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I'm getting too old for rock concerts

#41
Gal pal of mine was at an AC/DC concert a while back. Everybody was standing up and
she got peed on by some drunk guy in the row behind her who whipped it out and let go right there at his seat. lol
Concerts aren't for everybody I guess. But as I get older I get more and more choosy about who I am willing to go see. Bonnie Raitt is always a good show. Had front row center seats for her last show here and didn't mind paying the $92 per ticket for them either!
 
#42
I've never really liked the crowds at concerts, or anywhere for that matter.

Part of it is that from the age of 17 I was a lighting hire company manager, roadie or DJ through till I was in my late 20's. It was very rare that i'd pay to see an act... most of the time i'd be able to scrounge a free ticket and usually I'd get to hang at the mixing desk, DJ booth or side of stage and if any drunk idiots were a hassle it only took a wave and security would deal with it. The cost is usually the biggest thing for me, having not had to pay so much in my younger years. I simply won't pay $150 +++ to see an act that many times won't sound nearly as good as they should.

The best gigs i've seen recently have been at Canberra Theatre. A 1200 seat venue that has great sight-lines and sound from just about every seat, and everyone stays in their seat.

Yeah..... get off my lawn.
 
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#44
90% of concert goers are there to take selfies.

That being said I still enjoy shows despite the nonsense. I just accept the "circus" aspect brings our everyone's inner freak.

Weird that security didn't flat eject the guy that yelled at you.
 
#45
You have every right to be angry. You paid an arm and a leg to see a concert, not to deal with self-righteous idiots. It's not you getting old, it's stupid people everywhere. I'm 17 and have as much patience as you do towards them.
 
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#48
I was backstage at a 1970's Alice Cooper concert. They had lots of pizza and booze. The band got so drunk and one guitar player was soooo out of it they just unplugged him and he didn't know it.

Later, after the show my brother and I caught a VW bus with Alice Cooper to a bar on Capital Hill in Seattle and on the way up to the club, Alice Cooper threw up pizza and beer.

The crowd was rowdy. But I was 21. I think I was a bit of an undesirable myself.

Once a year I have to tell my Alice Cooper story. It's all I got. My doggone wife saw Elvis for goodness sake. She shook his hand and he rubbed his scarf around her neck. All I got was Alice Cooper. LOL.
 
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#49
Bullitt5135 said:
<<Rant warning>>

LOL...and I'm only 47. Last night, I took my family to see U2 in Detroit. Besides the usual ridiculously inflated ticket prices (having to buy on StubHub because nothing good is ever available on Ticketmaster), concert traffic, jacked up parking prices, long security lines, lousy concert sound, etc. -- I was actually having a great time. Until the drunk broad next to me punched me in the face, that is.

About 2/3 of the way through the show, the girls next to me got up from their seats. Immediately, a drunk middle-aged couple poured into the seats. Rude, obnoxious, annoying. This broad's style of dancing was to flail her arms like she was drowning. Lovely, I'm glad I paid hundreds for these seats. A couple songs later, she pulls out her cigarettes and starts to light up. I'm not having it. I tap her on the shoulder and said "that's not happening here...take it outside." She told me to f*off and lit up anyway. 49,999 other people in the stadium got the memo that Ford Field is a no-smoking venue, just like every other stadium in the USA. Not her, she's special. I turned around and got the attention of the usher, who immediately realized what was going on. Security arrived a couple minutes later and removed them from the seats. Zero tolerance, apparently. On the way out, the drunk chick told me to f*off again and back-handed me across the face. I guess I deserved it. Problem solved.

Maybe I'm a little too uptight? Probably because I seem to run into these idiots at every show I go to. Last year, we went to see the sold-out Steely Dan at the Hollywood Bowl. We got to our seats to find this meathead and his drunk friends in our seats. He wasn't about to move, and caused a huge scene before the ushers sorted everything out...disrupting the show for a good 15 minutes. Before he left, he got in my face like a drill sergeant and called me every name in the book in front of my 15 yr old daughter. Am I wrong for just wanting to sit in the seats I paid for? There were no other open seats...it was sold out.

Primus show a few months ago. We are sitting in the balcony with the 500 or so other people...all sitting...every last one...except for the guy right in front of me. I get it, it's a rock concert. People get excited and want to stand. I sat patiently staring at this guys back for a couple songs until I got tired of the people behind me asking to get the guy to sit down. When I tapped him on the shoulder, he told me to f*off and continued to stand. All by himself. Despite the fact that there was an acre of space to stand on the floor and mezzanine. An usher arrived eventually and moved the guy back to the cheap seat he actually paid for.

It's just getting to the point that it's just not worth the hassle and aggravation. Oh, and get off my lawn!
Click to expand...
Im 35 now, i love going to shows at local venues but the biggest venue I'll pay to see shows at is the house of blues. the last great massive show that I went to was when I saw 311 more than a decade ago. Maybe that crowd was cool because the majority of them were stoned instead of drunk. I'm glad I got to see most of my favorite bands in smaller venues before they were super huge.

But yeah those huge shows suck these days. The sound is terrible. You can have a band playing with a bass player that has all these interesting dirty tones on the album and at a huge show it just sounds like a boring sine wave between the direction Front of house sound has gone and the acoustics of those venues. There's also a ton of people at those types of shows that that show might be the only concert they go to for several years or their first concert ever. The type of people who are into a band more so because they are famous than their music and also the types that don't support local music at all because they assume all local bands must suck or they would be playing stadiums also. The ticket prices are also laughable these days. One of the doctors I work with dropped almost ten grand to take his family to see Bruno mars. That's a joke. I'm not saying ticket prices have to be $10 but I refuse to spend more than $100 per person between tickets, parking, gas, and dinner. The house of blues I go to is more than two hours away in a different state and I see shows there for less than that. The ticket scams. These companies like Ticketmaster and their huge fees. A lot of big concerts in my area a 2nd company will buy up tickets and resell them higher and which doesn't increase the pay for the bands or crewvar all because the band agreed to play for a set price.
 
