Kent and I were excited for him, and wanting to be supportive, purchased tickets. We certainly didn't want to stay at the show past Brandt's part, but we wanted to be there to hear and watch him do his thing. The party started at 9:00 and he was told he should be ready to play for about half an hour. I saw him in the afternoon when I came home from lunch and asked if he had been practicing at all. He seemed fairly unconcerned, but Izzy and I both said, "Dude, you should practice!" so he went down and made some loud music.
He left for West Valley and set up before I got home, but Kent and I left at 7:40 with plenty of time to get to the venue. And what a venue it was! Couple things to say about West Valley, which are observations, not criticisms. West Valley is a down-on-your-luck part of Salt Lake Valley, with many buildings that are closed and boarded up. We could tell we were not in Happy Valley anymore, and felt that we needed to be vigilant and hyper aware of what was going on around us. The venue looked like an old 7-11. We got there about 8:30 and texted Brandt. He said they weren't opening until 9:00, so we sat in the car in the parking lot and watched people coming to the event. We saw lots of young men, pants hanging low, looking like hoodlums.
At 8:55 Brandt said he was going to start and we could come in. We showed our tickets and entered. Brandt came right up and leaned in to give me a hug, then said into my ear, "Don't drink the punch. It's alcoholic." It goes without saying that Kent and I were the oldest people there. There were only a few other young people when we arrived, but a young man introduced himself to Kent. We sat in a corner and tried unsuccessfully to be inconspicuous.
Brandt played his music. It was loud. The bass felt like it was rearranging my heartbeat. A group of four girls had come in and they seemed to be into the music. They were sort of dancing together and singing along. He was going an ABBA set with the addition of an underlying heavy bass track. Did I mention my heartbeat? There was a decided division between young men and young women, and if the small of pot hadn't hung heavy in the air, I might have thought we were at a stake dance. While we could certainly avoid drinking the punch, I asked Kent how we were going to avoid getting high in the hot boxing.
Brandt only played for about fifteen minutes before the main DJ was ready to go. Sort of. He was having problems getting his board to work. It was new and he wasn't entirely comfortable with the controls. Brandt's co-worker said it seemed likely he didn't know how to work it because he stole it. That's not nice, but wouldn't be surprising. Brandt came over and said he was done and that he wasn't going to linger. He would load up his gear and we could go. I suggested we go get some dinner as he hadn't eaten, and he agreed. We made our way outside, most likely followed by a huge sigh of relief from the organizer of the event. He did say to Brandt that he thought it was "dope" that his parents would show up. It didn't seem like this particular crowd had had a lot of parental support through their lives, but that might just be me making assumptions based on physical appearance.
We drove south, away from West Valley, before we stopped for food. Brandt said he did not want to stay at all and was glad other people were in charge of strike. It was not quite what any of us had thought it was going to be, but it was good experience nevertheless. Brandt said he is going to be a bit pickier about who he agrees to DJ for. The guy who had organized everything told Brandt he did a great job, and they would love to have him come back for another show. Brandt was non-committal. I think Kent and I will be a bit pickier about which shows we attend too.
Click on this link to see video.
Maybe.
If it works.
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