Live 8
Park Place, Barrie ON
July 2, 2005
bands: African Guitar Summit, Barenaked Ladies, Blue Rodeo, Bruce Cockburn, Bryan Adams, The Bachman Cummings Band (who turned out to be just Bachman, with some other people), Deep Purple, DMC, Doba Caracol featuring Kna'an, Gordon Lightfoot, Great Big Sea, Jann Arden, Jet, Les Trois Accords, Motley Crue, Neil Young, Our Lady Peace, Sam Roberts, Simple Plan, The Tragically Hip, Tom Cochrane

Let me start by saying: Live 8 was absolutely incredible. Being a part of something so big was moving and powerful, and I really think that we can make a difference. Visit Live8Live.com to add your name to the petition to end poverty.

Now... on to the actual story! (click for bigger images)

The day started out at around 6:30am, when I awoke from a very restless sleep. By about 8:15am, the car was gassed up, the snacks were packed, the sunscreen was slathered, the tunes were blaring, the coffee was poured, and my good friend Katy and I were ready to hit the road.

mmm... coffee

Katy finds ways to entertain herself

Having driven the route to Barrie many times on previous concert weekends, I had assumed there would be lots of traffic. So I burned us two cd's of great summer/driving tunes. As it turned out... there was no traffic at all!

WEE! No Traffic!

I drove the entire way, going about 120km/h! We made it there in under half an hour. There appeared to be no lineup, so we went to Tim Hortons down the street. Stayed there for about half an hour... but by the time we left, and decided to head over to the venue to park the car, the lineup to get inside stretched for at least a kilometer, all the way from the entrance, down the ramp to get on the 400 north! So, we decided to chill in the car with our tunes for a little longer.

Rock On!

A police officer told us that we should go the opposite way of the lineup, because it would be shorter. But then, when we got to the other side, we didn't find another lineup, and we felt bad about cutting in. So we started walking to the back of the line. Luckily, we found a huge break in the line (probably from people having to wait to cross a light at an intersection), and we jumped in there. We ended up getting in in no time. (Unlike many of my friends, who tried to cut in, but ended up having to go to the back of the line... oh well!) They barely even checked our backpacks, so all of our food was allowed in - which was great, because food is so overpriced at Park Place, and we didn't have to buy food all day!

So, first thing we did upon getting in there was visit the Make Poverty History tent, where we donated some money, picked up some white wristbands, and signed our names to the campaign. We looked at some overpriced merch (although, proceeds were being donated to the cause, so I didn't feel too bad about that - I decided I wanted to buy a book, but didn't buy it just then, because I didn't want to carry it around for the rest of the day)

We made our way up to the front, left side of the stage. Tom Cochrane opened the show, with Life Is A Highway.

Our vantage point for Tom Cochrane

Even early in the day, the crowd was rather large. However, everyone was totally cool. No chaos or anything. I accidentally spilled some water on the dude next to me, and he was super nice about it.
Next up was Sam Roberts, who played a couple of his more popular songs, but left out Don't Walk Away, Eileen, which I would've liked to have heard.

Sam Roberts on stage

The day was also about hanging with some good friends. I met up, at the back of the park, with my friend Meredith, and some of her friends,as well as some other friends throughout the day.

The crowd, from the back of the field, was a very impressive sight. This wasn't even full to capacity yet:

Made my way back to Katy for Bryan Adams' set. He was also at the first Live Aid concert, if I'm not mistaken, so it was pretty cool to see him back, as a veteran, this time around. I was a little disappointed that he didn't play Summer of '69, as was most of the crowd in my general area. But it was very cool, and humble, of him, to interrupt his set, in order to join the "International Click Moment", where everyone at the Live 8 concerts around the world, snapped their fingers every 3 seconds, in order to symbolize how often someone is dying in Africa because of poverty. It was a very poignant moment.

After Bryan Adams, Katy and I decided that we wanted to get a little closer to the action. We saw huge open spaces on the other side of the camera rig, so we thought it might be a good idea to try to work our way through the crowds. At this point... we encountered some not so pleasant people. Granted, we were trying to make our way to the front, in a very crowded atmosphere, but there were some very rude comments directed at us, like "ugh! There's NO WHERE to GO!" etc... (however, I must roll my eyes at the fact that there were dozens of people who had blankets spread out, right in the centre area. It's a concert people! If you want to sit, go to the back, and let the people who want to stand up front through. People need to learn the etiquette of huge concerts like that)

Anyway. We made our way right to the front, and there was plenty of room. The crowd up at the front was SUPER nice. We made friends with some singer dude with nice hair, who had superhero powers. (hahaha)

Our hosts, Dan Akroyd & Tom Green

Up next were Doba Caracol from Montreal. I'd never heard of them before, but it was pretty cool. These two dreaded girls took the stage, front and centre, and started playing some great rhythms on various hand drums and percussive instruments. It was very cool to watch, being a drummer myself. They also had pretty decent voices. Some of the people in the crowd around me didn't really get it, but for those of us who did, it was very enjoyable.

Hanging out in between sets, enjoying the scenery

Next came Simple Plan. Now, I'm not a huge fan of theirs (in fact, I would've much rather have seen Billy Talent as the "punk" contingent to the show!) but they were pretty good, and they did get the crowd really into it, especially the younger people in the audience. And they played "Welcome To My Life" which is the only song of theirs that I actually like! I got some pretty cool shots of them:

Continued!