this was about a month into summer vacation, the longest amount of time i'd spent in my hometown since starting university. i had been growing stir-crazy living with my parents again. thankfully, my saving grace, my parents' yearly month-long vacation to the other side of the country, was on the horizon. and in the same week that i was informed of their flight, i learned that nailed shut would be back in albany the very next day. my parents took no issue with the thought of me having friends in their house regardless of if they were home; the only reason why i didn't get to host my friends had purely been to avoid adding any inconveniences to their schedule. with them out of town, i now had the perfect place for friends to stay, only an hour from any of the other places we'd want to go together. so, my friends and i coordinated a long weekend full of good music, good food, generally just good times, starting with going up to albany together to see nailed shut.
the drive was three hours from start to finish, though i was picked up two hours into it. my friends had gotten just dessert at a diner on their way to me, but just dessert does not a meal make. thankfully, the show was on the upper floor of a pretty solid korean restaurant. we got to the venue early enough that we got our food before the first band started, though not quite enough to finish. i didn't mind getting the late lunch/early dinner and a show. i unfortunately don't really remember the non-nailed bands too well. death metal live is very indistinct to me as someone who isn't really tapped into the genre. but i enjoyed the sound nonetheless. not long after i finished my food, asher noticed my shirt (it was for clifford, a band whose members are/were roommates of some of the nailed shut crew! i got to see them in march and they were quite fun). we chatted, and he recognized me as the guy who's been playing the band's music on the radio - he'd previewed to me that the band would be back in albany in band/radio dms, he just hadn't given me the exact date. so it was nice to reconnect faces to names! i scurried back over to my friends when it came time for the band to start setting up.
the set started with new music, which was incredibly exciting, but i will admit that i was even more excited to know the words to the not-new tracks. i had absolutely no strategy in my screams, just overwhelming excitement to properly appreciate the music for the first time. so while i almost certainly sounded horrific, i was so excited to have been given the microphone at a show for the first time. when the set concluded, i was just trying to catch my breath and soothe the diziness i was feeling from how hard i had moshed when i heard asher call my name from across the room. back at the merch table, asher told me about how he and the band had just been talking about how cool it was to see someone who knew the words to their songs so far from home. after some back-and-forth doting, asher gave me a guitar pick with the band logo on it and i bought a shirt to go with it (i deeply regret not getting a cassette tape too, had i known this would be my last chance..) and we exchanged personal instagrams. my friends and i stayed for the set after them before going off to a second show to ensure we didn't miss the second group of bands. though this second show was far more up my friends' and my alley than the death metal show, i spent the entire night reminiscing on how great it was to see nailed shut and actually know them for the first time.