Sunday, August 31, 2014

CPR Fest 2014

The rain stayed away long enough for me & Liam  to head to CPR Fest 2014. Short version: Muuuuuuch more fun and enjoyable than the Gulfport Music Festival. Smaller crowd. Better weather. Much more rock-oriented line up. Highlight of the summer!

For the morbidly curious that derive some value from my observations, here's a peek into some additional thoughts:

  • Dirty smugglers that we are, our folding chair bags also concealed a hidden Coke, for Liam. When we were getting into the park, past security, one of the guards was checking Liam's chair. The boy's eyes go wide but then Your Humble Narrator starts talking to the guard. Distracted him as he puts his hand less than an inch from the soda. Liam stopped breathing. Then the guard hands him the chair and we move through the line. Villains that we are. 
  • Event was sponsored by Rockstar. They had free samples. Liam tried his first one, and disliked it. Sampled the "peach," myself. Didn't like it. Not even for free. 
  • Buckcherry wasn't overly impressive. He talked as much as he sang. And most of his language was terribly profane. If that's your sort of thing, more power to you. Not mine, though. We sat in the shade and Liam cooled off. Took him a while to get used to the heat. Poor kid needs to get outside more often. 
  • Dinner was a Large Pizza for $15. Ugh! Liam ate like two pieces. Guess who ate the rest?
  • Skillet was amazing. Opened with solos from the violin and cello. Proceeded to kick muuuuuch buttocks. Great musicians. Appreciative of the crowd. Interactive and gracious. The string players were my favorite aspect. Not sure of their genders, though. And not 100% sure if they were playing live, or not. But it lessens the magic if you know how the magician does his tricks.
  • Seether surprised me with how phenomenonal they were.  Played all the songs that I wanted to here. Especially Broken. They did that one acoustic and the crowd sang most of it. Oddest thing, between songs they'd do weird music transitions. Usually with distortion and pedal effects. And they didn't talk much. Just jammed. Great, rocktastic jams. Another great band. 
  • Closed out with Godsmack. The headliner. Played some new stuff. Played a lot of old stuff. awwwwwesome drum battle. THEN old Sully, the lead singer and musical phenom, started talking. And wouldn't shut up. With his ultra thick Boston accent. Was fixated in throwing beers into the crowd. Spend a few minutes cursing and yapping, then throw another beer. And he had more than a dozen to throw. We got tired of hearing his accent, so we packed up and left. Heard almost everything we wanted to hear, anyway. 
  • All the bands raved about the heat. Even though it was a relatively mild night by South Mississippi measures. 
  • Aside from Buckcherry, we didn't sit down. Didn't need the chairs. But needed more water and could have hidden it in the chair cases. If we had only thought of it. 
  • Afterwards, a breakneck dash through Rooney's. One more Coke for Liam and the coldest, most delicious Johnny Appleseed for me. 
Another great trip with Kidd Maestro. Have to put more of those on our calendar. 

No comments: