Rocklahoma

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Me and Stacy's (my wife) Rocklahoma trip was quite an experience.

It's a 6 hour drive from St. Louis to OK. We arrived in OK around noon to notice rain clouds. Well, it rained REAL HARD for about an hour and a half. So the ground was nice and muddy when we arrived at the venue.

Stacy and I were going to be camping all weekend for this concert. We had a camp site, and next to us were her girlfriend Cindi and her friend Melanie.

We decided to walk in the light rain and try to catch Vain. Vain is a VERY VERY VERY cheesy band. Their cd was released in '89 and sold badly, so the label said, SEE YA. That cd was never reissued and its rare. The label never gave them a chance so they never even toured. They are a L.A band. Let the record show: Vain is a Stacy band, this is just WAY too cheesy for me.

As we were walking in the deep mud to find a spot to see Vain, we had to suffer through House Of Lords. They played while it was raining. As soon as they were done, IT STOPPED RAINING! So Stacy got to see Vain for the first time. The singer used to have hair about 3 feet in the air, but now, ummmmmmm, he's gained a bit of weight. It was ok, the singer rolled around on the floor, 1980's L.A style.

We split for Enuff Z Nuff so we could set up our tent (we found out later, they had a surprise guest play drums for 1 song Steven Adler---the original Guns N Roses drummer, but o well). I'm not really a Enuff Z Nuff fan anyway.

We are ready to set up out tent. The first stick thingy to go into the tent and we hear CRACK. The stick broke. A waytooofriendly guy who was next to us fixed our tent with 2 ink pens and duct tape (like MacGyver). So the tent was fixed, but kinda seemed to lean to the right. On the way to see L.A Guns Stacy and I decided to try to find a motel, because we were afraid the tent was not going to make it.

L.A Guns played next. They were good. The new singer is the singer of Guns is Marty Casey. He was on that INXS reality show where they were trying to find a lead singer. This guy nailed the L.A Guns songs, it was great. Until they played Pink Floyd.

While we were waiting to see Dokken, we met a horrible dressed band called S.E.X Department (don't worry, the cheesy sounding names are only gonna get worse as I type this out).

Dokken was cool. It is Don Dokken and 3 other guys, playing Dokken's greatest hits. Stacy was drooling over the bass player. But that was ok, I had a 101 pound brunette dancing next to us, wearing almost nothing, so a good time was had by all.

Sebastain Bach was next. He played some solo stuff (that was awful) and ummmmmm, yea Skid Rows greatest hits. I had to suffer though 18 And Life, AGAIN. I never never want to hear that song again. MTV used to play the crap out of it. Sebastain was so-so.

We decided to miss Bret Michaels. I heard he played (SHOCKER) Poisons greatest hits. We needed a motel room. We arrived back to the camp site, the tent was still standing, but the air mattress, was deflated. We found a motel down the road and crashed for the night.

The first band of Friday was XYZ. I know NOTHING about XYZ, but they were pretty good.

Next Armored Saint. Of course, THEY RULED. This was the heaviest band of the weekend. They were awesome.

This is how it works in general admission at Rocklahoma. We had our folding chairs and you kinda just leave them, when you want to walk around. Nobody screws with them. In STL, people would be stealing them, but in OK, it was ok to do that. We left to rest at the motel. Missing Kingdom Come was no big deal.

We get back to our spot and the chairs had been blown over. It was windy that day. These two hoosier chicks were in my spot. Stacy's friend Cindi asked them nicely to scoot over. Well, they did, but they were retarded about it. I knew very quickly that these two were gonna suck. And goody for me, they got small F****ING tambourine's to shake after every song. They could tell I was annoyed when they would shake them, so they did it more. I seriously wanted to hear what the tambourine's would sound like,if I shoved it up there asses. Stacy wanted to take them and throw them in the port a pottys.

All of this was going on during Living Colour. Living Colour were good, strange, but good. I'd seen them in '89.

The hoosier chicks would not stop. I was aggravated so I decided to watch the rest of that days show from far away and just stand. Stacy stayed there with Cindi and Melanie. When I left the hoosier chicks (kinda) calmed down.

Night Ranger played. It was good. Yep, I had to suffer through Sister Christian. Again, I never never want to hear that song. I'm burnt on it--------15 years ago.

I caught Lipstick Magazine on a side stage. STRANGE band, but decent.

Extreme was next. It was good. Nuno was playing some insane solos. They did not play Rest In Peace, but it was good. Nuno is a great guitar player.

Finally, Triumph ended the night. AWESOME. I was very impressed. This was the first North America show in 20 years.

Saturday was crazy. CRAZY I TELL YOU!

