Red Hot Cold

Photos by lissie12607

Red Hot Cold

Hey oh... listen what I say oh
I got your hey oh, now listen what I say oh

For the official record, on Friday January 26, 2007 I stepped outside my box. With my wife, daughter and her two teenaged friends in tow, I struck out for Charlottesville, Virginia to see one of the top touring rock groups in the world right now, The Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Come to decide that the things that I tried were in my life just to get high on.
When I sit alone, come get a little known
But I need more than myself this time.
Step from the road to the sea to the sky, and I do believe that we rely on
When I lay it on, come get to play it on
All my life to sacrifice.

When I found out that my daughter wanted to go see the band on their Stadium Arcadium Tour stop in Charlottesville, Virginia’s John Paul Jones Arena, I felt it would be my wife’s and my duty as parents to be her chaperone. Actually, we’ve always enjoyed the Chili Peppers. Even though they tend to play to a younger crowd, I’ve always enjoyed the grooves they spin. Their music has a signature sound that’s not reproducible by any other group. You can spot their tunes over the airwaves from miles away. That’s also my main criticism of them, too. Many of their songs sound almost identical, just with different words. Skynyrd used to have the same issue (Gimme Three Steps/What’s Your Name?)

Hey oh... listen what I say oh
I got your hey oh, now listen what I say oh

When will I know that I really can't go
To the well once more - time to decide on.
Well it's killing me, when will I really see, all that I need to look inside.
Come to believe that I better not leave before I get my chance to ride,
Well it's killing me, what do I really need - all that I need to look inside.

Getting to Charlottesville was a cinch, which was very strange indeed. Traveling to Charlottesville is usually a lot like sitting in a dentist’s chair and smelling tooth enamel as it’s superheated by a whining drill inside your brain. Friday, Charlottesville accepted us.

We traveled to the heart of the city and dropped the kids off at Sticks Kebob, not the “rock” group; but rather, the faux-Mediterranean kebob joint. My wife and I then moved back down the road a few blocks and ate at our favorite bagel joint, Bodo’s. She had some humus thing with other equally squishy things embedded within a warm, soft bagel. I chose my roast turkey bagel with cheddar, sprouts, lettuce, tomato all slathered with gobs of rich mayonnaise. After inhaling the food, we buzzed by and picked up the girls before heading off to the arena.

Hey oh... listen what I say oh
Come back and hey oh, look at what I say oh

The more I see the less I know
The more I like to let it go - hey oh, woah...
Deep beneath the cover of another perfect wonder where it's so white as snow,
Finally divided by a word so undecided and there's nowhere to go;
In between the cover of another perfect wonder and it's so white as snow,
Running through the field where all my tracks will be concealed and there's nowhere to go.

Surprisingly, we drove right in to the heart of the John Paul Jones (JPJ) Arena parking garage and got a fantastic spot. I maneuvered our Grand Caravan into its berth, carefully backing it in on one try. Then after a moment or two, we scrambled up to the entrance of the arena.

The concert was slated to begin at 7:30 with opening act Gnarls Barkley. We were in our seats by 6:45. I love being early. It gives me a chance to just absorb the surroundings.

JPJA is an amazing modern structure. Seating close to 16,000 people, the spanking new arena is state of the art. Women especially love JPJA because it boasts about 50 palatial women’s restrooms. Men on the other hand must make do with three small restrooms. Thus, lines of men who were crossing their legs snaked around the concourse. I watched one young man spend time twirling in the center of the walkway, then he would run to a wall and study the joints between blocks. His inspections very much pleased him.

Our seats were located near the top of the arena in the corner. In fact there was only one row and a strange little corner concrete pad above us. In keeping with the pergola theme used throughout the university campus, architects used huge structural i-beams all along the upper tier creating a functionally safe roof structure but also a stunning colonnade effect. Wisely, they chose not to place any seats directly behind these hunks of structural steel. I remember attending Salem Pirate baseball games at the old Salem Municipal field. That place also has the structural beams supporting the roof. The only difference was, however, that they had seats right behind the beams. In fact, it was very difficult to even sit down with a beam between your legs and wall of steel in front of you. Watching baseball from those seats was out of the question.

