Last night was the much-anticipated Guns and Roses concert outside Taipei. At least for my kid who has been counting the days, Christmas came early. She's still incredulous that were it not for her, I wouldn't have voluntarily gone. I am so glad she is here, for many more reasons other than the show, but yes, I am very thankful I got to go see such an epic performance. It's one of these special, core memories I will have with my kid forever, taking her to her first concert and her favourite band to boot. It was doubly enjoyable for me, as she was over the moon and it was a legitimate kick-ass performance. She sang along to every song like a true fan, knew which album it was from and loved guessing which song was next by the teasing strums from Slash.
Speaking of whom, Slash was a beast, a mythical creature, a Minotaur weaving us through a labyrinth of fingering, spine-tingling solos. He didn't take a break and played while the other guys changed shirts and Melissa added a ponytail. It was the rhythm guitarist Richard's birthday and he rocked! He was dancing and jamming his strums, I was beyond impressed. Duff didn't disappoint, he sang Attitude and has a better than decent, a damn good voice, and he was all over the stage (they all were). They all jammed pretty fiercely. What I enjoyed were the covers, obviously "Live and Let Die" from Paul McCartney, and "Knock'n on Heaven's Door", but they did an instrumental "Wish You Were Here", which always chokes me up and then went into a Chris Cornel tribute with "Blackhole Sun" which was flawless, intense. I especially liked "Civil War" and thought "Night Train" sounded a helluva lot better live. [The complete setlist is here.]
Guns N'Roses was a band I grew up with watching MTV in middle school, they had some decent songs. I respected Slash. Axl was one of those interesting personalities, he seemed like a dick. In high school, I prefered Nirvana or Smashing Pumpkins. But after living with my kid who knows everything about the band, and even read Slash's biography, I had a wider appreciation of them. After the concert, I am doing the whole Wayne's World, "We're not worthy". They sounded so much better live. Axl sounded in full form. Maybe it's living in Asia and teaching junior high kids who fawn over k-pop lipsynchers, but I was impressed that Axel could belt out and whistle and keep it real, "Hey kids.." He led us in singing Happy Birthday to Richard and afterwards said, "Thank God we got that bullsh%t over with!"
I regret not having better seats. I was embarrassed in front of my kid, she got angry at me for complaining, and was happy enough to see everything, "Check out this view!" We didn't get the cheapest 800NT tickets, but the next cheapest, so I figured we wouldn't be as high as we were. With the money we paid the scalpers, I could have gotten better seats! Most of everyone I knew at the show were down front on the floor, my former boss was literally front row. I ran into the old beach gang from Tainan in the 7-11 and the owner of Drifters. Funny, running into familiar faces in a crowd, the magic of a concert. I hadn't been to one in years, I think the last one was in Denver 11 years ago before heading to Taiwan (Jane's Addiction).
Then there was the whole camera drama before. We checked into a hostel (Homey Hostel) in Taipei and I thought about it, should I bring my camera or not. My phone camera is absolute crap and I wanted a nice photo memory of me and my daughter at her favourite moment of 2018 to be our Christmas photo. But the security at the concert was thorough, they wouldn't let me take in my camera, so we headed back to the train station. Unfortunately, all the lockers were full, as well as all the lockers at the previous stations. So I went into the bathroom (waiting in line forever) and tried to tie it to my belt, in between my legs, but it was dangling visibly from my jean skirt, so my kid just stuffed it into my leggings (it's not a small camera). We walked back to security and saw they were waving metal detector wands and I didn't want to chance being caught and banned from the show. My kid told me to hide it in the bushes, which was probably the best idea, but I was afraid it would rain (it didn't). So she went to the First Aid/ Help booth and tried the waterworks (didn't work either) and basically we ended up running to 7-11 stood in line for 40 minutes and posted my camera back to Yilan in a box without any bubble wrap. I took off my sweater and scarf, wrapped it up and hoped for the best. It looked like my lens was sticking out a bit and I won't be surprised if it's broken when it returns.
It's all good as we didn't miss the opening song, "It's So Easy. The crowd was pumped, the third song was "Chinese Democracy" which had a whole new meaning for me seeing it there. Go Taiwan, the crowd was so ready, my daughter was so ready, her rite of passage into the journey of live shows.
After the show, the hordes lining up to catch the last trains back to Taipei were daunting (last train was 11:15). I stupidly forgot to buy an Easy card for the train ride back (save time lining up to buy a chip). I also wanted my camera back and waited in line (again) at 7-11, getting some water and a rice seaweed triangle (we hadn't eaten since breakfast.). The staff at 7-11 wouldn't, or couldn't give me back my camera. We were tempted by taxi drivers preying on concertgoers, 800NT per person back to Taipei. I just wanted to go to the airport (a few stops ahead) and take the express train back, but none of them would do it. They wanted to fit in as many people as they could for the maximum profit. I almost took a taxi back, but when he opened the boot (space behind the back seat) for my kid to sit, I grabbed her hand pulled her out, vultures trying to fill their pockets. We tried our luck with the throngs at the train station and made it, sleeping most of the way back on the Night Train back to Taipei. We pulled in a little after midnight, quickly walked to our hostel, and were in bed by 1:15.
The next day my kid was too tired to do anything as planned (while in Taipei might as well do something.) I had planned on going to Yangmingshan to photograph the maple trees, but as my camera was gone, lost the urge, and we were back in sunny Yilan by noon.
Seeing Slash jamming the guitar behind his back, even if we could only see him on the screen, we were in the presence of greatness. I admit I was jealous of people in front of me with their fancier smartphones, zooming in on the band, so it looks like they were front row, while my camera could barely focus in the dark. Still, sitting beside my kid screaming out joyfully, her giddy face with stars in her eyes, priceless.
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