Unwanted Commentary

Cake...awesome...it was greatness. I can't recall seeing four men groove in the ways we dd. Motions, gyrations and exultations that were totally inappropriate for our ages, our shapes and lack of groove-ability. But we did, oh yes, we did…we got funky.

It's been six years since I last saw Cake and I hope I don't wait that long to see them again. I admit this wasn't the perfect venue for them, the auditorium was too big and they aren't really a big room kind of band. I suspect that they got irritated at the crowd, who had mostly been there for Collective Soul and Flickerstick, and all of their fans were too dispersed amongst the rabble. The first time I saw them was in a little theater, The Arcadia, and it was superb, much more intimate and they could feed from the crowd a lot better.

I still loved their set and they did most of the songs that I wanted to hear, Wheels, Carbon Monoxide and No Phone. They did a lot of songs from their slightly obscure first album, Motorcade of Generosity, and that surprised me. Of course, they did their big songs and some of the more standard ‘hits' from their middle three albums I would have liked to have heard more from Pressure Chief, but I won't complain…much…it was a very solid show.

Unfortunately, and here comes the bitching session, we had to sit through an hour and half of Collective Soul. I apologize if any of you out there are Collective Soul fans, but I just found nothing to appreciate about this band. Their music, while not bad, was inane and repetitive, totally lacking any flavor or substance at all, and it was just so generic. I knew a lot of the songs they played, as in, "these are those filler songs they play in the middle of sets on the radio", so that's what it was like, an hour and a half of radio filler. They weren't bad per say, I would have loved it if they were bad, I've listened to bad bands and enjoyed it, but they were just so standard fare that they elicited no response from me except utter boredom. The lead singer was this bizarre mix of stereotypes. He looked a little like Sammy Hagar, spazzed around like Steven Tyler and behaved like Pauley Shore. Now each of those guys alone are great (except Pauley Shore), but if you mix them together, well it just gave me the jibblies. Unnatural.

My other gripe was with the Nokia center in general. First off, the tickets were $40, I don't know if the venue was a factor in that equation, but it was still pricey. Then they charged $12 for fucking parking, fortunately our group converged in a central location and car pooled, but if I had gone in there by myself I would have been disappointed by the lack of a blow job after paying that. If that wasn't enough they charged $7 for fucking beer and we're not talking about good beer even, we're talking about $7 for gawddamned Miller light and Budweiser. I remember those being strip club prices and I didn't see any boobies! (Note how I skillfully attempt to point out that I haven't been to a strip club in years, specifically four.)

So despite it all it was still worth everything to see Cake live again.

Oh, I almost forgot, I had Indian food in the pre-concert warm up. I love that stuff, I have no idea how to pronounce it and only a vague notion of what's in it, but boy howdy is it yummy.