Day 212 — The White Stripes

My review is online. It includes a comma splice that was inserted after it left my hands. As well as a cliché that I used in modified form that got turned back into the actual cliché. I’ll let you guess which sentence that is.

Eh, I guess I’m happy with it for my first-ever real review. I’m pretty sure I didn’t focus enough on the actual music. But, you know, when the show is good and the band is doing you right, there’s not that much to say. Except “thanks.”

Anyway, the show was amazing. It was loud and raw and powerful and absolutely mesmerizing. I didn’t really talk about it in the review, but the sexual tension between Jack and Meg is just fantastic. I honestly think it’s the driving force behind their music. You’ve got Jack playing these screeching riffs and spitting out lyrics at a pace that gets a little carried away sometimes, but then there’s Meg, with her simple yet fierce beats, keeping Jack tethered to the song at all times. They look at each other and never have to say a word. By their nature, they are always on the verge of losing each other, but they never fail to pull it back together and make it fucking tight.

And how they don’t exit stage left and hop straight into the sack together every night after the show is absolutely beyond me. They’re good-looking kids, those two.

I’m disappointed with how my photos turned out, for the most part. The photo pit at the amphitheater is kind of ridiculous. There’s maybe two feet of space in there, and the stage is way up high, so short people with crappy lenses (like me) can barely see above the damn amps to take a decent shot. I got up on the barricade for a better shot (as per the suggestion of the security guy) and was reprimanded by one of the band’s black-suited handlers. The one with the thick beard. It didn’t matter anyway; everything was turning out like crap despite my vantage point.

Oh well.

I didn’t post a pic of the band up there because I had to sign a release saying I’d be glad to pay a $30,000 fine if my pics of the band cropped up elsewhere than the CA (except for my personal portfolio). What’s so dumb about that is that the kids in the first few rows had a much better vantage point than I did (they weren’t looking straight up and into amps), and they were snapping pics all night long. I, of course, was limited to the first three songs. Such hooey. So, if I or someone near me had taken pictures from the crowd, they probably would have turned out much better than the shots from the pit. But I’d never do such a thing, even though literally every person around me was doing just that. Nope, never.