Sonics Rally Brings ‘Thunder’ to Seattle

Community, Events, News

June 18, 2012 – by Sebastian Garrett-Singh

A sea of green and gold filled Occidental Park, all the dusty letterman’s and throwback hats that had been missing from our city in one day came out of the closet and amassed in full force at a rally to bring back the Super Sonics. Camera crews jockeyed for the best filming positions before a crowd of an estimated 6000 descended on the generally quite park, not today though.

“SONICS” the crowd replied as Kevin Callabro with his signature voice yelled “SUPER”. Screens streamed tweets from attendees and speakers urged the crowd to blast the city council with tweets calling for the return of their stolen Sonics.

Developer Chris Hansen who will be footing a majority of the bill for the arena sauntered onto the stage, he was met with gracious applause from the crowd, and wore a well-deserved smirk on his face. “We got great fans here in Seattle.”

Sonics fans in the adjacent building looked on with smiles and affixed banners to their windows. The voice of the fans resonated through Pioneer Square, almost “thunderously” so.

Old great Gary “The Glove” Payton wore a look of surprise and awe as the crowd went crazy at his presence, “We gon get this arena, we gon get a basketball team, we gon get a lot.” He later spoke with former Sonic Shawn Kemp and Seattle local Nate Robinson.

Sonics greats all came together on the stage and Kevin Callabro came and took a picture of me (I assume for wearing a camera on my Sonics hat). After thanking the fans and much talking a slew of local artists took to the stage to perform.

RA Scion of Common Market was the first to perform delivering an impassioned set of music. Here is an edited version of his set.

The Presidents of The United State of America played their hits “Lump” and “Peaches” but what really got the crowd involved was their performance of “Super Sonics”.

Local Hip-Hop hero’s Blue Scholars took to the stage to finish out the rally playing a mix of their new album with older hits like “The Ave” and during their performance of “North by Northwest” were joined on stage by rappers Macklemore and Grynch. Here is their performance of “Slick Watts”.

While the Oklahoma City Thunder played (and lost) game two in the NBA finals, the basketball fans of Seattle with their voices made it apparently clear were the “thunder” was.