Fave/Most "Transcendent" AFI Experience

AFI Everything
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So, with all the emphasis on collecting, I thought I would bring us back to basics- the music and guys themselves.

What has been your fave AFI moment as a fan? Meeting them? A specific show? Listening to one of their albums for the first time? Road tripping it to a concert?

I have a few, but I’ll start with a small one.

When Decemberunderground came out, I had just had quite possibly the WORST year of my life- socially and physically. It wasn’t a good time (it got worse after that, but, whatever; life’s tough; get a helmet). Anyway, back to the story at hand: I knew I NEEDED to see them live on the Summer Shudder Tour. That album connected with me, and it became this sort of bright spot for me.

I got to see them on June 23 at the Roseland Ballroom. My mom willingly took my friend and me, sat online with us for five hours, and then quietly hid herself away while we meandered through the pit.

Through sheer dumb luck, I made barricade at Jade’s side. They opened with Miseria Cantare, which was a usual riot causing my friend to abandon ship. A few songs later they played Summer Shudder.

I don’t know what it is about that song, but it’s incredibly uplifting for me.

This dude next to me- so nice, wore the coolest denim vest replete with spikes and old school patch- must have seen me practically crying and singing along with all I had and wrapped his arm around my shoulders and sang just as hard. He became my buddy for the night, and the two of us lost our shit when they played God Called in Sick Today.

That year had been such an alienating year for me, yet that dude chilling with me, not judging me for being an absolute mess, at least made me feel less like a pariah, at least for a bit.

And I think that’s why I have always loved AFI. At any of the shows, you are bound to find someone who connects with you over the music and who will be just as enthusiastic and welcoming.

That moment is one of my fave AFI ones- the way Davey got the crowd moving during Summer Shudder, Jade and Davey’s incredibly ostentatious looks during that period, the absolute energy of that room, and the super nice dude who was probably a good 15 years older than me but who was willing to chill was a disaster of a 16 year old in the pit- that’s all something I never really experienced again.

So, now that I have given one of my fave moments, what have been yours? Doesn’t have to be big, but it can be earth shattering. :slight_smile:

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This year was the first year I saw them, three times. Twice in ATL and the show at red rocks. It’s hard to put anything above red rocks, but I think the second ATL show was the best. I drove four hours from 4am and waited in line for 12 with some awesome people. Got center (almost but not quite) barricade and got to hold Davey up during the godwalk. Some really amusing/endearing moments during that show.

After the concert I got to meet everyone but Jade, but he was funny when we were all lining up at the bus to see Davey. He stops, waits in line, and goes, "What? I wanna meet Davey. " Got my shirt signed.

Drive the four hours back home at 2am delirious and giddy. It’s really been a fun year so far. I can’t believe I never went to concerts before. I’ve literally dreamt about these shows since the last one lol. If I admired/loved the band before, that’s nothing to now.

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Awww, Jade, haha. That sounds like an AMAZING experience! And so jealous you got to go to Red Rocks. I was supposed to go, but ended up losing my concert buddy and didn’t feel comfortable traveling halfway across the country alone. But that’s ATL show sounded amazing!

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I’m sorry you missed the show. </3 I really hope they have another opportunity to play there in the future. Hopefully there’s some decent video/pics of it floating around to live through vicariously. The atmosphere right before AFI came on was so epic. Distant thunder, wind, light rain. It was so fitting.

I wasn’t really planning on going to anymore after the first because they weren’t coming back to my area. But then I heard about red rocks and I just couldn’t miss it so we made a vacation of it. Then if course the week after I bought plane tickets they announced another ATL show. Zero regrets.

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I can’t complain. I saw them three times on this last leg and once back in February. :slight_smile: And I’m the same way. I’m from around NYC and decided to go to Hartford, Providence, and then at the Providence show, heard that there were Portland, Maine tickets left, so I bought those after Nothing’s set at the Providence show and ended up traveling to Maine a week later. :slight_smile:

But seriously, that Red Rocks atmosphere sounds AMAZING. So glad you got to experience that!

