Look, I'm no fancy shmancy "Brain Scientist" but aren't all thoughts, moods, emotions, etc., just the juices in your sweetmeats anyway?

This question is badly written. I mean, I get what this person is saying (kind of?) but they could have done a better job linking Neurochemistry to the whole "Nature v. Nurture" question. Either way, it's probably above both mine and abelincoln1864's heads.

Judging by last night's sparkling shenanigans, I can only assume the rest of Team Chicago is not as knowledgeable in the glittering ways of Stephenie Meyer as I. This should probably shame me, but the lulz are too rich to deny!

Thus, I have have taken it upon myself to write a primer of sorts for Twilight

( So it begins... )

So Every Time I Die and My Chemical Romance are totes buddies. Gerard was on an ETID track and Keith writes ~*poetry*~ on Frank's label/publishing/clothing company. Also, he played keyboard for them for a while? Idk.

The point is that there was once a tour consisting of American Nightmare, My Chemical Romance, and Every Time I Die. I would have gone to that show and heckled the shit outta MCR, s2s.

I'm taking a moment to step away from the whole "Johnny Depp-really?" to bring you this Special Report from our senior David Costa Is Dead Correspondent, Chase.

Brad Goes to Jail

Sean, Sean, Sean. Sean van Vleet was ill and adorably miserable. Prior to the show I saw him walking around backstage clutching a mug of tea like a lifeline. And during their set while they had sound issues (where Elle was ready to shank the sound guy for besmirching her profession), he sat at his little stool, with a little sad face of tired and sickly.

SIGH

I wish I had brought him soup, but I'm not sure he would have kept it down or whatever. Idk, I've never had mono.

I didn't get pictures, but I did manage to call Ryan over and ask for a set-list:

-Keep the Mood
-Modern Love
-Midnight Land
-Anywhere
-Late Night
-Warning
-Valmont
-I Want Blood

It still smells like sharpie. :D

Soooo...I got to hang out with Frank fucking Iero Friday night for like, half an hour w/ six other girls. Just, you know, chillin' in a sketch ass alley behind the Congress, talking about Rock of Love and how he's a shitty light guy.


Ok, so what happened was that me and Elle decided to street team Skeleton Crew (Frank's record label/publishing house/clothing line), so it was just us and two other girls being AWESOME AND MADE OF WIN. I cannot tell you how much fun it was just to hand out fliers, and take pictures, and promote the fuck out of S//C. I made a shirt! I'll post pictures later. From the very start we lucked the crap out, because as I was waving the banner to the cars and Bob Motherfucking Bryar drives right by me with his long, lustrous, lady-locks spread out like a beacon of hot. *sigh*

Um, anyway, we were there both nights, and on Thursday when we weren't rocking out to the bands, we were hanging out with David Costa. David Costa people, David Costa is the most adorable retarded butterfly you will ever meet. Period. Also, he's signed to S//C and he opened both shows! ILHIM! He's a rapper, but he plays with a hardcore band, so it's like if rap and rock had a child, David Costa would be the attractive sibling that gets all the play. And speaking of attractive, he and his band are all fine as hell. (Especially Brad)

Things you should know about David Costa:

- He's adorable.
- He's talented.
- If he wore lip gloss it would, in fact, be poppin'.
- He's playing Bamboozle on May 4th.
- He supports Bob Bryar's Solo Project.
- He's extremely proud of the fact he's from Northwest Indiana.
- He's Italian and so talks with his hands (and hips, and whole body) a lot.
- Did I mention he's adorable? Because he is!

Also, we got street team pics with Alica Hotass Way. She's so unbelievably hot in person you guys, wow. Throughout all of the show C(our team leader) made friends with Ed, who used to be My Chem's old tour manager and who now works at S//C, and as Dave's tour manager. Ed is AMAZING and a worker of miracles! He's the person responsible for getting us actually in to meet up with Frank.

