On May 2, I attended a show with Kill Hannah, 18 Visions, and HIM. The show was at a place called Slims. I came two hours early, just to make sure that I was the first person there. When I got there, there was a line about half a block long. Lots of people who showed up were dressed up like the lead singer of HIM. There were suit jackets, bowler hats, eyeliner, and the band’s symbol decorated on both boys and girls. I had never heard anything by Kill Hannah, and I had never even heard of 18 Visions, but HIM is my favorite band. I was really surprised to see so many people there, since nobody I've ever met has heard of them. I've read reviews about some of HIM's concerts; some were good, and some were bad, so I really didn't know what to expect, I was just thanking the lord that they finally decided to tour in the U.S.

Anyhow, an hour and forty-five minutes later we were inside Slims. The wonderful thing about that place is how tiny it is. I'd guess that they only admit a couple hundred people before they call a show 'sold out,' which this one was. That means that pretty much no matter where you stand, it's still better than where you would be standing if you were watching the show in a venue that admitted 40,000.

Kill Hannah was the first band on. I always hear about these new contemporary rock bands and think that they're so cliché, so I didn't think I would like Kill Hannah very much. But, I loved them. The entire band has great stage presence and started the show off great with their fast beats and high pitched voices (if I didn't know what they looked like I would have thought the lead singer was female). The rest of the crowd didn't seem quite as hyped about them as I was, but honestly, not many people are ever very hyped during the first band. A lot of bands that I've heard play live start sounding the same after about the second song, but not Kill Hannah. They had unique rhythms for every song that they played.

The same cannot be said for the next band, 18 Visions. After a few songs by them, I couldn't tell when one song started and another song ended. They were all extremely fast and hard rock-ish - in other words, good to rock out and mosh to, but not quite as good to listen to. It seemed like there were at least 5 climaxes in each song, and the climaxes lost their meaning by the end of the set. Although they weren't the best band that I've ever heard, I enjoyed the energy that came with their music, and the energy that it bestowed the crowd with.

The last band to perform that night was HIM. I had heard somewhere that they were only going to be playing songs off of their album Razorblade Romance, but their set began with a song called Buried Alive By Love off of one of their newer albums. Since they are more of an underground band, most of the people there were hardcore fans and knew every single song by heart, which made it even more fun. Before every song, the lead singer would say a couple of words about the origin of the song, and every now and then he would crack a couple of jokes. The lighting was a little bit much, so they were kind of hard to see sometimes, but other than that they played a magnificent show. As cheesy as this will sound, the worst part of the show was the end.