When it's time to party we will party hard

This past seven months have been kind of amazing for me. In the past seven months, I have seen AFI four times. Before that, I had seen them three times, but that had been over a span of three years. Seeing AFI that many times in that short of a span of time is kind of a big deal for me. I kind of wanted to make a blog post about these past four shows, and just share a couple of pictures from the fun times. This is actually mostly for me, because I don't want to forget how AWESOME a time I've had these past months.

Columbus, OH
Newport Music Hall
October 4, 2009

When dates started being announced for their tour immediately following the release of Crash Love, I snagged up tickets for both the Cincinnati and Columbus dates without even thinking. On October 3rd, I made the 6 hour drive up to Ohio and met Sarah, Katie, Tanya, Addie, and Kelsey. After a fun night of endless AFI puns, we went to bed, but only to get a grand total of four hours of sleep. By this point, I had already COMPLETELY lost my voice from laughing and screaming much of the evening before, and I don't get it back the entire trip. Womp womp womp. We woke up at 4 am, and were in line by 5:30. There were five people in front of us in line, and this is where we met Michael, Kaityln, and Lia. We spent most of the day hanging out with them, and there was some definite mambo going down. At every show I've been to since Crash Love, mamboing to "Too Shy To Mambo" has gone down. There are sacred dance moves that have been invented, and if you ever see me at a show, challenge me to a mambo and I will school you.

We got kind of bored around 2 or 3 pm, and we made a list of songs that we wanted to "request" the band to play. We really were just fooling around, and we addressed it "Dear dearest darlings" (I mean, the sheer AMOUNT of the words "dear" and "darling" in Crash Love made this a necessity). We slipped it under the door. About an hour later, it slipped back, and Kaitlyn put it back through the cracks, and kind of had a tug of war with someone on the other side. We all thought this was kind of hilarious. Then soundcheck starts. We can hear it PERFECTLY. Most of us hadn't seen AFI in YEARS (or at all), and we were all getting really, really excited. Then...they started playing songs off our list. Songs like "Rabbits are Roadkill" and "Ever and a Day" (there were a couple of other older songs that they played that were on our list, but I can't remember them). Needless to say, we were all kind of freaking out. Were these songs being played because of our list, or did they not even see it and just happened to be playing those songs? Whatever, we were excited.

When we got inside, we all go barrier, and were all on Hunter's side. This was the first time I had ever seen Gallows live, and before I was seriously like, "Meh, whatever, I don't care about opening bands!" Yeah, my mind was totally changed. It was fucking amazing. The last time I had seen an opening band get a crowd this pumped before AFI was when Sick of It All opened for AFI in Nashville in 2007. The energy was intense, and just had me pumped to see my favorite band hit the stage.

AFI hits the stage. At this point, I wasn't too sure about Crash Love. It had only been out about a week, and it was definitely different. I mean, I liked it, but I wasn't COMPLETELY sold on it. Hearing these songs played live, though, completely changed my mind on it. I fucking love Crash Love now. I sang every word to "Torch Song" (more like screeched it with my fucked up voice), chanted along with the rest to "I Am Trying Very Hard To Be Here", and joined in with the crowd on the intense "OHHHHHS" in "Beautiful Thieves". This was the first time "I Am Trying Very Hard To Be Here" was played, and it is one of my favorite Crash Love songs to see live. They also played "Ever and a Day", which had us all freaking out because it was on our Dearest Darlings list. I kind of wasn't expecting a "Silver and Cold" end to the evening, but it's okay. I still don't love it, but meh.



Setlist:
http://www.setlist.fm/setlist/afi/20...h-bd7f966.html

After the show we stuck around and met Adam. We asked him if they had gotten our list, and he said he actually had been playing tug of war through a crack in the door with someone earlier that day with the list (that had been with Kaitlyn). We all kind of got a kick out of that. He also said they played "Ever and a Day" for us off that list. Whether they actually did play it just because of that, or they already planned on playing it and he was just saying that to be nice, I don't know, but it was kind of awesome. We then drove the two hours from Columbus to Cincinnati in the middle of the night. We get to Cincinnati and make the collective decision to sleep in tomorrow because there is NO WAY we'd be able to make it to the line by five again. So the next day, we get to the line by....seven. Haha

