Kula Shaker at The Roxy in Atlanta
4/14/97
HEADSWIM AND GREAT ANTICIPATION
My friend and I were there thirty minutes before the doors opened, waiting in great anticipation for the moment when we'd rush inside...and then get to wait for another thirty minutes. When they finally let us in, Erin and I walked to the very front center and then began singing and dancing like the ridiculous kids that we are. After a while of dancing, the lights went out and the first band called HEADSWIM came on stage. They were great! When they left the stage, I screamed at the security guard to give me one of the set lists that he had just crumbled up on the floor, but he gave them both to this other girl. Erin kept on going on and on about Headswim even after they left, but at this time I was only thinking about Kula Shaker. The nice woman next to me had a bunch of things that she was going to get Crispian, Alonza, Paul, and Jay to sign after the gig and she told me that she would show me where to go to meet them. The roadies were spreading incense all around the stage. Yum.
Finally, Kula Shaker came on and immediately went into an astounding version of HEY DUDE. Crispian's voice sounded really great. I was singing along and screaming the whole time and Erin (not the BIGGEST Kula Shaker fan) just kept on staring at me like I was the weirdest person alive. I believe next they played Knight On The Town. A really groovemuffin song live. In the middle of the song, Crispian kneels down and looks Erin and me right in the face and smiles before going to play again. Too radge!
CAUSE YOU CAN COUNT ON THE 303!
The girl standing close to Erin and me had been screaming "303! 303!" since the beginning of the concert and after Knight On The Town, Crispian says, "What was that you said?" with a little laugh. "303!" The girl shouts at the top of her lungs again. "Well," Crispian says, "It's a good thing you said that cause you can always count on the 303!" and with that they start playing 303. These guys are really great with the audience.
PAUL'S LEAVING THE BAND AND A HELLO FROM ALONZA
After a couple more songs, Paul gets up from the drums and begins to walk off stage. "Ladies and gentlemen," Crispian laughs, "Paul is leaving the band." And with that, Paul walks off. While Alonza and Crispian are laughing, I scream out, "ALONZA!!!" Alonza, completely shocked by my outburst, looks around to see who it was that was screaming at him. He sees me waving at him, smiles, and even blushes as he bows and salutes me. That was really cool. Alonza's the BEST! Paul jumps back onstage right as they start playing Greatful When You're Dead.
GIVE ME THAT KEYBOARD!
A couple of times during the concert, Crispian decided to harrass the other members of the band. At one point, he walked up to Jay's keyboard and started pulling at it which made Jay start pulling at his guitar. Then, later on, he walked up to Paul while he was drumming and started sticking his tounge out at him and kicking his drumset. At close to the very end, Crispian and Alonza ended up wrestling each other on the stage floor.
DID YOU KNOW THAT MOTHER EARTH IS BLUE?
Next, Crispian says to the audience, "You know, the next song we usually dedicate to mother earth," applause and shouts from the crowd, "Yeah that's right. Do you remember her? Many people have forgotten. But...did you know...that mother earth is," and then he sings, "BLUE", which causes a great eruption from the crowd as they begin to play Smart Dogs.
DO THAT FUNKY DANCE, YOU WELL DRESSED MAN!
Well, I thought people who hadn't been to a Kula Shaker concert might wonder about their stage presence and anyone might like to know what they looked like onstage so I'm here to tell you. CRISPIAN- His hair was all messed up. He was wearing this blue and white polyester shirt that zipped up in the front, some white pants, and brown cowboy boots. Every time he did a guitar solo he'd kneal really close to the ground and he liked bothering the other members of the band (see "Give Me That Keyboard!") ALONZA- (the best member in my humble point of view) He was wearing a black shirt, blue jeans, and black cowboy boots. He was really great even though sometimes his back up vocals were a little hard to hear. JAY- I really didn't get a good look at what Jay was wearing and he was pretty quiet unless he was laughing at something the other guys did. PAUL- He was wearing shorts and a t-shirt and tennis shoes.
THIS IS THE END??
The concert ended as does everything in life. There were no encores because apparently Alonza was having problems with his amplifier. It took me a while to realize that the lights had gone up and it was time to go. How disappointing. Oh well. It was a great concert. I was all ready to hang around by the tour bus until Kula Shaker came out like that other woman was doing, but my friend informed me that she was very tired and wanted to go home. There's always another day.
Thanks for reading this!
Emily :)
Back Into The Deep!