Guster
The Time. Friday, Feb. 16, 07.
The Place. House of Blues, Or.
The Reason. Guster.
Rhiannon and I went to see Guster tonight at House of Blues. We were both incredibly phsyched, cause we’ve been die hard fans of them for years. Them and Badly Drawn Boy are my two favorite. Anyways, we arrive at House of Blues at around 6:45ish, and it was absolutely freezing, which is extremely odd, because this if Florida. We’d later find out that is was below zero. Anyways, we didn’t wanna wait in the freezing cold line with all the other little kids trying to sneak in beer. So we went to Virgin Records for a little while. Then we went back when the line started moving again. In the line, there was this short little jamaican lady singing in the mic for the H.O.B. restaurant. Then when we get inside, in was crowded enough, but we managed to grab a pretty good spot in the center of the floor.
We stood there with our spot for about 30 minutes until the pre-show [Mason Jennings[ started. His first song was a variety of different ways to say “Yeah Yeah Yeah”. Then after that it went sort of downhill. He was ok, but just didn’t wow me. Through the entire pre-show, there was this 6 ft. guy standing directly infront of us, and his afro made it look like a Solar Eclipse. Our bad luck shimmyed however, when a dude with one too many buds passed out. About five girls dressed like a Hilton or a Spear were alll yelling, “Get out of the way! Emmit’s gonna die! He’s dying!” When in actuality, a kid was waving his arms and accidently smacked poor Emmit on the back on the head. With all the preppy girls surrounding him, a big security guard who looked like Brock Samson picked him up over his head through the crowd. Why did our bad luck shimmy you may ask, because the crowd had shimmyed as well. Now we have a completely clear view of everything. The one drawback is, I’m standing next to a girl who’d had at least 5 beers, 6 if you count the one she dropped, and while she’s trying to sway back and fourth, she sways round and round, bumping into me a lot. At least tonight, there was only one drunk girl. When we went to Edwin McCain, there was like 5 drunk girls, and one crippled girl. Don’t get me started. So Mason ended his set, then we waited another 15 or 20 minutes for them to set up. Then Guster came onstage.
The lead singer and lead guitarist Ryan was extremely funny. He looked like a mixture between Tim Roth, and Ryan Gosling in Half Nelson. Then there was Adam, back-up vocals, and bassist. He looked like what you’d think Nick Lachey’s cousin would look like. And he played one mean trumpet as well. And then to the right, Joe, the new guy. He looked like a kid I went to high school with James. He ate things. And last but not least, Joe, the drummer. He played the drums rarely with sticks, but wwith his hands, which I imagine hurt. Joe looked like…. Well like Joe.
They opened with The Captain. And Then the rest, in no particular order were, The New Underground, Demon, Great Escape, Happier, a new South-American song [which was brilliant]. It was they’re first debut last night in Charleston, but they said it didn’t go to well, so they dedicated it to us. And a few other I didn;t know the names of. Right before they played Keep It Together, Ryan put a tie around his head and said “Usually at a wedding, the true wedding party doesn’t begin until some douche-bag puts a tie on his head. Well tonight lady’s and gentlemen. I am that douche-bag”. Then directly before they’re last song, Fa-Fa, he said, “Now for this last song, I want you to reach deep down inside yourself, and pull out and use… your inner cow-bell”, and the entire band used cow-bells during the song. It was definetly one of the best concerts I’ve ever been to. I’ll always be a fan of Guster. Not only for they’re brilliant music, and great sense of humor, but their amazing originality. They’re an extremely original band. Keep up the great works guys. Hope to see you again soon.