Passion Is The Gateway Drug: A Blog About My Favorite Live Music Memories, and What Are Yours?

Live concerts have always been something I love. I used to be obsessed actually! I stood countless hours in my teens when we had a local ticket master agent who cheated the system and printed out tickets in bunches that we all pre-ordered. I spent countless hours on phones (yes before the internet) calling in for tickets, trying to beat the next caller to the best seats. From there into my 20s it was about seeing shows in different venues, of different scales, with different sets. There's a certain magic, and thrill, from seeing my favorite musicians live that can't be simulated any other way.

A couple of days ago, I was driving home from NYC via Jersey City and the Turnpike. As I passed the Liberty Science Center, I began to reminisce about the Radiohead show I went to August 17th, 2001 at Liberty State Park.

There are many reasons why this show was especially memorable...

It was a glorious (for me) time in the history of Radiohead-- if you are a fan just check out the set list! 

1. The National Anthem
2. Lucky
3. Optimistic
4. Karma Police
5. I Might Be Wrong
6. Knives Out
7. Packt Like Sardines in a Crushd Tin Box
8. Exit Music (for a Film)
9. My Iron Lung
10. No Surprises
11. Dollars and Cents
12. Just
13. Pyramid Song
14. Paranoid Android
15. Idioteque
16. Everything in Its Right Place
17. Encore:
18. Morning Bell
19. Fake Plastic Trees
20. Climbing Up the Walls
21. How to Disappear Completely
22. Encore 2:
23. Talk Show Host
24. You and Whose Army?
25. Encore 3:
26. Like Spinning Plates
27. Encore 4:
28. The Bends

As I recall, it was a beautiful Summer's evening -- laying in the grass enjoying a show where the band played good and long and shared their passion from start to finish, giving all of their energy from first chord to last. As to be expected, the sound crew did their usual amazing work so the music was pristine. 

In the background of the concert was a view of NY which included The Statue of Liberty and the City, including the Twin Towers in their last days which of course no one could imagine at the time. And, this is something special about music, how it intertwines with our lives, and history. Music is a deep deep part of many lives, it's contextual, reminding us of good times and bad, heartbreaks and first loves and everything in between.

This concert, like many in my life, was attended solo. I often went by myself to shows. Often, concerts became a refuge for me, a solo adventure like a moving meditation. I wasn't distracted by anything.. just me and the music, and the settings, and making new friends too.

I used to collect the live bootlegs; part of the passion and excitement of attending shows was the following trip I would take months later to go downtown into NYC, (Sullivan Street I think), and hit the bootleg CD stores to see if I could find copies of the shows I had attended. This was in the early 90s before the internet gave us access to everything.

It was a great evening of music that August with Radiohead in my home state of NJ... I can still sense the beauty of the music after all these years, just from driving by on the way home.

Share a memory with me?!