2012/10/12 The Smashing Pumpkins - Part I: Bill Graham Civic Auditorium; San Francisco, CA, US
very first stop in the US? burrito!
OK, I went out of order & wrote up the BUCK-TICK show, despite it being a full month after the SP shows. Need to do these now so they don't turn into more of those never-reviewed shows... >_<; Since this did involve a trip back to the US, though, this will probably be a lot more about what happened around/between the shows than during them. But hey, that's why (both of) you read this, right? :P" Ah, who am I kidding, nobody reads this. Need to move it to a standalone domain or something.
Anyway. Having visited the family in WI this summer (during which no concerts happened, despite there being a Voivod show planned, but nooo, the entire festival got canceled because the promoters were complete fucktards & completely fucked up the entire thing (°Д°#)), I was free to limit myself to CA. We arrived in SF on 10/8 (7 hours before we left Tokyo, lol #timetravel), allowing plenty of time to get over the jet lag before the weekend road trip. But first things first. As in, first stop from the airport? BURRITOS! XD
transferring Frogs cassettes
A recent tweet/fb post by Jimmy Flemion (RIP Dennis) alerted me to the fact that they're interested in people's recordings of Frogs shows, so I brought the box of tapes along that I'd passed off to another trader before moving to Japan, but which sadly never ended up getting transferred. But hey- since my very own stereo w/ dual cassette desk was still being held (and used!) at The Girl's parents' house, where we were staying, I once again had access to Ye Olde Obsolete Audio Equipment. Brought along my digital/USB interface & dumped those suckers onto Girl's laptop, and then mailed the originals to The Frogs' PO Box!
Hello, what's this?
So, what else was there to do in SF? Well, besides getting over the jet lag before the shows, it was mostly hanging out w/ Girl's family (for some strange reason she wants to spend time with her baby nephew- I can't possibly imagine why :P"). There was, however, one other thing I wanted to do while in the states- particularly since the exchange rate means the yen is kicking the dollar's ass right now, making things even cheaper- especially the somewhat more expensive stuff. I'd been looking around at guitars for a while, but everything here is a bit on the pricey side. I think you can see where this is going. :D
After watching a taiko thingy downtown that Girl's brother was attending for school, we headed off to Guitar Center. Still not knowing a whole lot about guitars, I still had a general idea of what I was looking for. Namely, I'd try out a few guitars that I was familiar with and if any of them popped out, I'd think about getting it. Last time I hit a Guitar Center in Madison, during my summer trip, I'd been a bit rushed and later wished I'd grabbed one of the strats I'd tried out. So this time I started off there. Tried a few strats, an SG, & a couple Jazzmasters. One of the strats was a demo for a guitar synth, & heavily marked down, so I lugged it over to the area where they had the synth station set up & messed around with that for a while, but ultimately decided I didn't really need it (esp. since it'd require buying the synth part separately, and our band already had a guitar synth).
Why, it's a new guitar! :D
So after spending a bit of time on a few guitars, and constantly going back to an all-black Mexican strat- which happened to be marked down by $80, on an expired sale tag that they said they'd still honor since they'd neglected to remove it- and the fact that our ride back was fast approaching, I ended up taking it! :D Grabbed some extra strings and a hard case for the trip back as well, which I was surprised to learn was designed to fit in the overhead bins- here I'd just assumed all guitars had to be checked. I was still skeptical, but at least it was a thought.
So from Guitar Center, we headed over to Girl's sister's house for dinner, but happened to pass by a Best Buy on the way, so we stopped quick & I ran in to check for an extra Rocksmith cable so we could play 2-player. Sadly, they had none, but they did had the Ratchet & Clank HD Collection, which I grabbed w/ another PSN gift card (for Rocksmith DLC, since I'd just used most of the last one on the bass expansion pack). Got back to the car to find that her brother had realized he'd forgotten his backpack at the store, so we had to run back for it. I jumped out of the car, ran in & got it, and we headed back over to the sister's place. At which point Girl had me open up the case to show it off, and I noticed something. The whammy bar, which I'd asked about (it wasn't attached when I was playing), was still missing, despite the staff's assurance that it came with one. Evidently with the rush & the focus on the case, we'd forgotten that, too. Margh. So that meant another trip back there, which would have to wait until the next Monday, since it was just about concert/road trip time!
SP in SF!
