Yesterday, Rhea and I headed to Milwaukee to see Andrew WK perform his I Get Wet album in its entirety. We Got to Milwaukee about 5pm and checked in to our hotel; the Ambassador Hotel, which turned out just perfect as it was no more than a minutes walk to the AWK show at The Rave. The hotel was nice even though some of the reviews online weren’t so favourable. We had no complaints. Everything was just fine. We relaxed for a while before getting some Taco Bell for dinner. Good stuff! Cheap tacos for dinner… What could possibly go wrong? Thankfully for us, nothing. We chowed down on our food and headed to the gig. We walked in and the gig was downstairs in some crazy underground lookin’ bar. It was kinda cool. Decent sound and stage size and upon walking in, we were given free tickets to see Janes Addiction the following night. Um, let’s put this into perspective… Did the tickets sell that badly for this show that they have to give away 2 tickets to every person who walks through the door or were we just lucky? Not that I care cos Janes Addiction aren’t my thing at all but still, you’d think these guys would be pretty popular.
The first act on was some rap rock electronica one man show called Alestair X… or something. Not my thing at all.
Next was Math The Band. Another band mixing electronica and rock. The difference being that they are a 2 piece band and have a minimal drum kit (one drum and one cymbal). They were ok; again, not my thing but the kids dug ‘em!
Next up was Andrew WK. They were celebrating the 10 year anniversary of his I Get Wet album and for this special occasion, they were playing it in its entirety. From the moment they started, the crowd went nuts. It was insane! As he tore through the album by song after song, I was getting so exhausted. I mean, I was just standing there but watching AWK is enough to tire you out. He played an additional 8 songs to the album, finishing with We Want Fun, of course. By the time this song was coming to an end, it seemed like a third of the audience was on stage with him. Now, I don’t mind people stage diving at shows but I really don’t understand those who jump on stage with the whole “hey, look at me!” thing going on. I mean, dude, really, if you wanna be on stage, start a fuckin’ band! Still, I was not going to let these jerks ruin my night. After the show we returned to our hotel and crashed.
Waking up the next day (today), we were greeted with some dreary weather. The fog was thick and intense… At almost 11am. Crazy! We headed off to a diner called Katie’s diner as apparently it was inspired by Happy Days. It looked nothing like Arnold’s but their pancakes are awesome breakfast. Was a good feed.
From their we headed to Value Village which is a giant thrift store; then Vortex comics so Rhea could get some more study materials (ie. comics). I picked up some Halloween comics (yeah, like the horror movies) so I can use the art for a Michael Myers tattoo. Yep.
We also hit up Collectors Edge comics and some record stores. We went to Rushmore records which was all new stock which was a shame. I did grab the self titled album by The Goodnight Album though but that was it. Headed to Rushmore Records after that which was filled with second hand records as well as new stuff. Bought a good amount of stuff on the cheap there so that was exciting. Got some Journey records that I didn’t have, a rare Radio Birdman limited release, a Dubrovniks album, and a couple 12″ singles by the Ramones and the Nomads. Not a bad day at all.
To finish off our time in Milwaukee, we went and did the obligatory photos at the Fonz statue. Yes, Milwaukee has a bronze statue of Arthur Fonzarelli from the show, Happy Days. Got the photos, smiles all round, we left. Got on to the highway and headed back to Chicago.
On the way home we stopped at the Mars Cheese Castle in Kenosha. It’s a castle shaped building that houses… Yep, you guessed it… Cheese! I grabbed some chocolates from there cos I’m random like that. Oh, and cos I love chocolate. These were über tasty too!
Once back in Chicago, we had dinner at a place called Gino’s. It’s a deep dish pizza place and we had a cheese pizza. The waitress thought I was from England and when I told her that I was Australian, she told me that was even cooler. I guess not many Aussies visit Rolling Meadows. Regardless, I did and the food was delish! Yumbo!
We returned home from that and Rhea fell asleep pretty quickly. I am now sitting up awake writing this at 2:02am and technically I should be sleeping cos I never get a decent sleep. I mean, I should be able to sleep but this cold I caught keeps fucking with me. Coughing and spluttering. So annoying.
ANYWAY… Tomorrow I am off to interview Oderus Urungus from the band GWAR before their show tomorrow night. Good times! Let’s rock!
Time to sleep. Thanks for reading.
