Early arrivers were greeted with a wide open concert area and were able to watch as the set up and sound checks went on. A friendly, but firm security force kept the rules and no one seemed to mind or have a problem with them.

Lots of photos in my Gallery!

Prices for food tickets were $3.50 with one ticket being sufficient for most items. A can of beer, or a hard lemonade for that price isn’t out of line and there were a wide variety of food items available as well for one or two tickets. For example, a hamburger served with a side of potato chips, or a generous order of nachos and cheese were available for the single ticket price. Not Micky-D’s dollar menu, but for a festival, not too bad. Anyone who complains about that needs to get out of Lockport more.

The parking situation never reached anything near critical, despite the naysayers predictions. Those private lots that were charging $7, $10 and yes one even asked $20 dollars, were pretty empty. The free, city operated lots were sufficient for most parking, due in part to the large number of local residents who walked to the concert.

The chair restriction seemed to be a non-issue as well. A tip for anyone who needs to sit for whatever reason (Hey, I’m with you. My dogs were pretty tired by the end of the night!) - the sidewalks around the Walnut-Locust corner were a great spot to sit outside the fence. A multitude of enterprising people had set up stands selling food and beverages around the venue as well, so if you didn’t go inside the fenced area, you were not left out.

Okay, let’s talk entertainment. Rochester’s Uncle Plum was cancelled and Buffalo veterans McCarthyizm brought in. They’ve played every concert venue in WNY at least once before, so they were up to the task. I’ve gotten to know them over the years and was glad to see them play in Lockport.

53 days, a Buffalo band that has gained national exposure, filled the middle spot on the bill. By the time they and McCarthyizm had played, the crowd had reached pretty respectable size. Both bands were a great fit to open for Lou Gramm both in style and intensity.

The Lou Gramm Band was honored with a massive crowd there to see them. Unlike the former North Tonawanda site, the crowd was able to get a good view of the stage from not just the front, but both sides. The VIP area on the right of the stage was a great vantage point for those with the pass to get in.

Even though the crowd was pretty solid in front of the stage and a couple hundred feet deep, there was plenty of room for more relaxed listening further back. The food tent area had many picnic tables for eating and sitting. There could have been a few more, as there were many people sitting on curbs to eat. Rest room facilities, although just the typical port-a-johns, were plentiful and lines were short.

For the more discerning concert-goer, the place to be was definitely at Taboo, whether the patio in the back with tables and chairs in full view of the stage, or the outside bar where you could sit and chat with someone while the music played. The outside seating at Metropolitan was another great choice, if you were ready to order a meal.

Security at the venue was in-force. Besides the concert security at the gates and stage, the Lockport Police and Niagara County Sheriff’s Auxiliary Police were there with a very visible presence. Bicycle patrols were utilized by both groups as well as the Auxiliary’s mounted division. I saw no disturbances, and for the most part, the law enforcement personnel seemed to be enjoying the event as much as the crowd. Fire Rescue was also stationed at the event and promptly treated the one or two medical issues.

For the first such event, this was handled very well. The experience of the promoter with the concert series in the past must have been invaluable in making the transition to Lockport seamless. I’m looking forward to the rest of the season.

If you didn’t make this show, but are thinking of coming to any of the others this summer (and you should, it’s a great lineup coming) here are my tips:

Arrive early. Make a evening of it and enjoy the fine dining establishments both at the site and around it. There’s got to be twenty places you could eat at, from pizza and subs, to chinese, to fine dining all within walking distance.

If you can walk there, do. If you are from out-of-town, don’t pay for parking. There are several large free lots within three blocks of the venue with plenty of capacity, especially if you’re early.

Another reason to arrive early - the opening acts. you can see and appreciate them so much easier before the bulk of the crowd arrives. We have some outstanding local bands scheduled for the rest of the season.

If you need or want to sit, again, early arrival will be good, especially as people realize where they can set up chairs. Around the outside of the fence at the Locust-Walnut corner you can get a prime seat without going inside. If you can’t do that, the VIP area was utilized for seating as well. I think you need to have a real handicap to be allowed there, though.

If you don’t like crowds, or just want to hang out around the area, the sound was great. I walked around most of the downtown area and the sound was amazingly clear all over. Feel free to visit other shops downtown without missing the music!

Many vendors are already setting up and open. Parking lots all over are ready. I still think they are a bit high on their prices which were $7-$10 dollars. The free lots will be in high demand!

Sound checks were going on as I drove down Walnut Street and a lot of people were already walking around the area. Traffic was noticeably slower than usual on Walnut and I can see it being gridlock later. Main St. wasn’t bad, though.

