I had a photography teacher in high school that would play a video of  The Eagles‘ “Hell Freezes Over” tour, almost every day in class.  Occasionally, it would be a Billy Joel concert video instead, but it was still pretty terrible.  Fortunately, I was in “advanced photography” and was able to avoid some of it.  This basically means that I would step past the rest of the class and puff chronic herbs out of Country Time Lemonade cans in the dark room.  One day I came to class and was surprised to see that the TV playing  We’re All Devo, a VHS featuring music videos and original SNL cast member turned voice-over actress, Laraine Newman.  It wasn’t too difficult to locate the kid who brought in the DEVO video, because he was the only one that was even paying attention to the screen.  Besides that kid, the only other person that I knew who was really vocal about their appreciation for the group, was my friend Crackbaby G.  It was the mid -90s, and nobody at my suburban high school really gave a shit about the, then defunct, band.  Thanks to Crackbaby, in 2006, I was finally able to achieve my dream of seeing DEVO live for the first time.  This month, I was finally able to combine my love of photography with an opportunity to witness the bands on- stage theatrics all over again.

Much like The Pixies, DEVO has set out on a limited city tour, scheduled to coincide with a deluxe album re-release.  The Ultra DEVO-LUX Ltd. Edition packaging will feature their debut album, Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo, and the commercially successful Freedom of Choice.  The double re-issue will also contain unreleased material, 2 DVDs, a poster, and a yellow 7 inch vinyl.  The tour itself  involves a 2 night stop in each of 6 different major cities.  The first of the nights features the group performing Are We Not Men? in its entirety, while the second night involves them giving the same treatment to Freedom of Choice.  I knew that DEVO was scheduled to perform a pair of dates in Seattle, but I had also accepted that I was probably not going to be able to see either of them.  I tried to jump on it and request passes the day that the press release was sent out, but it was a difficult ticket to get and the comp. tickets were all accounted for by radio stations.  As someone who used to listen to Are We Not Men? religiously, I was disappointed.  When the day of the show approached and I hadn’t heard any good news, I all but put the concerts out of my mind entirely.  The first night came and went but, on the second/Freedom of Choice night, I received a last minute email informing me that I could be approved for a photo pass.  The problem was that there were no more reviewer passes left.  I’ve had issues trying to enter the venue without a ticket in the past, but I was assured that shouldn’t be an issue.  This also meant that, if I wanted to stay in the venue after the 3-song limit outlined in the photo-policy, I was going to have to do so on the sly. Read the rest of this entry →