On Saturday afternoon we went to our second Fish Fest concert. The last time we went was three years ago. Looking back, I wonder what we were thinking bringing a two year old and a four year old. Last time we sat in the lawn area. This time we were in the Terrace, which is the section just in front of the lawn (the tickets are the same price). I think I liked having seats better, although it really is just luck as to who you are sitting next to. n ended up on my lap most of the time, so we were able to have an extra seat “space cushion”, if you will.
One big improvement was that Verizon Amphitheater now allows you to bring a 1 gallon plastic bag with food per person, and 1 sealed plastic water bottle (20 oz. or less). This saved us a bunch of money, as we were able to bring dinner (sandwiches) and snacks. We saw a lot of people upset about their blanket policy, however. The security guards were saying the blankets had to be less than 4 feet by 4 feet, which is not stated on the website. Not many blankets are this size, aside from baby blankets, but it is a good rule to keep in mind if we go again.
I will also note that when I saw D put a long sleeve shirt and a sweatshirt into the car, I made fun of him. However, when we arrived, I realized we had forgotten k’s sweatshirt. I let k borrow my sweatshirt, so I had to take back what I said when D was able to lend me his shirt to wear at night.
As for the show, here are my opinions of the various performances:
Dara Maclean–not really familiar with her. Her voice seemed “off”, not sure what was going on there. Her songs were pretty good, though.
Jonathan Maclean—American sounding guy who claims he is from Sweden. Nice keyboard playing and voice.
Plumb—Wow…they really “pumped up the volume”, and not in a good way. I seriously thought I was going to go deaf. I had to cover n’s delicate ears. I had forgotten about their song called “Stranded”, which I used to like back in the day. The lead’s performance was quite dramatic and engaging.
Graham Saber—Introduced a little hip hop flavor into Fish Fest, which I enjoyed. A little cheesy, and a couple of the lyrics did not seem too “family-friendly” to me.
Tenth Avenue North—They sang a lot of familiar songs, and the lead singer is quite the talker. I was thankful that they were not over-the-top loud in volume even though they had the full band.
Jeremy Camp—My favorite of the night! His set was worth the ticket price alone, in my opinion. He has so many good songs, at the end I was wondering “Why don’t I have any of his CDs?” (I promptly added them to my Amazon wish list). I must admit, I have become a *little* obsessed. I’m planning on checking out his autobiography from the library. His faith in God is very evident and inspiring, and he got quite emotional on stage, remembering his first wife (who died of cancer four months after they got married).
Mercy Me—We made it through the first three songs, and decided to go home since it was getting quite late. They have a lot of energy, but I have never been too into their songs. **(EDIT)** [D would like me to revise this statement and go on record to say that Mercy Me actually does have quite a few songs that we like; I just did not realize they were sung by Mercy Me.] It ended up being a good thing that they were the last act, in that we did not feel bad leaving early and avoiding being stuck in traffic trying to get out of the parking lot.
Oh, I almost forgot to mention that Rob Wagman, one of the Fish DJs did a little stand up comedy routine that had D chuckling louder than I have heard him laugh in a long time. Although this particular DJ is not my favorite on air personality, I must admit he was pretty funny.
The next day, k said that “The concert was more fun than I thought it would be.” I’m not sure if that just means she had really low expectations, but I am glad that she enjoyed it too.
