This could surpass all others to be the #1 concert experience on my list...

Let me just say that I've never seen three guys rock a stage as much as Muse. If you've been wondering where I've been, I've been obsessing over seeing one of my top favorite bands live in Las Vegas.

When they came out onto the tiny Joint stage at the Hard Rock, I knew this was going to be special. They've only recently begun to have a following in the US. I got to chatting with the guy sitting next to me (who also sold me my tickets on Stubhub) who said that he and his wife routinely follow the band around the world. He said it was 'a once-in-a-lifetime' experience to see them perform in such an intimate setting. They just saw them perform a couple sold-out shows in London where the crowd was 90,000+. The Joint was 4,000 people. Yeah, that's like Matt and the boys performing in your bedroom. If your bedroom could hold 4,000 people.

As soon as they came on, they immediately got the crowd into it with their new single "Uprising". It's quite a powerful, rebellious anthem and totally set the mood. I wasn't sure if the crowd was going to be made up of hardcore fans or just passive fans who were there for the other bands, since it was a holiday radio show put on by 107.5 FM.

Definitely hardcore fans.

Muse ripped through 12 songs without even a pause between songs to say hello. It seemed that they were trying their best to fit in as much as they could within their allotted time. The entire crowd sang along to many of the songs, the most moving of which was "Time is Running Out" from Absolution. Unfortunately, that was true for the concert too, because they were quickly approaching the end of their show with a strong performance of "Knights of Cydonia", one of my favorites on Guitar Hero. :)

I don't really have a go-to favorite Muse song. They are one of those rare bands that I can throw on one of their albums and listen to it in its entirety without skipping tracks. I was particularly happy that they played "Hysteria", as it has been one that I've heard is ridiculous live. And it was.

Photo credit: www.Vegasdeluxe.com

I can't even describe in words how well the songs translate into a live performance. You just have to experience it for yourself and be in the moment. If the songs sound like they are powerful on CD or on your iPod, multiply that by eleventy hundred and that is about what it's like in person. Some people have commented that any band can sound good when some of their music is pre-recorded. That's the rumor that circling on some sites. Of course some of the music is pre-recorded. Muse is three guys, with Matt Bellamy playing most everything besides bass and drums. It would be impossible to recreate all of the intricate layers of music live. In this concert, Matt did start out "United States of Eurasia" on the piano... even though it was sort of a sad upright piano, not very fancy, when he's used to grand pianos. To see Matt's hands create the riffs in such a fury is a trip! Same with Dom on the drums. A person next to me commented that he has never seen anyone play like that in his life. It's totally a must-see concert.

Setlist included:
Uprising
Unnatural Selection
Supermassive Black Hole
Resistance
Interlude
Hysteria
United States of Eurasia
MK Ultra
Starlight
Time is Running Out
Plug in Baby
Knights of Cydonia

In Awe of the Claw

A big highlight of my trip was my trip-within-a-trip to Chicago. This trip was planned waaaay back in May when the tickets to U2 went on sale. Knowing that U2 tends to sell out fast and furious and knowing that I wanted to see them at some point, Sara and I decided upon Chicago as our venue of choice. It just so happened that I was chatting with my Aunt Carol, who is the Director of Programming at NBC Chicago, the very day that NBC was able to secure a block of tickets. She had no idea I would even want to go, so thank goodness we had said conversation. I got four tickets and before I could say Bono, Andrew let me know that he was in. Not a surprise since U2 is his favorite band.

The trip was phenomenal. First of all, we totally lucked out on the weather! Weather in Chicago can be dicey. It is not always blue skies and baseball games like Ferris Bueller. I spent many vacations there growing up visiting my grandparents and it was not uncommon to be cold on the Fourth of July or boiling on Labor Day. The earlier forecasts were showing rain and cold for the concert day (outdoors at Soldier Field, no less), so my ever-thinking Mom had packed us rain ponchos and blankets. So glad we didn’t need them!

Everyone converged on the City Saturday afternoon. Sara and I driving up, Andrew representing the west coast and my sis-in-law, Christie, representing the East. Carol hooked us up with a room at the Intercontinental Hotel downtown and the central location on Michigan Ave. was great.

If only service in Chicago could have been equally as great. Or even marginally as great. Fractionally great. We had some seriously bad service! One night we hit the wine/chocolate bar downstairs in our hotel. It took oh, maybe 20 minutes to be waited on, despite the place being relatively empty. The waiters looked like they should’ve been working in a garage, and the portions were tiny! So maybe we should have ordered more than 3 pieces of chocolate and one flight of wine, but at $20 a pop, puhleeze. Maybe it was our incessant giggling when we tried to carve up the miniscule chocolate treats into three equal portions. Or tried to snort the decorative cocoa powder on the plate. Or passed around each taste of wine twice and complained one smelled like sprouts. I thought it was perfectly normal, but whatever.

The other place we had bad service was at the Dana Hotel. We were starving. Okay I was starving. We never did get dinner the night before or after the concert, so by breakfast, I was a tad famished. Little did we know that Chicagoans are not big on breakfast. Probably because they are still sitting on the Kennedy at breakfast time. We walked a few miles blocks and eventually saw a sight to behold—people eating! We went in and were promptly seated. All good signs. But then the unthinkable happened. After placing our order, no food was served for approximately 57 minutes. Everyone around us was eating. Just not us. Our pouty waitress did manage to bring some toast for Andrew, but how was he supposed to know it was also for Sara? Oops. Just when we were about to dine and dash (or just dash?) our food came. It was pretty good, but I’m pretty certain we’ll never eat there again. Especially since our pouty waitress is probably looking for the rest of her tip.

On to the concert. I’m sorry, this blog is really in no particular order. Probably due to the low concentration of oxygen on this plane. Just pretend it’s Pulp Fiction. You'll probably want to read it twice.

The concert was amazing. It was certainly the largest one I’ve been to with probably one of the biggest names in music today. I think maybe only a handful of other stars would be able to sell out such venues… one being Michael Jackson, but we all know how that story ends.

The stage was this massive spaceship that really looked like a bear claw. No, really. I was looking for the joystick and button to pick up the Edge and drop him into the prize box. This show would make a fan out of anyone. I really had a great time. The stage had all sorts of moving parts and bridges that took the band out to a catwalk in the crowd. The lights were amazing too. The whole dang thing was just cool. See pix below.

Our last day in the City was spent marching around downtown. I really love downtown and I truly feel like I could live there. We tried to take a water taxi to Sears Tower, but the taxi attendant couldn’t be bothered to do our job and tell us the right boat to get on. After being told by other passengers that the employee was wrong (and noticing that the boat was indeed facing the wrong direction), we deboarded and decided to just walk. Great idea!

We visited the Sky Deck at the Sears Tower. It's this new deck that extends about 5 feet beyond the building made completely out of some sort of plexiglas. Totally rad!!

View from the top

That's us!

My feet. Well, two of the three are mine. I am not a tripod.

Oh yes, we also got a tour of NBC studios, courtesy of my Aunt, and got to watch a taping of the evening news. When it was a wrap, we got to pose for a picture with the two anchors. Can you spot the news anchors?