Thom Yorke @ Orpheum, L.A., Oct. 2009

This is my write-up I did about the Thom Yorke concert for Pulp Legacy. It is literally 4,670 words. It is LONG. You don't have to read it, but I did try to keep it entertaining to make up for its length.

I wrote it several months ago, when the concert was still fresh.

It started with a text message.

I’ve got 2 tickets – 1st row, mezzanine – for Thom Yorke. Any way U can be in LA Monday?

I stared at my phone. Usually, I text people right back.

This one? I had to think.

It was Wednesday at 1 p.m. Before I told Marlan no – because the answer had to be no, right? – I needed to do my due diligence, or, more specifically, see what flight prices to L.A. for the weekend were running.

Did the search on Orbitz. The price? $200. That was… do-able.

Before I got too serious, I needed to make sure the offer was valid, and not just a good-natured rib about some seriously awesome tickets.

I’m thinking about it. R U serious? Because I am thinking about it.

I am dead serious. 1 is yours if U can get out here.

I decided to take this idea to Defcon 2 – discuss with the wife.

My wife works downstairs in the same building, same company, as me. It’s quite convenient for car pooling, office gossip and for last-second trips to Los Angeles.

She was working at the front desk in the lobby when I dropped the idea on her. I told her about the tickets – Thom Yorke, front man from Radiohead with Flea of Red Hot Chili Peppers and Nigel Godrich, producer of multiple Radiohead albums – performing Yorke’s experimental Eraser album. I told her about the venue – The Orpheum, a small theater that seats only 2,000 in downtown Los Angeles. And I told her about the price of flights, which were reasonable, especially considering the immediacy of the flights.

She seemed enthused.

“I think you should do it,” she said.

You shouldn’t be surprised, for two reasons:

1) My wife is well known among my friends and me as being exceptionally cool. She doesn’t mind taking over everything by herself: daycare pick-up, drop-off, cooking dinner, bath time and everything else you have to do when you’re a parent. Even if it’s just so I can go catch a concert on the west coast.

2) My wife knew I needed something positive to go my way. For the previous two months, I had spent most of my time in hospitals in Wichita and Kansas City while my Dad battled brain cancer. But all the nights in the hospital paled in comparison to the three nights I spent with Dad when he was under hospice care in my childhood home. How many hours had I spent in that living room watching KU basketball with my Dad? Never would I have guessed that in 2009, him at age 62, me at age 32, we’d sleep together in that living room, him on a hospital bed, me on the couch, as his body slowly succumbed to cancer. Adrianne knew I needed something to help me try to shake that off.

Adrianne gave me the green light. It was time to move to Defcon 3.

Mar, I am booking my flight tonight!!!

Getting there
I booked my ticket the next evening and told Marlan I’d be on my way. Not wanting to spend too much time away from the family, I had originally only planned a two-day trip. Adrianne encouraged me to get out there early so I could spend some time unwinding. I booked a flight to get there early Sunday, then return Tuesday night. I was on my way.

I contacted some other friends I have in Los Angeles, Jonah, who owns and operates ComicBookResources.com, the No.1 comic book site on the Web and an employer of mine for six years now, and Lincoln, who works as our cameraman/soundman in San Diego when we’re covering Comic-Con. The three of us had talked about setting up a round of golf sometime for a few years now. This was our chance.

Marlan picked me up at LAX at 10 a.m. local time. Jonah picked me up at Marlan’s place at about noon. We then picked up Lincoln and headed to Coto de Caza Country Club in Orange County, a course I was able to hook up for us through a good friend in the industry. “You’re going to enjoy the hell out of it,” my friend told me. I did.

I started off hot with my rented clubs. They gave me Nike Sumo drivers and the comparable irons. My first drive – with a 3 wood – exploded off the club face. For the rest of the round I was at risk of crushing a drive farther than I’m used to. It should be noted for the non-golfers: this is a great way to relieve stress.

For a while I was the best golfer in the group. Then I got too drunk. Lincoln usurped me. The substance he was smoking smoothed out his swing, while the substance I was drinking wobbled mine. C’est la vie.

After golf, Lincoln invited me and Marlan to his house for dinner. We grilled out – something called a tri-top, which I had never heard of, and I’m the one from cattle country. It was all good, and the weather was perfect for a backyard barbecue. A police helicopter even went overhead with the search light on, which I felt was very L.A. My only regret was that, in that low light, I thought it was butter Lincoln set out for the broccoli… when it was actually mayonnaise. Well, you got to try it once, I suppose.

After dinner, me and Mar bid Lincoln farewell. Mar gave me a choice – back to his apartment to relax, or to a nearby dive-bar he enjoys.

If you know me, you know I opted for the dive-bar.

I felt a little out-of-place in my golf shirt, golf slacks and ball cap in the dive-bar. Hell, I wanted to kick my own ass. We stuck around for a few beers, but Mar sensed my discomfort and suggested we try somewhere else. So we did.

The karaoke bar.

Beers were expensive – like $8 a beer. But there was a fun-loving crowd, and the songs were loud and obnoxious. We had a nice booth with a good view of the stage, and it was easy to blend in among the noise.

Of course, we put in songs. Our original idea was to duet on Temple of the Dog’s “Hunger Strike” performed by Eddie Vedder (Pearl Jam) and Chris Cornell (Soundgarden). (Ironically, three nights later, Eddie and Chris would perform that same song together at the United Center at the Pearl Jam concert, the first time in who knows how many years. That show would be the impetus for a reunited Soundgarden, which will tour this year.) Luckily, two much more talented dudes beat us to the punch and rocked that duet before me and Mar had a chance to murder it.

We had to call an audible (football term: change the plan) on our songs. Marlan chose a Beatles song I’d never heard before, “Helter Skelter.” I hopefully never hear it again (or at least, Marlan’s version). I went with an all time classic, White Zombie’s “More Human than Human.”

Trust me, I butchered it. My key to signing Zombie is 1) hold the mic as close to your mouth as you can, 2) scream.

We just about closed the karaoke bar down. By then, it was about 2 a.m. PST. I’d been up for 23 straight hours, partying for about 15 of those hours. That was a good day.

Day two: Thom Yorke, comic books, In-n-Out Burger
The next morning arrived pretty quickly for me. Even though I just had an all-day bender, my body is still geared to CST. Though the clock on the wall said 9 a.m., my body was telling me that at any moment Evey was going to be staring at my head while I was still asleep.

So I got up. Got showered, got dressed. Took a deep breath – if I could survive for another nine hours, I’d be seeing Thom Yorke in the Orpheum, a 2,000-seat theater in downtown Los Angeles.

For such a special event, I felt like I should wear special clothing. The clothes make the man, after all. I chose a trifecta of my favorites – my Aquabats long sleeve T, my Rick’s Place short sleeve over that, and my Players Championship hat.

I tried to figure out Marlan’s DVD player and could not. I knew that Marlan would be sleeping in for another couple hours. Eventually, I decided that I’d go out and search for food.

I walked maybe a mile. Grabbed a hot dog and a juice from the local 7-11. A breakfast of champions, this was indeed a fine way to start my day. Had I been playing by the rules, after all, I’d be at my desk in Lawrence – not hungover in Los Angeles.

I got back to Marlan’s place and kicked back, reading a few comic books. Eventually, Marlan got ready. I’ll never accuse Mar of getting ready early or quickly, so it was about 1 p.m. before we got moving.

The first stop was lunch. My choice, I went for In-n-Out burger because I’m a tourist and I do like their burgers. Marlan treated, and we ate outside, enjoying the fine Southern California weather. I had Marlan snap a couple photos of me outside In-n-Out, just because I was geeking out at this point. I was feeling good about things… looking forward to a concert… not really thinking about my Dad, for the first time in a while.

Marlan asked me what I wanted to do, and we decided on a couple things: we’d hit his comic book store, we’d hit this music store that he said I had to see to believe, and that we wouldn’t return home before the show. This all sounded good.

So we drove over to House of Secrets in Burbank. I’ve talked to the owners before as part of my job with CBR, even met the guys at Comic-Con before. It was good to see the store in person. Nice store. I’m always impressed with my friend’s comic stores – a grass-is-always-greener type deal. I tried to wrangle a copy of Spectacular Spider-Man magazine # 2, but I didn’t like the price they quoted me (it was unmarked). But I still bought a few books… I don’t know if it was a mistake, or a hook-up, but the guy only charged me a fraction of what I expected at the cash register. Maybe I should have grabbed that Spidey magazine… but then again, I didn’t want to worry about getting something so cumbersome home in one piece…

I remember when we were getting ready to leave, Mar’s pal, the guy who co-owns the store (not Paul, the other guy), asked us what we were going to do.

“Well, Jones is visiting from Kansas… so we went to In-n-Out burger for lunch, then we came here, then we’re going to Amoeba (the record store) then we’re going to the Thom Yorke show…”

The guy responded, “Man… that sounds like the Best Day Ever.”

Indeed, we had a good day planned out.

So from House of Secrets, we headed to a place called “Amoeba.” We drove by the outside, then we parked underneath the store, in an underground garage. From the exterior, the place looked big… like a large warehouse. But surely, that was just the store front, and the room was shared by multiple stores.

We went inside… I was stunned. It was like the first time I went to a comic book convention – I remember being stunned that so many comic books could be in one place. Same thing with this place, but this was music. CDs, rows and rows of CDs. An upstairs DVD area. Records in the back. Sheet music. Concert T-shirts. It was like Lovegarden, my local used CD store, but it was 50 times the size.

We decided a time to meet, and then went shopping. It really was overwhelming. Where to start? What did I need? Because surely this place had it.

I mostly wandered around aimlessly for about 30 minutes (they had books, toys, graphic novels!) before formulating a plan. Then I started looking over the used alternative section pretty hard. I walked out of there with about six CDs – all of them a great deal, mostly older stuff I missed, but could sure as hell try when the price tag was $3.99, $4.99.

Eventually, I ran into Mar again. I told him we should go. I could spend all day in there, and I already had too many CDs that I was ready to purchase. We made it for the exit.

Marlan suggested at this point that we grab a few pre-game beers before the Thom Yorke show. He knew of a decent spot not far away… it was a wings place, he said, with pretty hot waitresses… sounded good to me.

We found a sweet parking spot and had a short walk to the wings place. We walked in the place… what Marlan calls a “wings place with hot waitresses” I call a “sports bar.” And I totally forgot that the biggest Monday Night Football game of the season – Brett Favre and the Vikings versus the Packers – was on TV that night! And the game was about to kick off! SCORE!

I was genuinely happy about this. I had set my DVR to record the game back home, but even better, I’d watch it live in a sports bar with Mar. We found a good spot near a flat-screen TV and ordered a few pitchers. Even better, pitchers were reasonably priced! I looked out the window, and saw “Jonesy” from the TV show Reno 911! walk by. It was almost as if Dad were telling me, “This is your day, son. You deserve it. Thanks for your help back home.”

After a few pitchers and some wings, me and Mar hit the door. I was doing well at this point… feeling a buzz, a good pre-game buzz.

However, I had not yet broken the seal (read: taken a piss).

I knew we had a short trek to the Orpheum… I figured my best bet was not to bother, since I really wasn’t feeling it. Hold on until I get to the venue, rather than breaking the seal now and having to piss every five minutes on the ride over.

The ride took a little longer than I thought it would. My eyeballs were floating by the time we got there. I was this close to taking a piss in an alley, but my thought on that was I would risk getting busted for public urination (or whatever it’s called), arrested, and I would have travelled all this way only to miss the concert.

Luckily, there was no line for the pisser. Me and Mar marched down there chatting. We continued to chat while we took care of our respective business. Marlan then went and washed his hands. He kept talking with me for a while, from the sink near the door. You know Marlan – the guy can talk.

Finally Marlan stopped. “Uh, Jones? I’m going to… wait outside for you.”

I simply nodded in agreement.

I was toward the tail end of one of the most relieving pisses of my life. I’m not kidding you, this piss may have lasted five minutes. This one was one for the record books.

=WHEW=

Reborn, I emerged to check out the theater. Beautiful place. We grabbed a couple beers – now three times more what we had just been paying at the wings place – and continued to snoop around. Marlan nailed it when he said, “Man, you can just tell everyone here… is so self-satisfied.”

The souvenir stand was selling something… what was it? A T-shirt? I got closer… they were selling a vinyl record. It was $15. I had the bright idea that I’d buy this record, and eventually sell it on eBay to recoup all the money I had spent on this trip. I hesitated, but then went for it.
The problem was now I had to haul this vinyl record around with me the rest of the night… and then I’d have to haul it back to Kansas with me. Guess I really should have just bought that Spider-Man Magazine # 2, eh? Now that I’m hauling things.

Why was this a big show?
I realize I’ve already written over 2,000 words about this trip. Apologies. It just started turning into a detailed story, and I can’t get out of it now. Thanks for reading it, if you’re still with me. I’ll try to keep it rewarding with a few interesting/funny nuggets.

