Because on Wednesday Dave Matthews Band announced their 2006 summer tour dates. And since I know you all hang on every word I write when it comes to DMB, I shall now pontificate upon this news.
More DMB content than I can really expect anyone to care about
(feel free to skip to next boldface section header)
Really, the tour this year makes me sad. Not that there’s anything wrong with it. It’s an exciting schedule. Another New York festival, Alpine, Gorge, SPAC, all those typical goodies. Plus two nights back at home in Charlottesville to close the tour. The problem is that I can’t realistically do any of that.
Phoenix's Cricket Pavilion: Not the world's most beautiful venue
I’m still at least tentatively planning on two shows. They play Phoenix on my birthday and San Diego that Saturday. (Also, there are rumors of something in Chicago in September and I hold out hope about that, what with the free lodging there and all.) It bums me out a little bit that due to constraints both on my time and my finances that I can’t justify going to Alpine, or Gorge, or Shoreline. And, yet, even more than I feel slightly sad about that I feel even more guilty about it. And that guilt leads me to feel sad in a whole different way, because part of me feels like I’ve gone and spoiled something pure and beautiful.
Seeing multiple shows in a year wasn’t entirely unusual for me. In 97 I saw Dave three times. Twice in 98. But I never traveled to a show until 2002, when I drove to San Diego. I did the same in 2003. Even then it was still something really special. Even the two shows of a given year were within a week of each other, they were special because it was my only opportunity that year. It was like a religious thing. That changed in 2004, which is the first time I ever traveled far enough that it required me to get on a plane. The first show I saw that year (here in Phoenix) was great, but it felt more like a warm-up. The second show (in LA) was like a boring second act, leading up to the big finale. That finale (in San Francisco) was everything promised and more. But it only made me more determined to get to those handful of “special” shows and “special” venues.
So last year I went to Alpine, and it blew me away. And then I saw a show in Phoenix, which was a good solid show, but so paled in comparison to Alpine before it and what I was expecting Red Rocks to be that even driving out there that night felt like an afterthought. And, again, the three nights of shows I saw at Red Rocks were more than I could ever have dreamed. But here’s the problem: They spoiled me.
Coors Amphitheatre near San Diego. A beautiful venue where the breeze blows in from the ocean, just a couple of miles away.
It makes me feel really obscene to feel even the slightest traces of disappointment just because I’ll only get to see two shows. Only? Every single show used to be like a pilgrimage. I’m invoking the religious imagery very deliberately here. Because there’s this small part of that feels like seeing DMB at Cricket f-ing Pavilion now is like going to mass at your local parish after being to the Vatican. And like the Catholic who gets bored with his own church, I can’t help it, but some part of me knows deep down it’s a sin.
The Hollywood Bowl. Why oh why does this show have to be on a Monday night?
On the other hand, there’s a new Pearl Jam record coming out in May. And tour dates to be released soon. Oh, Mike and Stone, give me comfort.
The post gets more philosophical, if not entirely less dorky
Why do I feel so guilty about this change in the way I feel about seeing DMB in concert, though? I’ve been a fan of that band for more than a decade, you would expect my feelings to change some way or another, right? But I think this really gets to the heart of why it’s an issue for me. Because I am the way I am to a great extent because of DMB. I do everything I try to live in the moment. I don’t believe in delaying gratification. I recognize the realities of adult-hood: that saving money is necessary, that we can’t always do all the fun things we want to. And yet I fight against that “adult” voice in my head every day. I know I have to go to work, for example – but how depressing is it to think that if today were to be my last day that I spent it sitting in this office? My compromise is this: I hate my job, sure, but I let it go as soon as I walk out the door. I listen to happy music in my car as I drive home. I drink in the sunshine and am thankful for it. I am this way because some twelve years ago KBCO started playing a little known band with a stupid name.
Well, OK, this is really a chicken-or-the-egg kind of argument. Am I the way I am because at an impressionable age I heard some music and it inspired me and I grew into a mold that fit with that? Or was I inclined to be this way no matter what and that’s why ultimately things like DMB held more appeal than Nine Inch Nails? And of course, even that doesn’t get fully at the root of it, because as much as I embraced the carpe diem stuff in high school … I didn’t really. How can you really appreciate the idea of your own mortality until something forces the issue? For me, college forced the issue in a big way. I had a girlfriend who’s sister had died at 18, who’s mother killed herself, and – more important than either of that – I had a best friend who one night was but a phone call away and then somehow ceased to exist. (Five years ago this month. Where did that time go? But the thing is I still miss her. All the time. Even after five years.) And while I think that aforementioned girlfriend’s experiences with losing loved ones at an early age has made her cautious and fearful of the world, seeing the reality of mortality has made me only more determined to live. Every day to live as much as I can. Does that sound trite? I suppose it is, sort of. But it’s also probably my number one motivating factor.
But there are two ways the guilt is working, remember. The first is that I feel guilty for giving in to my adult side and admitting that this just isn’t the year to fly all over the country for DMB. (Rhetorical aside: Is this entire post invalidated if I do end up going to see them in Chicago in September?) On the other hand, even I’m capable of admitting that it’s a little sad that I might be measuring my life experience based on when and where I get to see a band in concert. I mean, really. I can embrace a song lyric that says, “I can’t believe that we would lie in our graves dreaming of things we might have done,” but if those things are concerts? I admit it’s a little pathetic. But then I hate to begrudge people their fetishes, and this is clearly mine. To each their own. We all do what we must to get through.
Unrelated to all the above
Also, how cool is this? Assuming you're a Costco member anyway. (Though, really, it would be worth it to join Costco just for this single purchase if you were in the market. As best I can tell this same G5 Costco is offering for $1,480 goes for $1,868 via any other Apple outlet. 3-year Apple Care included. Kinda makes me want to buy one ... just cuz.
No comments:
Post a Comment