to them going on sell. Go figure that. So, lots of adreneline coming to Orlando, I tell you.
We didn't take my NEW CAR, 'cause Tracy wanted to smoke, and we all know that smoking ain't allowed in new cars. So we took my mother's and that was just fine. I was willing to keep my car under wraps (hell, it already had a few nice scratches from the asshole neighbors) for the time being. It also meant that Tracy was going to do more driving (he's like that), so no complaints here.
So the trip to Orlando was uneventful. We left at 8:30 am and made it by 3 pm. All according to plan. Orlando is really a manageable city. I had had experience with my Paula excursions, so it wasn't too nerve wracking finding the hotel. Actually, it was right off the turnpike and, like, to the right. Made it in minutes.   It was a rather large Holiday Inn right across from the Universal Studios entrance. We couldn't have been closer to the venue (Hard Rock Live is in the Universal Studios complex), or so it seemed (more on this later)!
The angels of check in were on our side. Tracy had signed up to be a "priority" member upon making his reservation, so we both got suites. Tracy's was two bedroom and mine was one. It was like we had apartments! So, of course we had to commence drinking rum and "preparing" for the show. If ever I felt like a rock star (you know, driving across state lines and staying in multi-bedroom suites) this was the time.   We even managed to do some web-surfing (free high speed hook up) and looked up Alice's opening band: something called "Supagroup" who were really hilarious, in a fun rock n roll, not very pleasant on the ears kind of way.
About 5:30 we decided to hit the streets and walk over to Universal Studios. Like I hinted earlier, it seemed like an easy prospect on the face of it.   Here you had an entrance and what more did one need to do, but walk thru the entrance and all the buildings and attractions would magically unfold. Well, as we commenced walking I had the creeping feeling that I should have brought a damn map. These streets are not streets, but roads. Well, more like avenues! If something was a "half block", well, that mean aout a 1/2 mile! The sign up ahead saying "Hard Rock Hotel" to the left was, like ways away. Oh man, good thing we left early. But wait, Hard Rock Hotel (which makes the palace of Versailles look like a doll house) isn't even attached to the Hard Rock Live. And�. Just where is Hard Rock Live and why the hell are we seemingly in the middle of nowhere?
And why can't we understand the parking lot attendants instructions on just how to get to the Hard Rock Live and how come we keep ending up in the same spot??
Well, loooonnng story short, we finally walked in to the Hard Rock Hotel for the third time and simply appealed to whomever worked there to please help us!! We had a concert to go to! And where was the Hard Rock Live? I mean, we are at the Hard Rock Hotel, right?!
A kind soul stepped forward and revved up a Hard Rock Hotel vehicle and took us there! And it was only about one minute away! What had happened is that we kept walking behind the OLD Hard Rock Caf�, which was abandoned, but didn't really look that way. So all the time we were being frustrated by not being able to get around this behomoth (very impressive looking for an abandoned building) we should have kept on walking and sooner, than later, would have come out to the "exit" for the Universals Studio Park attraction and thusly, the back-ass of the whole thing. Whew. But there was Hard Rock Caf� and Hard Rock Live, finally, thanks to the kind soul at the hotel. God bless him.
So a not-so-quick meal at the Hard Rock Caf� was in order as we met many Alice freaks, some with makeup, some in wheelchairs, all very nice and all very excited. I gotta tell you now, the adrenaline was really pumping. A few beers, some appetizers and we "slipped" next door to the venue. What a thrill. I was so looking forward to this venue and my seats.
I should mention at this point that I was a "street team" member for Alice's label, New West. That meant that I had some MP3 cards and fliers for the new CD to give out to the crowd. Interesting mixed reaction. Some super excited, some wary, some friendly, and some downright unfriendly. At any rate, an interesting experience. Tracy and I tried to leave a bunch of fliers in the Hard Rock Caf�. Not sure if they lasted. We were told they would probably get trashed.
The front row seats were as expected, if not a little far off to stage left. But that turned out to be a blessing. Just as Alice and band came on, all of the front row people stood up and rushed the barricade. I had pretty much lost my barricade spot (not really sure I wanted it - too far over) so I kind of hung back in between the front row seats and the barricade allowing me something like 3 feet of totally wide open space to walk/dance/preen/stomp/jump/flail around. Even better was that I could pretty much go to center stage and do my patented raise-your-fist and yell thing: "Alice, Alice, here, Alice". And the bouncer-dude did absolutely nothing! He was bouncing people/photographers who snuck in behind me but I just stood there. If our hotel suites didn't make us feel VIP enough; if our personal escort to the venue from the Hard Rock Hotel didn't make us feel VIP enough; then this front row shit really did!!
What can be said about the show? That when Alice presented his albino python to the crowd, it was pretty much swung over my head? Ditto, the severed head? That Coop and I made more eye contact than I can recall. That I got three of the dollar bills (but no silver Dirty Diamond beads - DRATS!). That everything just really fell in to place and it was a fucking great Alice-show? But� of course.
Tracy and I caught our breath in some Universal Studios upstairs bar after the show. Why we didn't go back to the Hard Rock Caf� is beyond me. I understand that Alice's band mates do that kind of after-show thing, particulary when in Hard Rock or House of Blues venues. I reckon we wanted to see more of the sites, or were just plain tired and followed the crowd to where-ever. Anyways, we found some damn-good Guinness and recalled the show fondly with the bartender (how exciting, I know).
And oh, took a cab home, all three minutes it took. We weren't doing that try-to-walk-home shit again!!!
The next day we walked around Disney Downtown and headed off for Naples to see the show again. Maybe I'll write about that experience one day...