Cincinnati, OH
Bogart's
October 5, 2009

We're all kind of a little worse for wear. Tired, sore, and not gonna lie, a little grumpy. We get to the line and there are four people in front of us. We're not as dancey and full of energy as we were the night before. I went to a Walgreen's and bought a $6 cheapo air mattress, and we all tried to get as much sleep in line as we could. Which, needless to say, wasn't much. By noon we had to bid Kelsey adieu, and Addie, Tanya, and I took her to the Greyhound station to get her on home. The day seemed to pass by really, really quickly. Not much happened outside of some juvenile line cutting, and before we knew it we were inside. Through some miracle, I ended up right smack dab in the middle on barrier. I've always kind of gone towards the sides, and I usually favor Hunter's side. I like to take pictures, and Hunter makes the best faces in pictures, where as Jade's face doesn't move. So being in the middle was new for me. I was squished up between Addie and Seb, and kind of ready for shit to get real.

Gallows was great, again, but the crowd just didn't seem as into it. Some old guy in the circle pit kept running the wrong way, and Frank stopped the show and called him out, and while hilarious and awesome, the crowd was just not as energetic as they were in Columbus. At the end of the set, Lags gave Katie and I his extra water. Here's the thing: I have a fangirly crush on Lags. He's cute. I'll admit it. So yeah, I was kind of a little happy to get handed water from him.

When AFI came on, I noticed a HUGE difference in the crowd. It was INSANE how intense they got, especially during "Girl's Not Grey". It was like a switch had been turned to on, and the crowd didn't settle down at ALL for the rest of the show. Some highlights of the night were "Self Pity" (which Davey says was the first time they had played it "since he could remember"), the premiere of "It Was Mine" (honestly, my absolute least favorite off the of the album because of the tiny cherub baby choir going on for the backup vocals, but you bet your sweet ass I screamed along to every word), and the premiere of "Too Shy To Scream". I seriously FREAKED OUT during "Too Shy To Scream". Hands down my favorite Crash Love song, and hearing it live for the first time EVER had me freaking the hell out.

At some point during the show, it got really hot. Smith came out with a case of water, and just started handing out water to all the security guards up front. He was making swinging motions with his hand, and all the security guards opened up their bottles of water and got all of us SOAKED. Smith and the rest of them were also all pouring water in our mouths (Smith missed my mouth by a mile, though, and I ended up with a face full of water).



Setlist:
http://www.setlist.fm/setlist/afi/20...-33d7f8c5.html

After the show we waited around to meet the members. We all met Adam again, and each got a picture. I'm kind of proud of my picture, because I HATE pictures where people have their arms around my shoulder. I'm a giant. It looks awkward. So I was like, "Yeah, I'm putting my arm over yours because I'm taller than you..." and he kind of jokingly went "THE FUCK YOU ARE!" But my picture turned out good, so I was happy.

Then Hunter and Davey came out. At this point, I had only ever met Adam. Love Adam to death, but I'd kind of like to meet the other band members, too, you know? I also NEVER EVER bring stuff to have them sign, and I'm always kicking myself for it, but usually I'm just so excited to meet them and talk to them that I don't really care about having stuff signed. But...I had my snuggie with me. So now I'm pretty sure I'm the only person in the world who has a snuggie signed by Davey Havok and Hunter Burgan, haha. They were both totally awesome and nice, and I just....couldn't stop smiling after FINALLY meeting them.

So my Ohio road trip to see AFI was definitely a success, and honestly, that was in large part due to the people I went with. Addie, Katie, Sarah, Tanya, and Kelsey are my girls. On the last day, Tanya bussed home and Addie flew home, and it was just me, Katie, and Sarah in a parking lot in a La Quinta in Kentucky. It was raining, and we just kept hugging each other and crying.

It was such an awesome trip, and honestly, it NEVER would have happened if it weren't for this message board. I've met SO MANY awesome people, and found the motivation to drive six hours to another state to see them because of these boards, and it makes me happy.

I was going to make this ONE BIG blog post about all four of these shows, but I'm tired of typing, and it's already WAYYY too long, so I'll talk about my Atlanta and Nashville show experiences in another post. My fingers need a rest.