The instruments were covered in floral arrangements, and at first I thought they were tacky silk flowers. Not too long into the show, however, the guitarist dressed head to toe in spandex grabbed some of the flowers and hurled them into the crowd. They were real roses! I caught a white one that was in full bloom. Sydney and someone else caught roses as well.
My beautiful rose! Too bad it's perishable and can't come home with me.
On Sunday after horseback riding I took the bus to Creekside for another delicious lunch at Samurai Sushi and then went back into town. Unsure of what exactly I was going to do, I got off the bus at the top of the village and walked down through the congested streets. There was a huge crowd in the Village Square listening to a concert at Whistler Live. After navigating across the two slow-moving lanes of pedestrian traffic, I stood at the edge of the crowd to listen. The band was awesome! I asked someone next to me what the band it was, and a girl told me they were called Sam Roberts Band, a Canadian group. Not only did I love their music, they put on a great concert complete with crowd interaction. The lead singer, Sam Roberts, made a point of acknowledging the accomplishments of the athletes, which I really appreciated. When they were finished, I promptly headed to Blenz to download their CDs from iTunes.
On the way down to Blenz, however, I made a few more stops. First I watched some speed skating with French commentary at the Omega bobsled, and was entertained by a marching band of middle school aged kids. I also received a cool gray hat that says Omega - Official Timekeeper and has the Olympic rings on it in white.
I paused again on my way to Blenz to listen to an acoustic cover of Wonderwall outside The Brewhouse right before the duo moved inside to escape the onset of dropping temperatures. What you cannot fully appreciate is that the space between Whistler Live, where Sam Roberts was playing, and The Brewhouse is only a few city blocks and in that space I heard three very different live performances. I understand that the frequency of free outdoor concerts is not a normal Whistler occurrence but rather due to the presence of the Games, yet Whistler does traditionally host live music performances in their many bars.
As I continued my walk toward Blenz I called Steve Ernst, the VANOC employee who had escorted us into the mosh pit for the Medals Ceremony the night before, to see if he could get five of us in to Medals that night for the OneRepublic concert. “Regrettably” (his words, so sincerely Canadian) he had the night off and he apologized that he would not be able to get us in, but he encouraged me to hang onto his number and call him for any other shows we wanted to get in to.
Fortunately, as we watched the end of the Medals Ceremony (including Bode Miller’s gold!) we saw that the Plaza was quickly emptying after the conclusion of the ceremony. We listened to the first OneRepublic song from our perch on the wall at the playground, then made the decision to enter the quickly moving standby line. By the end of the second song of the set, we were inside the Plaza. We moved our way up towards the front and enjoyed an awesome performance by one of my favorite bands. They played a good mix of new and old stuff, and I downloaded the new album the first chance I got.
Just as the Sam Roberts Band did, OneRepublic put on a great show including giving respect to the athletes and interacting with the crowd. The lead singer, Ryan Tedder talked about walking around Whistler and noticing that the whole town smelt like maple syrup. He joked that he wasn’t sure if it was because of all the Canadian flags featuring the maple leaf, but then explained that they learned a local business had been handing out maple candies to all the kids running around.
I also have to give props to OneRepublic’s music for incorporating instruments such as the cello (which I LOVE!!!), the viola, and the glockenspiel (similar to a xylophone). They’re from Colorado, so hopefully I’ll get more chances to see them when I move out there this summer.
OneRepublic cellist / base guitarist, Brent Kutzle
OneRepublic violist / lead guitarist / backup vocalist Zach Filkins.
Yesterday Steve Ernst went out of his way to call me to again apologize for not being able to get me in to the mosh pit for OneRepublic, and to let me know he was working the rest of the week. I was so touched by this, and reassured that he was genuinely happy to get us in. He said the only concert that might be an issue is Usher, which I wasn’t planning on going to anyway. I will, however, be calling him tonight to get us into The Fray!
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