Three tips on concert etiquette

CLEVELAND, OH – When Four Year Strong and the Fall 2011 AP Tour came to the House of Blues in Cleveland on Nov. 26, many would have expected the show to be a great time.  A great time it was.  However, it was not the show some were thinking it would be; not due to the bands and their music, but due to the crowd.  Quite frankly, the crowd was rather lackluster until the very end.  Gallows riled up somewhat of a mosh pit, only through lead singer Wade MacNeil literally jumping into the crowd and forming the pit himself and singing with the few extreme fans that were there.  The pit didn’t really fill up with people off their feet until Four Year Strong came to close the show

During the end of the first opening band Sharks, a concert-goer would have seen one lone girl dancing and singing her heart out all by herself in the front near the left.  That girl was me.  Nobody else was moving!  Maybe twenty kids were standing in the pit during Sharks’ show, all with arms crossed and dull looks on their faces.  Sharks is a punk band, arguably one of the best currently touring, and being from Britain, I really mean punk.  One would have thought there would be a great mosh pit for a band of the genre that started the moshing movement, but none of the skinny jean-donning, flannel-wearing, beard-having hipster/lumberjacks at the show seemed to have gotten that memo.  Tip number one: move.  If you’re in the pit, get off your feet.  Dance!  Mosh!  Jump!  Flail!  Sophomore Chelsea Gresh, who attended the show and witnessed the disappointment, says, “I get really annoyed when people don’t move when an opening band plays, like Sharks; [their behavior] was super lame. You’re at a show to move around and have fun, not just awkwardly stand there. A band knows if you like their music if you’re moving around and having fun. So even if you don’t know who they are, if you think they are good then move!”  Whatever you have to do, show your support for the band playing their hearts out and express that you’re having a good time by getting off your feet.

Later, I was upstairs waiting for the members of Sharks to come out and sell their merchandise while Title Fight was playing.  When they finished their set, upwards of twenty kids left the show.  Not for a breath of fresh air, either.  They walked out the door and didn’t come back.  I don’t care a whole lot for Gallows either, but I paid almost $30 for this ticket and not just to watch one band and split.  Gallows works hard to play their music and put on a fun show.  (I said I didn’t like their music, but they sure were fun to watch.)  They deserve an audience.  That’s what live music is all about!  Tip number two: stay.  If you don’t care too much for a band, doesn’t matter.  Unless you have something much more pressing elsewhere, just wait it out a bit. The people on the stage deserve your respect; you paid for the whole tour and they’re on it.  Go upstairs and talk to the guys selling the merchandise or just hang out with who you came with and hear some live tunes.

During the show, the more people arrived, the more this issue was prevalent; you will see this anywhere you go where live music is being played: girls looking like little runaround street-walking harlots. Girls think they’re cute or sexy and dress up in short skirts and low cut tops with seven inch stilettos to go shows, and what for?  Most of the other concert-goers aren’t there to see that.  Girls can dress cute, sure, but that’s not the point.  And this issue doesn’t apply directly to the ladies but to the fellas as well, because these girls aren’t showing their skin for their own benefit.  Keep your eyes and ears and thoughts directed at the stage.  Tip number three: go to the show for the music.  If you’re not going to the concert to listen to the music, don’t buy the ticket.  If you are, show it by dressing the way you should.  When alternative motives are put into play at a show, other people can be bothered.  That’s not what the concert atmosphere should be.  When you don’t attend a concert for the right reasons it’s apparent to everybody else, and you make a bad image for yourself.

So there are three tips important to keep in mind next time a band you like rolls into town.  Following the aforementioned guidelines will help make your experience and the experience of your fellow show-mates a much more fun and enjoyable one.  A concert isn’t about one person, it isn’t about the band, it isn’t about the venue or anybody there.  It’s about the music, and having a good time listening to it.  The band is just a vessel to put the drum beat under your feet and the bass beat in your heart so you can forget everything else and lose yourself in the music.  That’s what it’s all about.