Anyways, we went to dinner early so we could get to the concert when doors opened and get good seats (general admission, you know.) I had picked out a BBQ place for us called Fiorella's JackStack BBQ. Boy was it awesome. We ordered a sampling of food for two, with beef, ham, and half a chicken and baked beans, potato salad, and fries. Jarrod also had a Boulevard Wheat and I had a Tropical Paradise martini. He liked his beer, and I thought it was good too; it has an odd flavor on the finish that I couldn't quite pin down. My martini was good at first but by the end of it I didn't care for it much (this seems to happen a lot with me and martinis, I guess they're not for me.) Anyways, our food was amazing. The beef was sliced thinly like a piece of bacon and it was so tender you could just tug and pull it apart. The ham was good and smoky, and the chicken was tender with a good flavor too. Jarrod ate the potato salad, which he liked, the fries weren't
anything special, but the beans were THE best baked beans I have ever tasted. Seriously. Busch's Baked Beans you make at home ain't got nothin' on these. They had pulled pieces of pork which added a nice texture to them and the flavor was as smoky and good as the rest of the food. I read that they hickory smoke all their meats, then cook them in a brick oven, and they [obviously] have their own BBQ sauces, of which we stuck to the Original. All in all, I can understand why it was award-winning and I highly recommend the place to anyone heading to KC.
After that it was back to the hotel to chill out for a bit. We then left, had to run back by the restaurant because Jarrod left his hat there, and were off to the Starlight Theater for the O.A.R. concert. It was raining at that point, go figure, and we hit construction traffic too. However, we got there about 5-10 minutes after the doors opened. And we got close parking, which was nice. We were given wrist-bands that allowed us to get closer seats too, since we were some of the early birds. We got to our seats and ended up in the center on row 12. We could have been in a closer row, but we would have been way off to the side. Luckily the rain stopped, but we still got our shorts wet when we sat down. The Starlight Theater was a neat place it's very similar to the Muny here but a bit nicer. They have concerts there and Broadway shows. I've never thought of it, but the Muny should open up their venue to concerts too. It would be a good alternative to
Riverport/Verizon Wireless Ampitheater/whatever the hell it's called these days for outdoor concerts.
The opener was Citizen Cope. I realized I knew one of their songs, "Let the Drummer Kick." It's a catchy song, if nothing else and I had heard it somewhere, though I'm still not sure from where and it's driving me nuts. Neither Jarrod or I was overly impressed with them, though. Three things: 1, I am not totally convinced that the singing wasn't dubbed. He was barely, I mean BARELY, opening his mouth when he sang and even though he was on top of the mic, I just don't know that a person could possibly produce that much sound with such a small opening of their mouth. 2, A lot of their songs were repition, and I'm just not too hot on a song that repeats the refrain over and over and over and over and has (maybe) one verse; it seems like a cop-out and they're not trying very hard. 3, I am also pretty sure he was stoned out of his mind because they were so disconnected from the audience. They (well mostly 'he' the main singer, the creator of the band) didn't
seeme excited to be there one bit, they didn't connect with the audience (as in something like "You guys all having a good time tonight?"), and they were just TOO laid back. They stood still, weren't into their own music, and gave the impression like they were tired of playing it.
In short: not too impressed, don't ever need to see them again, might buy "Let the Drummer Kick" from iTunes.
A half hour went buy as they tore down the set and put on O.A.R.'s. They opened with "City on Down" one of Jarrod's favorites by them. We ended up standing the whole time, which sucked only because I was in flip flops. They played an awesome show. To me, they were a complete opposite to Cope. They were excited to be there, you could tell that they really love their music, and they really interracted with the crowd. At one point, Jerry, the saxophonist, came down and walked through the aisles while playing that sax (now THAT is some talent there.) He went down the house right side and came back up on the left and was right next to us, so that was cool. I was lucky to change over the camera to the "Continuous" setting so I didn't have to worry about missing him.
They played for two hours, and I know Jarrod liked it a lot. They are his favorite band and since he didn't get to go when they were in St. Louis two years ago, we decided we wouldn't miss this one. I like them, but they are not my favorite (that spot belongs to Muse; Jarrod: O.A.R. Jamie: Muse.) We got out of there pretty nicely too since we had a good parking spot.
Saturday we got up at a decent time and went down to breakfast, which was just so so. Soon after, there was a fasle fire alarm. Yay for that. It sucked that we weren't packed up and ready to leave, or we could have just drove away! We checked out around 10:30 to head down to the shops on the Plaza. We mostly wandered around. We picked up some caramel drinks from Starbucks. There was an old man there reading a book on an iPad, which prompted the idea to drop in the Apple store. We went in there and played with the iPads for a while. I was quite impressed and yes, it is pretty much a big iPod, but it is so darn neat. The experience of the user is so much better on a bigger screen versus playing games on an iPod. Plus, if you don't need it as your sole computer, it really isn't a bad alternative to a laptop. It's a lot cheaper, more versatile, and lighter. And more fun. After that, we decided to head out of the Plaza because it was a very hot day.
We originally planned to go to an art museum but I really wasn't feeling like museums that day. Jarrod was fine with that so we decided to just head back home, even if it was just 11:30. But before we left, we grabbed a light lunch. We stopped in Tomfooleries and split some chicken nachos. I liked the name of the place, and the nachos were fine, but our service was terrible. We were the only people at a table upstairs (which is no excuse) but our waitress didn't refill Jarrod's water till we were ready to leave, never checked on us after she brought us our food, never brought us silverware, and never brought us napkins. We had to use our little drink napkins! Obviously, she didn't get a good tip. She was terrible.
We came home and are back safe and sound. It was a great, great weekend. I know Jarrod really enjoyed the concert, and I'm sure we'll see tham again.
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