 | ON THE FRONT LINES with Freak |  |
ON THE ROAD WITH... FREAK JACKYL/DOKKEN/SKID ROW “SUMMER ROCKFEST ‘04” ~ JULY 3, 2004 STAR PLAZA THEATRE / MERRILLVILLE, INDIANA
Tracy and I hustled our way through the scurrying masses to our Jeep and headed out but the beast was topless and the deluge was quickly filling it with water so we had to get moving. If you get a Jeep rolling over 40-mph, its horrible aerodynamics actually creates a force field that keeps the water out. We hit I-294 and headed South towards Indiana and the Star Plaza Theater to see a few friends and have a few beers. By doing 70-mph, we not only dodged the raindrops but also started drying off as well. We arrived just as Skid Row was about to go on. We immediately raided Jackyl’s green room for a few cans of Pabst, and found the Beatboss, Tom Lounges, already hanging out with Jesse and Roman, watching the NASCAR race which was having a rain delay. We all caught up the way friends do, discussing everything from touring to the Hee Haw exhibit in the Grand Ol Opry museum as we drank, but most importantly we talked about the dark cloud hanging over my head. I was due for back surgery the last week in July and it wasn’t looking very good. I guess I was born outta whack with my sacrum pitched slightly to the front and years of bumps, falls, twists, and strains, had finally taken its toll. A condition, my doctor says, I would never have known about had I been a non-athletic nerd. They would have to cut two vertebrae to expose the pinched nerves and then secure a plate across them with three screws for support before scraping some bone from my hip to fuse my two lower lumbar (L-4 & L-5) to my tailbone. A common surgery sure but, not just bragging, a really nasty case for the doctors to deal with. I would be missing Sturgis as well as a load of concerts including Ozzfest and Metallica which had me pretty bummed. So I was dealing with it the way I usually deal with lifes curveballs... I was drinking. The show was great as Skid Row kicked some ass after taking a song or two to find their groove. Dokken did the same, as fans pressed closer and closer to the stage. Jackyl was Jackyl and delivered the outstanding performance they always do, but it was hard to enjoy with that cloud looming overhead even though I was buzzed. I go under the knife on Wednesday July 28th at noon and I’ll be laid up for 8-10 weeks after. I can’t really say I’m looking forward to this, but a few years with the new-and-improved Freak serves as the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel and, though the tunnel seems fairly long, I’m pretty sure that light is coming from a neon beer sign… so it should be worth the wait. | ||
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Every now and then, Mother Nature likes to mess with me and this time around she delivered a solid kick to the nuts. I was standing in a beer line at a street festival when a 60-mph wind gust filled the tent like a parachute and ripped it right out of the ground blowing it down the block. Things went completely nuts in a matter of seconds and there I was without a beer in my hand to help me deal with it.