exoskeletal junction at the railroad delayed

i don't even fucking know.

last night a friend asked me to go with him to see the mars volta at palladium. given that the mars volta at emo's in 2003 was probably the worst show i've ever been to, my first inclination was to tell him to get the fuck out of here. that said, he's new to town and i wanted to do him a solid. [an aside: i figured i'd just get a ticket at the door. as it turns out, he had an extra and gave it to me for free. thank christ, because the tickets were $35 each plus a $10 service fee. i still can't believe it].

i ended up working until about 8, and i when i got home he had already left for the show. i looked it up and saw that the show supposedly started at 7:30. "what kind of self-respecting band goes on stage at 7:30?" i wondered. [i would soon find out the answer: bands that play 2 hour sets without a break.]

i got there pretty quickly, only to discover that the whole parking lot was full. "oh, there's probably something else going on around here tonight. i doubt there are this many fucking mars volta fans around." right?

not so much. the place was fucking packed. like morrissey-packed. like the biggest crowd i've ever seen at palladium. who the fuck were all these people? well, for one, my friend and i were by far the oldest people there. by like 10 years. about half of the crowd was 17 year old texican chicks in skate shoes and black eyeliner swooning over cedric and omar. the other half were 17 year old suburban aggro types with their shirts off barfing into their hoodies. you know, the type that roam in packs and can't ever decide where to stand [and once they do decide, can't be still for more than 1 minute at a time]. basically, a lot of honda civic drivers.

i'm still pretty puzzled by the crowd. hearing give it a name on a mixtape and seeing that badass video for one armed scissor when i was in college are the only reasons these guys are even in my consciousness. so what about these kids in the crowd that were like 7 years old when that shit was coming out? where do they hear this stuff? more than that, though, i cannot for the life of me understand the appeal of this music. it's like early pink floyd + crystal meth + salsa + guitar player magazine + epilepsy. i mean, how does one guitar even make so much racket? and why are all these people going crazy and singing along to lyrics like "transient jet lag ecto mimed bison?" obviously i'm biased, but give me tool any day of the week over this shit.

all that said, this was one of the most fun shows i've been to in a long time. every time i go to a rock show, i leave thinking "dude, rock shows are so fucking fun!" i think it's because dudes that are into this kind of music aren't afraid to express just how into the music they are. i mean, fucking people were so into this shit! i even saw three gossip girls get into a fight.

they ripped through all the "hits" and some of the newer stuff that i didn't recognize. unlike the show at emo's (aka the worst show of all time), they didn't go off into any 40 minute free form fusion jam sessions. after hearing omar say that the government was behind 9/11 ("check the fuckin' footage! check the fuckin' footage!"), that we're all "slaves" ("don't put so much faith in your proctors!"), and that rock radio was full of "stepford bands," i was even more perplexed at who these guys are trying to appeal to. i mean, no one even listens to the radio dude... i felt like it was a time warp back to the late 90's, when i was one of those kids at a show on a weeknight, too busy looking around to pay attention to the stage, and all the while patting myself on the back for being so cool as to be at a concert.

in the end, the show was really, really fun. i just don't ever want to hear any of their songs ever again. but these? yeah, they still kill: