March 10, 2001
Beehive Theater - Pittsburgh, PA
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Matt wore the t-shirt from the "Load Me Up" video at this concert |
Concert Pictures
Set List
Giant / Everything Is Automatic / A Boy and his Machine Gun /
Strange Days / Deep Six / Load Me Up / Suburbia / Rico / Apparitions
/ The Future is X-Rated / Hello Time Bomb / Born To Kill /
Encore
Let's Get It On / Enjoy The Silence /
My mom drove the three hours up to Pittsburgh from our house so I could see
my favorite band in concert - Matthew Good Band. She dropped me off at the
Beehive Theater around 7:45pm. The doors were going to open at 8:00pm, so
I wanted to be in line by then. I walked up and asked some girls at the
front of the line where I went for my ticket and they directed me inside.
I signed for my ticket (ordered it online) and made my way to the back of
the line. I stood there a few minutes before a guy walked by and told us
that the under-21 entrance was in the back. A large group of us left that
line and found the other under-21ers. They finally let us in around 8:07pm
(it was cold, so we were counting the minutes). I found a spot near the
front middle and stood there waiting as others began to surround me. I
stood there for the next 45 minutes and didn't really talk to anyone,
spending my time zoning out and checking out the theater. There was a fence
that kept the under-agers from going near the bar. The side wall was covered
with a huge mural. Near the back of the room there was the soundboard and a
merchandise table. I noticed some MGB jerseys and a t-shirt hanging on the
wall above the table. I planned to check that out after the show. I didn't
want to lose my spot now. After a while some people came on stage and passed
out 7th House stickers. I wasn't able to get one. There were a lot of 7th
House fans near the front of the crowd and around me. One group of them
played with their cell phones the whole time, one guy begging a friend to let
him check a Pitt basketball score. (I was glad to see them go after the 7th
House set.)
A little after 9:00, 7th House took the stage. The band consists of three guys
- a lead singer / bass player, a guitarist, and a drummer. The drummer seemed
to be the most excited of the three when he played. He broke sticks on
practically every song. They played a 45-minute set, including songs called
Gypsy Queen and Rodeo. (The lead singer made a reference to their "Filipino
cowboy," the guitarist.) There was another song where the lead singer wanted
the lights turned down low because it was about someone who had died from an
overdose. At some point a girl in the crowd wanted the drummer to take off his
shirt. "I'll take it off if you take yours off." She quieted down really quick.
The thing I will remember about the 7th House set is being caught on the edge of
the mosh pit. I really didn't want to lose my prime spot for the MGB set later,
so I tolerated getting beat up a little. The worse was when I got hit in my sore
shoulder, but other than that, it was the typical getting hit in the back and
having crowd surfers hit you in the head.
With a lot of the 7th House crowd leaving after their set, I moved up closer to the
stage. The crew began to set up the mics and pedals for MGB. I ended up being
located about halfway between Matt's mic and the left rock block. I wasn't more than
2 people away from the stage for the entire show; most of the time just one person
was in front of me. At some point while the crew was setting up, MGB walked in and
went up to the left off-stage.
One of the guys from the MGB crew came out during the intermission and threw blue MGB
stickers into the crowd. At first I thought there was no way that I was going to get
one, but I thought I saw one sail by my face towards the floor. I looked down and
there was indeed a sticker on the ground, so I snatched it up.
A deejay from 105.9 The X (my favorite radio station for many years) came out and
welcomed us all. Some of the crowd started booing. "I'm already getting booed off
the stage. I'll be off soon enough!" She continued on to talk about local concerts
in the near future.
As the lights died down and the crowd chanted, "K-I-C-K-A-S-S, that's the way we spell
success," we could see the members of MGB walk out onstage. They were in their normal
"positions" - as you looked at the stage, Dave was to the left, Rich to the right, and
Matt in the center. They opened with Giant, which was awesome. At some point near the
beginning of the show, Matt said that it was his first time to visit Pittsburgh, but
that Pittsburgh has a "mighty fine" baseball team. He then followed up by saying that
he wasn't kidding; he had been a Pirates fan since he was "like six." Everything is
Automatic was really good, especially for me since it's one of my favorite MGB songs.
