YOU PUT THE R IN RETARDED

When I was a teenager, I spent many Saturday nights at a local indie/punk club. The best nights where when a local punk bad was playing live at the club. My friends and I would be right in the middle of the crowd, dancing like banshees. This was one of the few places where I could get my alternative music fix. There just wasn't enough exposure to that type of music in a small mid-west town. Actually, since the death of The Spy, there's still not a lot of exposure to indie/punk radio here. I would be lost with out the internet. It's really surprising when one of the bands that I like comes to do a concert in OKC. Last night I had the opportunity to see The Bravery. They played along with The Stock Market Crash, Your Vegas, and Phantom Planet at the Diamond Ballroom. The Diamond Ballroom is a classic venue. It looks like a total dump on the outside and it's tucked away in an area of south OKC that's a little sketchy. I felt sorry for the bands not just because the place was not that great, but also because not that many people showed up. I knew it was a bad sign when I could by my tickets two days before the concert at Tan and Tone America.

The kids at the concert all looked like the kids at the concerts when I was younger except they didn't have to make their retro-punk outfits like I used to have to do. The thing that was different was the attitude. Everyone just stood around like lumps. It's like they were there because it was the cool party place to be that night, not because they were into the music. Of course, I'm lucky enough to not give a crap what people think about me and danced like a crazy girl all night any way. I had a blast, but I couldn't help but feel a little sad. I think I'm getting too old to go to these concerts. Its not because I couldn't keep up, because I could. I think its because the attitude of the younger audience members was just too annoying. I wanted to scream at them "Get up there! Move around! Get excited about this totally cool music!". Stop being too cool for school.