This picture was captioned “Waiting for Trans Siberian Orchestra to start.” Waiting. They haven’t started yet and it already looks like this.
Today, Trans-Siberian Orchestra (TSO!) rolls into First Niagara Center for a pair of pyrotechnic-laden, bloated monstrosities.
I think this guy is trying to escape from TSO… twitter.com/BuffaloJill/st…
— Jill (@BuffaloJill) December 27, 2012
The arena will be full– twice.
Here are 5 reasons you won’t find us there.
1. Stop showing up after Christmas.
Christmas fell on December 25th this year. It’s pretty consistent. There’s debate about how early is too early to surround ourselves with holiday music but we can all agree about when to stop. (Yesterday.) All of us, that is, except for Trans-Siberian Orchestra.
2. Do something about your radio commercials.
Oh, you’ve got a new album again this year, TSO? Then maybe it’s time to freshen up the radio spot that you’ve been running since the dawn of time. You’re TELLING us there’s new music but the music says otherwise.
3. Can we please just admit that TSO is hair metal?
In 1995, Savatage released their second rock opera Dead Winter Dead, an even more ambitious undertaking than its predecessor, Streets. They also achieved cross-over success with “Christmas Eve Sarajevo 12/24”, which received heavy rotation on multiple radio formats during the Christmas season. While they toured Europe and Japan, the group forwent an American tour to work on their new project, Christmas Eve and Other Stories, recorded by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra (TSO), comprising Savatage and a large orchestra.
“Edge of Thorns” was a decent tune in its day, but how exactly did Savatage morph into an arena-filling tour machine? I have to defend my appreciation for Queensryche’s (incredible) Operation: Mindcrime but TSO has hockey moms clamoring for seats year in and year out? That’s a mindcrime right there.
4. It’s just weird.
We’re no Scrooges around here. We cut down our own Christmas trees and partake in the annual “light up your house by running extension cords through the snow like idiots” ritual. One of us even went to Shea’s for a performance of Irving Berlin’s White Christmas this year. But this TSO stuff has an almost cult-like, Joel Osteen creepy feel to it. The lasers and flash pots mesh well with the pre-Cobain shredding guitars but once you add the wizards and gnomes to the story line, you’ve lost your way. Kindly remove your goblins from my egg nog, sir.
BONUS: Late addition
So Trans Siberian Orchestra is like the white trash Nutcracker?
— Alan Bedenko (@buffalopundit) December 1, 2012
Also, this: https://twitter.com/buffalopundit/status/274704962255216640
Thank you. We just added your tweet to the bottom of the post.
“Buffalo doesn’t get enough cultural events”
“We don’t care for this cultural event so it should stop coming”
The title alone made me want to sit in the dark, eat a substantial amount of beef and listen to mediocre (at best) Christmas music.
If only Spinal Tap would do a Christmas album.
Wait, that isn’t Spinal Tap I’ve seen several times at Christmas time?
Since I can see the Cobblestone parking lots from my office window, I can say the majority of people showing up for the afternoon show are grandmothers and little kids.
Everyone else is heading for the metal casino shack.
I would also guess that grandmothers with their grandkids are most likely to arrive at the arena by 12:30pm for a 3pm show.
Also true. Well it’s 2:30 now and look at this chaos:
http://twitter.com/BuffaloJill/status/284380617045602304
TSO sounds like something robots would listen to if they celebrated Christmas.
The funnier thing about this is that the metal band which begat this TSO horror is called “Savatage”. I don’t know why I find that hilarious, but it is.
What? TSO was tonight?!? Thanks for the heads up, TSO…
Actually, Christmas is TWELVE days long, from the 25th of December through the Epiphany. Hence that really annoying song with the swans and partridges. So TSO was in fact in Buffalo during Christmas. Perhaps if people stopped decorating for Christmas when Halloween pumpkins were still on the lawn, we wouldn’t be so sick of Christmas by noon on the 25th and instead could enjoy all twelve days of the holiday.