The countdown to PCB (round 2) is about 9 hours to departure, 23 hours to arrival. Very exciting, I just have to pack, eat, and start drinking. That's pretty easy to fit into 9 hours. Hey, speaking of food here's some food for thought. That's an essay by Roger Ebert of all people on the differences between the Pope and the President as it comes to (a) war in Iraq and (b) prayer. It is a very interesting essay, and one that makes me think maybe I should rag on you Catholics just a little less.

Tick, tick, tick, tick.....

So the Billboard sales charts came out yesterday, and Evanescence clocked in at number 7, which is pretty impressive. Here's what MTV.com had to say about it:

One of the biggest surprises on the chart comes from the female-fronted Little Rock, Arkansas, band Evanescence, whose heavy, atmospheric debut, Fallen, bows at #7 with more than 141,000 copies sold.

Well, I wasn't surprised, and MTV wouldn't be either if anyone other than Jack freaking Osbourne at that network paid any attention to anything other than hip-hop.

Today is the anniversary of John Stewart's death. To commemorate it, I'm putting up the article that I wrote about it four years ago.

When I first heard that John Stewart had died, it didn’t register. I remember being told, but I don’t recall the words. A few moments later, I knew. Friday night, here at the Lawrence North gym, you didn’t need words to know what had happened. To look at the grief-stricken faces of students who had gathered here, at their collective home, to cry on each others’ shoulders was enough.

"Why?" was my first question. Why? Why? Why? I leaned against a brick wall and knew there would never be an answer to that question. As the night slowly went on, I cried knowing that John’s clumsy grace would never again brighten the halls of LN. Tears turned to bittersweet smiles as some of us gathered at the number 53 jersey at center court and relieved our fondest memories of John. When we left, we kissed the jersey goodbye.

The next day, I tried to come to grips with the meaning of John’s death. I wondered why a man in his prime, a man on top of the world, had to die. John was the guy who had everything going for him. John was the guy who could take one step into a room—lowering his head so as not to hit it on the door frame, of course—and make it a friendlier place just by smiling that giant smile of his. He played for the best team in the state, and on track to proving that to the whole world. John had two great families: one at home and one here at LN with his teammates and friends. John was going to be the guy that we all saw play on TV for the NBA. John had more success than any of us could hope to have. He was on top of the world, but in an instant, he was gone from ours.

Finally, I decided that the lesson for me to learn was not in John’s death, but in his life. John died young, before his bright future had a chance to fully shine. But John lived, and died, doing exactly what he wanted to do, exactly how he wanted to do it. John had the opportunity to fill his life to the brim with happiness, and unlike so many of us, John made good on that.

At the spirit rally the day John died, Dave Colabro pointed to the team and said that they were chasing a dream. For a lot of us, we will spend seventy years without ever attempting to chase a dream. John Stewart spent eighteen years with his dream held firmly in his huge hands.

So, thank you, John. This year, you have brought the school together like never before. When you made your trademark dunks, you made us cheer. When you danced or flashed your goofy smile, you made us laugh. When you died, you made us cry. And when you brought us together as a family in the shadow of your legacy, you’ve made us think.

Thank you, John. Because of you, now, more than ever, I’m proud to be a Wildcat.

Well, I know I said I would phone-blog you from the flipside... I tried to, but St. Louis has some electromagnetic field or something which drained my cell-phone battery to completely empty. I don't have enough time right now to give you the full report, but I'll put one up later. So, let me sum it up in a single word: spiritual.

The day began early. To put it in Evanescence terms, the alarm clock screaming monsters called my name at 7 in the AM, which for me is very early; I wanted to get a good start on things because I was supposed to meet up with Dave at noon in St. Louis and I had a four hour drive ahead of me.

Now, being that I am used to driving north/south and not west/east, I completely neglected the time difference. So I rolled into St. Louis about an hour early. Not anxious to be too early, I took some time to go to the local gas station, where I overheard a normal-sized local talking about how the owner of the professional wrestling federation for which he works wants him to have a simplistic good-or-bad guy gimmick. I interrupted, introduced myself as a pro-wrestling fan and told him to stick to his guns; that old face and heel stuff is out, I said. Then, having wasted as much time in a gas station as I could, I was out too.

