Why Don't You Try Using Manners?

by Jasmine Odessa Rizer

Welcome to the unofficial Treasure Box Guide To Concert Etiquette. I'm always telling y'all about recordings that you might enjoy. Now I'm going to take on the issue of live music, and tell you how you can help other people enjoy their concert experience in peace.

1. If I am sitting next to you in one of the good seats at the Classic Center, I have paid at least sixty-five dollars to see Willie Nelson. Chances are, I will not be able to scrape together that kind of money again for a long time. I did not pay sixty-five dollars to hear you sing every song in Willie Nelson's repertoire at the top of your lungs. I also did not pay sixty-five dollars to see you smuggle beer into the auditorium under your shirt, getting so drunk that you shout out in the middle of "Blue Skies," "You better do a whole hell of a lot better than that, Willie, or I'm-a come down there and kick that ass!" I also did not pay sixty-five dollars to year you talking on your cell phone, declaring loudly, "I'm at the Willie Nelson concert!"
2. If you've come to a free outdoor concert just to see the angry English band that is headlining, that's fine. Really. But please go somewhere else and make out during Kristin Hersh's set. Do not make out while standing directly in front of the loyal sixteen-year-old Hersh fans who gladly suffered the humiliation of being dropped off by their dads in order to see her. Especially, please do not make out during "Vicky's Box," which, as far as I can tell, appears to be a song about a fellow who has suffered some terrible traumas, and now can't so much as go for a ride in a car without having flashbacks. Also--and hopefully, this advice will remain obsolete, but you never know--some of you may remember the Nineties phemonenon known as "moshing," in which people churn their bodies around in a pit and pass other people's bodies over their heads. Should moshing ever make a comeback, please try to remember that, however loud she may be able to sing and play her guitar, moshing during Kristin Hersh's set is about as appropriate as moshing during a concert by your city's symphony orchestra.
3. Here is a little advice for the gentlemen: I did not come to the Georgia Theater to pick up fellas. I came to hear a band. And, okay, if they happen to be attractive persons, maybe to look at the band. Please do not attempt to strike up a conversation by bellowing in my face, "DO YOU LIKE THE BAND?" Of course I like the band. If I didn't like the band, I would have stayed at home tonight, and painted my nails, in my safe little apartment where there are no drunk scary guys yelling in my face. Also, college boys, please do not hit on my mom at concerts. Not where I can see you. The only thing more weird and gross than being mistaken for my mom's girlfriend (which is another story for another time) is taking my mom to see Jump (formerly Jump, Little Children) and having a college boy hit on her right in front of me. In general, it is best if you restrict your chick-picking-up activities to the gross singles bar on the other side of town.
4. The most common concert etiquette problem in my adopted hometown is one that it is hard to put into words. It is also the reason that I have pretty much quit going to concerts. At nearly every show I have been to in the last two or three years, everyone in the audience has been far too cool to appear to be enjoying themselves. Not only that, they want to make sure nobody else is enjoying themselves, either, presumably because that would the whammy on the coolness of the entire show, thus defeating their purpose in being there. Once, I saw a perplexed John Darnielle (of Mountain Goats fame), ask a skulking-in-the-back-of-the-room audience at the 40 Watt Club, "Why are you all hanging around back there? Come on up here!" Or words to that effect. Another time, when I got all choked up over "You Are Loved" at a Victoria Williams show (also at the 40 Watt), a cool-professor-looking type near me felt the need to ask his girlfriend, loudly, "What kind of person cries at a Victoria Williams show?" Well, sir, perhaps the kind of person who is actually listening to the song, instead of being so sad and empty that he has to look around in the audience in search of people being criminally uncool. My mother, who, as you may have guessed from Item No. 3, is prettier and hipper than I am, tells me she once saw an English folksinger who was opening for another band at--you guessed it, the 40 Watt--get so fed up with the rude audience at one point that he threatened to quit playing and leave the stage if people didn't shut up during his set. I can't blame him. It's bad enough when I, the music geek, can no longer enjoy a concert in my hometown because a hundred people are watching me, critiquing my outfit and my behavior in voices so loud I can barely hear the singer. When the hipness (read: rudeness) is so out of control that even the people onstage can't concentrate, that's even worse.

See how easy it is to be nice at a concert? All you need is a little common sense and courtesy. When in doubt, remember that I did not pay fifteen dollars to see you.