My Chem's set was awesome both nights! I'm probably getting both nights confused but in general:
- There were condoms, balloons, flying unicorns!
- Gerard got all excited when someone threw a Karate Kid headband on stage because the montage song is the song they walk on stage to!
- Gerard's weird cowboy thing. Frank doesn't get it either.
- Bob smoking like an utter hotass while drumming for Teenagers. Frank was smoking too.
- Frank wore a cowboy hat this chick threw on stage. And played with someone's shoe they also threw on stage. Idek.
- They played Bullets you guys. And a bunch of b-sides. Omg.

And that, you guys, that was just Thursday. On Friday, the shit got kicked up to eleven.

You would think street teaming for Skeleton Crew at an MCR show would be preaching to the choir, but we met a surprisingly large amount of people who had no idea what we were talking about. Anyway, as we were writing off the venue's property security kept busting our balls about every little thing. It was harsh; we had to tone down our amazing for like, two seconds. :(

Fast forward to just before Costa's set and our crew is hanging out by the side of the stage, when Ed and some guy walk past us with chairs. Only "some guy", after a second of processing that I was not actually delusional, is totally Frank. Elle is the one that manages to regain her senses first and points Frank out in the sound booth, "*lol* Frank completely fails at being stealthy."

Anyway, we catch him coming back after Costa's set (I love how much he loves and supports David, ILTHEM) and C's all, "Hey, how's it going, can we get a picture of you with the banner?" And he's all, ":D Okay!" and like, makes motions to pose or whatever, but C tells him he's going to get mobbed, so he's all, "Oh. We'll hang out after, okay?! :DDD" Then he shakes all of our hands(and pats my back, wth?) and skedaddles off backstage with Ed.

We rock out to Drive By and Billy Talent(which I can't take seriously because the singer sounds just like Terrance and Phillip), when Ed comes by and brings us all water, leaves, comes back again, gropes C strangely, and walks off with her. We're all "¿Que?" But it turns out he just put on a backstage access sticker on her and spirited her away to watch MCR from the side of the stage. We saw My Chem pretty clearly both nights from where we were standing because of the floor's incline, so after C left we kept changing lyrics to the songs as we sang along because we thought C was dead and Ed killed her. We're fans of My Chemical Romance, we reserve the right to be morbid.

After the show(and once we got C back) we passed out the last of the stickers/fliers and waited around for Ed to give us our stuff back, because earlier he had been kind enough to take all of our bags so we wouldn't have to coat-check. As we did, we started getting the people who lined up to meet Frank shouting about S//C and got in trouble again. Anyway, a little bit later Ed finds us and leads us back behind the venue into a series of mad-sketch back alleys, and when we turn the corner, it's Frank!

He was wearing his old man golf hat! It was really cool and relaxed, because there weren't many of us (seven) and we were all past the age of ridiculous fangirling (average age: 20). Then David came out and hung out with us while munching on a burrito. Elle works at a bunch of venues in Madison so she was asking Frank about his set up and how the sound was that night and he was really listening. Then he asked the group in general, "Hey, did you guys notice how the lights for Costa's first two songs sucked?" And we were all, "Yeah?" He's like, "That's because I was doing it! *heehee* I didn't know what I was doing, so I was doing it behind my back, hitting buttons with my elbows, whatever." Ilhim.

We started talking about Rock of Love and Bret Michaels' fake hair and the girls fake everything. He thinks my sister is amazing because she watches it all the time and for a while she'd walk around with her headband like Bret.

I asked about Leathermouth(CD out June!) and apparently David got to listen early, and I asked him, "So Dave, how can I be your new best friend and listen to your iPod?" And he was all, "You don't want to be my friend, I'm a sucky friend. Meeting me is awesome, but the more times you meet me the more you realize how annoying I am!" I still ♥ him!

We were talking about the weather, yes, and someone mentioned the fact that it was hot and sunny and people where still wearing hoodies, and Frank's like, "Yeah that's Bob."

