Sam. Sam. Sam he is.

"Magical!"

"Sexual!"

"Enchanting!"

"Transcendent!"

"Sonic fellatio!"

"Surreal!"

"Fucking brilliant!"


Going around MC Cormack's room, these are the words of 7/10 Sam Robert's fans recently returning from his concert at the McPhearson Theatre in Victoria.

"It's mind-boggling," says nearly 19-year-old Audrey Wong.

The Stills, also reigning from Montreal, brought real rock with an indie twist to the stage opening for the Sam Roberts Band. They are fresh, genuine, wholesome Canadian rockers. I was definitely impressed. It was a natural transition when Sam Roberts hit the stage.

Wow! The energy! The charmingly classy theatre seemed a little too dressed up for us at first, but the rest of the world quickly drifted away as all of our senses were overloaded with The Sam Roberts Band.

Them Kids, Uprising Down Under, Minds of the Kalahari, Up Sister, Where Have All the Good People Gone?, Love at the End of the World, The Gate, Brother Down, Don't Walk Away Eileen, Fixed to Ruin, Stripmall Religion, No Sleep, This Wreck of a Life and Hard Road...were some of the songs. See why it was amazing?

It also helps that I was in the company of Audrey, Johanna (Yohann), Andrew, Zoe, Natalia, Pierre, Caroline, Chris and Kiesha!

We danced SO hard. Screamed SO loud. Audrey and Zoe even flung their bras at the stage (read below). We put our arms around each other and swung back and forth across Row F. Yep, it was pretty magical.

The encore was epic too. Closing with the "Mind Flood" jam sesh changed my life.

Afterward, we headed outback to the tour bus. The pre-pubescent groupies beat us to the door but they were quickly swept away. We were at the back of the line and the whole thing made me feel nostalgic my fav movie "Almost Famous." You know, overly eager fans waiting at the top of the ramp for "their" rockstar to emerge. Cigarettes, attempts to suppress over-eagerness, friendship and rock and roll.

Then we got up there. It was a blur of firm handshakes, sincere eye contact and the best hugs of our lives (as we all unanimously agreed), some signatures, a few pics and a flood of compliments.

"He was kind of curious too, like he actually wanted to meet us too," said MC Cormack. He even remembered her name.

Then we talked about the weather. How cool and Canadian eh? Zoe and Pierre parlent en francais avec him. The rest of us stuck with English.

When Zoe was standing for the picture she asked him, "Oh btw, have you seen my bra?"

He asked if it was that pretty pink one and I piped in that that one was in fact, Audrey's.

She was pretty stoked on life to say the very least.

Yes my amazing friends actually did that!

Caroline and Pierre almost passed out with joy and anticipation (but all their undergarmets stayed on.)

It was cool, his arm around me for so long between my photo with him and the assembling and taking of our group photo! Hah! Ok, so I act like I'm a fourteen, big deal!

When we left it started with the ten of us walking to the corner, then speedwalking to the corner of the building, then running and jumping and as soon as we were out of sight (but definitely still in earshot) we screamed and jumped and screamed and hugged and screamed and people made tearful phone calls to loved ones. Dramatic? Nah. It was an amazing night for all of us. We were certainly, most definitely, feeding off of each other's elated, stokedness. (That's a real word, I love English.)

After the rest of the gang rejoined Audrey and I inside after a little sesh outside Wilson, Pierre describes the show as "stylus and ruptus." Natalia thinks that is was "dashing." Yohann sums up the night as "rad." Remember they were just outside.

While Andrew's take on it is, "Pierre once told me that we're all ants in a clouds world and tonight I became a cloud. I started as an ant and for a moment I was a cloud. It's better to live one day as a cloud than a lifetime as an ant."

Anyway, to say the least, tonight was pretty fantastic. I could try to transcribe our after-concert Sam Roberts infatuated gushing sesh...but I won't.


As Sam told us to remember, "Stay true to your friends because they'll save you in the end."

:D