head automatica/angels & airwaves/taking back sunday live @ the molson amphitheatre july 5, 2006... because mics are for singing not swinging

edit: "i'm sorry it took me so long, i'm sorry it took me so long..."
edit no.2: Sorry for the quality of the pictures… I didn’t have my real camera with me, so I had to use my camera-phone.

This is a long post on what I loved and hated at the Head Automatica/Angels & Airwaves/Taking Back Sunday show I went to the other night at the Molson Amphitheatre. You have been warned, stop reading now if you don’t care about those bands! The best part about the show was that I had general admission floor tickets... which mean that I was right in front of the incredibly huge stage. The first band was The Subways, but I am not going to talk about them because I don’t know or care for them.

The second band was Head Automatica; led by God himself, Daryl Palumbo. For me, I think the theme of the show was nostalgia. I first saw Daryl Palumbo performed with the best band ever about four years (I think) ago. That concert was probably my favorite concert of all time, and GlassJaw was a huge part of my life during my second year at U of T. As a result, seeing Daryl Palumbo performed again gave me the chills! He was so different on Wednesday night: he’s all dressed up in a suit and tie rather than just a white t-shirt/topless... nevertheless, he’s entertaining as usual and the thing that really triggered the excitements in me was when he did the whole screaming style vocal thing... granted, he only did that like twice, but it brought me back to the good old GlassJaw days!! Seriously, fuck Head Automatica, stop that shit Mr. Daryl Palumbo, and bring back the best band of all time!


Here’s half the video of "Graduation Day"... it’s only half because security stopped me from videotaping in the middle of it.

On to the first co-headliner: Angels & Airwaves. First, I just have to say that Tom DeLonge has absolutely lost his mind!!! He thinks that he’s God or some powerful special being. It was really annoying that before each song, he would give some sort of cliché moral speech about the track: how it’s going to change lives, how it’s going to strengthen you as a human being... all types of shits like that... WTF... where’s the funny DeLonge??? Actually, there were moments where he couldn’t resist and said a sex joke once or twice (that was what Blink shows were all about, oh how I missed them!) He’s trying way too hard to be this weird motivational speaker/musician. In fact, to top off this shit, the backdrop at the end of their set was huge letters that spelled LOVE, how fucking gay is that?!!! To me, he sounded like a jackass, but I guess it worked for all the innocent little teenagers at the show. With that said, Angels & Airwaves sounded great, Tom’s vocal as well as the instruments all sounded flawless, their set would’ve been amazing if Tom didn’t go all melodramatic on our asses.

As the sun set, the siren music from Kill Bill introduced Taking Back Sunday... I thought that was neat. Perhaps the nostalgic theme was strongest during TBS’s set. As GlassJaw was a big part of my life in second year of university, TBS’s first record, Tell All Your Friends, has been a big part of my life ever since first year at U of T. I think it is safe for me to say that Tell All Your Friends is one of my favorite records off all time... it belongs somewhere in my top three records of all time! Sadly though, I do not enjoy or support anything post John Nolan and Shaun Cooper. Oh shit... I have to stop my TBS rant and focus on the concert. So, Adam Lazzara has officially perfected his mic swinging skills: he can now actually sing and do his crazy mic tricks all at the same time. Musically, I thought they were great, no doubt a huge improvement from pervious TBS shows I attended. In addition, they actually played a handful of songs from TAYF: "Bike Scene", "Cute Without The 'E' (Cut From The Team)", "Timberwolves At New Jersey", and "You're So Last Summer". And I, as well as many old TBS fans went crazy for them... that was extremely cool.

Now ladies and gentlemen, if you are not exhausted from reading this overly long post, you can see more pictures from the show here.