A bizarre night at Busch Stadium

Last night my buddy Seth and I headed down to St. Louis to see Dave Matthews Band. It was something of a momentous occasion as it was the first concert held in the new Busch Stadium. The Post-Dispatch this morning reported that over 35,000 people were in attendance, which is probably an accurate figure as only the outfield bleachers between the two foul poles were left empty. It struck me last night that it's been five years since my last DMB show. In that time I swear the band's demographic rapidly aged in years. The crowd used to be full of free-spirited young adults out just looking for a good time. However, everywhere I looked last night I saw gray-headed couples older than my parents. Now when I say old I don't mean like Bon Jovi groupies-old. I'm talking more Neil Diamond-old. At one point I thought I'd unintentionally stumbled into a massive screening of The Bucket List. Later on an elderly gentleman in front of us turned around to a rauckous crowd near us and asked them to keep it down. In his defense, it was past grandpa's 8:30 bedtime.

Before the show started this girl named Kara was shooting a piece for MLB.com. I think she was an aspiring journalist who was covering the concert for the website. Now all this girl had to do was tape an opening segment, introducing where they were and why, and later a closing segment to wrap it all up. It took take after take to simply look into the camera and utter "Thanks to Busch Stadium. Thanks to Dave Matthews. I'll see you next time." I swear this girl was something of a retarded Katie Couric.

A few rows up there were two groups of girls that had just met and were introducing themselves. One of the girls asked if they had seen the new Sex and the City movie, and they responded no, that they were going tomorrow. "Oh my God, it's so goooood!" the girl said before launching into the entire plot of the movie. "Wait until you see Carrie (insert major plot spoiler here)." Hey honey, I don't think they even need to see the movie now. You mentioned things even Roger Ebert missed.

There was another strange older man a couple of rows up. I say strange for many reasons. First, he was in his 50's there by himself. Alright, that's not that unusual. Second, throughout the almost three hour concert he alternated between taking off his hat and waving it high above his head to no one in particular and using both hands to shade his eyes as he searched the crowd. The odd thing about this is that it's dark at 10:15 and there's no reason to protect your eyes from the powerful rays of the moon. Third, he looked like a pedophile. I know, I know, I always mention To Catch A Predator, but this looked like your typical guy that gets caught chatting online with a 13 year old girl. I'm sure he has some sleazy screen name like longdanny57 or ragingboner49. I'm just saying that he was a very odd little duck.

This kid behind me must have been president of the Dave Matthews Band fan club. He knew the most obscure facts about the guys. It was like having Wikipedia looming over your shoulder all night. It's like when you go to the movie theater and you watch the trivia questions before the film begins. There's always that one loud idiot who thinks they're so smart. John Travolta played Danny Zuko in Grease? Really? You mean, it wasn't Ashton Kutcher?? Thanks to Brainy Smurf, I now know the original title of "Don't Drink The Water" ("Weight of the World"), who directed the "Crash Into Me" video (Dean Karr), and Carter Beauford's first concert (Buddy Rich).

As the show progressed more beers were drank, more pot was smoked, and to most there wasn't a single care in the world. A guy in front of us really loved the slow jams because each time he'd rub his girlfriend's back before heading down to her butt. He was rubbing it as intensely as a maid polishes the silver at Buckingham Palace. I kept waiting for the genie from Aladdin to spring forth. About two hours into the show a girl magically appeared to my left dancing with a beer in her hand. I'm gonna go out on a limb and predict that it wasn't her first beverage of the evening. It didn't take long for her to start berating me for not being as into the music as she would have liked. "It's a concert," she kept saying over and over. I'm more of a laid-back, head bobbing kind of guy who just likes to sing along to his favorite songs. Unlike her, I don't feel like I need to dance like a goofy court jester in King Henry's castle. She got more and more annoyed with me that she began banging on my back repeatedly. Now let me inform you that this wasn't like a simple tap on the back with a kind of "C'mon, you can do it" quality. This was more like a battering that comes when your friend swallows a chicken bone and you're trying to dislodge it from their esophagus. I truly think I could have brought her up on assault charges.

Set List
Two Step
Rhyme And Reason
Corn Bread
Crash Into Me
One Sweet World
#27
So Damn Lucky
Crush
Don’t Drink the Water
Hey Hey My My (Into the Black)
Pay For What You Get
Recently
Water Into Wine
Tripping Billies
Grey Street
You Might Die Trying
Ants Marching

Encore
Everyday
Louisiana Bayou
Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)