Sunday, August 29, 2010

The Stills at The Distillery District



The Stills played a free concert at the Distillery District this past Friday night. It was part of the Lexus CT200h weekend concert series. Well, it was just this weekend they were sponsoring four Canadian bands to promote their new car.

The concert was supposed to start at 7:00 p.m. I got there at ten to 6:00 in anticipation of seeing a large crowd. I had gone to see Metric a few weeks earlier down by Union Station and there were thousands of people there. I ended up arriving a bit late and got stuck farther back than I wanted. This time I wasn't taking any chances.

Well, to my surprise no one was standing by the barriers waiting. There were plenty of people milling around doing their own thing, but no one was actually waiting to see the concert. There were people checking out the Lexus car display. There were newlyweds getting their wedding shots taken. There were people checking out the various stores and restaurants, but no one was waiting to see the show.

So I found the nearest bench and sat down to wait. Luckily I brought the Metro and 24 free papers along so I could do the Sudoku puzzles. Unfortunately I messed up the 24 one and didn't have another copy to do to kill more time.

Lexus had some freebies they were giving away as part of their new car promotion. You could win an Apple I-pad if you signed up for some thing... obviously I didn't do it because I don't know what you had to sign up for.

They were also giving away free bottles of water and frozen treats. I was sitting beside one of the ice cream carts so was positioned ideally to get some. They had two kinds. One was a sort of orange Creamsicle and the other a frozen Cherry/Pomegranate bar. That's the one I picked. Man, was it good. It was incredibly delicious. After finishing it I continued doing my puzzles. A little while later the ice cream lady offered me another one. I decided to try the orange one. It was okay, but couldn't hold a candle to the Cherry/Pom.

At ten to 7:00 I decided to get up and go stand by the barrier near the stage. There were more people close by waiting, but nobody wanted to be the first to stand there. So I went up and then more people followed. I figured the concert was supposed to start at 7:00 so I wouldn't have to stand for that long.

Well, the band didn't show up on stage until about 15 minutes after 7:00. No big deal. There was a fenced off section right in front of the stage that was empty. A couple of photographers went in there. Then a few people with VIP badges followed.

The area was relatively empty. So after the first song the lead singer told no one in particular that they should open the fences and let everyone else in. No one listened. The security fellow at the opening to the area did beginning letting random people in though.

I took quite a few shots from my post just outside the fence. Then I went over to ask the security guy if I could go in to take more shots. He said, okay.

I got some pretty decent photos I think. The concert was good too. I like The Stills. I think they're a really good band.

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