First stop was the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in SF. Originally we were going to go with Girl's friend, but apparently there was a communication fail & lack of confirmation, so we asked another friend to go instead. Who then ended up getting sick, which meant Girl's mom ended up coming with us to avoid wasting a ticket. >_>; Well, at least I knew she'd enjoy the Bowie cover. XD Anyway. Got to the venue & ran into the usual set of familiar fan faces. Headed in expecting Girl's mom to head upstairs to the seats, but the entire upstairs was closed- apparently they didn't sell enough tickets & decided it was better to close off the entire 2nd floor than have it look empty. Apparently some newer venues even have movable stages, so they can be rolled forward to make smaller crowds still appear "full". I suppose there's something psychologically preferable about playing a "smaller" room that appears full, to a large room that appears half-empty, even with the same number of people in it. But anyway.
SP poster in SF lobby
The SF show started rather late- considering there was an opening band, and by now I'm much more used to shows in Japan that end with plenty of time for people to catch the last train. Ended up chatting a bit with the lighting guy, who's been with the crew since at least 2000. Some Cure songs played over the PA before the show started. The opener didn't really catch my attention, but then again, I don't remember many opening bands that have. Fancy Space People were at least amusing visually (and perhaps equally amusing were the crowd's reactions to them, lol). Anyway. Once they were done, it was finally time for the massive SP Oceania experience!
After a brief Mellotron intro, the band tore straight into Quasar, a giant black curtain falling to reveal the giant globe that projected images throughout the set, with constellations of a turtle & an octopus recurring several times throughout the show. They played straight through Pinwheels before Billy took the mic to address the crowd, explaining that they were playing the new album, Oceania, in its entirety, before moving on to "the classics: Jeremy, Smells Like Teen Spirit, Black Hole Sun... Sex Type Thing... and what's that Dave Matthews one? Crash Into Me?" lmao. There were a few other moments of hilarity toward the end of the "classics" set, where Billy said "I'm like Mitt Romney- I just keep changing my position to suit my goal at the moment", and then asked people to call him "Mitt Corgan", which apparently someone misheard as "Mick", as he quickly corrected with "No, there's already a Mick. There's only 1 Mick. There's only 1 Keith..." etc. He also went into a little Spiel on the VIP packages, referring first to the "VIP tazer package", and explaining that people don't want to just listen to music anymore, it has to be something else. "So, it's $5000 to sleep with Mike. For $3500 Nicole will give you a tattoo. For $2500 Jeff will read to you... And I'll tell you what I think of you for free." lolz
Lozzy's lighting controller
- Quasar
- Panopticon
- The Celestials
- Violet Rays
- My Love Is Winter
- One Diamond, One Heart
- Pinwheels
- Oceania
- Pale Horse
- The Chimera
- Glissandra
- Inkless
- Wildflower
- Space Oddity [Bowie]
- X.Y.U.
- Disarm
- Tonite Reprise > Tonight, Tonight
- Bullet with Butterfly Wings
Calling Dr. Love [KISS] (tease)
Start Me Up [Rolling Stones] (tease) - A Song for a Son
- Today
- Zero
- Ava Adore
- Cherub Rock
Equipment breakdown! Billy stuck to his usual strats for most songs, swapping between black and white models, and a third painted blue & covered with bat and pumpkin stickers. A few departures included a red Jaguar on Glissandra, One Diamond One Heart, and My Love is Winter; a Harmony Rocket on Pinwheels, and a Reverend Slingshot on Violet Rays. Jeff was the most varied, using a black Jazzmaster on Glissandra & Pinwheels, a red one on Oceania and Violet Rays, and a sunburst model on Space Oddity; a tobacco sunburst Jaguar on 1D1H, MLIW, Disarm and Pale Horse; a black SG on Tonite/Tonight, white SG on Quasar/Panopticon; mellotron only on Wildflower (leaving BC w/ the only guitar); and various Les Pauls on the rest (cherry sunburst, gold-top, and white). Nicole swapped between her blueish Jazz Bass for the Oceania tracks + Disarm, Today and Song for a Son, and a white Precision for the rest of the "classics" set, save Wildflower, which was all keys (M-Audio). Even Mike came out from his drum set to hop on another Mellotron & sing backup. Didn't get a good look at amps & other stuff (other than Jeff's 2 angled ORANGE stacks), but there are interviews that go into far more detail than I'd be able to anyway.
Well, since this is already a decent length, I'll split off here & do the other 2 days in a separate post. Or maybe 2, if I'm feelin' like it!