This show determined which way I was to head next. Either East to Houston, or North to Austin. Scrolling through the list of bands playing Austin that weekend, Cro-Mags appeared, and that was that. Goodbye San Antonio.
My friends dropped me off at a gas station somewhere outside the city. I caught a ride pretty quickly from a newly married couple on their way back to Austin. They got me to the venue 6 hours early, so I walked around the block a few times in search of a safe stoop away from prying eyes and gnarly street squirrels. City squirrels out here are no joke, this one bastard came right up to my leg trying to rip my sandwich off me. I managed to get away and started talking to a nice lady walking a 3-legged dog, and soon enough I was up in her apartment doing shots with her and her boyfriend. We then wandered through a couple bars and when I looked at the clock the doors had opened, so she gave me a 20 and told me to go enjoy myself. Unreal.
5 minutes later I found myself inside the club, nicely drunk, without a penny of my own money spent. I befriended an OG punk named Arms and bought us both a beer. I cant remember what we said but he had a lot of energy and I had a lot of energy and we both just fed off it. We split ways and I tried talking to some other OGs but they were music nerds and all they did was huff and sigh about how much "music sucks these days" and all that shit. Thank fuck the guitars started up. Ran outside to the stage. No openers, must've missed em all. Cro-Mags baby.
Front man was already pacing, mic in hand, giving shoutouts and checking what was up with the audience. I was fuckin racing at this point. Nothing scared me. Nothing.
WORLD PEACE!!! First song, so damn good. The crowd exploded sending bystanders to the furthest corners of the floor. Around 40 of us jammed the frontline reaching out to the Mic yelling IT JUST CAN'T EXIST.
I can only clearly remember 3 songs which were World Peace, We Gotta Know and Hard Times. The rest of the show was a blur of pure ecstasy. Maybe the alcohol had some part in it, but I couldnt take my dumb-ass grin off my face, it felt so fuckin good to be there. A few times I'd run off from the front and deep into the bystanders yelling PUSH ME!! PUSH ME!!!! and end up somewhere on the other side of the floor. Me and Arms re-united and ran around the pit, arm-in-arm, stumbling and tangled like a drunken whirlwind screaming and yelling at the top of our lungs.
People often think of Cro as tough-guy shit but that show was all love. Everyone got picked up off the floor, including me. I kept trying to stage dive but I think I was jumping too far cos every time I hit the floor straight on my back. By the end of the set I felt like a caveman, arms swinging loose by my side all ape-like, then sprinting up to the stage yelling WE GOTTA KNOW and jumping back off again..
They came back on for an encore and ended the night with Hard-mutherfucking-Times.
I lost my shit. We all did. That song is just too much. We were all running in circles, building momentum, until he'd reach up and start hollerin
HARD TIMES.
HARD TIMES.
CAMINAAHHCAMINHAAAH SENDIN IT HOME
whatever he'd be sayin and we'd all be up there with him, all of us, our sweat, our voices and our blood like one big nasty chorus... goddamn... what an orgasm.
We gotta know
Hard Times - this is officially the best way to listen to a recording of this song
Thank you Cro Mags.
My friends dropped me off at a gas station somewhere outside the city. I caught a ride pretty quickly from a newly married couple on their way back to Austin. They got me to the venue 6 hours early, so I walked around the block a few times in search of a safe stoop away from prying eyes and gnarly street squirrels. City squirrels out here are no joke, this one bastard came right up to my leg trying to rip my sandwich off me. I managed to get away and started talking to a nice lady walking a 3-legged dog, and soon enough I was up in her apartment doing shots with her and her boyfriend. We then wandered through a couple bars and when I looked at the clock the doors had opened, so she gave me a 20 and told me to go enjoy myself. Unreal.
5 minutes later I found myself inside the club, nicely drunk, without a penny of my own money spent. I befriended an OG punk named Arms and bought us both a beer. I cant remember what we said but he had a lot of energy and I had a lot of energy and we both just fed off it. We split ways and I tried talking to some other OGs but they were music nerds and all they did was huff and sigh about how much "music sucks these days" and all that shit. Thank fuck the guitars started up. Ran outside to the stage. No openers, must've missed em all. Cro-Mags baby.
Front man was already pacing, mic in hand, giving shoutouts and checking what was up with the audience. I was fuckin racing at this point. Nothing scared me. Nothing.
WORLD PEACE!!! First song, so damn good. The crowd exploded sending bystanders to the furthest corners of the floor. Around 40 of us jammed the frontline reaching out to the Mic yelling IT JUST CAN'T EXIST.
I can only clearly remember 3 songs which were World Peace, We Gotta Know and Hard Times. The rest of the show was a blur of pure ecstasy. Maybe the alcohol had some part in it, but I couldnt take my dumb-ass grin off my face, it felt so fuckin good to be there. A few times I'd run off from the front and deep into the bystanders yelling PUSH ME!! PUSH ME!!!! and end up somewhere on the other side of the floor. Me and Arms re-united and ran around the pit, arm-in-arm, stumbling and tangled like a drunken whirlwind screaming and yelling at the top of our lungs.
People often think of Cro as tough-guy shit but that show was all love. Everyone got picked up off the floor, including me. I kept trying to stage dive but I think I was jumping too far cos every time I hit the floor straight on my back. By the end of the set I felt like a caveman, arms swinging loose by my side all ape-like, then sprinting up to the stage yelling WE GOTTA KNOW and jumping back off again..
They came back on for an encore and ended the night with Hard-mutherfucking-Times.
I lost my shit. We all did. That song is just too much. We were all running in circles, building momentum, until he'd reach up and start hollerin
HARD TIMES.
HARD TIMES.
CAMINAAHHCAMINHAAAH SENDIN IT HOME
whatever he'd be sayin and we'd all be up there with him, all of us, our sweat, our voices and our blood like one big nasty chorus... goddamn... what an orgasm.
We gotta know
Hard Times - this is officially the best way to listen to a recording of this song
Thank you Cro Mags.
