checkyoulater's Journal: SARStock review

For those interested, yesterday was the largest concert in Canadian history. Offically called Rolling Stones Rocks for Toronto, but unofficially called SARStock. If I had to sum it up in a word: Amazing.

We arrived at around 1pm, and the place was already packed. The best spot we could find was about 600 metres from the stage. We could see the stage, but the performers looked quite small. The first highlight of the day was a CF-18 flying over the park, doing a large circle, and then zipping away. Plenty of video monitors and speakers, though. Sound quality was iffy, especially for the earlier bands. For one band (The Tea Party) the sound was really screwed, and we couldn't even hear the guitars. It wasn't fixed until the last song of their set. By the time the second act started, the sound was louder, and somewhat better. It wasn't perfect until AC/DC took the stage however. I don't think this is anything to do with the bands, but more to do with the shitty speaker we happened to be near.

The best band of the night was by far AC/DC. I had never seen them live before. I wasn't sure what to expect, but they absolutely rocked the place. It took a lot out of us to be sitting in the sun all day, and it was hard to get into some of the earlier bands because of the heat. (And other reasons, this is Canada after all!) AC/DC came on around 8pm, so the air had cooled down substantially, and it seemed to give the crowd a boost. Brian Johnson sounded like he always does, and Angus Young's guitar sound was fantastic. A perfect crunchy rock guitar, backed by massive stacks of Marshall tube amps. He got the crowd screaming when he did a strange stripteas to the song The Jack, and pulled off his pants to reveal a pair of Canadian flag underwear. I would rate their performance a 9 out of 10. It would have been a 10 if they had played Who Made Who.

Rush was second best, in my opinion. They happen to be my favourite band, and are one of the best live bands in the world. Unfortunately they only got to play for 35 minutes. What they did play was good, however. Opened up with Tom Sawyer, then Limelight. A nice surprise was to hear Rush play Paint It, Black. Towards the end of the set, the sound had greatly improved. Geddy Lee played a great bass solo, Alex and Neil were as tight as ever, and the only bad thing about the set was that it was too short.

After Rush and AC/DC, the main event was coming up. Of course, it was the Stones. They were as good as they usually are, or as good as I have heard live recordings. I hadn't seen the Stones before, so I was quite excited about seeing them. Sound quality was good enough, and they played the songs that people wanted to hear. Opened up with Start Me Up, and then played Brown Sugar. They slowed it down with Ruby Tuesday, and then Keith Richards decided to sing a song, and talk to the audience for a while. That lasted about 10 minutes, and luckily Mick came back to get things back on track. They played Gimme Shelter, and after a few more songs ended with Satisfaction. The encore was Jumpin' Jack Flash, which sounded amazing. Mick even work a Toronto t shirt, with the Rolling Stones Lips as the second O in Toronto. All in all, a decent set, and great event.

Some negative points:

Justin Timberlake being included in this concert. I guess the kids and the girls like him, but I hate him and his music. It didn't fit in at all. The fact that he did a duet with Mick on Miss You made it even worse. Great for Justin, I guess, but shitty for the rest of us. Somebody in the front section actually had a sign that said Justin's A Fag. Plus he had plastic bottles thrown at him. That should have been the first hint to end the set quickly.

Too much time elapsed between AC/DC and The Rolling Stones. We sat around for almost 45 minutes after AC/DC left the stage. That definitly took some emotion out of the crowd, and quite a few people started to leave before the Stones even took the stage.

The first few bands really sucked. If this was supposed to be a world-class concert, why include shitty Canadian bands? Why not get good Canadian bands? La Chicane, Kathleen Edwards, Sam Roberts, Isley Brothers, Timberlake, to me are lower-tiered performers, and should have been replaced with bands like The Tragically Hip, Barenaked Ladies. Get less bands, but better ones, and let them play longer sets. Rush and The Guess Who should have played longer.

Food lineups were insanely long. Luckily they let us bring in our own food, so I was fine with my sandwiches.

Beer tents were packed, and some had a 2 hour wait to get inside. You had to buy tickets at one booth, which only took a few minutes, then wait in line to get into the beer tent. It took 2 of my friends 10 minutes to walk from the front to the back of the line. Needless to say, we decided we'd rather watch the concert than wait in line for 6 dollar beers.

We decided to walk the 6km home, as opposed to waiting hours for a bus. It was quite impressive to see thousands of people walking down city streets at 12am. I was also impressed with how fast the place cleared out. There was never a time when we weren't moving on the way out. The crowd all moved at a good pace, and the foot traffic flowed nicely down the surrounding streets. Took about an hour and a half to walk to our neighborhood, and we even made it to our local pub before last call. That was a well deserved and thoroughly enjoyed beer.

All in all, a great concert. I am happy that I was there, and I can say I was part of that record setting crowd. I think there will probably be a DVD released before long. I am curious how it will sound on video, hearing the sound right out of the mixing board. I will certainly buy one, as will probably most people who were there. I am curious how much media attention this event was given outside of Canada. It was supposed to prove to the world that Toronto is a safe place to travel to. They even premiered a new promotional video about Toronto. I guess only time will tell, but I doubt we'll see any increases in tourism until next year.