I rolled up to Dave's house at about 11:18. Having never met Dave in person before this I didn't know who to expect exactly. I knock and the door opens to reveal a large man of about 54 years.

"Hi," I say. "Are you Dave?"

"No, I'm his father." Good one Ray. "Dave's downstairs."

So I met Dave and his fiancé, Jeccy, and seem to hit it off with them pretty well... which is good since I was going to spend the whole day with them. We wasted some time watching T.A.T.U. videos ('30 Seconds' is the greatest video of all time!) while the others arrived. There were a few people who came and went, but our group basically consisted of myself, Dave, Jeccy, Dave's friend Jason, and Neilam from Champagne/Urbana.

Once the crew was intact, we made our break for Vintage Vinyl where Evanescence were set to perform and sign. The area surrounding the shop has some really cool architecture including these two pillars on which stone lions sit, keeping watch.

By the time we got to the record store, there were already probably already fify other people waiting by the makeshift stage. I thought we were posted up pretty far back but when I turned around and saw the amount of people that ended up behind us I figured we had a pretty good spot. So many people showed up apparently that they had to lock the doors and make this a "private party."

I don't remember the exact moment that Ben and Amy, the heart and soul of Evanescence respectively, took the stage, but I remember realizing that I really was in a small room with my favorite band as they play a rare acoustic set. Most of you that read this will not have any idea how cool that is, but Amy Lee's voice is a thing of pure beauty and it was a real special treat to get to hear it completely unfettered.

The acoustic version of 'Bring Me To Life' (their big hit, for those of you who don't know) nearly made me faint. Personally, I see lots of parallels between Evanescence and Nirvana and here's another one: if Evanescence ever does an MTV Unplugged album, it will be remembered as their finest hour too.

Autograph lines always get me flustered. I only bother with these things for celebrities that I really really want to meet, but I always try to rush through things rather than hold up the line or, more importantly, waste the very valuable time of the famous. So, while I had planned out some specific things I had wanted to say in my big opportunity to be face-to-face with my favorite band, I just ended up passing them my CD and marker and thanking them for the autographs. I didn't even mention that they are my favorite band!

But not even my immense shyness could contain how blown away I am by Amy Lee.

"Please play more acoustic stuff in your shows--you're amazing," I said.

"Oh we will when we play bigger places," Amy Lee said to me. "It'll be good for me 'cause I won't have to rock out so hard."

"That's the whole point of the acoustic set!" I said stupidly, thanked Amy, and moved on.

Afterwards, we met up with the Arkansas girls, Stephanie and Jules, as well as Steve and Melanie. Steve, also a drummer, had awesome plastic pants and had brought along a cymbal for Evanescence to sign. On the back of it, he put "Amy, Do you Like Me? Circle Yes or No." Amy circled yes, which Steve informed me meant that "technically" they were dating now. Clever.

Anyway, we went to a place called Tomatillo's where we got some burritos and beers and seriously lucked out on getting a a ticket for one of the Arkansas girls. (If any one ever thinks I'm dedicated to this band, I've got to point out that there are true fans out there who will travel 7 hours to *maybe* get tickets for a sold-out show. I wish I was that dedicated.) After Tomatillo's the crew plus Steve and Mel dumped back to Dave's place for another round of T.A.T.U. and talking about the finer points of Amy's vocal training with Mel, an opera singer.

Eventually it was time to head out to Pops for the big show. We had to go through the ghetto to get there, but we made it intact and just a little behind schedule. The line was already sizeable an hour before the doors opened and it was extremely cold outside: think 20-degree weather with gale-force winds. The two gigantic nude dance clubs that flanked either side of Pops were tempting but I resisted my urge. My ticket was at the will-call window, so I formed a line there and waited for that window to open up. I met some interesting people, including one kid named Mike who told me that he was gonna get to meet the band after the show on account of a contact he has in local radio. I told him how jealous I was and he helped me score an Evanescence sticker which I jammed on my car. Also I joked it up with some guys from Alabama who had come up to check out Evanescence too. They were cool. Plus, there was this really hot girl standing next to me too, named, uh, Heather. Heather was local and nice but my game was not spinning very fast due to the cold.