I’ve written so much about the trip, yet very little about what was so special about this show.
So, consider:

-- This was Thom Yorke of Radiohead playing a “solo” show away from Radiohead… he would be playing all the songs off his experimental “Eraser” album live… a feat I don’t think he had ever done up to this point. (I am a big fan of the “Eraser” album.)
-- He announced the show matter-of-factly on the Radiohead Web site only a few days before the show… tickets for the two shows (Sunday and Monday) would sell out in minutes.
-- Playing with Yorke would be Flea (of Red Hot Chili Peppers fame) and Nigel Godrich, who is a long-time Radiohead producer (OK Computer, Kid A) as well as producer of such albums as Beck’s Sea Change and Travis’ The Man Who.
-- The show would be in a 2,000-seat theater… the two times I’d seen Radiohead previously was with 25,000 friends (St. Louis, 2008) and 75,000 friends (Lollapalooza, 2008).
-- Mar’s tickets were 1st row, box (I didn’t know what that meant, exactly, but it sounded pretty good!).
-- I might not be the biggest Radiohead fan in the world – I came to the group a little later than some (OK Computer is the album that hooked me) – but I am a still a pretty hardcore fan… a fan who would consider them perhaps their No. 2 favorite band of all time (behind Pearl Jam) on some days and their No. 1 band of all time (ahead of Pearl Jam) on other days. And, in fact, I’ve travelled to St. Louis, Chicago and now Los Angeles to see them. So I think they’re a pretty big deal.

So yeah, I was pumped. And I was there, at the show.

???????
The marquee outside read “???????” but we knew who would be there soon.

Me and Mar marched inside the venue. There were no tickets – we speculated Thom tried to make it scalper-proof. You had to have your credit card and ID to get your ticket. Mar produced both, and we were quickly scanned into the venue.

We grabbed a cocktail and acted cool in a bar area. The opener came on, but we acted uninterested.

It should be noted that I stood horribly out. I looked like one of the “Big Bang Theory” nerds at a black-tie affair. OK, not that bad, but close. I should have realized when Marlan asked me if I had a “jacket” before the show that he didn’t mean something to keep me warm; he meant something to class up my act.

I mentioned earlier that I was wearing some of my favorite clothes – two T-shirts and a ball cap. Marlan was in a shirt, coat, slacks and bad attitude – everything you need to look cool in L.A.

Oh well, I know now what to wear “next time.”

Eventually I couldn’t resist, and I suggested we get out there to check out the opener and see what the situation was with our seats. We went upstairs… another quick piss break and another trip to the bar and we were on our way.

An usher pointed us out to our seats. He was impressed. “You guys are all the way down there,” he said, pointing to the front row. GOLDEN.

We sat in the front two seats of the balcony. The balcony crept out toward the stage, hanging just over the stage on both sides, with the rows gradually getting longer as the rows crept backwards. The front row was only two-seats wide.

We plopped down. How did we get these seats???

The first band was called “Lucky Dragons” and it was mainly two kids on sound machines making distortions and beats. Not terrible. They were appropriately nerdy and thankful and after their 30 minutes they were off the stage.

It was somewhere in-between acts that we were first interrupted. A guy our age informed us we were in his seats. Not wanting to relinquish our seats without a fight, we consulted with the usher.

As the confusion was settled, I chatted with the guy’s girlfriend. They were a friendly couple, so we were chit-chatting. I asked her how many times they had seen Radiohead.

“I’ve seen them five times,” this girl told me. “And actually, I met Thom Yorke by accident several years ago in a hotel lobby in Paris…”

I was appropriately impressed with her story when she ended with, “I have no idea how many times this guy has seen Radiohead,” gesturing toward who I thought was her boyfriend.

I gave her a confused look and she let me in on their secret:

“I just met this guy five minutes ago… I was outside hoping they’d release some more tickets, or maybe that I could buy a scalped ticket… I was waiting in the line when he walked up to me and said, ‘Hey, you want to go to the show?’”

At this point Marlan asks the guy, “So, how did you guys score these seats?”

“Man, I hate to be that guy, but… I have a friend who works for Ticketmaster.”

So at this point it occurred to me that this dude bought two of the best seats in the house… then showed up single, and picked up the cutest girl outside looking to score tickets. (It was my impression that the girl did indeed pay for her seat.) I was both angered and impressed by this dude at the same time.

