| Schenectady
is a tired old town. The buildings look tired, the streets look tired
and the people look tired! As we checked into our hotel, the older
gentleman behind us was heard to say: Why would ANYONE come to Schenectady?
I was born here and left 40 years ago!" We told him the Moody Blues
had brought us there, and he said...
"Who?" LOL!!! Oh, well. After a nice meal at Costino's, we dressed for the concert and drove to Proctor's Theatre in downtown Schenectady. A couple of adjoining lots made parking easy and we stood out front so that I could sell my extra sixth row ticket. The theatre is undergoing renovation, and the front of the theatre was marred by a large dump truck and fenced in construction area. However, The Moody Blues was on the marquee. There wasn't much room to wait in front, but after ten minutes of holding my ticket aloft, a gal ran up to me, asked if it was for sale (no, I was just "airing" it) and as she began pulling money out of her pocket, I said "don't you want to know where it is?". She said no. LOL I hope she was pleasantly surprised by her good fortune. The Venue: Same song, second (or seventh) verse. Proctor's is another small old theatre (seating maybe 2000). Its layout is different from the other theatres we've been to this tour. To reach the theatre entrance, one must go down a long hallway filled with small shops. These aren't of the Gucci variety! It has a flea market feel to it. At the break, the shops had tables in the hallway proper and were selling their goods. One table was filled with PIE of various kinds, and offered the coffee to go with it. I don't think I've seen pie sold at a Moodies' concert before. Or ANY concert, for that matter! Though I passed on the pie, I was pleasantly surprised when I bought our bottles of water - $1 each for a bottle of Proctor (labeled with the venue's name). I assume some teenager had the task of filling them in the bathroom before the concert! There were no purse searches or evident security of any kind at Proctor's. A nice lady tore our ticket and sent us to the far side of the auditorium. Another nice lady looked at our tickets there and sent us BACK to the other side of the auditorium thru the packed crowd. We were like salmon swimming upstream, with the actual spawning miles away. As we got to that side, the usher said "no", and I felt a wave of terror that we were going to be sent back like a ping pong ball. It turned out that we were one aisle away this time, thank God! I'd guess that most of the renovation of the interior of Proctor's is done. It is quite lovely! It has been amazing to me how all of these similar theatres can look so unique. Proctor's walls and ceiling are a cream color, with the designs accented in gold. There are marble columns with gargoyle type figures near the ceiling. The feature that sets Proctor's apart from Providence, NB and WB are the boxes on the second floor. Proctor's also had a box area on the two sides of the floor containing temporary chairs. I assume that the concert was a sellout or darn near close to one. There were very few empties. I noticed one security guard on my side of the pit (Raysville!) but he was of the quiet and unnoticeable variety. There were no incidents tonight. I did not bring my camera, feeling that both I and the Band could use a break (lol), but another fan on the front row got busted with her 35mm. The only other thing I can mention is that the theatre was quite WARM and humid. SueC and I felt a blast of cool air during LOAM which was very welcome. It must have been just as warm onstage; there were beads of sweat on Justin's upper lip, and RT's face had sweat running down it. The Fashion Report: GE - Car shirt, black slacks first half, flag shirt second half RT - Black on black, no change. The Keds are still seen onstage! JL - White embroidered white long slvd shirt, leathers, boots first half, long slvd black shirt second JH - Thin long slvd white shirt with breast pocket, black slacks, policeman shoes. The Battle of the Buttons: John won the battle of Schenectady last night! I noticed in the second half that one MORE button was undone on the black shirt, for a total of three. The shirt delicately gaped halfway down his chest. : ) It was a GOOD look. I suspect our good fortune was due to the rather WARM and humid theatre. In Justin's defense, his shirt was so thin that it looked *pink*. IMO, unbuttoning any extra buttons would have been redundant! The Concert: The concert was QUITE good! The same setlist was played in its entirety with the customary 20 minute intermission. There was a small bauble on GD, very small, where JL garbled a few lyrics. The concert was close to perfect. There were a couple of different moments onstage! During WYS, Justin was seen making funny faces at Dan in the wings. SueC said that Justin had looked over at Dan the guitar tech and they were seen "talking" and Justin was smiling. Justin looked away from Dan, then snapped his head back, still smiling, and then did it again, as if playing "gotcha!" with a three year old. They were laughing (not in a disruptive manner, I hasten to add). I looked over in time to see Justin acting VERY strangely, making off faces and rubbing his neck and chin as he perpetually does, but in an exaggerated manner. I was glad to hear later that he was occupied with Dan, and not gone off the deep end. Have you ever dreamed of your favorite Moody falling off the stage in to your waiting arms? (or ANY Moody, for that matter!) Of course you have! I can tell you, the near experience is MUCH different from the fantasy. As JL was coming down for the shuffle, he TRIPPED over Justin's guitar box cable and barely caught himself from falling towards SueC and me. It's at that moment that you REALIZE that John is 6 ft and close to 180 pounds of muscle and that it is going to hurt really badly if he falls on you, and probably send you to the hospital with a broken something. Not to mention what it might do to him or our beloved Fender Bass! The look on his face was priceless! He caught himself just in time, recovered and went on. What a cool guy! LOL He can laugh anything off and go on with the show. Sadly, still no crashing of the sea during Question - Gordon has remained glued to his drumkit. It was always a special moment for me when he joined Graeme in such obvious camaraderie, so appropriate and RIGHT for Question. Gordon ought to be over there! Please, powers-that-be, unchain our "other drummer" and let him go to his proper place: at Graeme's side. It just hasn't been the same. MaggieMay |
