On
Saturday March 16th, the Philadelphia waterfront exploded
with some good old-fashioned kick-ass rock 'n' roll. With
Molson Canadian sponsoring, 93.3 WMMR blew the roof off of
the Naval Ship Yard Cruise Terminal with the sounds of Bush
and Default. With doors opening at 4:00 PM, it would only
be a matter of time before the atmosphere of the party was
set. Reminiscent of Woodstock 99, Spring Break 2002 would
play out like a huge Frat party, minus the beer pong. With
Molson selling beer all over the place ($5 for a cup that
held about a can), and a Body Shot booth with some of the
local strippers, this was a drunken fools dream. If all this
booze wasn't enough, add to the party, professional wrestler
The Blue Meanie with manager
Jasmine St. Claire. Yes, that Jasmine St. Claire, the porn
star. There to promote the 3PW, the Meanie
and Jasmine signed autographs, and posed for all the pictures
that were requested of them.
 |
| Jeremy
Hora of Default |
Around
7 PM, the stage was finally put to use as WMMR held the bikini
contest. With chants of "Show your tits," and "Take
it off," this was obviously a high-brow audience. Girl
after girl was brought to the front of the stage and surprisingly
the ones who took off their tops were the ones who garnered
the biggest response from the crowd. The "contest"
was non-existent though as the woman in the American Flag
bikini easily won the affection of the crowd. Upon winning
her crown, the girl was coaxed into taking it all off (not
that it took much) as the crowd exploded with approval. After
learning Default would soon hit the stage, I headed to the
bathroom and was met with a Philadelphia standard, guys in
line to piss in the janitor's closet, one man in the corner,
one man in the trashcan, and a couple guys forgoing the line
and using the sink. Damn it all goes out the window when beer
is involved. So after I went in the janitor closet (it was
a shorter line, sue me), I headed back towards the stage.
As
the sound of "Slow Me Down" hit the hanger, Default
erupted onto stage. The band sounded just like they do on
record, which many bands cannot pull off. Unfortunately the
acoustics in the hanger were not great as the further away
you got, the more it echoed. This did not deter the band as
it went right into "Sick and Tired." The band was
definitely eating up the strong crowd response that they were
getting. The band showed a strong stage presence, which only
fueled the crowd more as all members were all over the stage.
Default cruised through material from their debut CD, The
Fallout, moving quickly from song to song. Now having
seen the band, I stick with my assessment that "Live
a Lie" is my favorite song of theirs as it sounded amazing.
The band closed out their 45-minute set with "Wasting
my Time," and their latest single "Deny." Surprisingly,
and thankfully, "Wasting My Time" did not turn into
the sing along that I had expected.
 |
| Dave
Benedict of Default |
You know
the one where the band stops playing except for the drums
and every drunken ass sings along. Hey, don't get me wrong,
I am that ass too but is there anything more annoying that
than? Well other than that guy who yells for "Freebird"
the whole damn show. The only thing that was disappointing
is that lead singer Dallas did not have much of a rep with
the crowd in between songs, but then again being on tour with
Bush will certainly help this great young band out.
After about a half-hour of listening to
WMMR on the house speakers (including Bush songs, which I
thought was dumb since they were about to go on), the lights
once again lowered and Bush hit the stage. Touring in support
of their latest release, and first on Atlantic Records, Golden
State, Bush set out like they had something to prove.
Playing without lead guitarist Nigel (who was at home with
his wife who had just given birth) the band opened with "Solutions,"
coincidentally the opening song of Golden State. Unfortunately,
it did not seem as if many people in the crowd of about 5,000
knew the song. That problem was resolved shortly as the band
started on what soon became a hit brigade, starting with "Chemicals
Between Us" and "People That We Love." The
latter of course was the first single of Golden State, a title
that had to be changing from "Speed Kills" following
the awful events of September 11th.
 |
| Bush |
Bush did
not lose any steam throughout the set. "Ghost World"
sounded amazing and was followed by "Everything Zen,"
and an extended version of "Swallowed," featuring
some killer solo work to end the song. Gavin proved to be
every bit of the showman, as he ventured into the crowd at
the start of "Hurricane." I can only think of one
lead singer that is better at being a frontman than Gavin
is right now, and that is Scott Weiland, of the Stone Temple
Pilots. You can easily make an argument for either as the
best lead singer in rock today, with both commanding your
attention on stage. Right as the set was hitting a high point,
it was over in a flourish with "Machinehead" and
"Comedown" closing the set. You could almost see
the crowd wanting to be pissed off about it, had it not been
for the fact that it was a free show, although the crowd did
bitch about everything else, including a woman complaining
about having to pay $1 for a strand of beads.
After a short break, Gavin emerged once
again on stage and commenced the encore with "Glycerine."
With a small twist, the rest of Bush appeared on stage toward
the end of the song for a more rocking end to the song. Not
wanting to stop the surprises, the band flabbergasted just
about everyone by doing an unbelievable version of the Cars
"Just What I Needed." It was like a big 80s karaoke
party as the 3,500 drunks left sang and danced along in delight
before the band brought the show back to where it left with
a reprise of "Swallowed." It was then time for the
band to really say goodbye as they ended Spring Break 2002
with "Little Things."
What looked like a disaster waiting to
happen, Spring Break 2002 pretty much went off without a hitch.
Don't get me wrong, there were a lot of people that were drunk
as shit, I should know since some of them were kind enough
to buy me a drink, which never is a bad thing, in fact if
you see me at a show, I wont mind at all if you buy me a beverage.
A couple of guys had to be helped out medically as they had
just a little too much of the $5 beers. Happily once the music
started, the majority of people ignored the booze and enjoyed
the music. Trashcans were overturned and became go-go platforms
for some of the ladies (and a few drunk guys) to get up and
show their stuff. There were a lot of drunken knuckleheads
though that were copping feels off all the lovely ladies that
walked by, which never is an acceptable behavior.
Bush proved why they have been around for
close 10 years and Default showed the skills to have a similar
run, as both bands put on great shows. The only thing that
would have made the show better was a third band to play in
the hanger around 5:30/6:00 to give more of a show. The almost
3.5 hours in between doors opening and Default was a little
much, even if I did get to watch guy after guy lick a body
shot off of a stripper. You could almost see on every guy's
face that he wanted to be that lucky guy the girl went home
with, like they ever had a chance. Damn us guys are so stupid.
Scott Hamilton
Editor, EMPYRE Lounge
Agree or Disagree??? Let me know what you think, email me
at scott@empyrelounge.com
|
