I picked up my buddy, Earthdog, at Midway mid afternoon, and we headed to the Congress to get our Riot Fest 5 day passes. From there, we checked into the hotel - Holiday Inn Express (formerly the Cass Hotel), and headed to Portillo's for some Italian beef sandwiches and a few draft Sam Adams Oktoberfest beers. The hotel was in a nice proximity to the two train stops we took to the shows all week.
Portillo's
Earthdog and Ronald McDonald
The Green Line
View from our hotel window of the Hancock Tower
The Trump Tower
We made it to the Bottom Lounge almost in time for the start of the screening of the X documentary "X: The Unheard Music". We met our Daghouse buddy, Bill, working the merch table for Riot Fest merch during the movie.
X played the entire release Los Angeles in order, and then broke out into a bunch of other songs including:
I'm Coming Over
The Once Over Twice
We're Desperate
Back 2 Base
In This House that I Call Home
White Girl
The Hungry Wolf
It was a great set. I am very happy that I finally got to see them play. They were solid and rocked. Exene's voice was incredible. John Doe rocked the bass and also was great on vocals. I'm still laughing at the thought of seeing Billy Zoom smiling and licking his lips the entire set. After watching the documentary, my assessment is that he is too good a guitar player to be in a punk band. He almost seemed bored behind the smiles as the chords he played were too simple for him. Exene did announce that DJ Bonebrake will not be running for President much to the displeasure of the crowd. I've been singing "I'm Coming Over" ever since the show.
While there, we met some other Daghouse buddies, MXV and Senor Citizen of the Chicago band Destroy Everything. We noticed former Boston punker, Springa, in the crowd, as well as, the singer from the Chicago band Johnny Vomit.
Here are a few pictures from the event. They are from my cellphone camera as I was too lazy on night #1 to carry my camera. What a mistake that was.
The rock and roll McDonald's was wild late night!
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