poster 12- covered in blood

feb 26th, originally uploaded by rebecca ann rakstad.
Bobby Hilliard
I grew up at the fireside bowl, without it I would be a much different person.
It was the like a YMCA or Social club for kids who had nowhere else to go.
I had other friends but, I made friends there that I still hang out with and talk to solely because we met from going to so many shows together and eventually, got to know one another and through the years had one another's back if something went wrong with an outsider who didn't understand the concept of hardcore dancing or punk kids smashing into one another, or head walking. It was all fun.
Saving your money for the show that week, five dollars to get in and hopefully enough left over to get some food and maybe a cd or a shirt off the band if you got lucky.
Hardcore shows, punk, ska, metal, all kinds of awful bands you had to sit through but it didn't matter.
The screwed up lanes, the bathroom being so dirty you'd swear if you sat down on the toilet you'd get an STD. Everything down to the tables in the back, the righteous liberation people who wanted to beat you up for smoking and eating a cheeseburger and wanted to beat you up even more for not visiting their vegan propaganda table.
Getting show lists that had someone you've heard of one night and ten other bands you've never heard of for the next ten nights. In a lot of cases, you still went anyhow just to hang out and maybe buy a new shirt to wear to high school the next day.
The dank smell that permeated the air and it was a smell you'll never forget in a million years. I'll walk into somewhere to this day and if I smell something remotely close, I'll say to someone " smells like the fireside in here"
Seeing bands like Poison the Well arrive two hours late because of a snowstorm even though the show was supposed to end at ten, still went on at ten thirty. Even though people left because of the weather, it still went on. No one complained about getting their money back, because they knew the band needed it, even though they couldn't stay that late.
The Dillinger escape plan show for three dollars, complete with a guy blowing fire into the crowd that was very much over any allowable fire safety codes.
Hatebreed showing up late for a show, luckily it was in the middle of summer and even though they arrived late they played every song they had at the time to make it up to everyone who stayed. Shane, Jim, Anton, they guys who kept Chicago hardcore in business.
Slapsticks last show, Botch playing two shows in one day, Converge and Glassjaw playing back to back shows. The Bollweevils, New Found Glory, Screech Weasel, the Smoking Popes, Rise against, Unearth, Coalesce, Fallout boy, Shadows Fall, Strife, Snapcase, Vision of Disorder, Earth Crisis (speaking of Earth Crisis, who remembers when Pete Wentz of Fallout boy was maybe 100 pounds soaking wet with blonde dreadlocks and was obsessed with EXC?).
Some of my best memories were spent in that disgusting, dark, smelly little room. I've gotten punched, kicked, covered in blood, sweat and other unsavory substances. But, would I ever trade it in? Never, it was essential in making me who I am today and I'll take that to my grave.