StewStuph

I love to listen to music. I love to go to live shows. One of my current favorite bands is Young and Heartless . When they announced a tour that would pass through my hometown of Raleigh I was very excited to see them again (I saw them at Wreckingball last summer.) The tour announcement said they were playing at The Radio Shack. Having been in this town for nearly 15 years, I have never heard of this venue. It turns out it is a house. In all my years I have never been to a house show. After discovering the address I went with Gina and my music loving son and his girlfriend. When we arrived were the first patrons to arrive. I guess that is due to my desire to never be late. As we watched the house fill up my suspicions were confirmed. I would be the oldest person at this show. As a by product, my son and his girlfriend would be the youngest. This was a college house party/show. Young and Heartless performed first. After their set I made my way out of the small room in which they pe...

Well, it's happening again. I am getting VERY excited about upcoming concerts this summer. While Wreckingball has already announced a hiatus for this year , there are already a couple of highly anticipated shows that I will be attending. Last years major draw for Wreckingball, for me at least, is back on the road. Thursday will be in Charlotte April 1st! Opening for them will be Wax Idols , Basement and Touché Amoré . Having listened to Touché Amoré more since they opened the aftershow at last years Thursday Wreckingball performance, I am excited to see them again with more knowledge of their catalog. It is sure to be an exciting night at The Fillmore in Charlotte. One other show announced this week is closer to home here in Raleigh. Rise Against and Deftones will be a Red Hat Amphitheater June 19th. Rise Against has been in regular rotation in my music collection since Endgame  was released. I sometimes ask myself how I can afford this Rock 'n' Roll Lifestyle.

No, none of my current relationships are coming to an end (that I am aware of.) One of my favorite things to do is make mixed CD's for my wife. I've also found that I enjoy songs about the end of relationships. Gina has known for a while that I like these songs, however, she does NOT want me to give her a CD of my favorite breakup songs. Well, at least not now. I have made a playlist of some of my favorite songs. This Relationship Is Over Playlist

but when I do, it must be something I find extremely interesting. As you may know, music is something I am very passionate about. I first heard of Against Me! while listening to Sound Opinions . I heard a bit of the story of Laura Jane Grace and heard a few of their songs. I was instantly hoked. So after seeing them perform twice last year and knowing that LJG had released an autobiography, I thought that I should read her story. I bought the book, TRANNY , and began reading immediately. I am a slow reader, which I think is the reason I don't read much. However, this book seemed to go quickly and I was looking for any opportunity to pick up the book and read a bit. I feel like the book really opened a door and provided insight into not only the transformation of Tom Gable to Laura Jane Grace, but to the evolution of the band Against Me! and their struggles throughout their career. I found myself engrossed in the stories and journal entries contained in the text. Some points I ...

WOW! What an amazing weekend. First let's step back in time a bit. It was a Saturday afternoon, April 2 of this year. I was sitting on the couch watching TV with my wife when I decided to take a look at the email on my phone. One of the emails was from twitter with a collection of tweets that twitter thought I would be interested in seeing. One of them was from Thursday . I saw this tweet and could not believe my eyes. Not only were Thursday going to play again! One of the bands my son loves and introduced to me, American Football , was also going to playing a reunion that weekend. I literally got up out of my seat, knelled on the floor for a minute and was speechless.  There were so many other outstanding acts set to play that weekend that I knew I would not want to miss that weekend and my son would never forgive me if I were to not take him along. So, on April 4, I bought two tickets to The Wreckingball . Now we fast forward to the weekend of the festival. Sat...