In Which I See Weird Al In Concert

In a word, the concert last night with Weird Al was awesome.

It was more than a concert, though. It was a performance, complete with costume changes, fog machines, and gyrating pelvic thrusting dances. This was my third time seeing Weird Al in concert, and as with the other two shows I've seen, I sat there with a goofy smile on my face, singing along with the lyrics in my head. While I would like to describe all the aspects of the concert to you, I don't want to write a review of it. That's not my style, and I would rather write about my experience in general.

The day was uneventful leading up to the concert, and there was nothing notable that happened until my father and I went to enter the arena. We approached the turnstiles with our tickets in hand, and were greeted by two overly enthusiastic employees in blue polo shirts and dark pants.

"Hello!" shouted Blue Shirt #1. "Welcome to the Meadowbrook Arena!"

"Hi," I replied, unsure why she was yelling. She made no move to see my ticket, so I continued walking past her.

"Hold on, Sir." Blue Shit said curtly, holding an arm out in front of me. "We have a strict 'no weapons' policy here at the Meadowbrook. Do you have any knives, handguns, poisonous gas, or hand grenades?"

"No, but I ate baked beans prior to coming tonight. Is that okay?"

Blue Shirt blinked confusedly for a few seconds, and then smiled awkwardly as she let me pass. I handed my ticket to the next attendant, who silently scanned the bar code on the stub and motioned for me to go through the turnstiles. My dad was right behind me, and we were in!

We had an hour to kill before the show started, so we found a place off to the side and people-watched for a while. What struck me as strange, other than being asked about my weapons arsenal, was the diversity of people present for the concert. One would expect there to be a wide variety of geeks there... The ones with long hair and patchy beards, or the diehards wearing concert shirts from 15 years ago, or the group of three scrawny, pimply-faced teenagers wearing tube socks with sandals. What I didn't expect to see were the older couples dressed in expensive clothing with their ticket stubs in clear protective cases hung from lanyards around their necks, or the young girls decked out in their designer sunglasses and all-too-revealing tops, or the gaggle of grandmothers huddled together, laughing amongst themselves. I guess it made sense that the crowd would be as diverse as Weird Al's music and parodies, but it caught me off guard at first.

Also in the crowd what a guy with a full scale, remote-controlled model of R2D2. It was a big hit, with people chasing after it and posing for pictures. There were vendors trying to sell their overpriced food and drinks, and there was a line of people waiting to get fake air-brushed tattoo's. There was a small band off to the side of the arena, and they weren't all that bad until they tried playing Queen's "Another One Bites The Dust". They murdered the song, and as we walked away I could sense that Freddie Mercury was rolling over in his grave. We purchased 50/50 tickets, and made our way to our seats. We found our seats with no trouble, and we remained there throughout the show. The seats were decent, but too far away to take a decent picture with my cell phone. The arena filled up quickly, and I was fortunate to have a neighbor that was respectful of the common armrest.

The show was entertaining and very high-energy, and the crowd of 4,000 loved every minute of it, myself included. He sang most of the selections from his latest album, and did a lot of the fan-favorites, too. My favorite part of the show was his Star Wars set. With everyone dressed in Star Wars costumes, he sang his parody of "American Pie" by Don McLean ("The Saga Begins", a re-telling of Episode I - The Phantom Menace) and "Lola" by The Kinks ("Yoda", a re-telling of events from Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back). Both songs are favorites of mine, and the performance of those two songs were the best out of the entire show.

The show ended with a hilarious rendition of "Fat", the well-known parody of Michael Jackson's "Bad". He did a large portion of the dance routines from his music video, complete with the fat suit. He returned for an encore ("Albuquerque"), and that was it. My dad and I trudged back to the car, and drove home.

If I don't sound too enthused about about the show, it's probably because I'm coming off of a pain killer and muscle relaxer hangover. I re-injured my back yesterday, but refused to let it keep me from going to, and enjoying, the show. I really did have a great time, and I would recommend anyone to see a Weird Al show, whether you are a fan or not.

In addition to not feeling too well, I'm working a 12-hour shift today. That should give me plenty of time to come up with a more interesting post for tomorrow.