Concerts

I don’t like standing, clapping, crowds, yelling or $6 glasses of American draft beer. I am not incited to begin clapping or yelling when someone repeatedly tells me they “can’t hear” me. Look, I know you can’t hear me, it’s because I’m not saying shit. But I’ll tell you what: I’ve got a whole entourage of senior-ranking assclowns waving papery secondhand joints and spilling $6 glasses of American draft beer who, I fucking promise you, would cheer the successful boarding of a commercial aircraft. Not bad? Plus, you are in luck, they just took a hit with their mom or lil’ bro and are elated as hell to discover the likeness of the person on stage corresponds to the image printed on the front of their official “Summer Daze” or whatever gimmick-tour-title t-shirt they’ll wear as a night shirt until they’re 34 and stop only then because their wife will request it and work up the courage in saying so to reveal to them they’ve been sleeping with a guy from work for the last three months but that they’re really sorry and it just happened and, oh, it’s not the shirt, it’s not the shirt.

As romanitized as they are on television and in my own memory, I always forget about how potentially underwhelming and unenjoyable concerts can be. This is probably because I start out with the assumption that I’m going to a sweet-ass rock n’ roll show with some equally rock n’ roll friends. Sure, they’ll be some other people there, I know that, like 19-year-old girls with nice tits and black bras and “it doesn’t count if I’m drunk” excuses in mind. Oh yeah, there might also be a few of those old rock sages with graying beards, Indian stories, and LSD still mixed up in their spinal fluid. But really, it’s mostly a bunch of douche bags who thought this something they should do and love that band’s one song. “Play that one song, wwwwWWHEEWWWWEWWWW!” No, fuck you, stop leaning on me. After three hours of standing, I’m already being staggered by my own fat ass.

And for what you pay for a ticket, I always feel like I should being getting at least some sort of package deal. “What? Thirty bucks just to stand here? Can’t I get like a hot dog and cheese sauce? And one of those baseball tees with the stencil of the apathetic-looking chick on front. Yeah. I’m a medium.”

Most of the time, though, I’m just doing my best to look like I don’t give a shit but could if some asshole even thinks about bumping into me. I also spend a lot of time thinking about shaking the arms of people carrying two or more beers. “’Scuse me, dudes, coming through. ‘Scuse me, oh, ‘scuse me. Thanks. ‘Scuse me, ‘scuse me, scu – BAM! What!? Dude! Dude! What the fuck man? What the fuck?”  I also sometimes try to trip the people who try to squeeze through to the front of the audience after the crowd’s already packed in for the headlining act (did I just say “headlining act”?). They’ll kind of bump you in the back and then apologize and try an alternate sneaky route past you.

That’s why you and your rock n’ roll friends must be united on this front. Last night, my friend Greg and I united against this asshat who tried all manner of sly shit to get past, including rock flattery. “(Bump, bump. Bump, bump.) Hey, what’s going on? You seem like pretty chill guys and I wouldn’t be asking you if I didn’t think you were cool but I got some buddies up a couple rows and just need to get through to get to them, see, they’re right up their (waving generally) yep, that’s them, so if you could…” But that shit wasn’t going to fly with a Rocketeer pack strapped to it. He tried all kinds of sighing and elbow jabbing techniques, but it just wasn’t happening on our rock watch. So he went two people down a minute later and got through almost immediately. Up a few rows we could see him, too. He seemed to be having a pretty good time with his friends and enjoying his superior view. Whatever though. If he had to leave to go to the bathroom he’d know where not to come for sympathy a second time around. I was fairly pissed, though, so when a drunk girl stunned us with a set of elbows and was able to slip past, I threw a trip at her that was kind of accidentally not really a kick to the back of her leg. I felt like a douche bag even though I don’t think she felt anything. Then proceeded to think about how awesome it would be to sit down in an hour.