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5.17.2008C'mon... C'mon... You and Your Cronies
 I absolutely love how Thom Yorke dances. I think it is some crazy variation of The Running Man mixed with Seinfeld's Elaine dance. In other words, it looks like a five year-old who has just developed a sense of rythm. I asked Twisted Wife if she would be embarrassed if I picked up some of Thom's moves and pulled them out at the next wedding we go to. Fortunately or unfortunately, my "Thom Yorke" will not be seen this wedding season.Radiohead: The Verizon Wireless Amphitheater 5/14/08 Until Wednesday, I had never seen Radiohead live. You would think that being a fan of their music would force me to go to one of their concerts. No, instead I decided to wait until they were not coming to Kansas City so I could drive eight hours round-trip to see them. It was a bonus to pay nearly $4.00 a gallon for the gas and an extra $60 for a shitty hotel room. Truth is, I was waiting for their genius to age just right before I stood 200 yards away on a muddy hillside barely able to see that there were actual people on the stage. In other words, I'm a complete idiot... idiot like a fox! Besides the show, this was a chance for TW and I to spend two days away from the Twisted Kids. And boy did we need it! The stress level in the car went from 100% to 0% in under three seconds after leaving the wee ones with Twisted Mother In-Law. Granted, it went from 0% to 100% in under two seconds 40 miles outside of the city. But in between, we had a great road trip. With this being show #4 in our Twisted Summer of Shows series, we have gotten used to parking a half mile away from the venue, pot smokers, neo-hippies, $40 t-shirts and the assholes that think the band came to play background music for their conversations. Oh, and let us not forget, the one drunk-ass that screams the band's biggest hit before every song knowing damn well that they will play it during the encore. I love that guy! ("CREEP! CREEP!" ahh, the memories). Regardless of all the crap we went through to see this show, it was amazing. The highlight for me being the band's unnerving rendition of You and Whose Army? The camera mounted on the piano that Thom Yorke used to sing to the audience via the video backdrop gave the song a very eerie feel, his lazy eye and disheveled appearance making the challenges in the song even more adversarial. I can only relate it to a drunk homeless man that really, REALLY wants you to give him a dollar for "food." Going in, I didn't know what to expect from this show. I kept wondering if Radiohead was one of those bands that plays the hits with a few of the new songs added in for flavor or would they stick to the newer material because they were tired of kissing the ass of the people that only came to hear Creep. I was pleasantly surprised to find out they were the latter. If I wanted to hear Creep, I should have seen them in 1992. All in all, I'm glad I've finally seen Radiohead. They are one of the greatest bands of my time, and now I can check them off the list of Bands I Want to See Before I Die. Going back to the crowd for a moment, there were A LOT of KC people who made the trip to St. Louis for this show. One of which happened to be right in front of TW and I. She was wearing what I kindly refer to as a tablecloth dress. She had multiple skull and crossbones tattoos and a Betty Page haircut. She was carrying a typical indie-rock boyfriend that is, undoubtedly, in a band that plays some sort of "fusion" (whether it's funk-metal or blues-rap or art-funk-blues-metal-soul is immaterial). I didn't know her, but she turned up two days later at the DMV when TW and I were renewing our car tags, she had number 599 and we had 600. Wait, she was in front of us at the concert, she was number 599 at the DMV... crap! I think we're stalking her. 
posted by Jim at 11:18 AM
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