It turned out that the dude was indeed correct and we were in his seats. No matter. We were simply downgraded to row 2, which was a row of three seats.

About ten minutes later, another group showed up and again challenged us. We wouldn’t lose again, would we?

Turns out, the numbering on these seats were way wonky… not only were we wrong, but me and Mar ended up being seated in different rows… I’d be in the last seat in row 2, Mar the first seat in row 3. We gave each other a disappointed look, but the show was about to start, and there was really no way to negotiate out of this predicament, as the groups of people were numbered in a way that there didn’t seem to be an easy compromise, we were the odd men out.

Show time
Soon, the lights kicked out and Thom and his mish-mash of musicians walked out on to stage.
Thom was opposite us, while Flea was below us.

They seemed to play the “Eraser” in order, and it sounded even better than I had hoped. The lights were flashing, I had a good buzz, and I was literally a stone’s throw from Thom Yorke, yet seated comfortably. Every once in a while I’d turn and look at the crowd, all dancing, and think to myself, “I’m really here.” (The last two times I’d seen Thom, I was way the fuck back in the lawn seats in St. Louis, and up kind of close, but squished among 75,000 people in a spot I stood on for six hours to assure me a good spot. This was so much easier…)

I was hoping it wouldn’t end. It was easy to get caught up in the moment. I snapped a few photos. Would I ever have such seats to a show like this again? I hung on every word. When Tom sang, “Do yourself a favor, buy a ticket and get on the train,” I just bobbed my head and thought, “Yup… sage advice.” It was like a burden was being lifted off me. It was like it was OK to be happy again – and not just happy, but thrilled and happy.

When my Dad first told me he had a spot on his brain, I was at Comic-Con, and from that moment on, I felt it was not proper to have fun anymore.

Well, I was having fun again.

Tom sang “Black Swan,” and kept muttering, “This is fucked up… fucked up… fucked up…” and I kept thinking of my Dad. I knew Dad would have hated this concert…. He hated Radiohead and their sound. Yet, it seemed like Dad was there with me in a way… he knew how big of a deal they were to me, and he was enjoying the band in a way he couldn’t of when he was alive. (That’s really stupid to type… sorry, I’ve been drinking.)

But, really… I think my Dad knew how much I enjoyed live music. And if “This is fucked up” is a lyric I can relate to, about losing my Dad… well, you know? It was fucked up. Sometimes things get fucked up. It ain’t witty, for damn sure, but at the time, it sounded like the secret to the universe.

They guys played for a while… they played the “Eraser” in its entirety, along with a Radiohead B-side. The whole show seemed to go by in 30 minutes, bit it was really about 90.
The guys came out for one encore. Then the show ended. We all stood and cheered. But the show was over.

Me and Mar walked out of there excited about what we had just saw. For me, it was the best concert I had seen in 2009. Best show ever? No… but man, it was up there. Way up there.
I can tell you this: I’ll remember this show fondly for the rest of my life.

The aftermath
We snapped a couple photos outside. We walked to the car. We tried to recall everything we had just seen.
We went to a bar called the Snake Pit. It was empty. We played a few songs on the jukebox. I watched the highlights of the Vikings/Packers game on the projection screen.

Eventually we went home and I passed out.

The next morning, we braved the traffic back to the airport. I bought Mar breakfast at a Carl Jr.’s near the airport. We got there plenty early.

I sat in the airport terminal, exhausted. I was afraid to fall asleep, for fear I’d miss my flight all together.

Eventually, they called my number. I hauled my vinyl record on the plane. A girl walked by me on the way to her seat, saw it, and said to me, “It was totally worth the flight from Denver, wasn’t it?” I responded, “It was worth the flight from Kansas City.”

I got home to my loving family. Adrianne and Evey were happy to see me. I was so happy to see them. I had been through hell the last couple months – FUCKING HELL. And this trip, and coming home to them… it all put kind of an end to it. I finally had a fun story to tell. And I felt like life was going to go on without my Dad.

So weird, having a concert play out like that. But it did for me. I was in a weird place, mentally. Ask anyone who knew me when my friend Wake died – that fucked me up for a while. What would my Dad’s death do to me?

Well, this was different. I was older, more mature. And I watched my Dad die. And I quietly suffered for a while. Then I went out and just had the best time I could.

And everything seemed OK.