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#50
When you jam that many people into a small space, the chances of you being seated next to someone who doesn't exactly share the same enthusiasm for the family friendly, homogenized HD living room experience (and will slap you like a rag doll to defend their right to enjoy a concert how they see fit) increases exponentially. This has been going on for as long as audiences seeing things has been a thing. Why would you expect anything else? Mega stadium shows aren't for people to enjoy music. They're for people willing to fork out stupid money under the false assumption that their ticket price somehow insulates them from reality.
 
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#51
I guess it really depends on the artist(s), venue and crowd. The last major show like that I went to was The Roots supporting Usher, and maybe since we were standing on the lawn about 60 yards back from the pit in front of the stage everyone around us was cool and respectful (even giving me space to dance like an idiot!). I've also been to two of the three Crossroads festivals put on by Eric Clapton, and aside from the atrocity that it Ticketmaster and their pricing scams it was a great experience with lots of other music fans.

The only time in recent memory that I had any real issue with someone was at a multi-band metal concert (between P.O.D. and Sevendust) when some drunk Jersey Shore D-Bag started to choke a random girl that was standing in a spot that he wanted to be. I threw some bottles at the stage hands (which I regret but had to get their attention) and signaled for them to call the police in, then went over and started crushing the D-Bag's windpipe (which I don't regret in the slightest) to get him to let go of the girl who was turning purple. When the police arrived and arrested the D-Bag I told them what I'd done and surrendered to them if they wanted to take me too, but they said I could stay. I've been to a fair number of metal concerts and it's uncanny how attentive and respectful metal fans can be, so I think this guy was just a random occurrence in an otherwise cool crowd.

I agree that I have less patience with such rude behavior as described by the OP, but maybe some of that is just the result of some people associating converts with the behavior of their youth where being rebellious was synonymous with being an inconsiderate jerk.
 
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#52
I love a live show but the audience are the biggest problem. I saw Paco Pena the other night and the cloth eared bint in front of me wouldn't shut up, constantly learning over to her friend to pass some gem of wisdom. This was a quiet show, you have to listen. But no, this woman's wisdom and wit had to be shared. Her head was bobbing around like a dashboard Elvis.
 
#53
70" ultra hi-def , a couple thousand watts , smoke / or not , drink/ or not , easy parking , comfy seats , clean nearby bathroom , Pause Button , Volume Control , ... a few guests over for ' Concert Night ' / or not ..!?

etc, etc .... i used to go to concerts before i had my own small theater at my own house ...

i played 6 nights a week and was in sales 6 days a week ... i've had more than my share of dealing with idiots ..!!
 
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#54
I can fix the idiots at concerts problem.

Cheaper beer inside the arena. Seems counter intuitive, I know. The problem is this. Beet inside is $19.95 plus shipping and handling. The dipsticks who simply HAVE to have a buzz to watch a show will get stumbling drunk for a $20 case of PBR. In fact, they want to get drunk enough for the drunk to last the whole show so they can avoid paying a ton for a beer inside. They always forget the part about being drunk turning them into idiots.

Now, if a beer were $5 inside there would be less tailgating going on. AND once they get to their seats, many will think of it as too much hassle to go buy beer. So they drink less. Less drunk people. Cheaper beer would actually amount to fewer idiots.
 
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#55
During David Gilmours most recent tour I decided to NOT spend $200 to see him. Instead I spent $39 to see Brit Floyd live at a local college amphitheater (about 2000 seats). We had a great time, no idiots, great sound, great setlist.

I know it's not exactly like seeing the original, but I don't regret that decision at all. I will definitely see them again if I have the chance.
 
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#57
I'm right there with you. These days I'm VERY selective about who I go see and where. Venue almost makes a bigger difference to me than band. If a place sounds good and I know there's going to be a friendly crowd, I'm all for it (I also like a place to sit and watch somewhere instead of standing the whole time).

There's a summer festival an hour north of me in Sandpoint that goes on for one week every year. The seating, crowd, food and sound are so good that I will see anyone there, I don't care who they are.

Also, I work in law enforcement, and I have a hard time shutting that off sometimes at crazy rock shows.
 
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#58
I have not been to a concert in a few years. I use to go to camp out festivals.
My last one was Mt. Jam it was my fourth or fifth year and the crowds just ruin it for me. The kids that were suppose to be peaceful loving hippy's were nothing of the sort. They just looked the part.
I'm 41 now and grew up in the tail end of the Grateful Dead vibe. People were respectable and for the most part you could trust your neighbor. These kids at Mt. Jam were disgusting litter every where, the would rip you off without thinking twice. All of our tents got broken into and my friends truck was victim to someone defecating in the bed.
Not a fun time. That was my last time.
(Don't be a dirty hippy, pick up your trash!)
 
#59
I went to see "Phantom of the Opera " a few years ago with an old GF ( yea yea I know ) and there was this clown sitting behind me who insisted upon singing along with the show ( very badly and off key I will add ) . After turning almost all the way around several times , I finally told this guy " I didn't pay $90 to hear you sing along , off key the whole night so shut up ! " This guy didn't like that and called a usher to have me removed . I told the guy "He's the 1singing out of tune the whole time , and I didn't pay to hear him !" Usher asked him to keep it down , but then the guy started kicking the back of my seat . I got up and left and waited in the lobby . Saw the usher and told him after he left the clown started kicking my seat and before I did something stupid ( like clocking the guy ) I just came out.
 

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