Audioslave The first time that I heard Rage Against The Machine was at my friend Tamara's birthday party in Junior High. She was having a big slumber party, with the girls upstairs and the boys downstairs. My friend Dave brought one of their albums to the party and we played it loud. It was fast and angry, and I didn't really care for it other than as a diversion from the radical Christianity going on above us.

About a year later, I got an acoustic guitar for my birthday, which made me get into different genres of music than the top 40 rubbish on the radio. This change of taste quickly flourished into a deep appreciation for the actual talent of the group. I bought their albums, videos, posters, and t-shirts. I followed the career of the band intensely. Tom Morello became my idol and is the reason why I traded in my acoustic guitar for an electric.

When Rage Against The Machine broke up, I was disappointed. I thought I'd never get the chance to see the group play live. Well, as fate would have it, Zack de la Rocha left the group and the rest got together with Chris Cornell to form Audioslave. And also, as fate would have it, last night Audioslave came to Edmonton and realized a dream that I thought would never happen. And it was as perfect as I could have ever imagined.

When the curtain literally fell, Your Time Has Come thundered from the speakers. The sound was consistently clear; Brad Wilk's drum kit, Tim Commerford's bass, Chris Cornell's vocals and, of course, Tom Morello's wild guitars.

Though I admit that I was mildly intoxicated and don't remember the entire set list, some songs that really stand out in my mind are Like A Stone, Cochise, Testify, Out Of Exile, Doesn't Remind Me, Spoonman, Rusty Cage, The Worm, Be Yourself and Set It Off (one of my favourite songs from the first album). The band took a bit of a break late in the show to allow a fan to propose to his girlfriend, then jumped right into Killing In The Name and a song that is going to be on the band's third album called One And The Same.

And then, as abruptly as it started, the show was over. Chris said, "thank you Edmonton" and the band walked off the stage leaving the whole audience cheering for what must have been five solid minutes until a lonely Chris Cornell came back with an acoustic guitar. "I want you all to sing along," he said, and lead the crowd into a beautiful acoustic rendition of Black Hole Sun. Following that, he played another Soundgarden song, Blow Up The Outside World, then started playing I Am The Highway. Just before the second chorus, the rest of the band returned to the stage and cranked the volume up again. They played another four songs together, which included an amalgamation of Bulls On Parade with the rest of Sleep Now In The Fire. The final song of the evening was Shadow On The Sun.

All things considered, this was very likely the best show I've ever been to. It was partially due to the fact that I had been looking forward to seeing most of these guys play for so long. I watched Tom's unique style carefully, noticing which guitars he still uses from the Rage years - Arm The Homeless and Soul Power. It was an evening of loud rock and roll that really pushed the envelope.

I'm not sure if I will ever see another show like that again. And if I do, it had better be the next Audioslave concert.  ¶ 8:06 PM