John Legend & Corinne Bailey Ray at the Chicago Theatre

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Chicago Theatre Marquee, The Loop, Chicago

Last Friday we went to see Corinne Bailey Rae and John Legend at the Chicago Theatre. Before going we weren’t sure where to go eat that was nearby, so we went to South Water Kitchen. It was alright. Overpriced, we thought. The show was really great, though. Even better than I’d expected, and I was really excited and expecting a lot!

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Corinne Bailey Rae, Chicago Theatre, The Loop, Chicago

Here are some thoughts I took note of when we got home:

  • In between visits to the Chicago Theatre, I always forget how beautiful it is. Gorgeous.
  • I was using the bathroom before the show and all the girls were all a twitter. I heard them saying that they hadn’t slept the night before and that they couldn’t even believe they were there. That’s how charged up and excited the crowd was.
  • Our seats were fabulous. On the Mezzanine level, in the front, section K seats 1&2.
  • Corinne Bailey Rae is adorable. Cute hair, cute little dress, cute shoes.
  • When Corinne went on everyone was still walking around and filing into the theater on the ground floor. it was really distracting and made it harder to concentrate on her performance. I mean, I guess she was the opening act, but still.. I really wanted to hear her and let her have my full attention and it was hard to do that.
  • At the end of her set everyone was cheering like crazy and she seemed very gracious and very humble.
  • When Corinne sang, the audience was excited, but not like “stand on your feet and go crazy” excited. John Legend, on the other hand, worked the crowd like crazy. We were only seated for his first song before everyone was up on their feet dancing, singing, and screaming. I was kind of surprised, since when we listen to his music at home it’s kind of mellow. It definitely made things more exciting, though.

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John Legend, Chicago Theatre, The Loop, Chicago

  • The 3 women behind us were hysterical. Not like “funny” hysterical, but more like in hysterics. It made me scream 50% more.
  • When John came out he was dressed really nice. A vest, a dress shirt, black pants, and some Chuck Taylors. Early on he took his vest off and I said “Whoooo!!! Take off mooore!!!” Dallas said “Simmer Down!”
  • At the end of the song “Slow Dance” John was dancing all around and said something about how there were plenty of beautiful single women in Chicago and there he was up on stage dancing alone. You could tell he was hinting that he was going to take a girl up on stage to dance with him. Well, the women started running down the aisles towards the stage! One was picked to go up on stage and all the ladies were screaming. Especially when she took John’s shirt off and he was stripped down to his white tank top. At another point he went down into the audience.. I didn’t think he was going to make it out.
  • For some songs John sat at the piano and played. For some songs he danced around the stage.
  • John’s backup singers made me giggle. They had all the old-school synchronized dancing moves.
  • One of my favorite songs is “Number One.” I love the melody and tune and it’s just a really fun song, even though the lyrics are horrible and about cheating and lying. The opening lyrics are “You can’t say that I don’t love you just because I cheat on you.” So I think you catch the drift. On the album version of the song Kanye raps for a time and we were thinking he might show up at the show because he’s from Chicago, but he didn’t, but it didn’t matter really. The song was still fun and the show was still great.
  • The last song of John’s set was “Coming Home.” He said that they’ve gotten a bunch of letters from the people fighting the war and their families who have said the song has really meant a lot to them. The performance of the song was really chill. John at the piano and in the background they showed great big photographs of soldiers and families. In the moment it was really moving. Maybe it was the wine, but I cried through the whole song.
  • During the encore John talked about his travels to Ghana and the poverty there. Before singing the song “Show Me” he talked about the “Show Me Foundation” that he’s set up to help the people of Ghana. He talked about how for just like $10 or $20 you could buy a whole family beds or something really crazy like that.
  • Finally, this is in regard to both Corinne and John, their voices were just as beautiful and clear and soulful as on any recording I’ve heard. You know, sometimes people have great voices on the records and then you hear them live and it’s not good. Not the case here.

The photos and videos here are not great, obviously, and they’re more for my personal memories, I guess, than any display of photographic or videography skill. At least the videos below still sound good:

Thai Linda Cafe

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Thai Linda Cafe, Roscoe Village, Chicago

Thai Linda Cafe is one of our close by Roscoe Village restaurants. I like the interior decor and the food is pretty good. I like that Roscoe Street is all businesses and restaurants and the side streets are all residential. And that I can walk out, just steps away, onto Roscoe and have my choice of bars and so many different cuisines like Thai, Guatemalan, Southwestern, sandwiches, American, Italian, Turkish, etc. Can’t wait for the new Mexican restaurant to open!