Band 1, that we missed, Pretty Boy Floyd. After seeing what they look like now, I renamed them Bloated Boy Floyd. Nooooooooooot sooo pretty anymore

Every Mothers Nightmare was next. Another band that never toured. Stacy loves these guys, and it was great.

Right behind us on the side stage after EMN, was Bad Candy. Bad Candy is a St. Louis band. They are good. I think everyone in the crowd during the set were from STL. Bad Candy had not played together since the early 1990's. And boom a record label calls in 2007 and now they are playing again. Cindi and Stacy used to see Bad Candy in STL. There is a youtube video of them at Club 367.

Next a band we both wanted to see badly. Tora Tora. This band rules, they put out 2 cd's. This was there second show in 9 or 10 years. It was great.

During Tora Tora it got HOT AS HELL. So Stacy went back to the motel to chill out. I decided to stay.

Black N Blue was next. I was not a Black N Blue fan, but they were very good. The singer said, "I know it's a party and you guys are hitting a beach ball around. But I like it a bit more sleezy". So he tossed out a blow up doll, and the crowd hit that for a while. During their set, it got REAL HOT! The bass player on the 2nd to last song had to get oxygen because he passed out. They revived him and he played the last song.

Trixter was next. Another band Stacy used to love. But then it got weird. The clouds were coming in, QUICKLY. Trixter started to play. Stacy showed up around the 3rd song and said I'm sick, lets go. I said, Ok, it looks like its going to pour any minute. As were driving to the motel, the sky got darker and darker and the rain was blowing sideways.

We get to the motel, and get a call from Cindi, she said the entire venue was evacuated and she had thought it was a tornado that hit the venue.

It was pouring rain. I watched the news and they said both side stages fell over during the storm. The storm had 70 mile an hour winds. With both side stages gone and the rain, the show still went on. But I stayed at the motel, and chilled while it was pouring rain. Bands I missed that night: Lynch Mob, KIX, Lita Ford, Vyper, Deathriders, and Warrant.

Me and Stacy would later hear that a woman died because of the heat. The news did not announce it, but I spoke to about 10 people and they saw the scene. Her husband thought she was sleeping and she was not. She had health problems as it was. I thought it was strange the news did not say anything. The news also said the amount of money lost because of the side stages falling down was $500,000, I would find out the next day it was actually $2,000,000 lost.

Eariler that day, Cindi's tent broke, so she got a room at our motel 2 doors down from us. She did not want to watch the bands in the rain, so she came back. That night I hung with Cindi and Melanie and we drank beer until 12:30 or so.

Stacy slept 11 hours and was better. So the next day we went back. We arrived not quite knowing what to expect. The place was a mess. The vibe in the morning was crappy. But the show went on, they created 3 side stages. These side stages were very small, it was AWESOME.

The first band me and Stacy saw was Zebra. The first two songs they played were so-so, but then it was ON. The rest of the set was awesome. Zebra rules.

We missed UFO. We saw a band called Real Steel. They ruled!

Steelheart played. They were a 1000 times better than when I seen them in '92ish at Mississippi Nights. And Stacy seen them in STL and she thought they were better this time too.

Next was another band Stacy thought she'd never see. A band called Reckless. They put out an album in '87 or '88 and never toured. And boom, here they are playing on one of the smallest side stages ever. They were very good.

I caught a band named Texas Hippie Coalition. The crowd was nuts for them. That side stage was jammed packed when they played. They were good.

Ace Frehley played the main stage. I never seen any Kiss people live ever. And Ace was ON. He was killer. He played about 6 Kiss songs, some solo stuff. It was great. I had heard sometimes when he is solo, he's not good, but not this time.

Tesla was next. I seen them in '95 (I think) and they were awesome. Stacy never seen them. They did some new stuff, and then played the hits.

The future of rock n roll played the side stage. Crooked X. This band was GREAT! The band is teenagers with the 1980's rock sound with some heavy stuff too. They played one of the small stages. I saw teenage girls drooling over them. They from OK and are going to tour with Ted Nugent in the next few weeks.

Neither of us are Queensryche fans. So we stayed put when Crooked X was over, because to close out the entire Rocklahoma festival was Bullet Boys on that same side stage. We had a front row seat. We had to wait for Queensryche to finish (they played almost 2 hours). Bullet Boys wear AWESOME. They seemed to be on fire and brought it.

We did'nt get back to the motel until 2:30am.

The venue and the security were great too. Nothing like this will ever happen in STL. The security were real cool in dealing with the drunk morons in OK. But in STL the security are usually B & D and they have always sucked. B & D are never pleasant.

Check out my photos I took in my Rocklahoma album in myphotos. I will post some more photos in the days to come.

Rocklahoma ruled, I was worried because I like 1980's hair metal, but not as much as Slayer and REAL metal.

Next up for me: a death metal concert at Pops. O YEA!

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