WTF is with people at live shows?

[David C]

A pea is probably pretty hard to hit.

As accurate as blow darts.

 

[Sax-son]

But I bet the chicks were flashing their **** without excessive talking....right?

Yes! There were no complaints about that.

 

[Dik Ellis]

I think some of these dodo's just want to be seen there.

 

[mad dog]

It's pure selfishness, entitlement. People treat public spaces as if they were their own living rooms. No one else matters when you're in your living room, right? It's like that. If the world spins around me, only I matter.

 

[Zoso420]

I used to go to Wanee fest every year to see the Allman bros. One year this dude behind me had a tambourine and was just going off, out of time and everything. I finally got fed up and turned around and cussed him out and said I paid to see the the bros not your crappy tambourine

 

[Askwhy]

I'm fine with people up and dancing. The talking and insistence on going back and forth between checking facebook and making a recording no one will ever see, resulting in a sea of screens, is what has ruined it for me. You can say yelling at clouds, etc, but concerts were very different and much more fun before iphones (not that long ago). Like the op, i really don't get spending money on a show and then not being able to keep from spewing your completely banal banter the whole time. Save the cash and go get coffee with your friend instead.

Active listening is a skill that has been completely lost.

 

[Edgar Allan Presley]

. . . I've seen attention spans compact to a meth-addled gnat's size in the 36 years I've been teaching college English. Most of my current students cannot even visually focus on, much less think about, anything for more than 10 seconds. If that. If they even come to class. They're so jaded, frayed, exhausted from addicting themselves to constant sensation-seeking/phone-checking that if something in their self-interest requires a bit of work, their selves have already lost interest. It's shocking. Like a downward spiral deciding to jump off a sudden cliff with barely a shrug.

If I see Mr. D. again, it would have to be at a no-one-younger-than-40-allowed venue. Or I'd have to be in the first row, where I might be able to ignore the bubbles of bent little mirrors yabbering around me.

Some technologies are as toxic as some (very missing) values are....

No doubt these phones are taking a toll on our attention spans, but--there may not be a delicate way to bring this up--are you sure your teaching hasn't gone downhill?

I'm in my mid-40s, so I've been out of school for quite a while, but I still remember a few embittered professors that seemed frustrated that the lectures they'd written in the 1970s no longer seemed to captivate us. They seemed to be running the clock down into retirement. But I had other profs toward the ends of their careers that kept it sharp, new, and challenging, for them and for us. And yes, then in the 1990s, we were stupid, inarticulate, lazy, and selfish, like 18-22 year-olds have been and always will be in the eyes of their elders.

My samples are different than yours, but the law students and recent grads interviewing with me the last few years are the brightest I've ever seen. And my teenage kids and their friends are smarter than I ever was at their age.

 

[RoscoeElegante]

No doubt these phones are taking a toll on our attention spans, but--there may not be a delicate way to bring this up--are you sure your teaching hasn't gone downhill?

I'm in my mid-40s, so I've been out of school for quite a while, but I still remember a few embittered professors that seemed frustrated that the lectures they'd written in the 1970s no longer seemed to captivate us. They seemed to be running the clock down into retirement. But I had other profs toward the ends of their careers that kept it sharp, new, and challenging, for them and for us. And yes, then in the 1990s, we were stupid, inarticulate, lazy, and selfish, like 18-22 year-olds have been and always will be in the eyes of their elders.

My samples are different than yours, but the law students and recent grads interviewing with me the last few years are the brightest I've ever seen. And my teenage kids and their friends are smarter than I ever was at their age.

Short answer, yes--and no.

Yes in that I update all that seems to need it or could benefit from that, relentlessly.

No in that many needed skills don't much vary over time.

And also No in the sense that I can accommodate their...issues only so far before I cross the line into enabling self-stunting. And that, of course, I can't do. (Which is not to say you were suggesting that.)

Coming to class, paying attention, doing the clearly stipulated and demonstrated work, using the provided resources/links/exercises/sample quizzes/papers/exams, asking any question about any issue that's puzzling or intriguing, commenting in any way even faintly relevant to our focus and goals, exploiting extensive office hours whenever one needs to--these are the students' responsibilities. I'm plenty vivid, adaptable, eclectic, etc., in and regarding our classes and course. I analogize both systematically and as each situation proves to require, I use self-mockery to help students get around the defensiveness that can block constructive criticism, I let us wander into tangents when we need a brain break, etc. But I can't give points for work undone, work shabbily done, classes missed, classes wasted with endless phone checking, etc.

It's a two-way street, of course. The road signs are all there, but I can't force anyone to make forward progress.

Please note that I elsewhere acknowledged, and said that I feel honored to work with, the shrinking % of students who want to and can learn. It's the growing mass of unable or unwilling students, including those so blithely defeating their own opportunities, that baffle and frustrate me. And concern me for our culture's future. A lot of systemic problems collide here: the fact that we've repeatedly dumbed down SAT's and now often set aside such tests entirely, inflated high school and college grades, writing and reasoning skills tests dropped from entrance metrics or allowed to slip into slop (https://demmelearning.com/college-level-writing/) or gunked in dogma--no wonder "Whatever" is the go-to student setting.

 

[Uncle Daddy]

Short answer, yes--and no.

Yes in that I update all that seems to need it or could benefit from that, relentlessly.

