Back in 2014 I got to see Rise Against play at the House of Blues in Boston, which was amazing, and just recently I went to see grandson and K. Flay perform together.
I think these are my two favorite concerts I’ve been to, and the key factor seems to be the energy between the crowd and the band. It’s a thing that’s kinda hard to express in words, but for me that’s definitely what makes a concert go from good to great. It doesn’t need to be a high-energy thing necessarily, either: one of the best moments from grandson’s set was actually a really somber, lower energy song that he came down onto the floor to perform, and you could just tell that everyone was really invested in that moment.
What about you all? What takes a concert to the next level for you?
Stage presence is a big one for me. When I saw My Chemical Romance last year it was this big spectacle and just marvelous. Even though Gerard himself is not the best singer, it was just a fun time period. When I saw Slayer with Testament, Behemoth, Lamb of God, and Anthrax. It was the mood they created. The intensity was something you could literally feel from just the noise. They were really giving it their all as it was Slayer’s farewell tour. But the crowd also kind of matters too.
And when concerts have disappointed me, it’s usually been because the stage presence is okay at best but the audience has been terrible. There were some local hip-hop/rap festivals I would go to. And the bigger the festival got, the more belligerent the behavior got. You would have people pushing and shoving to get to the front. And since these festivals were always in the middle of summer. It was be unbearably humid. Then they switched to a venue that was all concrete and that just killed my knees entirely to be there for 5+ hours.
This all the way.
Saw Oasis many years ago, massive stadium show not too long before they imploded. Hands down the worst gig I’ve been to. The band were fine, but Liam being Liam was goading the crowd. A crowd who, mostly, had been drinking for most of the long day, so were rowdy as shit.
The end result was a gig that felt dangerous and not much fun at all.
Exactly, I’ve been to metal shows like I said and have felt fine. And those generally have a lot of physicality. But not brutality. When it treads into the realm of brutality or abuse it is just hard to justify.
Terrible audiences really ruin vibes. I’ve seen it happen mostly at festivals. During a headlining act at ACL some people started making a mosh circle, but just used it as an excuse to bash their way to the front. As someone who likes mosh pits quite a bit i was honestly pissed at their actually dangerous behavior.
It was grueling. I don’t think I can stomach going to another festival again because of the prior experiences. It was reminiscent of the behavior when people got trampled to death at Travis Scott’s show awhile back. Thankfully no one in my situation died. But the pushing/shoving that people were doing was very dangerous.
One thing I really appreciated at the grandson show I was just at was that he explicitly told everyone at the start of his set that one of his show’s “rules” is: if a mosh pit forms, and somebody falls down, you stop and pick them back up. None formed at this particular show, but still a really cool thing to ensure everyone’s on the same page about that up front.
It warms my heart too when artists will stop shows because they can tell someone in the audience is in trouble.