The crowd was shouting ‘Third-Eye-Blind, ‘Third-Eye-Blind, ‘Third-Eye-Blind” on probably the last “parlor game” of the evening during the Oktoberfest Kick-off party last September 05, 2008. It felt like there was a rally of some sort with arms thrown up in the air in sync with the band’s name being called out loud. For more than 4 hours of waiting, with games squeezing in between performances, the crowd impatiently shouted asking for the band of the night. They even booed the sexy girls doing a dance number depicting their demand to see 3eb perform live. Minutes before midnight (this is Linkin Park’s newest album, by the way), Derek Ramsey who hosted the show had no other choice but to obey the command of the crowd. Third eye blind came out and the audience went crazy.

This was the first Oktoberfest kick-off I have ever attended. The last time I remember going to a party like this was in year 2003 in Sta.Rosa, Laguna with my college friends but we went there around 10 minutes before the last band performed so what the heck, did we miss anything? I was really excited to attend this one because 3eb was coming.

Bad news. A week before the gig, we found out the ticket price for the main event was 1500 pesos. Wow! I thought I’ll settle with listening to them from afar with a 120 peso gen admission ticket instead. With that set, I went to San Mig Ave in Ortigas at around 7pm with 2 of my officemates and one friend from my previous work. The gen admission pass went with two bottles of beer with entrance to the longest bar stretching the whole of San Miguel Properties compound. It’s fine with me, I don’t drink beer and I was really aiming for the bands.

There were lots of people, sweat, line piling up, beer, emo-styled youths, etc. Far from the main stage, my friends were enjoying the band and the beer while i was headbanging with bottled water. We thought it could have been nicer if we could be on a good spot near the front row but we only had the 120-buck pass so we could not get in and only stay at the perimeter fence.

Then a miracle happened, we managed to get a pass to get through and voila we were near the stage standing at less than 10 rows from the front. I won’t tell how we got the pass but thanks to our friends who had the power (they know who they are and thanks a lot, next time will be payback time). It was a great experience. Cool music plus the perks. For 120, we had drinks, watched various performances, saw cute girls, and enjoyed 3eb live.

Unluckily, we had to leave early during the performance for we had to attend a friend’s birthday blowout in Makati. My friend had been calling me since 12 MN but 3eb had just started so I could not leave. At 1:30 AM, we left 3eb still playing Jumper. I didn’t learn of their last song but it could have been How’s Its Gonna Be. We arrived at the birthday party in Kamagong at 2 then left at 3. Wow, a sulit gimmick night. Lagare. Well then, till next time.