Bogieblog: Playing Hookie

October 26, 2004

Playing Hookie

I'm playing hookie from work today because we didn't get back until 2:30 AM this morning. That is really late for someone who gets up at 4.

"Now why," you ask, "did you not get in until the wee hours of the morning?"

Thanks for asking!

We went the the Godsmack / Metallica show at the Fleet Center in Boston last night. It was the second of two shows they put on (the first being on Sunday).

We had to catch the "T" (the train - not subway) into Boston at 5:30. Since I work in the general direction that we would have to go, I had WS meet me at the closest Walmart, since they don't mind truckers, campers and others leaving cars in the parking lot - as long as you park way out and don't block parking for customers. I met him at 4 PM and we made our way down to Mass.

We were meeting the train in Reading, since that was the closest line that actually had a train picking up passengers at a time that wasn't too inconvenient (we could have met the train closer to NH, but would have had to get there an hour earlier). Once on the T, it is about a 30 minute ride to North Station, which is really convenient because the station is underneath the Fleet Center.

We were in the lower half of the top section; far enough up that we were away from the rabid teeny-bopers, not not so far up that we couldn't see anything. Oh yeah, we were in seats 1 and 2 - making for easy getaway during the intermission. Another advantage to being on the top level was that not many people were cruising the corridors, so we could get shirts before the show with a minimum of hassle (except for the fact that the printer for the credit card swiper didn't seem to want to work).

I was surprised that the seats were only about 1/3 full when Godsmack came out on stage - they are a Boston band so I expected people to be there early. They put on a hell of a show and had the crowd going the entire time. It was amazing how much noise could be put out by the (relatively) few people that were there! They played for about and hour then broke for Metallica to get on stage.

Then there was about a 45 minute wait for them to get everything ready (really excessive time for what, to me, seemed to be very little work - but that's probably just me). We seemed to have slightly better sound for the Metallica show than when Wichi Dude went, but everything else was pretty much the same. One other thing that differed was that they didn't do a lot of pyrotechnics. As far as I was concerned, Godsmack blew Metallica away and the people that came in later just plain missed out on the best of the show.

We got different songs by Metallica than Wichi Dude did because they wanted to give those that went to both shows in Boston different material. Sully, from Godsmack, came out and joined them on one song (I suck when it comes to remembering names of songs) and the crowd really got into that part. Some of us older fogies had gotten a bit zoned out because everything was starting to sound the same until that part. We did get to hear Sandman, which was awesome, and once again got even us older fogies on our feet.

The show got out about 11PM and we had to wait almost an hour for the last train to come in and take us back to Reading. Traffic on the way back to New Hampshire was almost non-existant, so we made good time to pick up my truck and get home.

Next concert is on Saturday - we are going to the Verizon Wireless arean (in Manchester) to see the Australian Pink Floyd. I haven't heard anything about the show, but will let you know how it turns out.

Two concerts in one year - we are living large!

Posted at 01:06 PM in Music | Permalink

Comments

I agree with your view that Godsmack put on a better show. I am glad that the sound quality of Metallica was better. And I am also glad you heard things the same way I did, every song started sounding like the one before it. I had a hard time telling where one song ended and the next started.
Sounds like you had fun though.

Posted by: Wichi Dude | October 26, 2004 at 05:54 PM