I was looking forward to this year's Midtown Music Festival for one reason: silverchair!!! We arrived at the festival at around 9:00pm and Local H was on the 99x stage. I saw only thier last couple songs, but easily came to the conclusion that they suck! As they were playing their finale, 'High fiving Motherfucker', it looked like it was going to pour down rain, but luckily the storm held off all night.

When Dinosaur Jr. went on, my friend and I decided to look around at some of the other stages in the festival. As we were walking, we saw three tour buses with a small group of teenies surrounding one of them. we figured it was silverchair's bus so we decided to wait around to see if anything would happen.

After about ten minutes, Daniel peeked his head through the curtain for a quick second but none of the teenies saw him. Shortly after, Ben stuck his (bald) head outside the window and I gave him the bird. He smiled and nodded his head before going back into the bus. We waited outside the bus for a while more, but one of the roadies told us that the band was in the back of the bus talking to their management so we decided to go back to the stage.

After finding a good spot, we watched the rest of Dinosaur Jr's set. After they finished with a long, rockin', solo-filled finale song, the stage was set for silverchair. I was dissapointed to not see the familiar heating vents from the Freak video that have been a part of the live shows lately.

After waiting 15 minutes between bands, the boys took the stage. They broke into Slave with the usual pauses during the intro. Everyone began going crazy as the 'chair pulled off a perfect version of the song, which was followed directly by Roses. I had never heard them preform this song live, and was impressed by the musicianship displayed by all of them. After the song, Ben realized that there as something wrong with his snare, so to fill time, Daniel began speaking to the audience. He announced, "We don't need no education," to which everyone went wild. Then he joked, "Hey ya'll, what's goin' down in the hood" in a funny black accent. Finally he said, "Ok I've got nothing else to say so I'll wait 'til the drums are fixed."

After a short delay, silverchair played a good rendition of Findaway. Abuse Me would be the next song, with Bailey Holloway on rhythm guitar. Daniel introduced him by saying, "Ok, this guy is gonna help us play this song. His name is Tony Iomi and he used to play for a band called Black Sabbath. He teaches us various methods of masturbation and tickles our breasts!" Everyone sung along to Abuse Me, as Daniel refrained, "Throw the sailors overboard." After this song was up, Daniel started into Pure Massacre.

When it kicked in, the mosh pit was wild and Daniel thrashed around whenever he wasn't singing. Everyone started throwing clothes and shoes up on stage and after the song was over, Daniel said, "Your shoes fucking suck! We don't want them!" Then Ben and Chris left the stage, and Daniel played an excellent rendition of Cemetery. Then the two returned for Suicidal Dream. After this song, Daniel asked Bailey to check something on his pedals. During the delay, Daniel said, "Ok, I'll let Bailey fiddle with my penis for a while, then we'll play. Then Tomorrow was played with Daniel singing "The water in this country is very hard to drink!" Even though I've heard it a million and half times, I thought Tommorow was one of the highlights of the show.

Afterwards, Daniel said "Thanks Atlanta! Y' know, when we watch baseball, we follow the Atlanta Braves," to which everyone cheered. Then he said, "and whenever we participate in football matches, we like to pretend we're the Atlanta Falcons!" then the crowd began to boo. Finally he replied, "No, I was just kidding, Atlanta football sucks!" Then everybody began cheering again. Then Daniel, Chris, and Ben ripped into The Door. I don't remember much about this song because a fight broke out behind me and these two guys were beating the shit out of each other! After the peace returned, the 'chair began Faultline. Every time I hear this song live it just blows me away! The extended ending was great as well.

Then Daniel introduced the next song as "track number five" after which he started playing No Association. They really rocked out and the whole band was jumping around. After it was over, Daniel started making feedback with his guitar and making weird sounds with it. Then he began playing Freak. I was surprised that the crowd got into this one even more than any other song. Right after the last note, they ripped into madman. Daniel just started running around the stage like he himself was a madman and Ben and Chris were smiling and thrashing around as well. Then, when the madness of Madman had ended, they left the stage.

Some people began to leave, but I knew it wasn't over until they played Israel's Son. Sure enough, about Five minutes later they all returned and Ben and Daniel started playing 'greensleeves' which is some weird medieval piece. They only played it for a few seconds before Daniel came up to the mic. "Has anyone heard of a band called Minor Threat? We're gonna play a song by them." Then Local H came out and started jumping around as silverchair played the song, 'Minor Threat'.

The drummer of Local H jumped out into the audience and Daniel could hardly sing the second verse because he was laughing so hard. After the song, the lead singer of Local H said, "...and that's a fucking promise!" Chris then started the epic song Israel's Son. Knowing that this was the closing number, the fans went crazy! Daniel did something really awesome with his effects pedals during the part where they slow down during the third verse when the song is played live.

At the end, Daniel just kept screaming "put your hands in the air!" Then he climbed over his amp and let his silver PRS drop to the ground. Finally, in an unexpected move, Chris threw his bass into Ben's drum set! I was totally not anticipating that to happen! Then Ben knocked his drums over onto the stage and walked off. The crowd keep cheering ten minutes after the band had left! I had a great time and look forward to seeing silverchair for a fourth time!!!