verve pipe concert

this past saturday night i once again had the opportunity to see 'the verve pipe'. they are one of my favorite bands and have been able to see them quite a bit (they are originally from grand rapids). they broke up about five years ago, but i guess they are now making a tradition of a christmas weekend concert at the Intersection.
the concert was a blast. another local band that kind of made it big opened up for them, papa vegas. i had been preparing myself by listening to papa vegas a bit lately, so as to reacquaint myself with their stuff (i dont ever have to reacquaint myself with verve pipes stuff, because i know them all by heart...) and really enjoyed their performance. before they started playing i got a chance to chat with brian vander ark (verve pipes lead singer) for a bit. he actually remembered me from the last show i saw him at (where i was one of 11 audience members. great story, ill share it another time). also, i talked with a guy named brandon- he was one of the people who was on rockstar:inxs last year! kind of strange to see him there. actually, its stranger that i was able to recognize him...
around 11:15 verve pipe came on and it was awesome! they played so many hits. just about everything from their villians album, and two or three from each other album too! they even through in a song they recorded for the soundtrack for 'great expectations' called 'her ornament'. they played a couple of songs from brians solo stuff, but the focus was certainly on the old stuff. one of the biggest highlights was the appearance of griff. if you have ever seen this man in action with a harmonica, then you know who much fun he brings to the stage. at one point there were actually 9 musicians on stage singing/playing/being crazy just loving the fact that they were back together again! it was very obvious that they were enjoying themselves just as much as the audience was. they ended up playing a two hour show- the longest ive ever seen them on stage.
definitely a great time, and i look forward to seeing them again next year.