“We’re having a great time up here!”
Upon pulling up to the Lodge Room and parking my motorcycle on the street for the second show I would be covering that week, I made a discovery that is every photographer’s nightmare. In my rush to pack up and leave my house, I forgot to pack my SD cards. This part of Highland Park is relatively small and while there was a camera shop nearby, it had closed an hour or two ago, which meant I would have to haul ass to the closest target, panic coursing through my veins, mixing with adrenaline, where I would find the only SD card they had in stock. A quick purchase and a semi-reckless speeding jaunt back to the Lodge Room later, I had luckily made it with time to spare and also discovered that a guard rail had been set up —a first for my experience with this venue, rendering my previous panic somewhat unnecessary. After a celebratory beer, I readied my camera for a night of heavy metal.
Weedeater came on stage immediately spouting that they’re a shit band and we should all get our money back. So yeah, that’s the humor for their performance. Sludgey, loud as fuck stoner doom rock. They introduced their second song with: “This is a song about a fuckin sandwich.” I’m not familiar enough with them to tell you what song that was, but it was a hell of a fun time, and bass player/singer Dave “Dixie” Collins looked like he was having a grand ‘ol time on that stage.
Baroness is fucking tight! The band plays with incredible precision while rocking the fuck out. They really are a cut above, and the sound in the Lodge Room was possibly one of the best mixed concerts I’ve seen in quite a while. Nothing was lost or hidden beneath anything else, making for a truly great experience. The evening, and in fact the entire tour, was centered around the first two albums, Red and Blue, of the band’s career. Both albums are incredibly strong on their own, so seeing them live back to back was a truly unique and awesome experience.
Rather than taking an intermission between the albums, frontman/guitarist John Baizly took the opportunity to express his gratitude to the audience. “I don’t know if you guys can tell, but we’re having a great time up here. We truly appreciate the energy that you share with us,” he said, while also remarking on how special The Lodge Room venue is and how much fun it is to play here. Before continuing, he took a last moment to dedicate the entire set to the original drummer Allen Bickle, who had passed earlier this year. With that, the wash of red light shifted to blue, and the band launched into their second album with the same amount of gusto as the first.
