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May 31, 2005
 
2005 ROCK FESTIVAL IN HOOSIER STATE May Day Radio Festival Spotlights 3 Doors Down, Shinedown, Crossfade, No Address by Brandon Woolum
Huntington News Network Writer
 
Huntington (HNN) – Prior to this weekend I had never ventured into the state of Indiana and with the Indy 500 happening Sunday, May 29, 2005 it made it seem like a crazy mess before it even began. Nonetheless I took to the holiday weekend traffic Saturday and was on my way to Noblesville, Indiana for WRZX's May Day radio festival.
 

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The annual event had a lineup featuring 3 Doors Down, Shinedown, Crossfade and No Address.
 
Two of the bands on Saturday's bill will be coming to Charleston in July as part one of the hottest non-festival tours of the year. 3 Doors Down and No Address will join Breaking Benjamin and Staind for the Charleston appearance July 31.
 
My adventure started Saturday, May 28 when I pulled into the box office of the Verizon Wireless Music Center around 12:30 pm central time. I checked to see if any of the bands or WRZX had left me my tickets/passes.
 
Shinedown and No Address were both running behind schedule and had not arrived yet so there guest list wasn't at the box office yet. However, X103 was set up just inside the gate of the venue broadcasting live.
 
The station's program director had agreed to leave tickets at the box office for me, but then decided to stop responding to e-mails from me. The rest of the stations staff followed his lead and I was unable to get answers from anyone.
 
I later found out that the station did not leave anything for me.
 
Once Shinedown and No Address (two bands we talked to last week on HNN) arrived the big hassles began. Although I was on both of the guest lists for photo passes the venue employees decided that was not enough to be allowed to bring my camera into the gate.
 
After about an hour and a half of arguing with the employees I called Shinedown's tour manager to let him know what was going on since the first band was set to play 10 minutes from then. He was outraged at what was going on, but was too busy to do anything about it and expressed his apologies.
 
Finally I was able to get them to escort me in the gate to take pictures of No Address. They quickly told me the guidelines which were the same that every concert makes you abide by. However, they also told me that after I took pix of each band I must check my camera in with a shelter on the other side of the venue and could not get it out until right before the next band was to take stage.
 
I wasn't happy with this stipulation and I expressed it to them as they walked me to the pit area, but I had no choice and went with it.
 
At 5 p.m. No Address hit the stage for a early crowd even bigger than I had expected. The band is led by Ben Lauren who I talked with last week via the phone (insert link).
 
The former college professor and his band have been on the road with Shinedown and Crossfade already and will continue a trek across the U.S. this summer with 3 Doors Down.
 
The crowd was sitting for the remainder of the bands set, but did seem to get up and join in with the hardcore No Address fans when the band played its single "When I'm Gone (Sadie)."
 
No Address is currently receiving major radio play nationwide and is one of the bands I've been listening to quite a bit lately.
 
Following No Address's 35-minute set the only band on the bill that I had not seen live before took to the outdoor venues stage. Crossfade dropped their banner from the ceiling and immediately began playing songs from their debut self-titled record.
 
Crossfade is a four-piece band, but for some unknown reason only 3 of them were present at this performance. The band member who was absent was Tony Byroads, vocals/turntables/samples. The missing member didn't change the sound enough to really even notice that something was different.
 
Since this was my first time seeing this band and being a CD I often listen to in my free time, I was pretty pumped to see them live. However, now after seeing them I'm not too heartbroken that I hadn't made an effort to see them before.
 
The band possesses a very different sound live than what is showcased on the album. The vocals of Ed Sloan sounded similar to what's on the album, but it seemed like there was definitely some tweaking with his voice on that CD by Sony.
 
As I talked with some guestlisted people outside the gate prior to the show, a woman arrived at the will call window and said "Hi, I'm here to massage Crossfade." Sounds like a little bit of success went to their heads very quickly.
 
Overall I was pretty disappointed by Crossfade's set, but I did enjoy hearing the singles "Cold" and "So Far Away." It seemed like the vocals of these two songs matched the CD a lot closer. Hopefully backing tracks weren't used for them.
 
As Crossfade left the stage Jacksonville, Fla-based Shinedown geared up for one of only a handful of scheduled shows this summer. The band is currently recording their second disc in the home of guitarist Jasin Todd. Recently Todd called in and we talked about it on HNN (insert link).
 
Since Shinedown is not on a tour, the equipment they used had to be rented from local music stores. The drum set used by Barry Kerch was much smaller than his kit which he usually uses. The different drums definitely had a different sound, but a person who hasn't seen Shinedown as much as myself would have probably not noticed it.
 
The first thing I noticed when the guys came out on stage is that lead singer Brent Smith has dyed his hair back to a dark color like it was at their X-Fest 2003 appearance in Huntington. Shortly after that show here Smith started dying his hair red and continued in for two years. Jasin Todd has also shaved his beard off since the show in Columbus back in February.
 
Shinedown began playing their hit singles early in the set, starting with "Fly From the Inside" coming third in the set. There have been several rumors lately that Shinedown was going to stop playing Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Simple Man" live and we even talked with Jasin about it on HNN.
 
The song was played in Noblesville at the halfway point in the bands set. The song really got the crowd going and singing louder than they had prior to that night. There was never really a point when the crowd was not really into Shinedown.
 
Several fans came from throughout the country to see the show since Shinedown has been pulling 12 hours days in the studio instead of playing live. I talked with fans who traveled from Missouri, Colorado, Michigan and Las Vegas.
 
The Florida four piece played all their radio singles and finished with "No More Love." Durign the song singer Brent Smith jumped off the stage and the security barrier and ran throughout the crowd of over 25,000.
 
Shinedown was amazing as usual, however, they did not play any of the new songs that they have been working on. Todd had promised they would play one in the HNN interview, but a possible time limit restriction from the venue may have not allowed time for it.
 
Headlining X103's May Day this year was 3 Doors Down. The band is touring right now in support of their album which debuted at #1 on the billboard charts, "Seventeen Days." I'd seen 3 Doors Down twice before, but not since the new album was released.
 
A huge stage set up, which included large spinning gears took over the entire stage. As the band came out on stage sparks flew out from the ends of several of the gears that were spinning at different speeds on stage.
 
Just like Shinedown, Brad Arnold and the rest of the 3 Doors Down line up gave the fans some of their biggest songs first. The bands third song, "Kryptonite," was one of their break-out songs from their debut record in the late 90's.
 
It looks like Arnold is trying to get out of the southern rock image a bit and show that he's a rock star with his new mohawk. A new face also appeared on stage with 3 Doors Down. Earlier in the year their drummer moved to rock band Nickelback and 3DD took in Puddle of Mudd's drummer.
 
Since 3 Doors Down will be more than likely performing the same show in Charleston later in the summer I don't want to give too much away.
 
It appears as if 3 Doors Down has taken some pointers from Kid Rock. Rock's live show has always been known for tons of pyros and explosives. At 3 Doors Down's performance in Noblesville many pyrotechnics were used and several different forms were used throughout the bands performance.
 
The band is performing a lot of new stuff on their summer tour and is still tossing in the old songs that have helped them become the number one selling rock band in America.
 
3 Doors Down will be live at the Charleston Civic Center July 31 along with Breaking Benjamin, Staind and No Address. Tickets are $45 and $36 and can be purchased at all Ticketmaster outlets and the Charleston Civic Center Box Office.