Then a twisted thought crossed my mind. Will there be a theme song for the concert series? You know like how Thursday In The Square always plays Petula Clark’s Downtown to let the drunks know it’s time to go home.

I propose the Erie Canal song - you know “I had a mule, her name was Sal. Fifteen miles on the Erie Canal.” I think the Bruce Springsteen version would be good. (Yes, there is one.) Maybe you have a better idea?

While we’re at it, what is this concert series called? I mean officially, it’s still the Molson Canal Concert Series, but you can’t even see the canal from where it is. The closest view of the canal (and one you really should see) is across Main Street at the overlook next to the closed parking ramp. The Molson Lockport City Center Concert Series would be more accurate.

Hey, there’s another idea! If only the parking ramp was still open, the City could charge to park there and pay for it’s repair/replacement in just a few years! It’s really close by and you’d have to walk through the archway at City Centre, so it ought to get a premium price!

Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes made of ticky tacky,
Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes all the same.
There’s a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one,
And they’re all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

While the song was about suburban architechture on the surface, the conformity this ordinance is attempting to impose fits just as well.

Why do we need to pass a law, an ordinance, another piece of red tape every time someone doesn’t like something? What ever happened to letting the marketplace regulate itself?

To paraphrase the motto of a local sign company, A business with a crappy-looking sign, is a sign of a crappy business. What serious businessman is going to put up a sign that looks bad? It’s in his own best interest to look good, especially the first thing someone sees when they see his business.

But this attempt at making everything fit the vision of the Mayor, or Mr. Ulrich’s scheme for Main Street, is excessive. The historic term has been dropped because of it’s un-enforceability, but the mindset continues. Who wants top see a historic sign on a shop that sells urban wear? Is it called Ye Olde Hip-Hop Shoppe?

A laundromat that has been a blight on a neighborhood for years has also been one of the businesses held up by the moratorium. New owners came in, fixed the place up, made it look nice and safe again and want to replace an old sign. Their reward from the city? A big NO!

As usual, the best solution, letting people alone and not cluttering our lives with more laws, and letting businessmen run their own business, escapes our politicos. Unless a sign endangers someone’s safety (which is already covered by building codes) why do we have to regulate it? Plaza owners already do a good job of making their tenants signs fit a theme for their buildings. It’s the first thing they do when they remodel a strip mall. Let our struggling business owners alone and quit driving them away with more red tape.

Hamster Gets Owned

I’m not a big user of instant messaging, IM. I’ve had accounts on most of the IM networks, from ICQ years ago, to MySpace IM, a pointless exercise, and all those in between - AIM, Y! MSN etc.

I stopped installing all those - or any of those - networks clients when I found Trillian, a program that connects to all of them at once. It was kind of cool seeing all those little colored dots light up to tell you they were connected.

But for all that connectedness, I used it very little. Most of my real friends and family are on AIM, so I still can use that. But the other ones are long forgotten. I sort of wish I had my old ICQ account. Those were just numbers and mine would be pretty low nowdays.

I’ve heard of several other programs that, like Trillian, function on all the popular IM networks. I’m sure they all work swell and may even offer some bells and whistles that Trillian doesn’t. Lately, I’ve been using an open-source client called Pidgin. But I can’t help but think that this is the wrong approach.

Years ago, when telephones were new, you might have had a local telephone company. You could call anyone in the same company, but there was no connection to anywhere else. Of course, that all got fixed by technology and government regulation. It was good for the country to have a unified telephone system, even if it turned the phone companies into a big monopoly.

I think that’s where we stand with IM. It’s turned into a necessity for many young people and has transferred over into text messages on cell phones. Why should I have an account on four IM networks and a special client that joins all four? Why not ONE network and a simpler client? Does it matter if Yahoo or AOL or Google or whoever builds a client into their software, as long as it talks to your friend no matter what network he/she uses? I don’t think so and don’t care how someone gets into the network.

Why should AIM users only be able to talk to other AIM users? Why should I have to open another account and give out more personal information just to talk to someone who uses a different IM network? Not that there is any personal information that is sacred anymore, they probably already have it. It’s just the annoyance of another username, another password, another login screen to deal with. It’s so bad already that I use a password manager to keep them all straight for me. Someone could tie me up and torture me for my GMail password. I couldn’t tell them, I don’t know it myself, it’s in the password manager and the only password I need is the one for it.

It’s just all unecessarily complicated. It doesn’t have to be so.