Welcome to part one. This thing looks like it’ll cover four parts in total. Get yourself a pillow. . .

I’m one of those “bridge and tunnel” people that New York City denizens loathe so much. Except I’m not the obnoxious kind that feels the need to scream at the top of their lungs on the city streets just to prove I’m cool or something. I don’t know what that’s all about.

I visit the city sparingly. A comic-con here, a friend up for vacation there, and the occasional acquaintance’s birthday party that I’m inclined to attend. I don’t go in just for the sake of going in. I don’t brag to my co-workers on Monday morning of the adventures I had in “the city.”

I hate the city: It stinks. It’s crowded. It’s loud.

But every now and then, it has something that cannot be missed. Last week, that was an O.A.R. concert. In case you’re just joining this web site, O.A.R. is a band I got turned onto in the summer of 2003 when I caught their appearance on the Conan O’Brien show on a cable repeat. They’re a band that formed in college and tour relentlessly. Taking their inspiration from everyone from the Beatles to Bob Marley to U2, they’re a continual work in progress. They allow — and encourag — fans to record their shows and pass them along. They recorded a couple of demo CDs in college and sold tens of thousands of them at concerts across the nation, growing an audience slowly over time.

In the past couple of years, signs of growth have been there. A band that once played in bars and backyards graduated to small clubs and seatless venues and festivals. Those clubs turned into smaller concert hall type places, and grew past 10,000 for the first time at the PNC Arts Center in Holmdel, NJ in 2004. It was my first concert. My second was the following summer at the same place — again, their biggest crowd.

With a big push behind them with their new album, “Stories of a Stranger,” they booked Madison Square Garden for a concert on January 14, 2006. 17,000+ attended it last weekend — a dream for the band made real through years of hard work and persistence.

I took the 6:32 p.m. train into the city on Saturday night. It was a bitter cold night, with a good wind and some rain blowing about. Circles of teenagers were at the train station, but I figured they couldn’t all be going the same place I was going, right?

Wrong. Bits of conversation proved they were all going to the same place as I was. The thing about OAR is that they draw a young crowd. While they try to move themselves away from the idea of being a “college band,” they still get the bulk of their fanbase on college campuses and high schools. I feel old every time I go to one of their concerts. Aside from a few scattered parental chaperones, I’m the oldest one in the room. But, hey, there’s nothing better than an anthropological study of youth today in their natural environment, right?

I wonder, for example, how comfortable those girls were in their tank tops and low cut jeans in the 30 degree weather once they got off the train. At least one of the crew was smart enough to bring a jacket. The boys seemed to rely on hoodies and the awkward longness of their shirts to keep dry.

I also wonder how people can hold conversations while blasting music into their ears through their iPods.

Pardon the digression. . .

The way the train system around here works, you only have to travel a block over to MSG from where the PATH train puts you in the city. A more seasoned NYC traveler could probably point out an underground path directly into there, but that wouldn’t be me. I had to walk the block. The concrete canyons funnel the wind beautifully. A 30 MPH wind picks up twice that speed in the city. The cold sleet-like rain pounded mercilessly down on the fools who congregated under open skies. I was one of those fools for a few minutes, and it was bone chilling. My umbrella barely made it alive. I saw a couple of others turn out. I was lucky.

I had been to MSG a couple of times in the past, but it was always for a comic book convention, never a concert or even a sporting event. (If you can call a Knicks or Rangers game a sporting event these days. . . ) So this was a thrill. Not only did I have a ticket for this concert, but I was sitting on the FLOOR, 14th row. I was all of 30 feet away from the stage.

I picked up a t-shirt at the hallway t-shirt vendor. He didn’t have the style I liked in my XL size, so I had to go with a sloppy second choice, but it’s still pretty cool. There were three or four different shirts produced for just this concert. There was a nice grey one with the letters of OAR spelled out like subway signs.

After passing a couple of ushers, I landed in a seat in the middle of the section. Great. Time to be awkward and annoying to people. I’m nearly 6′4″. Nobody wants to stand behind me at a concert. I felt sorry for the girls behind me, but about halfway through the concert, that feeling passed. I don’t think either of them was feeling much. I’m not sure if it was pot or booze, but they were in a state that probably produced three of me in front of them. Great. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

I haven’t touched on the Jewish rapper on stage.

That’s for tomorrow. . .

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 21st, 2006 at 9:48 am and is filed under Music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.