Today Was A Good Day

AKV was all about Daddy today.  He would come find me saying, "Dadda?", grab me by the hand, pull to wherever he wanted me, and then play with me.  It made me feel so wanted and good about myself.  I guess I'm doing something right.  I love you Alexander.

Walk Down Constitution Lane - The First Amendment

I realized that most of us Americans throw around the numerical form of the Constitutional amendments when talking to others.  For example:

Friend: "Hey Nelson. Did you fool around with that ugly, old, fat chick after the show?"
Nelson: "I plead the fif! 1, 2, 3, 4...FIF!"

Nelson: "Man, I wonder if gun restrictions should be in place cuz mofos be shooting each other a lot lately."
Redneck: "I tell ya what, man.  If you take away my right to bear arms - my 2nd amendment! -then they'll have pry  it outta my cold, dead hand...sittin' over there. Ma gun went off accidentally and uhm...shot it clean off...kinda ironic ain't it?"

Republican: "THEY SHOULDN'T BUILD A MOSQUE NEAR GROUND ZERO! IT'S HALLOWED GROUND!"
Nelson & Obama: "They're entitled to be able to do so. The first amendment allows them to practice their beliefs. Hey, isn't that a strip club 2 blocks away from Ground Zero?"

I also realized that most of us don't know our Amendments beyond the 5th  so I'll post up the verbiage and any  related thoughts/jokes.

Amendment 1 - Freedom of Religion, Press, Expression.  

Ratified 12/15/1791. 

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

The Return of Rock - Dovetail Joint & IvoryWire 08/14/2010

Dovetail Joint's Chuck Glaflter(Guitar/Vox),
Jon Kooker (Bass), Joe Dapier(Drums),
and Robert Byrne (Guitar - Not Pictured)

I got to see my two favorite local Chicago bands Ivorywire and Dovetail Joint reunite for the 2010 Doug Meis Memorial Concert at Lincoln Hall this weekend.  It's been roughly 7 years since I've seen these bands play so I was naturally excited to catch them at the newly minted Lincoln Hall (well, newly minted at least for me).

For not having played for a long time, both bands pretty much picked up where they left off before going on hiatus.  Ivorywire played songs off both of their releases The World is Flat such as "Hey You", "Geisha Girl", "Promise To Burn", "Living With The Static", "Backfire", and "Just Like I Remember It" along with rarely played "You're Never Satisfied" and "Faint Praise" from their last release Notables & Nobodies.  Dovetail Joint stook primarily to playing material off their Aware/Columbia releases 001 and The Level EP with songs like "Boy", "Home", "Motorcade", "Protocol", "Beautiful", and their most famous hit "Level on The Inside". They also busted out gems such as "Candy" and "Honestly" from their double-disc Killing of Cool independent release.It would've been nice if both bands could've delved into more illustrious b-side material but their set times were rather limited (35 minutes each I think) so we got a lot of music in a short amount of time.

The show itself was taped professionally for a hopeful DVD/Blue-Ray release in the future.  I would recommend everyone getting a copy of this show as it may be the only one we get for a while.  Below are fan-filmed clips from the show:

The Rah Rah Rah Concert

The Smashing Pumpkins 3.0
Metro, Chicago, IL 07/27/2010

Last week I went to the Smashing Pumpkins  (SP) concert in Chicago to raise money to offset medical costs got musician Matt Leone who valiantly tried to fight off a man beating his wife while passing them on the street.  Matt's insurance lapsed two months prior to the altercation that put him the hospital, and the medical procedures required to save his life are incredibly expensive.  Thus, someone at Sweet Relief.org organized a benefit for Matt at the Metro featuring the Smashing Pumpkins along with Kill Hannah (KH) as the opening act.  Tickets were:

• $500 for VIP seating during the show, merchandise, a sneak preview with the band during their soundcheck, and a picture with the band.
• $100 for VIP seating only during the show.
• $10 for a pair of tickets to the show done via raffle.

 I decided to go with the the $500 ticket as I figured it would be a once in a lifetime opportunity.  Only 20 of us got the actual ticket so it was nice that Gawd looked upon me and blessed me with a coveted golden ticket (even if the ticket was paid for and benefited someone else).  All proceeds that night (as far I know) went to Matt's fund which included niceties such as large checks from Joe Shanahan (owner of the Metro), Billy Corgan, sales from on-stage (someone paid $10K for a guitar Billy played that night and another paid $4K to just do a 15 minute meet-and-greet) and online auctions, merchandise sales, and of course ticket sales.  Overall, I enjoyed the show (for a review, check this out).

The one thing that did irk me a little bit was the stage banter from KH and SP regarding how "Chicago came together to support one of their own" and how "we should be proud of what we've given to Matt".  Don't get me wrong.  I plan to write off my donation to charity at the end of the year.  I was there to see the might SP play, and inadvertently gave my money to help Matt out.  My intention wasn't to be charitable per se.  So, I'm not going to try to justify my attendance at the show as a sign of good father but rather as a sign of my selfish want of seeing my favorite band of all time play in a small venue.  Maybe they were doing this rallying to get people to give more which I guess is fine within itself, but I found it funny that people were cheering for themselves as if they were there to truly support Matt.

Let me restate this: 96% to 98% of us there were there for the same reason - to enjoy SP; not to give Matt our money; not the watch Kill Hannah, not get all hot and sweaty with 1200 other mofos to get closer to the stage.  If SP wasn't there driving this effort, this wouldn't have been a big deal enough to see Gov. Pat Quinn swing by to declare it Matt Leone Day.  It's a farce to think any other way.

Another Matt Leone benefit show is being put on by a ton of bands on August 21st. Will this make the news? I hope so. Will it be the smash I attended? Probably not.

Note: I wish no ill-will towards Matt and hope he does recover from his injuries quite soon.  I have a lot of respect for what he did for I probably wouldn't have done the same.  To donate to his benefit, please visit http://www.sweetrelief.com.