Last weekend was great. I spent all day driving to Calgary on Thursday so I could make it to the first Tool concert that night. We had floor seats so it was pretty good. The only negative that I could think of would be the people standing on the chairs in front of us. This resulted in everyone standing on chairs then (stupid). After that concert we went back to Black Diamond sleep at my brothers house.
Then the next morning we drove off to Edmonton. Since we left early enough we checked out the West Edmonton Mall before we ventured off to the second Tool concert. Our seats for this show were up in a bit which resulted in a really good view of the stage. The only negative I could think of is the setup they have at Rexall Place in Edmonton. Everyone in the building shares the same concession stands. This resulted in huge lines for beer. I think we probably waited 40 minutes (basically missed the entire opening ISIS show) Both concerts were great, I had a really awesome time. I bought a couple shirts, while Ben and Jesse bought some big posters. After the concert we decided to check out the hype and see White Avenue.
After taking the taxi to White Avenue we found out that it isn’t actually very close to Rexall Place. The street was busy and a lot of people were mingling around. We didn’t really know which bars to check out. We first stopped at an upstairs bar called “The Attic”. It was alright, kind of just whatever, only having one small bar. After we finished a drink we left and went walking down the street in pursuit of another bar. The next and last bar we stopped at was the Funky Buddha. It was a little bit bigger with definetly more people. We ended up staying at this bar for an hour and a half or so until closing time. We were basically the last people out of there. After this we were trying to get a taxi. This was way harder than it should have been. We waited and waited but nothing. We got a hotdog and kept waiting. Ben got lost for a bit but we eventually found him. We saw a group of people surrounding one guy who was turtling. Jesse the good guy he is convinced this group to leave the guy alone and get some hotdogs with him. So Jesse was leading these 5 guys towards the hotdog stand when a police car flies across the street almost driving up on the curb. The police jump out and immediately move towards Jesse. They say “put down the pipe”. Jesse looks around. They say again, “put down the lead pipe”. Jesse looks at his poster and says, “I don’t have a pipe”. The police officer runs at him open handedly punching him in the throat knocking him down. Ben runs in and says “what are you doing, calm down”. The police runs at him and pushes him, while I get knocked over standing beside Ben. After a couple more seconds I get Jesse back over beside me and Ben, while the guy who was about to get killed earlier tells about the real bad guys and informs the police that we were a bunch of good guys. The police officer goes on and on telling about he was justified to hit us since the posters looked like lead pipes, so we matched their description. It was retarded and I thought we better get out of there quick. So I turn around and within seconds get a taxi who we immediately make our getaway in. The taxi driver saw the events unfold and said the cops had a misunderstanding. Whatever though, it’s just police brutality, we got back to the hotel and went to sleep.
The next morning, Saturday, I drove back to Calgary from Edmonton. That night, we went to some guys party at his house. It was interesting and only 1 or 2 fights broke out. That was a very entertaining evening. Finally, Sunday morning, I drove back from Calgary to Regina. I had just enough time to recouperate in time for work on Monday. Overall, it was a good adventure, with a great band for entertainment.