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The first time I saw AFI in concert was in 2010 at a festival they were playing in Milwaukee, where my sister lived at the time. During the second verse of Silver and Cold there was a short moment, probably only a second or two, where Davey looked straight into my eyes. Looking back it kind of seems a bit silly, but at the time it meant a lot to me. I was going through a very difficult time in my life where I felt very insignificant. To have someone I looked up to so much look at and see me felt like an extremely important moment to me. The show itself was also very fun, even though it rained and most of the crowd was there for the band after AFI.

I’ve seen them 4 more times since that first show, each show better than the last, but that one short moment still sticks out to me.

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@Ophelia you have amazing story. 2017 is a year you’ll remember forever. I could only imagine getting a one-on-one meet & greet like that… I met them all in 2003 at a Meet & Greet but it wasn’t all of them all together as they were kind of in different corners.

But you, winning TWO different contests AND the meet & greet… :raised_hands:

My favorite AFI experience would have to be 6/18 this year at Sayreville. The set list I got framed and the fact that we got the last Totalimmortal performance AND I was able to record the whole 2nd encore. Then to be able to meet Adam, Jade and Hunter after the show… terrific, terrific, terrific…

Actually after the 2/7/17 show I realized how much I missed AFI. I never saw them twice in one year before, so that was also awesome. PLUS, I started these forums with all of you lovely folks! BTW we’re at about 1,500 posts. :slight_smile:

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It’s cool to see a lot of 2017 stuff being mentioned here.

The first couple times I saw AFI in 1999 were probably the most excited I ever was to see a band. I had been into them since late 96, and 2+ years feels like forever when you’re in high school. For as much as I enjoyed those shows though, I don’t think they were necessarily notable moments for that particular time. I could have seen any AFI shows that year and probably felt the same way.

Somewhere between Sing the Sorrow and Decemberunderground, I stepped away from AFI, relatively. I still saw them a couple times during the DU era, and it was enjoyable, but they had gone so far from being “my” band that I felt like I was doing it a little out of force of habit rather than being really excited about the shows. A couple years later CL came out, and I went into it with the same sort of feelings. At the Pittsburgh date of that tour, they played “Half-Empty Bottle”, and it totally blindsided me. It had been one of my favorites the whole time I had been into them, but I’d definitely given up on ever seeing it live. I remember getting like, reflexively excited for it before my brain even processed what song it was. Right before the vocals came in, my brain caught up and I think it was that very second that I was pulled back into diehard AFI fandom.

Based on the posts here, I think that ties into how a lot of fans are feeling about the band these days. The Troubadour show this year was like, a whole show of transcendent moments for me. Strength Through Wounding (aside from that one stray lucky Portland show) making its return to the best possible crowd reaction one could hope for. He Who Laughs Last, the first AFI song I ever heard, bringing me out of stagedive retirement at age 34 (if 14 year old me could be told this, he’d be proud). Prayer Position, Coin Return, the Miss Murder tease into Lost Souls, the first performance of Dumb Kids getting a great singalong from the crowd. The setlist was like their full career on shuffle, and then they kept doing it at almost every show. AFI in 2017 is as good live as they ever have been. Glad some of you guys seem to feel the same.

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This year was my first time seeing AfI live, i got to see them in NYC, Baltimore, Hartford, and New Jersey. Each time was amazing, but the Jersey show really stood out to me. They played Malleus Maleficarum, one of my favorites. The whole set list was awesome, they played Strength Through Wounding, Lost Souls, Of Greetings and Goodbyes, Totalimmortal, etc. But Malleus just felt like a once in a lifetime opportunity, the whole crowd was going wild over it, it was an amazing experience to be able to sing along to one of my favorite songs, during the bridge Davey came over close to where i was, about 2 people away from me as we were all singing “ashes fall as I’m rising up again.” Definitely something I’ll always remember.

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