Ho!
Went to descend to amend for a friend of the channels that had broken down.
Now you bring it up, I'm gonna ring it up - just to hear you sing it out.
Step from the road to the sea to the sky, and I do believe what we rely on,
When I lay it on, come get to play it on
All my life to sacrifice

Hey oh... listen what I say oh
I got your hey oh... listen what I say oh

After the crowd had mostly filled the arena and just before Gnarls took the stage, a playful group of irascible souls began a “Let’s Go Hokies” chant. Within seconds, *Hokies from all over the arena took up the chant. Befuddled, **Wahoo’s murmured in alarm. They tried to mount a response by jumping into their favorite school song, Auld Lang Syne as they swayed to and fro, but that didn’t seem to strike the resonate authoritative response that was necessary to quiet the Hokies. After another round of Hokie cheers, they finally mustered an audible but rather crude “Hokies Suck” cheer.

Gnarls Barkley stepped onto the stage with enthusiasm and lots of shouting. I can honestly say that I couldn’t understand a single word that anyone in that group said nor could I really differentiate between any instruments that were playing on stage. All I really knew about them was that they started songs and about 3 minutes later they just stopped playing them. I suspect if they had better sound engineering, their music might have made sense to me.

When will I know that I really can't go
To the well once more - time to decide on.
Well it's killing me, when will I really see, all that I need to look inside.
Come to belive that I better not leave before I get my chance to ride,
Well it's killing me, what do I really need - all that I need to look inside.

Hey oh... listen what I say oh
Come back and hey oh, look at what I say oh

The Red Hot Chili Peppers (RHCP) were an amazing group. Their music was tight and clear. Vocals were mostly taken care of by the audience since their songs were so popular. Most of the young people watching the concert felt the need to sing along at the top of their lungs as they recorded each song on their electric blue glowing cell phones. One of the girls we brought played her recording from the concert afterwards and all we could hear was her singing.

RHCP won me over Friday night, not because of the hits they dragged out of the deep vault, but because of what they did surrounding those hits. At the beginning of the show and between almost every song, the drummer, bass player (Flea), and guitarist would stand around beside the drums and just jam. One of them would begin a groove and the rest would join in. Sometimes these jams went on longer than the hits. The guitarist was making his guitar cry and the bass player was making his bass hurt. The drummer, who dedicated his performance to a very female looking 83 year old Uncle Frank, unleashed titanic power from his sticks. These guys were pounding and relentless. I’m sure his Uncle Frank was proud, but the late legendary guitarist and philosopher, Frank Zappa, would have been prouder still. Never in my life have I ever heard such a jam. As far as I was concerned, they could have just continued all night.

Behind RHCP was an amazing array of video effects. I suppose other groups these days have these types of effects, but I found them to be extraordinary. A huge screen behind them seemed to be made of steel bars which magically became the most gigantic wide screen television ever. Embedded within this massive screen were other screens that appeared as if by magic to give close up looks at all of the distant stage action. Hovering above the stage was a lighted fleet of mother ships that floated up and down above the stage illuminating the stage and being themselves illuminated.

A hazy artificial haze hung around the arena. It was also sweetly scented, the byproduct of certain illegal activities happening in the row and platform directly behind us. My wife and I wonder just how much marijuana a person could possibly smoke in one sitting and remain standing. As we were leaving one of the smoky young ladies was attempting to go down the stairs just behind me, and I overheard her saying that she needed a bath because she felt like she was swimming.

Deep beneath the cover of another perfect wonder where it's so white as snow,
Finally divided by a word so undecided and there's nowhere to go.
Deep beneath the cover of another perfect wonder where it's so white as snow...
Running through the field where all my tracks will be concealed and there's nowhere to go.

I said hey oh yeah oh yeah... tell my love now
Hey yeah yeah... oh yeah.

We ended up being some of the last people to leave the arena since we were up so high in the corner, but that also meant that we could cut across the seats and exit right in front of the doors by which we entered. So we popped out far ahead of all of those who were trapped in the mobbed concourse. By the time we made it to our car, traffic still had not really begun flowing out yet, so we escaped Charlottesville even easier than we entered it. In all my years living there (15 years), I’ve never experienced such free-flowing traffic.

Arriving home at about 1:30, I had time to just sit and reflect on the evening, letting my sound memories over wash me before finally falling to warm cold of sleep.

I said hey oh yeah oh yeah... tell my love now
Hey yeah yeah... oh yeah.

Snow (Hey Oh) Lyrics

* Hokie: A person who is associated with Virginia Tech.

**Wahoo: A person who is associated with the University of Virginia (aka France).