The inside of Pops is very nice, with a balcony that stretches across the upper level and a large pool hall to the right of the stage. For being a pool hall / bar / concert hall, it's a pretty sizeable venue. We got shirts and got as close to the front as we could, which was close but about two rows back. Everyone else filled in behind us and while it was extremely cold outside, it got to be extremely hot inside fast. I guzzled down a Bud Light because beer is so good for keeping you hydrated.

First up on the ticket was a band called The 5th Element. They played with alot of energy, so much energy that they overcame any talent-related decencies they might have had (or might not have had.) Jack, the lead singer, absolutely launched himself into the crowd several times to jump-start things and it paid off in spades: Fifth Element rocked the house. After the show, I shook the Jack's hand and thanked him for putting his body on the line for my entertainment.

Next up was a band called Neptune Crush, which is a cool name for a lame band. I'm paraphrasing (read: plagiarizing) when I say that I expected more from them. They had an interesting setup: mike stands wrapped in flowers and illuminated by black lights, and a 24-inch mirrorball attached to the drum kit, but they could not capitalize live, although they did sound like they might be interesting on record. To steal directly from a fellow EvBoarder, "Imagine an Ozzy Osbourne look-alike singing 80's pop/rock/crap to 90's grunge music and that's Neptune Crush." Word.

By the time the third opening act came out after a really tiring downtime, the crowd was overheated, cramped, bored and ready to boo them off the stage. Expecting another Neptune Crush suck-fest, imagine our surprise when a full-on punk band strides out in full costume to "Also Sprach Zarathustra." The lead singer is a scary clown in a suit, the drummer-- a green-haired pothead, a mohawked space invader bassist, and a polyester-clad cartoon of a rhythm section named Chia Karaoke. The band was called Flipp and they took the crowd's animosity and turned it right around. Flipp's gimmick is, as you might imagine, the ole bird salute, so when the scary clown started to flip the bird at the crowd, we responded in kind and were off to a rocking start.

I don't know how Flipp is in the talent department, but the show they put on was meticulously designed to rock. There were lots of little touches that added up to a way entertaining set, including the drummer lighting a fat j and passing it into the crowd, the clown bringing up an underage girl onstage to guzzle beer, passing their instruments into the crowd, bringing people up on stage to play the instruments with them, etc. It was a spectacle in organized chaos. Now, I wouldn't go out of my way to see them or anything-- hell, they're not even my kind of band-- but if Flipp ever comes through your town definitely check them out for a helluva crazy time. [Trivia: Since you're the type of person who visits my site, you've probably already heard Flipp on the Chasing Amy soundtrack.]

Of course, the downside to Flipp was that their act climaxes in pillow-type feathers being strewn all over the place which took over a half hour to clean up and resulted in the Flipp tour manager getting punched out by the Evanescence tour manager. So while we were all worn down by the long wait while Pop's staff futilely tried to sweep and vacuum up all the feathers, at least we saw someone get punched out.

Finally Evanescence took the stage amid swirling green fog. Ben came out shrouded and menacing under a hooded sweatshirt, which I thought was just the coolest. They launched into 'Going Under' which works pretty well as an opener, from a thematic standpoint, since it represents how we are all being pulled under into Evanescence's world of sound. (It opens the album too.) Between songs, I made eye-contact with Rocky Grey, the drummer. Rocky must have remembered my insightful comment of "Thank you so much" from the signing and nodded his head at me, so I nodded back with a grin. I thought about trying to start a 'Rocky' chant at one point, but I'm sure that would have gone right over the head.

