the west edmonton mall
it was going to be "my thing"
i was planning on living in edmonton and never setting foot inside that (in)famous consumerist monstrosity, the world's former largest shopping mall ever.
wiki and you will be terrified and allured.
but then the dropkick murphys played there.
it's the only venue of an appropriate size, edmonton lacks good clubs with concert theatres and the dropkicks aren't really going to fill the stadiums.
so meaghan and i went to the mall.
the edmonton event centre has it's own entrance, so we luckily didn't have to go through the mall. it used to be called Red's and was a super sleezy meat market club. then they took the 'R' down and renamed it "ed's" or the edmonton event centre.
the sound was awful, owing to the layout of the place, it had a mezzanine and catwalks extending all around the main floor, but the main floor was full of pillars and the main bar cut right through the middle of it. the upper levels were filled with tables and chairs. it was clearly meant to be a giant dance club and not a concert venue.
but the show was awesome.
we were both exhausted, megs had been up at 5 or 6 every morning to make it to work out on the oil patch for 8, i had been up fairly early myself working my new job. i had to work saturday morning at 8.
still, we made the best of it!
the opening acts were totally awesome. lots of banjo and penny whistle and fiddle. they all lacked the ability to announce themselves, so i have no idea who any of them were, other than "the tossers" who had their name on their drum kit, and i know that one of the bands had to be "the briggs' because they had a huge merch table set up at the back near the arcade. (the club backed onto one of the mall's many arcades and foodcourts)
the dropkicks were incredible as usual. the piper had an alberta flag hung from his pipes!
alas, we had to leave just after midnight, i was actually falling asleep in the pit. sober. i was falling down sober.
after megs caught me nodding out for the third or fourth time, she suggested we'd better leave before we curled up in the puddle of beer and got trampled.
the crowd was a little odd, they all threw beer. full cups of beer went hurtling across the venue all evening. people would shake up beer cans and spray everyone too.
it's a symptom of the weird economy here megpye says. the oil patch pays many 20 thousand a month and they tend to blow 500$ a weekend on booze, drugs, loose women and fast living. that's why we were soaked in 6$ glasses of kokanee.
i don't know if i should try again to avoid the mall. they do have a pirate ship.
i was planning on living in edmonton and never setting foot inside that (in)famous consumerist monstrosity, the world's former largest shopping mall ever.
wiki and you will be terrified and allured.
but then the dropkick murphys played there.
it's the only venue of an appropriate size, edmonton lacks good clubs with concert theatres and the dropkicks aren't really going to fill the stadiums.
so meaghan and i went to the mall.
the edmonton event centre has it's own entrance, so we luckily didn't have to go through the mall. it used to be called Red's and was a super sleezy meat market club. then they took the 'R' down and renamed it "ed's" or the edmonton event centre.
the sound was awful, owing to the layout of the place, it had a mezzanine and catwalks extending all around the main floor, but the main floor was full of pillars and the main bar cut right through the middle of it. the upper levels were filled with tables and chairs. it was clearly meant to be a giant dance club and not a concert venue.
but the show was awesome.
we were both exhausted, megs had been up at 5 or 6 every morning to make it to work out on the oil patch for 8, i had been up fairly early myself working my new job. i had to work saturday morning at 8.
still, we made the best of it!
the opening acts were totally awesome. lots of banjo and penny whistle and fiddle. they all lacked the ability to announce themselves, so i have no idea who any of them were, other than "the tossers" who had their name on their drum kit, and i know that one of the bands had to be "the briggs' because they had a huge merch table set up at the back near the arcade. (the club backed onto one of the mall's many arcades and foodcourts)
the dropkicks were incredible as usual. the piper had an alberta flag hung from his pipes!
alas, we had to leave just after midnight, i was actually falling asleep in the pit. sober. i was falling down sober.
after megs caught me nodding out for the third or fourth time, she suggested we'd better leave before we curled up in the puddle of beer and got trampled.
the crowd was a little odd, they all threw beer. full cups of beer went hurtling across the venue all evening. people would shake up beer cans and spray everyone too.
it's a symptom of the weird economy here megpye says. the oil patch pays many 20 thousand a month and they tend to blow 500$ a weekend on booze, drugs, loose women and fast living. that's why we were soaked in 6$ glasses of kokanee.
i don't know if i should try again to avoid the mall. they do have a pirate ship.