My brothers and sister got together last week to travel to Vegas to see Cirque du Soleil's "The Beatle's Love" show and Santana, who is doing a 2 year gig at the Hard Rock Casino. My Father died 6 years ago and my Mother died on Palm Sunday, they loved Santana and the Beatles, as did the whole family, so we thought this would be a great way to get the six of us together and honor them.
We flew in on Wednesday night and my youngest brother and I walked the strip taking photographs while waiting for the rest to show up the next morning. Thursday, we jumped in a van and drove to The Valley Of Fire state park near Lake Mead, a lot of fun and laughter. We made it back to Vegas in time to eat a great meal and grab some Hurricanes before the The Cirque Du Soleil show. It was incredibly good, started on time, comfortable seats on an incline that allowed everyone a great view, a super sound track mixed by Sir George Martin and his son from the thousands of hours of Master tape he had worked with when he produced the Beatles' work. The show was near perfect, typical of Cirque Du Soleil.
Friday, we drove to Utah to eat an outstanding breakfast at the Bear Paw Cafe in St. George before going on to Zion National Park. My brother takes pride in finding all of the trick places to eat and scored with this cafe, easily the best breakfast I have ever had. The park was spectacular, shot a couple hundred photographs during a hike to The Narrows. The water was very cold to walk in and became too deep to get all of the way in but what we did see was breathtaking.
On the way out we stopped to eat at a Thai place that was also great, so far a super trip, Santana was playing that night and we were all excited to see what we hoped would be a gathering of the many great musicians from the numerous bands Carlos has assembled. We arrived there early and sat in the folded chairs that were sitting flat on the floor. We had read that they had reworked the arena just for Santana, after the night before we were very underwhelmed. We hadn't bought the real expensive tickets but they were 100 bucks, saw Santana for the first time in 1971 and paid 8 dollars and was allowed to bring in my camera and sat in real seats.
The band started a half hour late and the people slowly kept coming in. The sound quality was shit, with all of the technology today, a giant mixing board and an arena designed specifically for their 2 year stint........ it was the worst sound I have ever heard at any concert, ever! On top of that it was loud, louder than the airliners I work around every day. All you could hear was a jumbled up bunch of shit. The keyboard player sucked! The vocalists sucked! Carlos himself sucked the most! It was like I was watching a weak ass Santana tribute band. He seemed to have forgotten how to play the guitar the way he had always played. I've seen this guy 10 times over the years, I know what he was suppose to sound like. The crowd was filled with idiots holding up their little point and shoots trying to take pictures, their bright lit screens in front of your face oblivious to others behind them.
That isn't what finally made me walk out flipping him off and screaming FUCK YOU at the top of my lungs though. After totally trashing Europa, one of my favorite songs, Carlos decided to ramble about politics. He thanked GOD for sending us Obama, he went on about what a disaster the last eight years have been and then brought up FOX News....... I didn't hear the rest because I was storming out of the dump arena. I wasn't alone, 3 of my brothers were right behind me. I know my dad would have jumped up too.
I didn't spend 100 dollars to listen to someone that couldn't play the songs he has played for 40 years talk about politics, my sister told me he went into a rant that it wasn't about the United States, it was about the New World Order that Obama was going to lead everyone to.
What an asshole, I should have known, I've seen this prick wearing a Che Gueverra t-shirt in the past. What's so very typical is that this dick head is now producing his own line of expensive shoes, he is deep into Capitalism and is hypocritically talking it down. Without the United States, he would be scraping gum off the streets in Tijuana. He will never get another penny from me and I will work against his lousy ass for now on.
I spoke to the manager of the arena about a refund and of course she passed the ball to ticket master, I doubt I will get any money back. The Hard Rock was a shitty casino full of wanna be gang clowns and skanky looking little girls, I will never get within a hundred yards of that place again.
We flew in on Wednesday night and my youngest brother and I walked the strip taking photographs while waiting for the rest to show up the next morning. Thursday, we jumped in a van and drove to The Valley Of Fire state park near Lake Mead, a lot of fun and laughter. We made it back to Vegas in time to eat a great meal and grab some Hurricanes before the The Cirque Du Soleil show. It was incredibly good, started on time, comfortable seats on an incline that allowed everyone a great view, a super sound track mixed by Sir George Martin and his son from the thousands of hours of Master tape he had worked with when he produced the Beatles' work. The show was near perfect, typical of Cirque Du Soleil.
Friday, we drove to Utah to eat an outstanding breakfast at the Bear Paw Cafe in St. George before going on to Zion National Park. My brother takes pride in finding all of the trick places to eat and scored with this cafe, easily the best breakfast I have ever had. The park was spectacular, shot a couple hundred photographs during a hike to The Narrows. The water was very cold to walk in and became too deep to get all of the way in but what we did see was breathtaking.
On the way out we stopped to eat at a Thai place that was also great, so far a super trip, Santana was playing that night and we were all excited to see what we hoped would be a gathering of the many great musicians from the numerous bands Carlos has assembled. We arrived there early and sat in the folded chairs that were sitting flat on the floor. We had read that they had reworked the arena just for Santana, after the night before we were very underwhelmed. We hadn't bought the real expensive tickets but they were 100 bucks, saw Santana for the first time in 1971 and paid 8 dollars and was allowed to bring in my camera and sat in real seats.
The band started a half hour late and the people slowly kept coming in. The sound quality was shit, with all of the technology today, a giant mixing board and an arena designed specifically for their 2 year stint........ it was the worst sound I have ever heard at any concert, ever! On top of that it was loud, louder than the airliners I work around every day. All you could hear was a jumbled up bunch of shit. The keyboard player sucked! The vocalists sucked! Carlos himself sucked the most! It was like I was watching a weak ass Santana tribute band. He seemed to have forgotten how to play the guitar the way he had always played. I've seen this guy 10 times over the years, I know what he was suppose to sound like. The crowd was filled with idiots holding up their little point and shoots trying to take pictures, their bright lit screens in front of your face oblivious to others behind them.
That isn't what finally made me walk out flipping him off and screaming FUCK YOU at the top of my lungs though. After totally trashing Europa, one of my favorite songs, Carlos decided to ramble about politics. He thanked GOD for sending us Obama, he went on about what a disaster the last eight years have been and then brought up FOX News....... I didn't hear the rest because I was storming out of the dump arena. I wasn't alone, 3 of my brothers were right behind me. I know my dad would have jumped up too.
I didn't spend 100 dollars to listen to someone that couldn't play the songs he has played for 40 years talk about politics, my sister told me he went into a rant that it wasn't about the United States, it was about the New World Order that Obama was going to lead everyone to.
What an asshole, I should have known, I've seen this prick wearing a Che Gueverra t-shirt in the past. What's so very typical is that this dick head is now producing his own line of expensive shoes, he is deep into Capitalism and is hypocritically talking it down. Without the United States, he would be scraping gum off the streets in Tijuana. He will never get another penny from me and I will work against his lousy ass for now on.
I spoke to the manager of the arena about a refund and of course she passed the ball to ticket master, I doubt I will get any money back. The Hard Rock was a shitty casino full of wanna be gang clowns and skanky looking little girls, I will never get within a hundred yards of that place again.
