Bush 4/26/96

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Jack was responsible for introducing our group of friends to Bush. He had bought Sixteen Stone pretty early on and we all liked it. The album was successful enough for them to headline a tour and this was that tour. Jack, Earl, Marvin, and I made the drive to Tacoma in Marvin’s Chevy Cavalier. We had some time to kill before the concert so we went to a thrift store, which is something we did pretty frequently at this point, to look for cool clothes that were cheap. Jack ended up buying a flannel shirt (sounds cliché for the time and location, right?). Somehow Marvin and I ended up with seats while Earl and Jack had floor tickets. The opening band was No Doubt, who was just starting to get popular at the time with the release of Tragic Kingdom. I believe this was the tour where Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale started their romance. They put on a great show but next up was the Goo Goo Dolls. I did not and still do not care for them. The whole time these two bands were playing Marvin and I were trying to think up a scheme to get down to the floor. It was quite a drop from the seats to the floor so jumping down was out of the question. Then it hit us. After the Goo Goo Dolls were done Jack and Earl spotted us in the stands. Jack convinced the bouncer to allow his newly acquired flannel shirt to be passed over the wall to us. Inside the pocket were the two floor ticket stubs. We immediately left our seats and headed for the floor. The guards were apparently waiting for someone because one said, “oh, you must be the two we got the radio call about.” We obviously went along with it and soon were directly in front of the stage with our buddies. Bush played almost all of Sixteen Stone and maybe even a song from the yet unreleased Razorblade Suitcase. We didn’t have anywhere to stay in Tacoma so we decided to drive home after the show. It is normally about 4 hours to Kennewick from Tacoma but this drive took forever! It started to snow as we were going over the Cascades so we had to slow down in order to see and stay on the road. We were all wired on caffeine and didn’t end up making it home until the sun came up at about 6 in the morning but it was worth the while.

Tragic Kingdom

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