BeatNonStop A Weblog by Chris Macias Bee pop music critic Music geek (n. myü-zik 'gEk) 1: A person who proudly wore KISS commemorative pajamas in third grade. 2: A person who owns multiple copies of the same album, still buys vinyl and has a room dedicated to 2,000 or so CDs and records. 3. A person who wrote a five-part series about traveling with a local band in their stinky van - and loved every minute of it. 4: Chris Macias, the Bee's pop music critic, serving Sacramento's music scene since 1999.

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August 25, 2005

Petty thoughts

I'm kicking back in my kitchen right now with some coffee and "The Waiting" playing on my boom box. It's my way of decompressing after last night's excellent Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers/Black Crowes bill at the Sleep Train Amphitheatre. (Check my review at sacticket.com).

I've seen Petty and company quite a few times over the years, and it's always a quality rock 'n' roll experience with tasty guitar heroics and time-honored songs. I kind of became a Petty fan by accident. I'd grown up on FM rock radio, so songs like "The Waiting" and "Refugee" were ingrained in my musical memory. But I'd never paid to see him live until the early 1990s. And I only went to that show at the old Cal Expo Amphitheatre to see Petty's opening act, the mighty Replacements. The Replacements were unfortunately a drunken mess, and not in that fun, punk rock kind of way. They were just sloppy and uninspired. My friends and I stuck around for Petty's set, and soon found ourselves singing along and having a hell of a time. The guitars were loud and melodic, the songs stately and rockin'. He even played an early version of "Free Fallin'," and after such a good time we all gave our props to Petty.

Posted by cmacias at 12:38 PM | Comments |