holy hell. what a crazy twenty four hours. it was a last minute decision to go to chicago anyway. but the super last minute part was when kiera called me around eleven the night before and said her band practice was cancelled, meaning we could leave earlier than two thirty. she then jokingly said "we can leave whenever you want, as long as it's not six in the morning or something." i laughed and said "well..." state & madison had an acoustic set scheduled at orland square mall at noon and i really wanted to be there for it.
i went to bed at midnight, feel asleep at three and got up at five thirty. oh yes. perfect way to start the longest day ever, i know. i left the house by six thirty, got gas and was at kiera's house at about ten til. well kiera slept through her alarm and had woken up to me knocking on the door. NOT a good way to start our day; i was already a little panicky about making it by noon. but she pulled an amazing feat; showered, got ready, and we were in the car by about three after seven. absolutely amazing i tell you.
well the two hours of sleep seemed to be doing me just fine and the drive went pretty fast. we got the mall in record time (thank you handy dandy garmin) and were inside wandering around by about eleven thirty. we then run into nickolas who seemed just as lost as we did. he looked at me, cocked his head, looked down at his watch and back up at me. "what the fuck are you doing here?" was his only acknowledgement. we chatted briefly and found our way to hot topic together. tony, then mike proceeded to have the same reaction to our early morning appearance. sam of course knew what was up and just shook her head and called me insane. ahh, friends. love them.
the set-up was small, as was the set. but it was fun and it was cute. and jack martino even made an appearance on drums which of course was adorable. kiera and i wandered the mall for a bit then left and got some lunch at tgi friday's. we then rolled ourselves out of there and went to old navy, then barnes and noble, and that's where we spent most of the afternoon. we both found books to read, i got some starbucks, and then curled up in a big comfy chair. kiera passed out for a few hours, but i read straight through my book. by that time it six or so, so i texted meesh and we decided to head over to the venue. everyone was in the parking lot talking, so we hung out for a while and eventually made our way inside.
no one was really interested in the opening bands, so we grabbed a table and meesh i caught up on life. lots of shenanigans ensued, of course. [there was a lot of batman and a whole lot of brewnicorn.] we eventually made our way over to the stage for a part of hotel ahead's set. they weren't bad. urbanites were up next though, and i think we all wanted to secure our good spots up front. deb was of course doing her thing - right up front taking notes on all the set lists. love that woman. so urbanites finally came on and besides quite a few technical difficulties [water bottles flying, drums falling, faulty mics] they put on a pretty bad ass show. this was only my second time seeing them live, but i noticed loads of improvement from the last time i saw them back in january. they broke down quickly and the crowd packed in fairly tight for state & madison who put on one hell of a show, let me tell you. this was by far the best i'd seen them. it's great to have small shows in st. louis with thirty to forty people and watching the fan base grow, but it's another story seeing a band in their hometown with everyone singing along. the urbanites came on stage for a few songs and caused a ruckus, and scott from cavashawn even came and sang for part of 'everybody wants love'. great show.
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[tony of state & madison - i stole this from his facebook. meesh will probably upload more pictures at her leisure which means this will probably be updated at some point.]
it was a bit chaotic post-show, but i got a chance to catch up with the cavashawn boys, officially met brad and steven from urbanites and talked briefly with mike, tony and nickolas. i ended up with three shirts and a huge bag of state & madison promo stickers and flyers [thanks mike]. kiera and i had set a curfew for ourselves earlier in the day, and our goal was to leave by midnight which would ensure us getting home by a solid five am. well i made my rounds, said my goodbyes, and we were off by just about twelve. the drive home was long and kiera fell asleep about an hour in. i think i was hallucinating by the time i got home, but i made it safely in one piece. i'm pretty sure i was in bed by about five thirty... the time i was getting up a whole twenty four hours earlier... whew. great trip, i'm still smiling.
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