Column written for class:
Every inch of you is touching every inch of someone else. Every breath you take is thick with fog machine chemicals. The moisture hanging in the air is the perspiration of hundreds of young adults.
This is the scene at any standing-room-only concert. If you have not attended one, I assure you they are more fun than that picture would suggest. The music feels closer, but unfortunately so does everyone else.
Those people you’re sandwiched against at a concert sometimes end up making the band a sideshow.
The last show I attended was The Hives on March 3 at Kool Haus in Toronto with a couple of friends. The crowd was the typical young hipster scene, the boys and girls hard to tell apart in their skinny jeans and matching skinny ties.
Deep in the masses, near stage left, is where it began.
“Sorry, babe!”
Two teenage boys wearing black Hives shirts fresh from the merchandise booth were pushing their way in front of me, jamming their elbows into my side and slamming their hips against mine, attempting to dislodge me from the tiny space I’d been holding into.
“’Scuse me, babe!”
Ignoring my returned pushes and glares that could scour pans clean, they stood right in front of me. Naturally, they were two heads taller than me.
“I think we pissed off the redhead,” yelled one to the other.
The redhead was my friend, and was indeed pissed off. I wasn’t entirely pleased either.
“Oh my God, you are so tall. Why do you have to be so close? Do you want to make love to the band or something?” came in a slurred shriek from behind us.
It was a petite blonde grasping a half-crushed can of Canadian. She was in the middle of clumsily tugging her shirt over her head.
My friends and I performed a chorus of eye rolls as those around us ogled the girl, some snapping photos destined to appear on Facebook the next day adorned with witty captions.
Struggling to kick her shoes off, and refusing to drop the beer can, the girl began motioning upwards in the universal signal for a hoist.
I ducked, refusing to participate, as the crowd picked her up and carried her away with masculine hands popping up to cop a feel. That is reason number one why crowd surfing may not be a good idea.
Reason number two came crashing down moments later.
A twenty-something man with a bald head and a red beard slammed into the floor. He had been floating on the crowd and hit a bare spot.
The crowd parted like a zipper as burly men in matching “Security” shirts rushed in, looking very composed as the fallen man squirmed into the fetal position. More cameras flashed.
Scooping their hands under his arms, they dragged the poor guy off with his head rocking from side to side. We did not see him again.
The shrieking blonde made one more appearance. After the show, while walking over the floor carpeted with beer cans, plastic cups and rolling papers, she slunk past on a friend’s supportive arm, hair mussed and makeup smudged.
Good news, she managed to find her shirt.
Herding with the sweaty hipsters into the cool night air, we laughed and cursed at the people we had encountered, armed with our own photos ready for Facebook.
So be warned, for better or for worse, your antics at a concert may end up being more memorable than the show itself.
