I Just Read About That…

[ATTENDED: July 20, 2015] The Steelstacks Pavilion

We have been to the Sands Casino stage in Bethlehem three times.  The sound isn’t great, but it’s a close venue and that’s where we saw “Weird Al” from row three, so it will always be awesome to us.

But just a few blocks away there is the Steelstacks venue.  I’ll be seeing the Flaming Lips in the larger venue (I don’t even rally have a sense of where it is) in a few weeks.  But last night I saw Gene Ween and Modest Mouse in the Levitt Pavillion.  And while I’ll talk about the shows, I had to spend a few paragraphs talking about this amazing venue.

After going to Philly and spending $25 for parking that was almost a ten minute walk away, or traipsing to New York City ($14 just for the tunnel), imaging going to a venue and getting free, close parking (I sorta hoped that Modest Mouse would play “Convenient Parking, but they didn’t). 

The city closes down a city block to let the music flow out onto the street.

The stage is small and there can’t be more than fifty yards of sloped grass to stand, sit or recline on.  The grass goes wide in either direction, but the view is great from anywhere.  I easily managed to get up really close.  And the sound was outstanding–crystal clear and loud without being painful.

The stage is set up against gigantic old steel mills.  During the day they are imposing and cool.  But at night…  We had seen them at night from the Casino parking lot.  They are lit up with red and blue lights.  And they are wicked cool looking.

But that’s nothing compared to seeing them up close.  You can see parts of the stage in some of these pictures, but it’s really impossible to show how large these stacks are.

There is a concession building across the way with seats a bar and other nice amenities (this really isn’t a lace you’re going to see a ton of huge rock shows, I realize).  There is all kinds of steel being used decoratively–including a bar of fire that crosses the street.

There is something so weird and cool about that gigantic colored backdrop–almost like an industrial Red Rocks.

The building was open until 11PM so I was able to get a cool Bethlehem Steel T-shirt and use the nice bathrooms before walking the two blocks to my car to whisk out of town (and to hit the Waffle House on the way out!)

I would like every future concert I go to to be there, thank you very much.  There’s are a ton of free concerts there, and if I lived closer I’d go see some.

I happen to think this is one of the coolest photos I’ve ever taken.