Day Two

After that Rancid show for the next couple of weeks all I wanted to do was go to shows, I probably got really annoying talking about how cool it was but I didn’t care all I wanted to do was go to another show. Only problem was I was like 14-15 and had no way to get around so I had to rely on my parents / grandma or my friends parents to bring us to shows. Mostly I was going to shows with Jeff, Andrew, Skodnick and Ian. We all pretty much liked the same things but were still into different stuff. I mostly liked street punk, Skodnick was all about metal, Jeff listened to mostly indie stuff but it was all good we all still went to whatever shows. The second show I went to my Dad brought us to, it was also in Philly at the Trocadero Theatre in Chinatown. The Show was Avail, Anti Flag, Flogging Molly and The Explosion. I was so excited to see Anti Flag and Avail, they were two of my favorite bands at the time… I remember being at the show in line with my friends and Dad, and this was the first time he had ever seen anything like this…. Kids walking by with huge Mohawks, liberty spikes and god knows what else. So many weird people in one place wasn’t something he was very used to but he didn’t mind at all, which ruled. We got inside, he went upstairs to the balcony to watch the show while the rest of us stayed downstairs. I don’t really remember the Explosions set but I do remember Flogging Molly’s set being pretty insane. This was right around the time Swagger first came out and they were amazing. Anti Flag blew the room away, I don’t really give a shit what anyone has to say about that band because they had some awesome early albums. I got beat up during Avails set, that was pretty cool. I was just standing there minding my business when this old guy came up to me, picked me up and started hitting people with me. I thought it was awesome until he put me down and out of nowhere I got kicked from behind and stomped on the ground for a few seconds. I really have no clue why that happened to this day, probably some really cool dudes got some really hard fucking boners and decided to beat up a little kid. None the less, still an awesome set Avail fucking rules. Anyway, we’re walking out and I look pretty battered up and my dad (who hadn’t seen me get stomped out) said I didn’t look too good and asked if I was okay. I told him yeah and he basically told me that if I have fun at these things then he’s 100% cool with it. I was really siked… and when we got into his car he put on a Flogging Molly cd he just bought because he was really into them so that made me happy too. A lot of that night is a blur but I remember the feeling I had when i came out of that show, it was such a good one I had never felt before. I felt a part of something and when I got to school the next day I felt different than everyone else, but this time it was in a good way.