The State Theater
New Brunswick, NJ
September 14, 1996
On Saturday September 14th, 1996 I went to see "Weird Al" and The Bad Hair Band live only about a 3-minute walk away from where I lived for 2 years while at school in Rutgers. Four friends, James Van Dyke, Jason Greschler, Brandon Masters, and Adam Bahri joined me. This was Adam and Brandon's first concert, Jay's second and James's fourth. Well they picked a great Al concert!
The concert was the best one I've ever been too! The energy of the crowd was incredible, plus Yoda helped to energize them even more. We had really nice seats right in the middle of the theater. The State Theater is a really nice decent size theater with really big seats. I know you are probably saying what's the big deal about seats? But every other concert with the exception of one where I sat on folding chairs in a convention center was standing room only so it felt nice to be able to sit and enjoy an Al concert.
But who wants to hear about seats?
We've all seen or heard about the set list, so I won't post it. Nothing unusual about this show except for some reason in the middle of "Melanie" Al stopped singing and said they screwed up and went onto the drum solo. I'm not quite sure why though.
Have you ever seen those cardboard cut outs of famous people? Well I found one of Yoda the day before the concert so I brought it along. Right as the taped "Fun Zone" started I stood up and held it high above my head and everyone behind me yelled and cheered so everyone in front turned around and did the same thing! It was cool.
Then, during "The Biggest Ball Of Twine in Minnesota," someone started a conga line and naturally I joined it. Well on my first pass of my seat someone handed me Yoda so he was joining in on the conga line and got cheers too. But security stopped the conga line. They were no fun! :( They also made me stop taking pictures, the nerve of them.
Anyway during the encore, which is "Yoda," everyone sitting around me starts screaming for me to go up so I hand Yoda to my 13 year old cousin, Brandon, and he runs up to the stage stands in front of it and holds up Yoda with such enthusiasm and the place go crazy. This was the first time the balcony had seen it too! It was so much fun.
Anyway after the show I got to talk with Bermuda, Al, and Steve Jay. Actually everyone was there but that's all I got a chance to talk to. My friend James and I brought autographed spatulas and gave them to Bermuda and Al as a token of our thanks. What better way to say thanks than with the gift of a spatula? Bermuda signed a hat that I had that Jay gave me when he visited Bermuda (the island). Bermuda said he should get one of those.
Al signed Yoda, and recognized James and I from Toad's Place! We posed as a group with Al and the spatula and he also said to me, as a joke, "Bermuda really doesn't like your sig. He was just being nice!" It was so much fun! Unfortunately, the film got ruined before I got to get the picture developped.
A while ago I found a CD of African music that Steve Jay compiled when he lived in Africa, so I brought it. He was happy to see it. We then talked forever about what Africa is like and he was telling me all about what he did there and stuff and it was a lot of fun actually talking human to human with 3 of my heroes. Steve said that he didn't own that on CD and he said that he'd have to go out and order a case.
By then we were the last people left in the theater so security kicked us out. I told you security was being a pain! We asked Bermuda to go out and hang out with us but the band was leaving right after the show to go to Cincinnati so he really couldn't. I doubt Al would have liked a fat cat (a Rutgers favorite) anyway. He's a strict vegetarian.