The Thanksgiving Post

Thanksgiving break was a blast. A solid week of no work was just what I needed. Well it wasn’t quite a solid week of no work, but close. I spent Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday working on some projects for Gateway Church in Austin, TX. I did all of their artwork and layout for the Christmas season. I was honored to be involved and it was a lot of fun.

Wednesday is when the madness began. Wednesday night I headed on over to The Cain’s to catch a show with Dustin and Travis. The show was looking to be grand – Anberlin, Taking Back Sunday, and the All American Rejects.

I had been really excited about this show. I saw Taking Back Sunday back in September with Weezer and Blink 182. And to be honest with you, they were the only reason I bought a ticket for the show at The Cain’s. I do like The Rejects, but they are a band that releases catchy singles and the rest of their albums aren’t that great. I like to be able to listen to a record from front to back and I could never do that with them.

Anyway, we started the evening with dinner and beer at the Mexicali Cafe. I dug the restaurant and it was a great place to kill time waiting for the doors to open since it was just down Main St. from Cain’s, we had a short walk back in the cold. The bad news was that Travis didn’t have a ticket and a guy was trying to sell him one for $80 bucks – way more than it was worth. But after embarrassing himself walking up and down the line he finally found a ticket for face value and we were in.

The first band out of the gate was Anberlin and they rocked the house. Anberlin is a band with a big sound. They have swelling, heavy, catchy guitars and they had a TON of energy. Even though they were working with limited space they were all over the place. And they sounded good too. The vocals were amazing and they were so tight. That probably had a lot to do with the fact that they were playing to a click. Their keyboard player was rocking a Mac that I am assuming was running Ableton Live. They kept high energy playing like that and it was impressive. My favorites from their set were “A Day Late” and “Paperthin Hymn.” 3 and 1/2 out of 5 stars.

Next up was Taking Back Sunday and they ROCKED THE HOUSE. We had been standing in back for the Anberlin set, but as soon as TBS started we worked our way into the mosh pit and had a lot of fun. Although things had been tame during Anberlin, the crowd started moving for TBS. It was crazy. IF you have never seen TBS live before you are missing out. Front man Adam Lazzara was delightfully entertaining as usual. His microphone acrobatics are fun to watch and is set off nicely with the band going nuts in the background – dancing, jumping, and flying around. Their drummer (Mark O’Connell) is so fun to watch. Unlike a lot of drummers, he uses his arms heavily instead of his wrists and he just pounds the kit and it really takes things to another level. And of course they’re TBS so you’re gonna enjoy the music. They sounded amazing – a very full sound. And it wasn’t sloppy at all, but just what you would expect it to be. My favorites from their set was “Liar (It Takes One to Know One)” and “MakeDamnSure.” 4 and 1/2 out of 5 stars.

And last but not least came The Rejects. As I said before I was least excited about them. We were in the bar/merch area when they hit the stage (although we could hear all the pre-teen girls welcoming them). They opened with “Dirty Little Secret” and from the start it was a little off. Lead man Tyson Ritter started singing and it just sounded off. I am all for originality, art, and expressing yourself. But the time comes when you just aren’t on and it’s not art it’s messy. At one point I thought maybe a 14 year old girl had wrestled the mic away from him. I thought musically they were tight, but Tyson was all over the place and not in a good way. After about four songs we bolted. Couldn’t take it anymore. It was just off-putting and weird. 2 out of five stars.

It was a good time though. On Thanksgiving day we headed to OKC to have dinner with Tina’s family which was great. It was good food and very relaxing. Had a lot of fun – especially watching them all strategize and game plan for Black Friday. On Friday – all the ladies shopped and I hung out with the kids. We had breakfast at McDonalds and spent some time at the park.

On Saturday I had the privilege of attending BEDLAM. It was a TON of fun – after the first quarter. Gotta say a big thanks to Zach for hooking Blake and I up with the tickets. They were great seats and it was fun to watch OU play up to their potential. It was a rocky year, but I think they battled through it well. On Saturday night after the game we drove back to LG and spent Sunday recovering.

All in all it was a good time. Hope everyone had as much fun as I!! SO thankful for my family and friends and what they mean to me in my life.