Visiting Louisville Slugger

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The Big Bat: You are standing next to an exact-scale replica of the model R43, 34 wood bat designed to specifications requested by Babe Ruth in the early 1920s. The “Bud Hillerich” signature that appears with the famous oval logo is a tribute to John A. “Bud” Hillerich, who turned the company’s first bat in 1884. Height: 120 ft. Diameter: 9 ft. Composition: ASTM A36 carbon steel. Weight: 68,000 lbs. Installed October 21, 1995.

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Louisville Slugger Walk of Fame. Babe Ruth Bat Model R43. Baseball’s first great slugger and the most celebrated athlete of his era from 1914 – 1935, hit 54 HRs in 1920, more than all but one A.L. and N.L. team. Led the A.L. in HRs 12 times, including a 154 game season record of 60 HRs in 1927. 714 career HRs and a 342 career batting average.

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On the day after the wedding, we had breakfast and visited with everyone in the morning. Then Molly, Eric, Tristin, Kim, Dallas and I went and saw Blades of Glory. I think we all got really good ab workouts from all the giggling. It was really funny. Next we had lunch and then Dallas and I were off to Louisville to get ready for our flight.

We got to Louisville earlier than expected so we were just driving around when we came across the Louisville Slugger Factory & Museum. You can’t miss it because of the huge bat out front. Unfortunately, it had closed an hour before we got there, but there were still some things to look at outside. We also looked in the windows and could see some bats in the process of being made.

The last photo is a stadium next to the gas station we stopped at before dropping off the rental car.

After the Party is the After Party

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The Elmer T. Lee Clubhouse, Buffalo Trace, Frankfort, KY

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Eric, Frankfort, KY

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Alex, Frankfort, KY

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Rachelle, Dallas & Tristin, Frankfort, KY

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Extra Beer, Frankfort, KY

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Playing Left Right Center, Frankfort, KY

Eric & Molly’s wedding ended at 11 p.m. or so and there was a ton of beer and wine left, so the people that were staying at the hotel took the limo and went back and partied some more. Fun times. I have no idea what time it was when everything settled down and people went off to their own rooms to go to sleep.

Molly & Eric’s Wedding

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Buffalo Trace

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Buffalo Trace

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Dallas

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Buffalo Trace

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Elmer T Lee Clubhouse at Buffalo Trace

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Outside looking in.

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Table settings.

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Flowers

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Flowers

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Flowers

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Flowers

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Flowers

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Megan’s toast.

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Molly and her mom.

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Molly and Eric

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Violinists During Dinner

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Wedding Cake

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Groom’s Cake

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Chocolate Fountain

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Eric and his mom

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Molly and her dad

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Molly and her dad

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Molly & Eric

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Eric’s brother doing the worm.

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Eric getting punk’d.

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Eric realizing the joke.

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Jessica dancing.

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Rachelle, Dallas, Kim, Tristan

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Scott & Megan

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Megan & Dallas

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Megan & Dallas

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Megan, Molly, Dallas

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Molly & the DJ

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Kim & Tristin

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Jessica & Chris

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Dallas & Rachelle

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Megan & Scott

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Dallas, Rachelle, Eric

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Buffalo Trace

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Rachelle, Dallas & Tristin in the limo.

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Eric & Alex in the limo.

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Alex in the limo.

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Leftover beer for the after party.

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Leftover beer for the after party.

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Playing Left, Right, Center

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Gift basket in our hotel room.

The last time we saw Molly & Eric was in Peoria at Megan & Scott’s wedding 2 years ago. This past weekend we went to Frankfort, Kentucky to attend their wedding. It was so much fun. Sometimes you go to weddings and they’re nice and fine and pretty, this one was all that and a really a great time. It was at the Buffalo Trace distillery. Part of it was supposed to be outside but the weather didn’t cooperate, but it was totally fine. The ceremony was only about 15 minutes long, then we had dinner and then it was a great big party. I think it helped that Molly & Eric are totally fun and casual people (after the ceremony they came up to present themselves to everyone and that song that in the beginning says “Let’s get ready to rummmmmmblllle” was playing!). Also, they didn’t seem worried about a thing. They said the key is to get a wedding planner, and they had 3 of them there. We saw many people we hadn’t seen for years and also met a lot of really cool people from all over the place – Illinois, Kentucky, even Hawaii. Congratulations, Molly & Eric.