Spill Gas, Go Boom

With the Howl's Moving Castle soundtrack blasting (ha!) through my sound system and the setting sun burning into my retinas, I found myself driving down HWY 49 on my way to meet Natty and Pepper in Charlotte.

After arriving and pigging out on leftover Halloween candy, Pepper's dad took us out to a little Italian place for dinner. We returned to Pepper's parents' place for a chocolate refill and then Pepper drove Natty and I to Amos' where we had tickets to see MuteMath.

MuteMath is a recent thing for me - I think I got Armistice back at the beginning of September and knew right away that it was something special. Since my recent musical diet has consisted mainly of d&b and other electronic music, Armistice was like a breath of fresh air. After hundreds of hours of 170 beats per minute or faster, the whole world feels slow. When Natty mentioned that she had tickets last Thursday, I went online and bought one immediately. I figured the band wouldn't be able to pull off a lot of their tracks live and was looking forward to a technical show.

We got to Amos' and were floored to see a line stretching down and around the block. And it wasn't the line for tickets - it was the line to get in! I viewed the masses with a jaundiced eye. Crowds of people usually make me extremely cynical about America and humanity in general. Skinny jeans, unkempt hair and dour expressions prevailed. Natty muttered "Star Fleet" and I looked up to behold a young woman in a long baggy turtleneck, half turquoise and half black. It was horrible. The slouching, reeking dude behind us spent all of his time in line recounting in detail every occasion on which he'd funneled beer.

After waiting in line for about 30 minutes in the cold, we finally made it inside, which was pretty nice, and smoke-free. A few thousand fans were packed like crayons into this space. Natty, Pepper and I were close and didn't have enough room to stand without pressing up against somebody else. Over the course of the show, I must've shoved 4 or 5 people out of my way. I think all of us were elbowed, rubbed up against, fallen upon or stomped on at least a few times each. We were also in the Tall Section or something - there was a guy at least 7 feet tall in front of me at one point that other fans were calling "sasquatch" while threatening to force him to stand in the back, since he was being such an obstacle.

The opener, As Tall As Lions, were solid, and played for about an hour. I thought they were pretty good, until MuteMath came on and blew them away. They were FABULOUS live. The drummer was so animated that he had to wear his headset strapped to his head, and he eventually had the crowd hold up his bass drum, stood up onto it and fell backwards into the crowd! Crazy kid.

I'd totally see them again!

On my way home, I stopped at a gas station to fill my tank. When I took the pump out of the car after it had automatically stopped, it started gushing gasoline all over my car and the concrete! It was over in about a second, but there was a LAKE of gas all around. I ran to the attendant and told her what had happened, and she said, "you're at pump 10, aren't you." I nodded and she rolled her eyes like pump 10 does this every day. I told her that they should shut it down until it gets fixed! She headed for the back of the store and when I asked her where she was going, she said exasperatedly, "We don' want this place to go boom, right?" She returned with kitty litter, which she deposited in the ocean of fuel.

I haven't picked up a piano in two weeks. I mean played. Er.