So I went to a little show called w00tstock on Wednesday night in LA with a couple of coworkers. I originally learned about the group that does w00tstock just after they did a show in Minneapolis. Boy was I bummed that I had discovered them just after missing an opportunity to see them. Luckily, most of the show's participants live in CA, so I knew that I'd have an opportunity sooner or later, assuming that some shows would be during the week. Then, a couple of months ago, they announced a show in LA. I was so excited! I bought a ticket the same day they went on sale and practically counted the days until the show.
Before I get into the details of the show, let's do a little background on it. w00tstock, in case you didn't know, is a comedy/music show founded by Wil Wheaton, Adam Savage and the song duo Paul & Storm. It's kind of a nerdy variety show. They do a lot of music, standup and show funny videos. You can go to their website if you want more detailed information on the history and such. You could also use the google and the youtubes to find more information.
So, last night my coworkers and I left work, changed and headed to downtown LA. It took us about seventy-five minutes to drive the thirty some miles to the area that the show was located. One of my coworkers had done some research and found a decent restaurant within walking distance of the theater. It was called Norm's Restaurant and is on La Cienega Blvd. The food was excellent. I had a really good French Dip sandwich (probably the best I've ever had).
After dinner we walked to the theater and got our seat assignments from will call. The theater is called the Coronet theater. They have two show rooms, w00tstock was in the Largo room. Their website says that it seats around two hundred eighty people, so it was a very intimate show with a lot of crowd interaction, which was part of what made the show so great. I imagine that w00tstock could have probably drawn a thousand people or so, but that would have been too many, in my opinion.
My memories of the show are still blending in together into one big happy memory, which hinders my retelling, but alludes to what a great experience it was. I started the evening a little disappointed that one of my personal heroes, Wil Wheaton, was not going to be performing (he's filming Eureka in Vancouver), but I quickly got over it. I was also expecting to have parts of the show where I was bored or at the very least only mildly enjoying myself. It just wasn't true. I thoroughly enjoyed the whole show. Even the people I hadn't heard of before the show were very entertaining and the only time I ended up being bored or not entertained was during the intermission. I can tell you that I will be seeking out material made by the artists and such that performed from now on.
There were a lot of highlights. One of my favorite moments was Mike Phirman singing Chicken Monkey Duck. I'd seen the video online, but it was so much better live. Another highlight was the Pi song, by Hard & Phirm (Chris Hardwick and Mike Phirman). Chris Hardwick's monologue was good as was Adam Savage's. All of the music was very good. Some of the other artists (all good) were: Garfunkel & Oates, Molly Lewis, and Eric Schwartz. It was pretty awesome to see Dr. Demento live and hear some excerpts of songs that he's played in his forty years of broadcasting. Also, Weird Al showed up to pay tribute to Dr. Demento too! The crowd cheered for at least a couple of minutes when he came bounding onto the stage. A fun time was had by all.
If you ever considered going to w00tstock, don't hesistate! Even if you are not of the nerdy persuasion, you should go. It's a lot of fun and even though a lot of the references are nerdy in nature, the music is good and the comedy is good. I think that everyone would enjoy the event.
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