Offspring and 311...chilling by the lake

I have been waaaaay behind on my posting. Like two plus month behind. I have made it my goal before going on my annual super vacation to get caught up on the back log of at least eight blog worthy stories. Here are pictures and VIDEOS of the Offspring / 311 concert held at the old Miggs field in downtown Chicago. Yeah, the venue used to be the small airport right on the Chicago lakefront. That is until 9/11 and Mayor Daley decided to demolish the runway in the middle of the night with zero warning to the city. Seriously, look it up. Well the private jet owner’s loss is totally my gain. The venue is small so we can get up close to the bands and open to the wonderful summer nights (with a hint of cool breeze coming off the lapping water of Lake Michigan). Granted, I don’t push up in the crowd to get THAT close because I am A) too old to mosh or stage rush, and B) too worried the crowd would knock away my beer. There is a definite line between the 30+ crowd and the 16-25 year old crowd (or basically the crowd who loved these bands when they were originally a hit in high school and the crowd that likes the band because they just picked up the greatest hits album).

Yep I am not ashamed to admit that my all time favorite band is The Offspring. I could (and did) sing along to every song they played. The sad thing is I didn’t see them in concert till last year. Same goes for 311, somewhat. I always liked their music in high school (I mean Omaha styling hello!) but never got around to seeing them once they made it big (the Ranch Bowl in Omaha doesn’t really count…but man that place was a magnet for good upcoming alternative acts). I attended my first 311 concert in March, which just happened to be 311 day (talk about an education).

Okay here are videos of The Offspring. In Gone Away, you can see how Big Mike disapproves of the acoustic version (he much prefers the “rock band” version, ah ha ha ha).

--Note, all of these are links to the videos I posted on my YouTube account. I never thought I would need one, but unfortunately my blog has limited memory and this was my only option.

Gone Away

Self Esteem

Come out and play

Staring at the Sun

Can't get my head around you

Bad Habit

Here are pics of 311 (sorry, they did rock but I only had memory space for one band).




Bill drinking Joose or otherwise known as a bad idea (refer back to Vegas post when we first were introduced to Joose...aka canned douche bag).