No in that many needed skills don't much vary over time.

And also No in the sense that I can accommodate their...issues only so far before I cross the line into enabling self-stunting. And that, of course, I can't do. (Which is not to say you were suggesting that.)

Coming to class, paying attention, doing the clearly stipulated and demonstrated work, using the provided resources/links/exercises/sample quizzes/papers/exams, asking any question about any issue that's puzzling or intriguing, commenting in any way even faintly relevant to our focus and goals, exploiting extensive office hours whenever one needs to--these are the students' responsibilities. I'm plenty vivid, adaptable, eclectic, etc., in and regarding our classes and course. I analogize both systematically and as each situation proves to require, I use self-mockery to help students get around the defensiveness that can block constructive criticism, I let us wander into tangents when we need a brain break, etc. But I can't give points for work undone, work shabbily done, classes missed, classes wasted with endless phone checking, etc.

It's a two-way street, of course. The road signs are all there, but I can't force anyone to make forward progress.

Please note that I elsewhere acknowledged, and said that I feel honored to work with, the shrinking % of students who want to and can learn. It's the growing mass of unable or unwilling students, including those so blithely defeating their own opportunities, that baffle and frustrate me. And concern me for our culture's future. A lot of systemic problems collide here: the fact that we've repeatedly dumbed down SAT's and now often set aside such tests entirely, inflated high school and college grades, writing and reasoning skills tests dropped from entrance metrics or allowed to slip into slop (https://demmelearning.com/college-level-writing/) or gunked in dogma--no wonder "Whatever" is the go-to student setting.

Dr Mrs Daddy teaches history at a local university. Apart from one or two students who will always do well, the rest are melts. You'd think with the cost of education, students would take it and themselves more seriously.

 

[buster poser]

I dunno man. A small percentage of people suck, but a concert is a large sample size. You’re gonna find some idiots or they’re gonna find you.

Stop going to see live music because some people don’t know how to act? Be serious.

 

[Leonardocoate]

Basic manners seems to be lost on so many people......like the wooohooo screamers at the best part of the song

 

[1955]

 

[richiek65]

The clips is no longer on Youtube, but Jeff Tweedy went off at a crowd at one of his solo gigs where there was much chat throughout his performance. You could tell he was not happy but he turned it into a very funny rant, almost standup comedy.

He mentions it in this clip from the following night

 

[nojazzhere]

Dr Mrs Daddy teaches history at a local university. Apart from one or two students who will always do well, the rest are melts. You'd think with the cost of education, students would take it and themselves more seriously.

I agree 100% with what you say, but I have to confess when I was at University.....fifty years ago.....I could be an inattentive and lackadaisical student. If you look at my transcripts, I had all A's and B's in my music and English courses (my major and principle interests) and C's, D's, and even Fail in many other subjects. Yes, I wish I had been more serious about my work......but can't go back.

 

[kookaburra]

I'm completely onboard with the observations of entitlement in public spaces that people have, and I'm seeing it from most age catagories.

That said, I haven't had many bad experiences at shows, which may have something to do with the venues that I see bands gig in? Maybe the types of folks at those venues? Also, I still have a preference for rock music, so the shows are louder.

As for coffee house gigs and such, I would expect conversation. But I understand the frustration of the OP regarding other venues.

 

[Marc Morfei]

View attachment 968300

OMG where can I get one of these?

 

[Greggorios]

I like to hurl insults over the parapets at the trouble-makers just like they did in the old days. It generally brings the perpetrators to their knees in shock and awe. "Your mother was a hamster and your father smelled of elderberries!"

 

[Marc Morfei]

There are very few rock bands I've seen where the music wouldn't have completely drowned out any talking. In fact, talking was all but impossible at most rock shows I've seen. You have to yell into the person's ear, and they still can't tell what you're saying. Rock music should be loud. That's the solution.

But there are also other forms of music.

 

[Marc Morfei]

Most of these (justified) complaints are about people who go to shows but pay no attention to the actual music, and ruin it for those actually trying to listen. I’ll share one similar yet opposite story.

Went to see the Avett Brothers a couple years ago in a theater-size venue. There was a middle-aged women in the row directly in front of us who was so excited she screamed deliriously at the top of her lungs the entire show. Now the Avett Brothers have some lively tunes but they are an acoustic act and have lots of quiet and carefully crafted songs. No matter. This woman acted like a teenage girl at a Beatles concert. And she didn’t wear down after a while. It continued literally the entire show. It was so out of place and so annoying it ruined the whole experience.

 

[Spox]

Back in 2019 I went to see Steely Dan with Steve Winwood as support. When I got to my seat there was a large, beligerent middle aged male manspread over the seats either side of him one of which was mine. I politely asked him to make space for me to sit and he tried to discourage me with a mean stare and demanding to see my ticket. He proceeded to ask me if I even knew who Steve Winwood was, I replied in the affirmative and he proceeded to tell me that he was his biggest fan, had been there right from the start etc. He also opined that Steely Dan were crap and had one good album and then turned on the other audience members labelling them all "dilettantes" which brought a couple of angry looks from the rows in front of us and I was trying to proclaim with my eyes that I didn't even know this guy.

During Steve Winwoods' set the guy played Name That Song and would congratulate himself when he got it right. During the Steely Dan set he decided to leave midsong and fell down the stairs between the rows of seats.