Apr
10
2005

It Pays To Return

(Add / View Comments) (0)PhotosSunday, April 10, 2005 - 12:10:36 pm
(Posted Under: Travel, Arizona Trip, Music Music, Tempe Music Scene Tempe Music Scene)
This morning, on the way out of Flagstaff, I requested we swing past the Orpheus Theatre. Last night I'd intended to get a photo of the sign announcing the Peacemakers show, and promptly forgot to after the giddy haze walking out. (Denise and Katie bolting to the car because it was snowing. These gals don't handle the cold well. [smile] ). Neither really wanted to, I could tell, and generally I go with the flow, but how often do I see the Peacemakers. I needed a photo!

We found the venue so much easier this time. They parked, and I jumped out to take the photos. I'd taken photos of the sign out the front of the theatre, and noticed a flier for the show in the window. At the same time, a woman had walked out of the venue, and we'd said hi to each other in passing. I proceeded to take a photo of the flier, when she asked me if I'd been to the show. I said I had, and when asked if I'd come up from Phoenix from the show, I replied that I had, but I was actually from Australia. As it turned out, she was the owner of the venue. We ended up in a falrly length chat about the show, the Peacemakers and my trip in general (where else I was going etc.). Midway through the conversion, a guy, who I'd assume was her husband came out and chatted also.

Talking about the show, where I was from, and how it was my first show finally after being a fan for so long, he interupted with "I think we've still got a poster from the show inside. Would you like it?". The answer obvious! [smile] This was totally unexpected. When he came out, with a HUGE poster in hand, we chatted more about what I did back home, how long I was staying for, the venue, and the turn out of the show last night - for anyone who is interested, apparently 400 tickets, and 50 and the door. He said how normally the Peacemakers bring in more people, and that the bad weather probably stopped a lot of people driving up from Phoenix.

We talked from a good 15 or 20 minutes, and Katie and Denise were quite curious as to why I had been gone so long, and was walking back with this huge tubular thing.

This made me even more glad that I'd insisted driving back to take the photo. The owners very extremely friendly, and it was great having that long chat that I did with them.

Without further ado, the photos from the Flagstaff trip.

Photos.

I took more on the trip back, though Mr. Burn's windshield was pretty skanky today, which funks up the photos. I just keep them for my private collection at the moment. Unless I can find some state of the art photo software that can remove squashed bugs, butterflies and other wildlife from photos! [smile]
Apr
10
2005

Trip To Flagstaff / Roger Clyne & The Peacemakers

(Add / View Comments) (0)PhotosSunday, April 10, 2005 - 11:07:22 am
(Posted Under: Music Music)
After sleeping late (well myself anyway, not so much Katie - which she's certainly not kept quiet about [wink] ) we headed of to Phoenix to pick up Denise, for the trip up to Flagstaff, to see Roger Clyne & The Peacemakers.

The trip up was interesting, as when we hit central Arizona, the scenary changed, almost immediately. From the deserty landscape and cactii, to pine tries, and log cabins, which was very remenicent of what I would expect Colorado would look like. The big shock, was when we rose in elevation, and hit the snow. SNOW? In Arizona? In Spring? Huh? Although Denise had said earlier in the day that it was 20 degrees (that's farenhight folks) in Flagstaff, seeing the landscape covered in snow was still such a suprise. The drop in temperature was noticable, even in the car. On the way up we saw a spectacular car wreck. A yellow sports car, on it's roof - people on stretchers, and a person still in the upside down car. Daunting.

However, we safely pulled into Flagstaff, around 6PM and found the hotel fairly easily. After checking in, Denise did her thing getting ready, Katie went to find us some food, and I lit up a smoke and tuned into VH1's Top 100 Metal Moments. HEY, I'm on holiday, okay! [wink] Quite entertaining, and cool to see so many random shots of Poison on TV. No doubt Katie was sick of my rock fingers when there was a shot of Poison after about the second time. Hey, we're not spoilt with Poison footage back home, what can I say.

Katie brought back a delicious meal from Jack In The Box. [wink] (Note the sarcasm!) Given how hungry we both were, it was fine though. While Katie was gone, the snow started to really come down, which was cool to see. While I've seen snow before, this was my first experience of 'it snowing'.

Around 7PM Denise was ready, and we made our way down to Mr. Burns to find the Orpheum Theatre. That proved to be quite an adventure in itself, though we finally got there.

We'd shown up quite early to get a good position, because of the reputation that goes with Peacemakers fans - snotty, drunk and obnoxious, and always being childish about front row. We took up position, second row, right side, right in front of Larson. Glad we did, obviously, but it was a very boring wait for the Peacemakers to take the stage. The opening band came on, and, well...like i said, a very long wait for the Peacemakers to take the stage. A completely weird opening choice for the Peacemakers, in my oppinion.

However, finally Roger, PH, Steve and Nick walked out. Suddenly my aching feet didn't seem that sore any more.

A critique of the show to come later when I have more time. Surfice to say, my tongue was completely sore today - I have no idea what I did to it, but I'm sure it was from rockin' out last night.

Once the show was over and the guys walked off stage, Steve came to the front of the stage, to do the rock 'n roll thing and shake hands with his adoring fans. On shaking hands with him, he reckonised me (I met him last night) and chatting breifly with me. I don't overly recall what about, other than asking what I thought of the show. I was just impressed to be recognised. Denise asked him for the setlist - he leaned back, looked around, in true Steve fashion, found the setlist, and handed it to me, saying "here you go Mark, take this back to Australia".

Steve is genuinely the nicest guy. For those of you who don't know who Steve is, he's truely the most suely & unimpressable looking old school rock 'n roller. Seeing Steve on stage, or even just hanging out at Yucca, he is physically intimidating, and looks like he'd as quickly tell you to fuck off and kick your ass if you got in his face. But under that, he's the most humble, gracious and friendly guy. It's so cool seeing bad ass Larson up on stage, and then him with a huge grin on his face, asking people in the audience where is good to shoot darts in Flagstaff. Definately one of my trip highlights is not only seeing Steve play, but getting to meet him.

After this, we headed out of the venue, and Katie and I stopped in front of the merch booth, waiting for Denise. Being there, I decided I should get a new RC&PM t-shirt, especially since we noticed when I arrived that there was a hole developing in my Sonoran Hope & Madness shirt. Katie pointed out that Kathleen & Doug Krammer were behind the merch table, so I introduced myself to Kathleen (RC&PM website / everything extrodonare) and proceeded the hard task of picking out a shirt. Hence, I walked out of the venue with a new Peacemakers shirt, and Steve's setlist.

All in all, an amazing night.

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