Deaf Punk

So finally got a chance to post about Daft Punk at Red Rocks.

One thing that hit me on the mountain climb in to the venue, is how seeing shows at the Rocks, is like an annual Summer ritual.

And Rocks is kind of like Denver's high school auditorium.

Anywho, while walking in, I was blown away how many people were tailgating.

I thought they prohibited open containers in the park.

All the way up to the entrance, people were trying to sell beer and booze to incoming concertgoers.

We get in, and it is only like a third of the way, full.

As for the crowd, a random mixture of ravers, college types, high school kids*, and the occasional yuppie.

We managed to get seats right smack dab in the middle of row 32.

Perfect view of the stage.

While we waited for the rest of our party to show up, it was nothing but people watching, and listening to the DJ [who wasn't bad, but played a lot of hard breaks].

Right in front of us were these five high school boys, who looked three sheets to the wind already.

The annoying part is when The Rapture came on, these guys started dancing like a bunch of wanna-be-funky jock white boys.

So annoying.

The Rapture was good, being that I only know a few songs of theirs.


'Whoo! Alright - Yeah... Uh Huh!'



Luckily they played all three.

I am going to have to get some of their stuff on CD.

They play for about an hour and a half, and make this big announcement that Daft Punk was up next.

Well, the crowd took it to mean that the show was starting, so the seat scrambling began.

Unfortunately for them, it was the second act, some DJ Sebastian, who took the deck.

His stuff kind of sounded like Daft Punk, but harder.

So it was just us and the crowd, being blinded by the house lights, waiting for Daft to actually start.

It was during this set where my fellow goer had to go meet the rest of our party at the gate so he could give them their tickets.

It took forever.

To make matters worse, the beers I had consumed were wanting me to 'break the seal'.

I couldn't go the restroom, because I was the only one there, and would most definitely lose our primo seats.

At one moment, whilst doing the pee-pee dance, I sent an angry text to hurry their asses up.

Finally they show up, after what felt like an eternity, and I hit the head.

I buy some more hooch on the way back, and settle in.

Sebastian is still spinning.

At this point most of the crowd's booze and drugs had kicked, in and people were dancing around like they just peaked, while at Burning Man.

White jock boys included.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, this girl who couldn't have been more than 17, stopped and asked if we needed pills.

We kindly declined.

At that point I had to ask my party, were we this obnoxious when we used to do drugs, at parties and concerts?

Seriously, everyone around me was FUGGED up, and acting obnoxious.

At least we were still approached as potential 'buyers' though, so I didn't feel that old and persnickety.

It was also during this point that the jock guys decide to take some e.

'Great,' I thought. 'Now they're going to be even messier.'





Finally Daft Punk starts and I had a horrible moment of realization.

I shouldn't have watched the Amsterdam concert on YouTube.


Opening Intro

I realized I was going to be seeing the exact same show[!].

That sucked.

But holy man, was it friggin' loud!

Even though it was outdoors, somehow they managed to get it so loud, and the bass so deep, that it sounded like I was at an old-skool rave, dancing right in front of the speaker.

My ears finally stopped ringing about 5 PM on Wedsneday.

I must say, the light show was amazing.





Probably the best light show I have ever seen at Red Rocks.




Basically the show was a DJ set of all of their songs mixed together.

'Technologic', 'Harder, Faster, Deeper, Stronger', and 'Around The World' showed up in multiple parts of the show, though reworked and in different contexts.

I didn't like 'Robot Rock' before, but the show made me like it.



'Robot Rock'

Throughout the first half of the show, everyone around me was smoking weed.

We were outside on the side of a mountain, yet it smelled like we were in the back of Jimmy's van doing bong hits.

[The next morning when I put the clothes I wore to the concert in the laundry bag, they wreaked of pot.]

About the time 'One More Time' came on, a blast from my past showed up.

It was my ex-roomie who we shall call 'Grace'.

I hadn't seen her since the after party of Bjork's concert a couple of years back.

Anywho, the significance of this is that she and the person I went to the concert, whom I shall call 'Nate', have a long, complicated, dramatic history.

After talking a mental flashback on the whole 'Jim' post, this was another case of total personal history rememberance in recent real time.

I will post on the whole Nate, Grace, and Big Daddy saga in an upcoming post.

We make plans to hang out soon, and Grace returns to her friends in a different section.

Overall, I say they played a little over an hour and a half.

Sadly, they didn't play 'Digital Love'.



As it worked out, by watching the video on YouTube, I knew what the final song was, which worked out great, as we were able to beat the crowds, and not have to spend two hours trying to get out of the parking lot.


Final Song

Great show, if a little loud, and if you get the chance to see them, definitely check it out.

* I was shocked to see high school aged kids at the show, because they haven't toured in nine years, and these kids were tweens, or younger, when Daft first came out.