*Everybody's talking 'bout blowing up the neighborhood...*

Jul 27, 2004 14:26

As I proceed to type this long ass post I have Sugarcult "Stuck In America" in my head... This was mine and Chris' theme song for the weekend... anyways here goes nothing...

Hellfest 2004
@ The Rexplex
Elizabeth, New Jersey
July 23 - 25

Thursday:

Chris and Clark got me around 11:30 am and we made our journey to New Jersey... We got held up at the border... The American cocksucker border crossing people decided to take us in a small room and search us while they searched the car... I was afraid we were gonna get cavity searched or something... Well at least I would've gotten action hahaha.... Anyways after like 15-20 mins at the border all was well and the fuckers let us in the country... We made our way towards Syracuse which annoyed us because Hellfest the previous years was held at the Fairgrounds in Syracuse and now its all the way in New Jersey... we then went south into Pennsylvania then east into New Jersey.. We eventually made it to Jersey 8 hours later... we then drove around attempting to find the Rexplex to no avail, so we decided to find the Rexplex the morning of the first day... We then drove around Elizabeth to find a place to stay... we tried one place and they didn't have any vacancies for the entire weekend... I also noticed in the lobby they had a no smoking sign that said "No Fumar" it was quite humorous... so smoking was referred to as "fumar" the whole weekend... silly indian people hahaha... Anyways we went a little more deeper into Elizabeth and realized how ghetto it was... If you think Rexdale or Scarborough are ghetto you haven't seen Elizabeth... we pulled into a motel called the Oak Grand Motel... this is where shit gets interesting...

Before I go on lemme tell you about the fucking roads in New Jersey... you can't make left turns at like 99% of the main intersections... to make U-turns they have little side street detour thingers that allow you to make U-turns... instead of islands separating the opposite side of the road on main roads in the city, they have those huge concrete barracades that highways have... I did a bit of driving this first evening while we were looking for a place to stay and yeah I fucking hated it...

Anyways, we got a room at a decent price... we got 2 beds a washroom... a tv with like 6 or more channels... with like the WB, CBS, NBC, ABC, FOX... and Porn... yes we got a porn channel!!!! Actually it was more like a channel being fed from the main office... It was pre taped porn movies... with all the story edited out of it... so all we got was constant sex scenes...

We settled in and Chris and Clark started to crack open beers... me being the dude that doesn't drink anymore wasn't gonna have any of it... Of course they then force me to have one, I'm like aiiight that's savvy... yeah then they force me to have another... I take a sip and was like pshhh fuck this shit... But they were all like 'DON'T LET IT GO TO WASTE!!!' I'm like FINE!!! SO I just downed that shit hahahaha... we also decided to the nearest Burger King in Elizabeth... man is the place ghetto... yeah I got some burger called the Angus Burger... and yeah that did not sit right at all...... ughhhh... Anyways yeah that was night one...

Friday:

I woke up with a fucking headache and that burger was not sitting right... hahaha anyways we got ready and to our fucking luck it was fucking pouring outside and we still had to find the place... Yeah we drove around for over an hour finding the place... getting lost... stopping asking for directions it was fucking horrible... we eventually found it... and yeah it was still pouring rain and the line up was massive... We were outside for a good 30 minutes and then we realized there was another line but a lot smaller to the left of our line... We then find out that the massive line we're in is for people who are paying at the door and the smaller line was for people who had tickets in advanced... fucking stress haha so yeah we move into the other line and we're in the building in no time...

Rexplex is basically a massive recreational center... it has like an indoor skate park, a skate shop... basketball courts, two indoor soccer/lacrosse fields, a hockey rink, a paintball area, and many other places... the place is massive... the set up was they had two main stages side by side in the 2 indoor soccer fields... the Trustkill and the Hopeless stage... then in the basketball court they had the Hot Topic stage, then in this other room they had the Dinosaur stage...

We get in and the first band I hear in the distance at the Hot Topic stage is Anterrabae... so we rush there and catch the last half of their set... they were pretty sick... we then decide that we should all go check out the merch... Yeah we went kinda merch crazy the entire weekend... the shocking thing was Chris bought way more merch than me... hahaha... then again he had more money... But I'll list the merch bought the entire weekend towards the end haha...

A few hours in on one of the main stages they make an announcement that some idiot decided it would be cool to jump off the second floor balcony for some odd reason... he basically broke his back and both his legs... and they said that if something like this happens again the show is being shut down... fucking retards...

