Juliana Theory, Unwritten Law, Filter @ Molson Ice SnowJam, Commerica Park, Detroit
A fantastic evening spent with fantastic people. With me at the concert was my bestest friend Eric, and the guitarist of his band, Tom. It was my first time meeting Tom, and he was a pretty neat-o kid, who looks like the Dell computer guy. Yes, yes he does. We got to Commerica Park about ten minutes before the Juliana Theory performed, and we went directly to the 89X tent, where we found the lead singer of Filter and his guitarist doing an interview. We weren't very thrilled because, well, we all agree that Filter sucks and hasn't written anything worth playing in quite some time.
After Filter left, the guitaist (Rob Brewer) and bassist (Pat Kim) of Unwritten Law came up to the tent! Since everyone knows that Unwritten Law is my favorite band, then it should be easily understandable why I started freaking out. Well, freaking out for me consists of giggling like a sorority sister and playing with my hair, because suddenly OH MY GOD, WHAT IF THEY'RE LOOKING AT ME?? I eventually calmed down enough to walk over and get Pat's autograph while proudly displaying my Unwritten Law tattoo for the both of them. I felt like a complete idiot aftewards because I'm positive I sounded like a retard, but I'm sure they are used to that.
Then the Juliana Theory's set began. They started off with my favorite song, "If I Told You This Was Killing Me Would You Stop?". Unfortunately, it and a couple songs after it were a bit rough, thanks to the retard of a sound guy, who basically made the lead singer's (Brett Detar) as loud as a whisper. Fortunately, Brett eventually walked over to the sound tent and ripped on the sound guy. At least that's what I think he did, 'cause he looked PISSED. Then the sound got better, and the concert went uphill from there. They played a pretty good variety of songs, and they were all right on. My favorites were "Into the Dark" and "Constellation". After the Juliana Theory went offstage, Eric, Tom, and I decided to check out the venue. There were tents set up everywhere, each one hawking something different. There was a lot of marajuana paraphernalia, and an interesting clothing company called DICK (Detroit Industrial Clothing Kartel), in which all of their clothing items had DICK printed on them in large block letters, or I LOVE DICK. Interesting. The half-pipe where the bikers, skaters, and bladers were was pretty cool, but kind of melodramatic, as well as the quarter-pipe the snowboarders were using. In fact, the snowboarding was pretty lame. No one was really into it, including the boarders, and it just seemed a waste of time.
FINALLY Unwritten Law was set to come on. I of course, got right in the front row, because I love it when punk sweat gets on me. But only punk band members' sweat. No punk audience members. Because they smell. Unfortunately, there was a girl and her boyfriend right next to me, and the boyfriend was smashed, and consequently was humping his girlfriend throughout the show, sometimes confusing her and I. Gaaah.
Unwritten Law is one of the best live bands EVER. EVER. The relation is much like the White Stripes, who sound great on CD, but FANTASTIC live. It's the same with Unwritten Law. Their recorded music is FANTASTIC, but seeing them live is ENTIRELY different and much more FANTASTIC. Scott Russo is definitely one of the most entertaining and charismatic frontmen of any band out there, even though he said, "He was hungover and felt like crap" he had enough energy to keep the audience jumping through the duration of the concert. The audience themselves were really energetic, TONS of crowd-surfing going on, and just general mayhem up in front. And of course, everyone, including yours truly, were singing at the top of their lungs. At one point Scott leaped into the crowd, shirtless, and once he returned to the stage said, "You guys really are as crazy as I am". The songs were fantastic, and all of the guys are awesome musicians. I wish they had played more of their older stuff, but they did play AWESOME renditions of their new songs, including "Up All Night", their most recent single, and "Seein' Red" which really, you haven't heard until you've heard it live, because it is SO much better live. I think my favorite comment from Scott was, "There's something about Detroit that makes you want to fuck.", and then they leaped right into "Hellborn" from Elva. FANTASTIC.
The only drawback was the fact that the concert was so short, (Juliana Theory had 30 minutes, and Unwritten Law had only 45 minutes) and it was obvious that everyone was disappointed that the show was over, and that they were there really just for Juliana Theory and Unwritten Law, because after UL's set, almost half of the crowd left for home. Including Eric, Tom, and I. Honestly, we had no desire to see Filter whatsoever, and it's a shame that Filter got an hour of playtime, while the real talented bands got so much less. It's hard for me to take a band seriously that hands out STICKERS of themselves. Not stickers of their logos. Oh no, stickers of pictures of themselves, with American flags. Could you be a bigger loser?
So here's the lowdown on the Molson Ice Snow Jam:
Juliana Theory: Rocked Da House (after the sound guy stopped being a retard)
Snowboarding and Half-Pipe: Kind of rocked da house but not really
DICK clothing: Rocked da house, but in a weird way
Unwritten Law: FUCKING RULED DA ROCKED HOUSE
Filter: Dudes sucked da house