Talk into my bullet hole, tell me I'm fine.

Saturday night at 8pm the only thought in my head while standing around the corner from the entrance to Gilman was "Shit. I don't think we're getting in". The line for the show that night (which included Thorns of Life, the only band on the bill out of five that I wanted to see) wrapped a quarter of the way around the block. I've been to a handful of shows there and I've never encountered a line, let alone one that disappeared around the corner. An hour and a half later, we finally got in, sat through the 3 band of the night. After they left the stage, the place got significantly more full. I found myself shoulder to shoulder and not being able to falter half a step forward or backward. All I could muster was my freeing my right hand to be able to hold it above my head to take pictures, but even then I had to be careful not to elbow my friendly neighbor in the head.



Thorns of Life is fronted by former Jawbreaker/Jets to Brazil frontman Black Sch... and backed by ex-Crimpshrine drumer Aaron Cometbus and Daniela Sea from Showtime's "The L Word" and Cypher in the Snow. Hailing from Brooklyn, this three piece knocked me on my ass. Forgive me for not having a setlist or even song names. Blake did mention some names of songs, but I can't remember them. They opened with a song about losing your virginity, my second favorite song of the night next to a song about the story of a man who is friends with a robot who slowly starts to fall apart and malfunction, but he has no spare parts to fix him. Said story was written by an author whose name escapes me. I love robots. Robots love me.



There also was a "singalong" where the chorus where the second half went something like "sink me teeth into babies knees / baby baby baby please". They played for a solid hour and their sound was sort of like a cross between Jawbreaker (Dear You/24 Hour Revenge Therapy era) and Jets to Brazil. They had the heart of Jets to Brazil and the carefree-ness of Jawbreaker.



Overall, it was a lot of fun and an excellent show, especially at 8 dollars. It also doesn't hurt to be waiting in line for a little while with Davey Havok right in front of you...literally.