Monday, August 15, 2011

311 & Sublime With Rome at Gexa Energy Pavilion (You+Dallas)

After forty consecutive days of triple-digit heat here in Dallas, 311 and Sublime With Rome brought the cooler weather and great vibes on that Saturday night.

Doors opened at 6:30PM and shortly after Sublime With Rome surprised the audience when they walked onstage well before their scheduled set time. A lifelong Sublime fan, I was curious to see how the crowd would react to Sublime With Rome, the reconstructed version of the California band, after the death of lead singer Bradley Nowell.

Sublime With Rome blew the doors off with Sublime song “Smoke Two Joints” to the delight of the crowd. They played a couple new songs off of their new album Yours Truly with the same reggae jams that fit the expectations. There were the same characteristics of Sublime with their style, audience and two-thirds of the band members. It was an awesome concert, but for me, Sublime was way more edgy with their lyrics in comparison to Sublime With Rome.

“Wrong Way” was played five songs in and it was then that the crowd really woke up. Many knew all the words and Rome let the audience fill in a couple of verses. Jared Watson, lead singer of the Dirty Heads, joined Rome to produce a unique sound. They ended their set with two fantastic Sublime covers, “What I Got” and “Santeria”.

Then the guys I have seen over 20 times in concert took the stage. Opening with “Beautiful Disaster” the crowd was jumping and singing like it was the greatest moment of their life.

The majority of the band members are in their 40′s and they are still going super strong. They played the drum solo as usual with a combo drum for S.A. and Tim, then the same for Nick and P-Nut. From what I can recall, the reaction from the audience was much stronger than usual during Chad’s beginning solo.

Old school favorite “All Mixed Up” really had the crowd feeling the jive. “Looks like another one of those nights here in Dallas!” said Nick.

“Amber” slowed it down and the crowd sang the entire song. Then Nick introduced P-Nut who played a solo ending with his usual fist in the hand ritual. 311’s most well known song “Down” was played to perfection before the encore where the crowd was out-of-control loud.

They came back for the encore with “Omaha Stylee” and ended with “Creatures” for another perfect 311 show.

After seeing 311 twice in Las Vegas, New Jersey, Kansas City and even for “311 Day” in New Orleans, these guys just know how to put on a show.

311 consistently perfects from beginning to end each song and gives their fans the crowd experience that they anticipate each show. These guys never cease to amaze me.

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