I have a hard time remembering the order of the songs because I was so into the whole
experience at that moment. All the songs were amazing. I sang along and jumped around
during every song. Dave played keyboard on Strange Days. Rich played a bass keyboard
for Suburbia. (Also during Suburbia, Matt stood on the left rock block, so that was the
closest I was to him.) Matt changed guitars between practically every song. Ian was
steady on the drums.
Somewhere around Deep Six (definitely before Load Me Up), Matt asked, "How far is it to
the bar?" He continued to say that he had crowd surfed to the bar for a gin and juice
during another recent show. But then he realized that there was a "no alcohol" barrier.
"Would I be able to transfer alcohol back across that fence?" he joked. He never did it,
but he mentioned it a few more times during the set (while burning the duck, for example,
read on for that).
During Load Me Up, they continued their tradition of burning a stuffed animal. This
time a brave duck sacrificed his life for our enjoyment. Matt wanted a show of hands to
save the duck. There were a few murmurs in the crowd to save it, but the majority
cheered when Matt offered to put it up in flames. (After the show, I saw a lucky fan walk
off with the charred duck.)
Matt said that he really liked the mural on the one of walls of the venue. "You know
what that reminds me of..." he said. He then coaxed Dave to get up on the rock block and
they did a little ACDC Thunderstruck. "It's the last show of the tour ... we have to go
out in style."
Matt said that they hadn't hired any exotic dancers, so he invited some girls up on stage
to dance. I knew that meant that The Future is X-Rated was next. Four ladies climbed up
from the audience - two took spots on the rock blocks and two more just danced around on
stage. After the song one of the girls got hugs from Dave and Matt.
The only time that the entire crowd got into it was during Load Me Up and Hello Time Bomb.
Otherwise the crowd was calmer than I expected, which I was happy about. I don't like to
fend for my life the whole time. We all enjoyed the concert on a more individual level,
reacting to the music in different ways. One group of guys to my right always seemed to
be putting one of their friends up on their shoulders. Other than that there weren't too
many few crowd surfers.
There were a lot of requests for Raygun, Middle Class Gangsters, and Indestructible
throughout the show, but none of them were played.
They "ended" the show with Born to Kill, which was amazing. The guys threw their guitar
picks and drum sticks into the crowd and left the stage for a few minutes. The crowd
chanted "MGB."
The guys came back on stage and broke into Let's Get It On. Between Let's Get It On and
Enjoy the Silence, some girls made it to the front of the crowd and offered up a Chewbacca
Pez dispenser to Matt. "Cool" was his response. They also had a child's size R2-D2 t-shirt.
"I think Dave could fit in that, what do you think?" Dave answered, "Uh, no, I don't think
so."
Right before Enjoy the Silence, Matt asked a crewmember if he had something. Turns out that
Mr. Good can't remember the second verse lyrics. The crew guy brought out the sheet of
paper and handed it to a girl in the front. It was an awesome final song and the guys left
the stage as they had about 10 minutes ago and that was it.
After Enjoy the Silence, I went over to the merchandise table and bought my first MGB t-shirt.
(I hate it how it looks like they made the shirt for $2, but they can charge you a lot of
money and we'll still buy it!) I unfortunately did not stick around. The band came out later
to the merchandise table to sign some autographs.
After putting on my new shirt, I went out the same back way of the Beehive that we had entered
through and walked back down the street to take pictures of their tour bus (a sign that said
"Skin to Win" was in the front window) and the marquee with their name on it. I met my mom
over at the McDonald's. While I sat there drinking a Sprite, some guys walked in and noticed
my new shirt. "Matthew Good Band!" they yelled. I noticed that they had Beautiful Midnight
promo posters and I asked where they got them. They had ripped them off the wall. They
offered to trade a poster for my t-shirt, but I declined. As I left they asked to talk to me
a little more because "it's hard to find MGB fans." One guy said he had been a fan since 1998
and I told them I had been a fan for over a year - found out about MGB through a friend from
Winnipeg.
It was an awesome night and went along with my realization that the cheaper my ticket is, the
greater the concert is. (Only $7.15 to see this show!) My mom even got to enjoy the sounds of
MGB from outside the theater. Perhaps it was an "award" for driving me there. Thanks Mom!
Thanks to the guys of MGB for putting up with the flash on my camera and for giving us an awesome show!
Thanks Mom for all of your driving!
Thanks Meghan for introducing me to the wonderfulness that is the music of MGB.
Updated: 06-19-2001