Karl's Corner - 09/12/2001

9/12/01 Oakland: rocking all they could

"i went to school three blocks away from the world trade center
(Stuy) and it's ****ing FANTASTIC to be alive!" --Cheng in NYC

POST SHOW UPDATE:

...the tour finally got off to a slightly unsteady start today. Everyone in the lighting and stage crews worked like crazy to sort out tons of last minute details and concerns, and many had been working solid since 3 AM by the time the doors opened and the fans entered Henry J Kaiser Arena. Hopefully the kinks have been worked out and the production will continue at the smooth level achieved today.

As a special suprise, the UC Berkeley Marching Band did a special weezer medley out in the crowd between the Cold and Weezer sets. Tons of people sang along, and it was awesome! The UCB band rocked it out! Then Weezer finally took the stage and did their best to deliver the best show they could. This was only the second show with Scott on bass, and the first with the current line up of staff and lighting design. I for one thought it looked and sounded great! Unfortunately, we heard some reports that not everyone could or would make it out to the show. it seems that those who were ready to come out and rock, rocked, and those who werent ready and didnt come, or didn't have access, we missed you!

...re: my brother in law's essay: about a dozen wrote in upset by what he wrote, and I apologize for having upset anyone. I did indeed debate with much difficulty whether I should share the essay with you all or not, knowing that his very realistic language might be too much for those who werent prepared for it. I have decided to make the essay a pop up link instead, as I do beleive that it may not be fully appropriate for my corner, but i dont beleive the essay is in itself wrong or in bad taste. My brother in law did NOT call for mindless aggression and an increase of violence in the world. To quote: "War is ugly and unfair, an incredible, irrational waste of everything precious, and we just had one dropped in our laps..." As i said he is realisitc- and what is real is that We, all of us, were attacked. to deny this just isn't right. I utterly abhor violence and just the thought of hurting someone else sickens me deeply, but I cannot deny that our country will need to repond to this. Anyway, the essay is now here [pop up] should you wish to read it. Again, if you have seen too much about all this already, just dont click on the link.

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ORIGINAL POST ("the horror, and the music")(4 AM):...like you, we've all been following the story of these horrifying acts of terrorism, and we are all just as stunned and shocked as you. Normal life stuff, including the very act of being in a touring rock band, seems incredibly strange. Everyone feels terrible for the victims of this, and a sense of frustrating anger over an inability to do anything about it. It certainly felt proper to cancel the San Jose show and hopefully reschedule it for an upcoming date. Now the question has come, that assuming we have permission to do today's show in Oakland (and as of 4:00 AM PST as far as I understand it, we do), should we? Should we say, as they say, "the show must go on?"

it is impossible to know what is truly the "right" thing to do here. Tons of you have written in begging for the show to happen, others have suggested cancelling out of respect for the tragedy. It feels gut-wrenching to have to even think about what is supposed to be a musical celebration in such terms, but these are the terms we have to deal with. And as such, the guys have decided that (if they are allowed to), they want the show to go on. Why? I think Rivers summed it up best, when he said "I want to do something about all this, but the only thing I can do is play music." The band loves to play, they love to reach the crowd of fans and get everyone stoked and happy. They know no other way to deal with all this, as sitting around feeling sad can be so frustrating. When the band lost their wonderful freinds Mykel and Carli back in '97, they faced the prospect of 2 shows in Calgary before the funeral services were planned. They had every right to cancel the shows, but it just felt wrong to do so... what would Mykel and Carli think- weezer missing a show on their account? Theyd hear nothing of it. Here, the unbeleivable magnatude of loss is far more than can be understood, even if we contemplate it for the rest of our lives (which I am sure we will.) We all feel sad, we all feel terrible for those who have been lost and those who lost them, but it feels wrong to just do nothing. So, again, assuming Oakland allows for it, we will be there, rocking for you as hard as we can. We hope you can join us, and we understand and apologize if you can't.