|
Sign up now for a FREE Citygigs listing. No strings, no bull, just
free unlimited self serve access to your info on the site.
New User? Click here!
|
|
Sweat and Screamo at the Opera House
Toronto
June 22, 2003
How to articulate the expressiveness of a screamo show? They all jump
around, tear off their T-shirts, jump into the crowd off the stage, PA
stacks, or whatever else could possibly endanger their lives.
Which is what brings me to this: a photo essay. These pictures are
tangible, a freeze frame that brings you close enough to actually being
there. I hope I never have to see another trucker hat or lip piercing in
my life, I had enough to last me a lifetime at this show.
But for the things you couldn't see in these pictures, like the fact that
this show happened on a day when the temperature hit 36ºC, was oversold and
stuffed beyond capacity, meant that everyone was sweating before the first
band even began. By the end of the night, everyone was soaking wet. Even
though I didn't even touch a soul all night (the isolation of the photo pit
is a wondrous thing), I still managed to leave the venue at the end of the
night, soaking wet, pulling the legs of my jeans away from my skin, and
gasping for breath.
One could make the obvious jokes about being close to everyone in the room,
but it was true. There is a friendly atmosphere to all ages shows, where
younger kids aren't as embittered by their rock snobbery like their older
counterparts are. Besides, all the 19+ ones hurried themselves onto the
19+ balcony at the Opera House, but irony has its ways… all the sweat and
heat ultimately rose up in the upper parts of the venue.
Or the fact that this show ran late, and no one cared that tomorrow was a
Monday, because school was out.
Or that some of these kids were so desperate to see this show that they had
been waiting since 3 PM in the afternoon, a full 5 hours before doors
opened, in order to pay at the door, because tickets had sold out weeks before.
Summer shows like this don't come along often enough.
CLICK HERE to enter the photo essay.
|
|
article search
|
