Cool Cherry Cream

Ringo Starr Concert

Wednesday, July 19, 2006 at Bank Of America Pavilion, Boston, Massachusetts

Here I am in Washington D.C. after a nice looong drive. But you don't want to hear about my drive, do you? You want to hear about RINGO! What's my name? RINGO!

We had quite a time getting to the Bank of America Pavilion in Boston. Had to ask a few people on the street for directions, and lucky we did because otherwise we would have missed it. Anyway, we found it, but then we had to find parking. And after almost getting on the highway and we finally did find parking and hurried back to the venue. We still had some time before the show and we hadn't had dinner, so mom and my brother got pizza and dad had a hot dog. I wasn't in the mood for eating and wasn't too hungry, so I just had a Pepsi. Once again, a HUGE one, since we're in America, after all.

Now, the Pavillion is definitely not my favourite venue. I mean, we were pretty close. Well, it seemed close because we weren't vertically far away, all the seats were on the ground. It was the first concert I've had trouble seeing over the person in front of me. They weren't tall or anything, but if the seats were lifted up ever so slightly I wouldn't have had a problem. I had to sit on my foot and keep changing feet because my feet kept falling asleep. But the people behind me were standing up almost the whole time, so I didn't have to worry about blocking their view.

Anyway, we started towards our seats as they told us the All Star Band was coming on stage. And as we got to our seats we hear RINGO coming onto the stage! YAY! The crowd goes wild! They start out with It Don't Come Easy, Ringo's solo hit.

Let's see if I can remember who was in the All Star Band. Before the concert, I had no idea who any of them were. All right, we've got Edgar Winter on the far left on keyboards, with long white hair and a white mustache and a black strange cape. Then we have the guitarists, Billy Squire and Richard Marx. I believe Billy Squire was wearing a yellow Zeppelin t-shirt and he's apparently from Boston, so they all loved him. Then we've got on the right, Rod Argent also on keyboards. In the back right we have Sheila E on drums and to her left Ringo Starr on drums (of course!). I think there may have been some other members of the band, but I don't recall who.

Each member did a few of their own songs, most of which I didn't know, but a few sounded somewhat familiar. Rod Argent did a song, which I believe is called "She's Not There" which I've heard and liked, but didn't know who did it. Sheila E sang a song about everybody wants a love song or something. Edgar Winter did a craaazy far out instrumental, Frankenstein. One of the guitarists did a song and kept saying the last line over and over and dragging it out until someone came up and put a towel over him, but even then he had to keep going. It's annoying when they do that and keep dragging the song out and you start clapping but they still have to do another "DUN!" "DUN!" "DUUUUUN!" CRASH! You know what I mean? And then you either keep clapping for five minutes until they decide to end it or stop clapping and start and stop and start…!

Sheila E did a few drum solos. She's pretty good. Much better than me. But I think the fact that she's a *girl* drummer made her that much more impressive. I don't know if it was unfairly more impressive, but I suppose so. I suspect if she was a guy she may not have had such a big applause and all, but you never know. I'm no music critic.

Ringo did (in no particular order) Act Naturally, I Wanna Be Your Man, What Goes On, Yellow Submarine, Choose Love, and Memphis in Your Mind. When he was up front of the stage, running around, I found it a little awkward. I mean, Ringo's the drummer! He's supposed to be in the back! "Hey, you all right back there, Bonzo?" It was strange, for me at least. And he is so short! Heh heh.

After "Memphis In Your Mind" Ringo says something about "well, usually after this song we all run away and hide in the dark… we all know we're gonna come back out here anyway, so tonight we are breaking tradition!" So instead of going off and then coming back for the encore, they just did it right there. How cool.

For the encore, what could they do but "With A Little Help From My Friends". And that was it. Then they were gone.

In closing, I'd like to keep the idea in my head that Ringo was looking at me through most of the concert. He kept looking in my general direction, and I mean, my green hat must stand out. When we were in the parking lot someone said something about my hat and let me go down the stairs first. Then during the concert as someone was passing by he said he liked my hat and asked if I liked fishing, but I think he may have been drunk. But obviously, this is a cool hat. I'll just wear it to all my concerts and everyone will just naturally be drawn to look at it and point at me and say "you! Backstage! Now!" And I'll go "TEEHEE" and run away. And he *so* waved at me in WALHFMF at the "I need somebody to love" part. Even though those losers way up in front of me were waving, he was looking at the lime green hat.

The end. Oh yeah. All right.

I mean, there's more I could say, but this is an awful laptop and connection and computer and everything and it keeps freezing and blah blah blah so good night.