Blue Man Group

My parents bought us all tickets to see the Blue Man Group at The Backyard here in Austin. We had been wanting to see them for quite a while but things never worked out. We'd be out of town when they did a show. We'd be out of money. Etc. Well, we finally got to go and take Dakota too. It was his first concert ever. The tickets were really his birthday present.
When we got there over an hour before the concert was to start things were already quite packed. It was standing room only and we got a crappy spot near the back. Dakota wasn't going to be able to see anything and I wasn't happy with that.
The concert started and the first act came on stage. It was Tracy Bonham. She was very good, kinda like Sheryl Crow with a country edge. She played a mean fiddle and could really wail. I'll have to look for her CDs next time I'm in a music store. After she was done, people got up to stretch before the second opening band came on. I took this chance to improve our seating. I grabbed Dakota and we moved closer to the stage and sat down in a tiny spot. I was able to make enough room for Shannon and my sister and we had much better seats. The next band cam Venus Hum came on. They weren't really my taste. Their lead sounded a little like Björk I guess. They had images displaying on the backdrop during their songs. I started laughing during one song, the images were just an OS X screen saver. Real original there guys. While they were playing I improved our seating. We were now within 40 feet of the rail at the front.
When Venus Hum finished up we moved farther forward and got a spot on the rail for us all. We were now 15 feet from the Blue Men during the performance. We we also that same distance from the subwoofers but didn't realize it. The music started and the Blue Men came out. When one of the would hit their giant drum you could literally feel the wind passing you coming from the subs. I don't think I'll have to worry about kidney stones after that. Even though we were only 15-20 feet from the speakers it wasn't uncomfortable because most of their music is percussion and that doesn't really hurt your ears to listen to. During the performance they played with a camera and panned the crowd a couple times. We managed to get on the big screen because of our spot. The Blue Men played for nearly an hour and a 1/2 in the Texas heat. From our spot you could see the sweat flowing off them. I did not envy them. They put on a hell of a show. I've seen their concerts in concert halls on tv but I think they really rock in a rock concert type venue. After the show when they were doing intros a drummer threw his sticks into the crowd. My sister managed to fight off two girls for one and I think it is now her prized possession.
We managed to beat most of the traffic and get home before midnight but not after an encounter with a drunk driver(I'll save that story for another time). Dakota was one tired puppy but I think he had fun at his very first concert.