There were short jokes, Dave eating kitten burrito jokes, jokes about bosoms; it was a really, incredibly cool half-hour or so. I really think my favorite part was just the fact we were hanging out in an alley, late at night, just hanging out. It was relaxed enough that there were lulls in the conversation where no one felt compelled say something(except for how we were aware our time with Frank would be short *sadface*).

And the then we thanked them, took pictures(Ed: "The banner says 'I'm a Jerk.' Frank: *hee* "Inorite?" *lifts banner* Camera: *click*), and then we went home. YAY!


THE END.


p.s. MySpace for pics, S//C for family! And while you're here, how 'bout a free sample of Skeleton Crew's music?



ETA: Random shit I just remembered!

1.) Ray and Krista are married! Krista and C were talking while she was backstage.
2.) HeyChris did merch both shows!
3.) Ed almost stole my cigarettes because apparently everyone on that fucking tour smokes Marlboro Lights.

My life is hard.

NO EMPIRES FOR ME BECAUSE WTF I CANNOT FIND BELMONT?! CTA LADY POINTED ME IN THE COMPLETE OPPOSITE DIRECTION, TOO, WTF CTA?!?!?!

Whatever, they're playing at Reggie's next and it's close enough to the train station that I won't walk eight blocks in the wrong direction.

So, I've finally gotten around to uploading my videos of the Metro show, and while I think the sound was better on the videos at the Beat Kitchen, you can actually see them in these! It's all very exciting.

I did take some pictures, but all save one came out really blurry and lame. Besides, there were a minimum of four photographers taking pictures at all times and I counted seven at one point. Wth are all these pictures?

Anyway, I got all of the new songs, plus! Plus, a truly epic gem of Empires history caught on digital film.

( Featuring: Falling Drummers, Hot Bassists, and an Embarrassment of Photographers )

I'm not going to beat around the bush here, Leathermouth is awesome. I love it as deeply and earnestly as any other fan My Chemical Romance loves them.

But see, here's the thing, I'm sort of irrationally pissed off that people have been watching the live performance clip on mute. (Which is stupid and irrational, I know.)

Look, I'm not here to tell you how to live your life, I'm not going to taser you into liking Leathermouth; if it's not your type of music that's totally cool. It's the reasoning behind it that…irks me. Therefore, I meta.

Okay, so you're embarrassed by the emotional release in the lyrics. How are the Leathermouth lyrics any different from say, Brand New lyrics in that respect? Or even Fall Out Boy lyrics? I don't think they're anymore revealing than Jessy Lacy writing a whole CD about how much he hates his cheating ex-girlfriend--or Pete Wentz in general. I mean, seriously, there's a reason the media has dubbed the majority of bandom bands "Emo". I'm not saying they're even using the term right, but come on. It's music; it's supposed to be emotional. What's the point of making music if it doesn't make you feel something?

And if the songs make you feel uncomfortable, like you're listening in on Frank's private soul-searching, I think part of that reason is the way Frank himself talks about Leathermouth. "Leathermouth is the side of me that I'm not proud of, it's the side of me that holds a grudge." It's angry, it's violent, it is fucking hardcore, but it is not wrong. The problem is that he sounds like he's ashamed of himself for being angry, and that's not right. Everyone has a right to be angry. It is as unalienable a right as happiness and twice as prevalent. So he gets angry sometimes—BFD—it happens all the time to a lot of people. I'm sure Ryan Ross was pretty pissed when he wrote a few of those songs on the first Panic CD. So Frank expresses himself with body slams instead of ironic fashion statements; we all have different modes of expression. I, personally, am with Frank in his fist-to-face stress relief exercises, but that's just me. Leathermouth is Frank's anger management (and also probably the knitting).

