So, if you know anything about me by now, it's that I'm passionate and music moves me in powerful ways.
That being said, we saw Coldplay at The Forum last night. Following is my tale of awe:
The parking down there is mind blowing... we anticipated quite a walk but found a spot not too far away. Just a block or so. (yeah!) R was figuring this... the venue seats 18,000... say there are three people to a car (approximately) at $20 parking per car. That's roughly $120,00 hauled in from parking alone per sold out event, in one night. Coldplay was sold out two nights. That's a two bedroom condo right there. I'll try not to think about it.
We found our way around the round round venue to will call. That's where you pick up your tickets if you haven't got them already. We got them super easy, no hassles, and tried to find our way around to an entrance. We found one after feeling like we were going in circles... and the venue workers in yellow jackets guided us down, down, down until we were on the floor. I remember glancing at the sound desk a ways back and thinking, wow, wouldn't it be amazing to sit that close? But no, we were even closer! Like 8 rows from the front, and dead center! I was stunned, we've never had such great tickets! The adrenaline was pumping through me, and had me in a cold sweat...
"I'm surprised they don't have a pit," R remarked, noticing that the seating went right down to the stage.
I looked around, taking it all in... the filling seats, the Sigur Ros ambient pre-show music (which R tells me the band chooses) the proximity to the stage, and wait! Staging to our left, and to our right surrounding us.
"I think we
are the pit," I replied.
And indeed we were. Awesome seats... the stage was covered by a semi-transparent scrim (another nod to Sigur Ros there) and you could see them come on stage, I could hardly stand it. They opened with the lead track from Viva la Vida, an instrumental... and as they played the black scrim started to lift, and then *lights*:
The backdrop was stunning, a huge enlarged copy of Eugène Delacroix's "Liberty Leading the People", which is featured on their album cover. But this huge it was overwhelmingly powerful.
Viva la Vida (the song) was fantastic. You can see the bell there on the right... Will (the drummer) is playing his two timpanis in front there. You can't really see but their costumes were a play on french army uniforms, it was cool :D
This is how the stage stretched either side of us. That's Jonny right there (on guitar).
Jonny and Chris have a moment. I don't know why they seem so far away, it's odd. That's what you get from a camera phone I guess. Anyway, after that I gave up trying to perfect the photos on my camera phone, and just let myself enjoy the show... They're great performers, but humble and totally ok to start a song over if they screw it up. Love it. Giant spheres came down from the celings that became the screen that images were projected on, one of the best features about shows... the incredible footage. Illistrative, graphic design, and motion picture images were interspliced with real time footage of the show. It was pretty rad. They played a couple of songs out on one of the arms of the stage that jutted into the audience, and played a crazy good version of "God Put A Smile Upon Your Face" with cool guitar effects and awesome drum kit sounds. And of course you know people just went nuts with them being in proximity that most fans would never dream of being in...
So you can imagine how wild the stadium went when they ran down off the stage and up into the first row of seats, and up, up, up they went, waaaaaaaay into the nose bleeds, where there were acoustic instruments all set up, and the proceeded to do an acoustic set from way up in the stands! Everyone went nuts, even the people far away, because the idea that a band would do that was just insanely cool!
And then the encore... See, when bands play sometimes on tour they have a set list that is the same every night. But sometimes the bigger bands will actually vary the set list every night. We didn't know what they would do, but I knew that they hadn't played one of my favourite songs "Fix You" the night before, so I already knew I wouldn't hear it. Imagine my joy when the first song of the first encore was that very song! It was so awesome hearing it live, it has a different personality almost, way more intimate, which is surprising for such a large venue. And from there they went right into one of my favourite songs on the new album, "Lovers In Japan" which had THE coolest images projected, lots of vintage and black and white footage and photos, shown. And then during the song, great bursts of colour came from above in the form of paper butterflies about 2 inches across, that flutters like we were in a parade. We just lifted our eyes to the sky and let the colours swirl around. The first burst was all in red white and blue, and the second was purple, silver, green, blue, pink and orange, it was gorgeous! I just stood there trying to drink it all in...
Lights will guide you home And ignite your bones And I will try to fix you...I had been so sunk that day, feeling like my flaws were overwhelming me, knowing that I didn't deserve anything, I was such a wretched, horrid thing. Why is it we who know a merciful God, can be so convinced that he is as vindictive as us, ready to spite us at every chance? I knew I deserved far worse, but there I was in a flurry of colours and lights, warmed again...
I love you, I love you, I love youFinale: And to the pit the exhortation came -
Spectaular!
It's way cuter in person, I think, because it has more subtle colour variations that you can see in the print, but not in the photo. Also, most clothes and shoes look better with a person in them. Same with these shoes:
Thank you Target, for $5 shoes. These also look cuter in person. The heel is higher than it looks here, but they incredibly comfortable for what are essentially plastic shoes. I also don't generally go for the peep toe thing either, but as I was telling a friend today, I do think part of it is the shape of the peep toe, and how much it shows.