I won't bore you with a song-by-song report, so I'll just hit the highlights. First off, wow. It's no great secret that I love the slower, softer Evanescence stuff most of all, and this is exactly the sort of songs that they don't play in concert, only the harder way more rockin' stuff. In fact, after looking at my list of requests on the EvBoard, Ben said, "AHHHH COME ON!!! Where's the metal dude? Those songs are total DOWNERS!!!!!...
PEOPLE WANT METAL.... AND METAL THEY SHALL HAVE." He also added that, "You have a better chance of getting tea-bagged by a quadriplegic platypus than hearing 'Forgive Me' or 'Anywhere' live."

So I knew this wasn't going to be the kind of concert that it would be if I were calling the shots. (Which is probably a good thing, since I've seen Sarah McLachlan perform live more times than any other act.) But still, Evanescence ruled. Even at this stage of the game, they know how to work a crowd. Amy has amazing stage prescience and is very confident in her role, and Ben is such an intriguing figure lurking behind her in shadows until he steps forth for a rocking solo. I cannot overstate this enough: If you ever have any chance to see Evanescence perform live, take it.

The highlight-- and welcome surprise-- of the night came when Amy announced they were going to do a cover tune. Having heard them perform a stunning version of Nirvana's 'Heart Shaped Box' acoustically on a Washington DC radio station, I was anxious. Would this be the cover? Indeed it was, and it was quite simply amazing. Everyone in the place seemed to know the words to it by heart, too, which is was nice especially since that song is nearly a decade old.

Speaking of knowing all the words, I was singing along with every song (save for 'Farther Away' which I did not know) and it seemed like nearly everyone else was too! It was so exciting to be in a crowd full of Evanescence fans. All throughout, people were crowd-surfing like mad. (I would have gone up myself, except for the vast amount of things I carry in my pockets.) I was surprised that neither the band nor security made any attempt to stop the practice, as people were also falling down like crazy. But we were all being moved by the music of Evanescence and we all wanted to revel in it. I know personally I was, throwing my hands up in the air like I was listening to the gospel in church. Of course, I was-- particularly when the overtly Christian 'Tourniquet' was being played-- that's when I broke out two hands in the air. But for Evanescence their church is the rock stage, and their gospel their music.

The band finished off their main set with 'Imaginary,' my one of my very favorite songs off Fallen. After a very loud period of clapping and wooing from the crowd they came back out for the requisite encore. They did 'Whisper', which is a perfect song for an encore/closer since lyrically its about not wanting something to stop. "Don't turn out the lights," Amy sang. I couldn't agree more. But all too soon, it was over and the lights were turned not out, but up.

Despite the intense heat, my inability to take off that jacket of mine, and my intense fandom, there were several times when I almost passed out like the girl standing behind me. But I made it out alive. After the lights came up, I went straight to the bar for an hours-overdue bottle of water which I alternately guzzled and poured all over my head. Then we dumped back out into the Dave's fan for the ride back to his place where I had some parting words with my new friends. Finally, after a long and wonderful day, I climbed back in my car, now proudly adorning an Evanescence sticker, and started off for my long ride back home, kept (mostly) awake by my thoughts of the next time...

Well the 'rents blew through Btown for the evening and took me out for a nice post-birthday dinner. I ate a $32 dollar New York Strip steak which was, in the words of Bobby 'Big Poppa' Craft, "divine." It was a good steak, one that clocks in at number four on my all-time top-five steak list. Number one is, of course, the one I had at Fran O'Brien's Stadium Steak House in Washington DC. Oh man, I get weak just thinking about that steak; it was like eating water. Number two would be, naturally, the cabernet-marinated steak I had at Lulu's... though, I have to confess, my memory of the taste of the steak is obscured by other more wonderous features of said evening. Number three would be my recent trip to Texas Roadhouse-- everyone else's steak was overdone, but mine was perfect. Dollar for dollar, there has never been a better steak than that one. And we'll round out the list with the night of the Original Outback Challange, not so much because the steak was above average, but because that was damn fun.

Well, tomorrow is a big day for me. I'll phone-blog ya from the flipside.

As I was saying, we live in an age of wonder, don't we?

We live in an age of wonder, don't we?