What I can respect, is if you just don't like it. You don't like screaming in your music, you don't like that particular kind of music. I can honestly respect, "Yeah, I watched it on mute because Frank is hot, but the music sucks." That is a completely valid point of view and I salute you. I don't really like TAI (read: I think their music is shitty), but the Butcher is probably one of my favorite people in the world. If we didn't have TAI TV I have no idea how I could survive in a world that deprives me of Andy Mrotek. I've never heard a Hush Sound song in my life, and I listen more to Cannibal Corpse than Panic at the Disco. I don't think all the bandom music is shitty (just TAI, sorry), but I can't say I'm really a fan of the music. Except for Cobra Starship, because they're an amazing house band and I really want to hear their version of The Percolator. I've gone to bandom shows, but only for bands whose music I like, and can tolerate if I'm in a pit dancing and not looking directly at them or their shenanigans. Or if my sister wants to go and she needs a cool, older person to guide her in concert going experience and not be a parent.

I don't want to generalize, but I doubt most of the girls at the Knitting Factory show knew Agnostic Front from a hole in the ground. Of all the side projects for Frank to start he just had to start a pretty decent Hardcore band I'll probably never get to enjoy live, and not just because he'll be touring with My Chemical Romance for the rest of his natural life. I'm not going to go into what happened at the Misery Signals show last April, but having to shut down a show because there were too many twelve year old children that might get hurt is never fun. Not that I think there'll be little kids at a Leathermouth show, but I'm sure there'll be a lot of girls complaining about getting squished or hurt. I mean, if you're into that scene, there are certain things you can expect a show. If you're only there for the hot dude(s)? We're all probably better off you stayed home, chilling on your sofa watching clips on YouTube, if you're not going to try and have fun at a show.

Hardcore is aggressive music (yes, even when it's a love song) and it is meant to make people's parents nervous (including your own), but there's nothing particularly scandalizing about Leathermouth. I guess what pissed me off the most about the majority of bandom's reaction to Leathermouth's music, is that for a long time I listened to people's reactions to a type of music they had no experience with, and I ended up missing out on such a cool band for a long time. Leathermouth is good, but there's really no good reason for histrionics. Going to a concert is not an invasion of privacy, even if the majority of the people going are raving fangirls; it's a cathartic experience for the performers and attendees alike.

Utterly ridic.

Man, you guys, let's talk about how kick ass the Empires show was and totally not about how late I am in posting about it. Seriously, two weeks, how have I not been shot yet?! In my defense, I had to bust out my Photoshop-fu on a few of these mofos, so that took a bit. Also, YouTube drags, but now I'm just whining.



Anyway, I took some videos! Check them out--Keep The Mood.
And the lyrics, because they're secksy~

New Songs!

War

and

Anywhere Please note this video is SIDEWAYS because I am an EPIC TOOL. *facepalm*

ETA: Because echoing0comfort is awesome, here is the right-side up version of Anywhere

That's all the video I took, though there's like fifty million versions of Valmont out*. I'm pretty sure for those of you who weren't there, there's no reason to think you'll never actually get a chance to see the entirety of their first show, as you'll see later on in the entry.


And now that I finally decide to post my Empires pics, I seem to have reached the end of my lulzy wit. Therefore, the only commentary to accompany the following Picspam of Supreme Awesome will be the actual Save File As names of the pics.

( And 'lo, verily didst they rok mine knitted stockings )

In conclusion, BEST SHOW EVER.





*This is a complete lie, obviously.

AT&T keeps letting me down, but at least I can now complain a little louder for all of my legitimate entitlement.

Lo! An update!

I wonder, should I really make CS food? I'd feel ridic lugging around tupperware, but... Who knows. *thinks*

In which skoosiepants  is once again a bad influence, and Zack is no better.

( That's totally coming outta Zack's check )

Usually, I just MacGyver shit and then BeDazzle the fuck out of it.

Limp Bizkit. Don't judge me, they were awesome back in 97-99. Then came The Suck.

I realize that Wax On Radio is actually Mikey Russell of 504 Plan's new band. This is hella long after they friend me on MySpace. And actually, I really like both bands, so maybe this Mikey dude is awesome.


Also, this fills me with ABSOLUTE HORROR and like, no one will get WHY. I don't care though, SCARY!