Burning Fight

I got home on Tuesday after driving out to Chicago for Burning Fight on the prior Thursday with Brizz, Andrew and Justin. This was a trip I had been looking forward to since before the tickets even went on sale and for months this feeling of anticipation was building deep inside of me. I really had no idea how things were going to be but I knew no matter what happened during the weekend of Burning Fight, it would be worth it. I couldn't have been more right.

I have been trying to transcribe my experience into a cohesive blog entry since the day I returned but I've been unable to do so, but I am going to try to anyway. If this is a mess I apologize to anyone taking the time to read this entry.

From the start of the 10:00 pre-show on Friday night I knew something was special about this event. It wasn't just a book release. It wasn't just a show where a few older bands got back together. It wasn't just a show where a few of the best and biggest hardcore bands of the present were getting together to play a show. It was truly something more than all of that...and I am having a hard time finding the right words to accurately describe it. At the risk of sounding cheesy, the word "magical" comes to mind.

Throughout the 22 bands that played (I only watched 20 of them...only! I needed a break sometime) I cannot think of a second where I didn't have a stupid smile on my face. The energy of the crowd (younger, older and in between) mixed with the pure unbridled passion that the bands poured out of themselves on the stage was a mind-blowing experience. I still think about how I first got into punk and hardcore and how it all hit me like a sack of bricks to the face and I've always had this insatiable desire to possess that feeling again. I always get such a natural high when I go to a great show that it makes me feel like everything is right in the world at that present moment, but it never quite felt the same way as the initial one-two punch the music packed on me almost 12 years ago. After all of this time I FINALLY was lucky enough to relive that feeling; not only relive it but feel something possibly even more powerful and meaningful as the past feeling. It wasn't simply the idea of Disembodied playing a show or seeing Trial put on one of the greatest sets I have EVER seen but it was the fact that these bands, old and new, were playing to a bunch of kids (and I use that term loosely) with the passion that seemed to drive them from the start and the passion that attracted the 1100 people in attendance to turn an ear to the sound to begin with. I had fucking goosebumps the entire time Unbroken played. I choked up when Reach The Sky ended their set. I cannot remember a time when i was so sore from dancing and singing-along to bands and still physically paying the price for it.

I met a few people in Chicago and everyone was awesome. It is a terrible thought if going to a show and immediately getting the feeling that some of the people in attendance got into the music for the wrong reasons and eventually use it as a stepping stone to something later in life, but the people at Burning Fight radiated nothing but positive energy and the desire of wanting to be nowhere else in the world except for right in that very spot, seeing those very bands, having those very conversations. I hate to judge the sincerity of another person but I know it is something we all do and while I try to work on it, I feel like last weekend I didn't have to with a single person because there was that one unifying theme amongst us all. The music spoke to us in a way only the people there those two nights will ever know. I am not trying to take anything away from a person who wasn't able to attend the shows, but the feeling I felt is something that I KNOW FOR A FACT nobody else could ever feel if you weren't in that room. I could honestly die knowing that I felt complete. It was some sort of zen like moment for me and I can bet my bottom dollar that everyone there had that same feeling of happiness.

Last week made me rekindle my romance with hardcore. There are times where I seem to get a little burnt out and go through my phases where I strictly listen to hip-hop and indie rock (which seem to become more and more frequent as I age) and I will never stop having an open mind about any genre of music since I would like to think I have a pretty open taste in music, but it was punk rock and hardcore that spoke to me like no other genre has, is, and will ever speak to me. The book release was a celebration to me in the fact that I didn't have to try to do anything but the entire atmosphere just dug deep into my heart and found where the passion and drive for the music was hiding and released it all along with everyone else in that room.

There is so much I want to write and I honestly have absolutely no idea if anything I had just typed out makes sense to anyone at all but I need to finally get it out. It's been a week and my mind and heart haven't come home with me, they are still in Chicago. I haven't been able to and almost don't want to stop thinking about that experience. I am trying not to dwell in the past by any means but I cannot help but think to the weekend and how I was happier than I thought was ever possible. If I did learn anything from last week it was that the past may have been incredible but we have a future and present and we need to take the momentum of the past and turn it into something positive for right here and right now...I know it may not seem like I learned that from typing up all this worshiping the events of a week ago, but I feel like that last week possessed the energy I need to make things right for the present and the future. I aim to feel that same euphoric feeling again. Maybe it won't come from music (although my life revolves around music so it would be hard not to) or maybe it will not even come at all, but at least I now feel that there is much more than going through the motions making it to the next day when I know what it feels like to be perfect for even a split second and I can take that and use it for my future. I have a feeling this is going to come across as some soul-searching rant at this point but I can honestly say if it wasn't for hardcore, my life would have probably ended a long time ago and this show could not have come at a more perfect time in my life than now.

Burning Fight made up for the best two days of my life and I wouldn't change a single thing about how anything unfolded. It gave me a breath of fresh air and I intend to keep breathing it all in.

I assume by now this is truly a jumbled, incoherent mess so I'll just leave this off with a quote which couldn't ring any more true to me than it does right now:


"I can still see the reasons that I opened my eyes to this scene in the first place. I can still count my beliefs growing stronger - stronger everyday" -Bane