Anyways to sum up the the bands I watched/catched some of the set on Friday:

*Anterrabae
*Unearth
*Every Time I Die
*Terror
*As I Lay Dying
*Himsa
*Remembering Never
*Norma Jean

(Bands I wanted to see but couldn't... for whatever reasons)

*The Red Chord
*Found Dead Hanging
*Hawthorne Heights
*The Juliana Theory
*The Ataris
*Sick Of It All

We left after Norma Jean because we didn't feel like staying around to see the last few bands of the night which were bands like Shadows Fall, Sick Of It All, The Juliana Theory, The Ataris, and *shudders* The Misfits... I mean I like Sick Of It All, The Juliana Theory, The Ataris and Mest... but yeah we just figured lets get out of there...

The funniest thing... we then leave the Rexplex and find our way back to the motel with no problems at all... what took over an hour in the morning to find the Rexplex..... only took us 15 minutes to get back... so yeah THE FUCKING PLACE WAS 15 MINUTES AWAY FROM OUR MOTEL!!!?@?!@?

We got back and ordered some Chinese Food to the motel room and continued to watch more porn... hahaha... Me and Chris at this point were memorizing most of the scenes and we recognized most of the scenes hahaha... we watched some news, The Simpsons, That 70's Show... and then back to more porn... haha...

Saturday:

I find myself waking up earlier than everyone else... and I would just lie in bed and light a smoke... then go to the washroom and smoke... haha I swear the motel room was looking like a batchelor pad... smokes, beer, take out food, porn... haha it was great...

The weather was better still overcast but it wasn't as humid as Thursday or Friday...

bands we watched on Saturday:

*Odd Project
*HORSE The Band (which the crowd went absolutely crazy for)
*Martyr AD
*Evergreen Terrace
*The Hope Conspiracy
*Stretch Arm Strong
*Nora
*Zao
*Beloved
*Bane
*Underoath

(bands I wanted to see Saturday... but missed)

*No Hollywood Ending
*I Killed The Prom Queen
*Killswitch Engage
*Mest
*Andrew WK
*Drowningman
*Embrace Today
*Comeback Kid
*Dead To Fall

So yeah I would like to mention my little experience during Underoath... from watching previous Hellfest's on DVD and seeing how the crowds are for pretty much every band... its a free for all!!! no security guards... people piling onto the stages all trying to get to the mic and creating the human pyramid... and during every obvious breakdown you would just see hundreds of kids just bringing the mosh... It was quite an amazing yet funny sight seeing hudreds of limbs flailing and legs kicking around haha... and the first aid room was filling up like woah... bandages hands, bloody noses... I saw a few ambulances when I was out smoking...

Anyways so I decided to go up front against the stage for Underoath and Clark decided to come with me while Chris stayed back... yeah as soon as Underoath started I lost Clark and it went crazy... I was getting crushed against the stage, and trying to watch my head for the endless amounts of stage divers...

(this is for Sam) Underoath's Setlist (in no particular order) so you can kind of expect what songs they do when they come in September...

*Young And Aspiring
*819 Stops Today
*The Best Of Me
*Angel Below
*Reinventing Your Exit
*The Blue Note
*It's Dangerous Business Walking Out Of Your Front Door
*I Don't Feel Very Receptive Today
*When The Sun Sleeps

During the last song "When The Sun Sleeps" I decided to climb on stage and pile the singer and everyone else hahahahaha... and then I decided that since I've never done it I might as well so I fucking just launched myself into the crowd I landed on like 5 people.. and they picked me up... haha it was great...

I got out all drenched in sweat... and had this massive cut on my arm and it was bleeding... and my right arm hurt cause I landed on it when I dropped... other than that I seemed fine...

I wanted to stay to watch Andrew WK (Posicore hahahhaa) because I figured it'd be jokes but he was on at 10 pm and we were all already tired... especially me after Underoath... so we booked it back to the motel...

We then ordered a pizza... along with mozerella sticks, french fries, and hot wings... hahaha... we're such guys... back to more beer, porn and smoking for the rest of the night...

Sunday:

We packed up our belongings into the car and said goodbye to Oak Ridge Motel and channel 60 of porn... of course we watched it while we got ready hahahaha... call us porn freaks or something ... porn is overrated but its so fucking funny!!! If you're with the right people...

The sun decided to finally shine its light on the horrid state of New Jersey and we got there earlier than the previous days.. and got in in no time...

bands I saw/caught a bit of on Sunday:

*Fordirelifesake
*Alexisonfire (for like the fucking 7th time...)
*Most Precious Blood
*Death By Stereo (as much as I dislike them ughhh)
*Throwdown
*Shai Hulud (which was their final show!! Very amazing!!)
*Misery Singals (one of my favorite bands the entire weekend!)
*A Life Once Lost
*Fear Before The March Of Flames
*Converge
*Dillinger Escape Plan

(bands I wanted to see but missed...)

