Warped Wednesday

So, I'm sitting here, miserable because the third issue of Dallas came out today and, due to Athens's SUCKING, it is not in my hands. I think to myself, "I have an entire icy day free of classes and am about to cry. What could cheer me up?"

Duh. Warped Tour.

I had planned on writing my Warped Tour blog earlier than this, pushed it away from my focuses, then was reminded by my blog-follower, Sarah, who posted a blog about a Warped Tour documentary.

-----
There's nothing in the world quite like Warped tour, where you are likely to run into any variation of being available all while burning in the sun and watching, on your choice of several stages, the most diverse concert line-up out there. Warped tour is less of a show than an experience, a hot and sticky experience that takes place on the burning asphalt of a parking lot in the dead of summer. The mere smell of Warped Tour is unlike anything else in the world. There's no other way to describe it than the smell of "hot" completely epitomized, especially when one is standing amid the crowd. For some, Warped Tour becomes a survival experience, where one must come equipped with gear to get through it, ie. the time I stood at the front of a Warped Tour crowd for 10 straight hours to see My Chemical Romance front row and nearly died.

Warped Tour, like Christmas, is sort of a regular tradition for many like myself, and I was surprised to find out some of the differences my favorite annual tour will have this year. For instance, in the past I have had to "rough it" to simply survive a day at WT, traipsing back and forth between two main-stages and several smaller ones (well, not Warped '05 where I stayed at one stage the entire time), but this year- there will be only one main stage and it will be actually placed in the comfort of an ampitheatre. What fun is that?! Why, back in my day, Sonny-Boy, you had to stand in the sun, your flesh peeling off and die to see bands on the main stage, but this year kids get the luxury of sitting in the shade. Two of those words just don't fit with the Warped I know: "sitting" and "shade." It's warped. You're supposed to be in the middle of a parking lot or in some dirt pit somewhere, not somewhere where a stage is actually meant to be. As far as I know, all the smaller stages will remain in the desert-like conditions to which they are accustomed, but Warped Tour will be down one crucial stage this year, the traditional second main stage. I'm excited to see what kind of difference this new set-up will make, however, and especially excited about this line-up:

3OH!3 A Day to Remember A Skylit Drive Alexisonfire Anti-Flag Attack Attack Bad Religion Bayside Big D and the Kids Table Black Tide Bouncing Souls Breathe Carolina Brokencyde Cash Cash Chiodos

Dance Gavin Dance Dear and the Headlights Dirty Heads Escape the Fate Every Avenue Flogging Molly Forever The Sickest Kids Gallows Hit the Lights I Set My Friends on Fire In This Moment Jeffree Star Less Than Jake Lights Longway

LoveHateHero Madina Lake Meg & Dia Millionaires NOFX Outernational P.O.S. Saosin Scary Kids Scaring Kids Settings Senses Fail Shad Silverstein Sing it Loud Streetlight Manifesto

Tat The A.K.A.s The Architects The Ataris The Devil Wears Prada The Maine The White Tie Affair There For Tomorrow Therefore I Am Thrice TV/TV Underoath Valencia Westbound Train

I have made bold the ones for which I am most excited. Which Warped '09 bands are you most excited to see? I can only hope that when I go to copy down the set times of the bands from the huge, inflatable Warped schedule that none are playing at the same time.

It is my absolute dream to some day follow this tour and write for it, to highlight and document everything amazing that goes on during the show and behind the scenes, from set up to the post-show BBQ. So, Kevin Lyman, if you ever find yourself reading this, I now fall to my knees before you, hands clasped and beg of you to let me cover the tour. I'm thoroughly willing sweat and bleed through it.

That's not an overstatement.

So, in honor of this year's amazing Warped Tour, I decided to share my favorite Warped memory.

Warped Tour 2005

This was my first Warped and the third time I had seen MCR live as well as the first time I met Gerard and Mikey. After their set, I was lifted from the crowd by a security guard who drug me under the stage where my favorite band was standing. I fell over an equipment-loading ramp and got a piece of metal from the drummer of MCR's kit stuck in my knee. The band, of course, saw all of it. How embarrassing! Mikey and Gerard must have felt bad, though, for; they came to talk to me in the first aide tent.






Me with Gerard Way, singer of MCR (above) and with Mikey Way, bassist of MCR (right).
Columbus, Ohio



So now, all of you, go forth and get Warped!

XoXo
c.