Hershey Park Review

        Sunday May 21st at Hershey Park Arena was a day I won’t forget for a long time. It started off a little rough standing in the general admission line to get into the field area for about 2 and half hours with people sitting on lawn chairs and listening to portable CD players all waiting to get in the gates. When the time came and they started to take tickets fans started dashing towards the stage to be the closest and have the best spots but as the concert went on you will see it didn’t matter. As my friends and I were standing by each other waiting for Finger Eleven to open it up it seemed like the longest half hour of my life. When Finger Eleven took the stage the crowd wasn’t to enthused and only wanted to see Creed but they proved themselves worthy of the fans as guitarist Rick Jackett was jumping around the stage spinning his guitar around his neck and even when he wasn’t moving he was sticking his tongue out making his eyes larger just to get the crowd going more. He wasn’t the only one though lead singer Scott Anderson was pounding his feet and getting people up while other Guitarist James Black jumping up and down throwing bottles of water in the crowd. They finished it up by playing songs from their upcoming album “ The Greyest of Blue Skies” which included “My Carousel” and “Drag You Down”. While they walked off they got their respected cheers from the fans but they still wanted Creed. With the crowd just getting fired up from the performance of Finger Eleven, no one was prepared for Sevendust to come out. They started it off with their hit single “Denial” as lead singer Lajon Witherspoon was walking out on the edge of the stage reaching out to his fans about a foot away from me singing at the top of his lungs. Unlike Finger Eleven the more experienced Sevendust had a lot more props including trampolines in which all their guitarist were launching off of and running back and forth from side to side. Now the crowd was really on their feet as the mosh pits started to form and fans started to crowd surf. People in the crowd were reaching out to the security guards for help as they pulled them over the little fence for what seemed to be their life but as I saw it they were just scared. I must admit though it was rather rough being so squashed you couldn’t even lift your arms without struggling. With all this going on it didn’t seem to phase most of the fans as they wanted more and lead singer Lajon did nothing but give more as he asked the whole crowd to hold up all their lighters and light up the stadium, while he stood up their hollering for people to jump and hold their hands up he talked about how he wasn’t supposed to curse, so all he did was stand their and asked everyone to hold up their middle finger and salute them. So now with the crowd all going nuts from Sevendust, they all started chanting for Creed to quit stalling and come out and I must say it was pretty cool hearing everyone go “We Want Creed” at the top of their lungs. So now from all the mosh pits I was moved about 15 feet from where I was originally standing chanting for Creed. Finally the moment I have been waiting for for such a long time Creed took the stage and right away ripped into their first song “Ode” and followed it up with “Torn”. The crowd was pushing and shoving everyone back and forth as Creed then went into “Are You Ready” and then “Beautiful” and “Say I”. A little towards the end the crowd was settling down as lead singer Scott Stapp said “This next song is very special to me, I wrote it for my little boy and it is called With Arms Wide Open”. Now the crowd was going nuts again as Stapp introduced lead guitarist Mark Tremonti and bassist Brian Marshall was walking up standing behind drummer Scott Phillips. When they got into “What If” just as soon as it was going to get heavy flames and sparks flew everywhere as the fans started jumping up and down and just before the end of the song the went right into “Illusion” without a stop. When they walked off the stage the crowd refused to move and started chanting once again “Creed” getting faster each time they chanted it. Fans holding up one finger chanting for them to play their song “One”. Finally they came back out and they got their positions as Stapp said, “Remember, the only way is one” and they broke into the song but that wasn’t it Creed then for their last song started to play “Higher” as they got huge roars from the crowd and fireworks went off, flames exploded out from the stage, strobe lights flickered as the crowd one last time went hysterical. All three bands were great but it definitely was A Creed concert.

--Kc

See that's why I never was in journalism