*A Thousand Falling Skies
*Walls Of Jericho
*Bleeding Through
*The Bronx
*From A Second Story Window
*Forever Is Forgotten
*With Dead Hands Rising

Dillinger Escape Plan was the last band we saw... afterwards we decided to hit the road and head back home... this was at about 8 pm Sunday night...

One problem... You figure with a journey like this we would've been prepared... NOPE!!! We didn't have any maps and the only way we got to New Jersey was using Yahoo Maps hahaha (personally we should've used Mapquest)... and Chris didn't print out return directions... and we couldn't remember how to get out and back on the Interstate we needed to... so basically we drove and got lost for awhile... it was freaky and really fucking stressful ahhahaa... we actually almost ended up in Manhattan... which wouldn't have been good... we eventually gave up and pulled into a gas station and picked up a map for New Jersey... and plotted our way out of of New Jersey... of course we had to get on The Garden State Parkway which is like the New Jersey fucking Turnpike... basically you have to pay to use it.. stupid fucking American toll highways can suck my cock...

We eventually made our way back onto the route we took home and we were finally on our way after being lost for over an hour... Chris once again did the driving home because he said he was wide awake... I wouldn't have minded doing some of the driving, but for some reason during the drive home I was falling in and out of sleep like crazy once we got into Pennsylvania... We eventually got back into Canada... and Chris dropped me home at about 5 am... That's it.

It's good to be back home... I'm still exhausted and sore from Hellfest... but now I'm bored again... As much as I hated New Jersey and America and a lot of that shit.. I miss Hellfest... the huge amounts of edge kids with edge tattoos hahaha and all the pretty scene girls with their chest pieces... speaking of which I'm calling to all artists out there (I'm looking at you Mariola, Kierstan and Jordanna and whoever else) someone help me design some stuff I want to get done PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!...

In general... I kind of miss the whole trip................ Nawwww.... haha... I wanna hit the west coast some day on my next vacation... like BC or Cali... maybe one day... Either way this is definitely one trip I'll never forget... Haha you know want to do it up again next year Chris!!!

Merch Purchased Throughout the weekend:

*2 To Die For Clothing Shirts... they're purrrrty
*Converge Zip Up
*Converge shirt
*Boys Night Out shirt
*another Boys Night Out shirt *for Erica*
*Norma Jean shirt *for Laura*
*Underoath shirt
*Odd Proect shirt
*Hopesfall beanie (I believe that's what its called... haha either way its pictured below)
*Converge "The Long Road Home" DVD
*Odd Project "The Second Hand Stopped" CD
*Circle Takes The Square "As The Roots Undo" CD
*This Runs Through "Until Forever Finds Me" CD
*Across Five Aprils "Living In The Moment" CD
*Fordirelifesake "Dance.Pretend.Forget.Defend" CD
*A Thousand Falling Skies "The Wilting" CD
*A Thousand Falling Skies "From Behind The Shadows" CD
*On Broken Wings "Some Of Us May Never See The World" CD
*Unearth "The Oncoming Storm" CD
*Curl Up And Die "Unfortunately We're Not Robots" CD



(Rocking out the Hopesfall hat thinger...)

So I'm a broke ass nigga now.... but it was worth it...

Anyways that's probably is the longest post I've ever done... heh... anyhoo I'm still on vacation until Sunday night... so yes I need something to do for the rest of the week damnit!!!

Anyways I'm out I need a fucking smoke... xoxo

21 Songs:

Curl Up And Die - Kissing You Is Like Licking An Ashtray
Sex Positions - Commit It
Fordirelifesake - Something Missing
Curl Up And Die - Total Pandemonium
A Thousand Falling Skies - A Desire Named Despair
Across Five Aprils - Spaghetti Junction In The Rearview
The Red Chord - Catalepsy
Odd Project - A Perfect Smile And Broken Wings
Unearth - Bloodlust Of The Human Condition
Trophy Scars - Chapter One How To Fail Yourself
Evergreen Terrace - Dear Livejournal
The Red Chord - Nilihist
On Broken Wings - As You Speak
Odd Project - The Phone Is Such A Blunt Object
Evergreen Terrace - My Heart Beats In Breakdowns
Anterrabae - Dressed To Thrill
Across Five Aprils - Through The Pane
Unearth - False Idols
This Runs Through - The Wind That Brought Us Here
Misery Signals - Murder
Circle Takes The Square - A Crater To Cough In
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