High Wire Days

"I'll shine up the old brown shoes, put on a brand-new shirt. I'll get home early from work if you say that you love me." Cheap Trick Live at Budakon from "I Want You To Want Me"

When the nurse came in to give me some new drugs she had a backstage laminant from some band called Bob Knows Best or some other such nonsensical name hanging around her neck. As the pass dangled above me it occurred to me that some security guard most of gotten one helluva a blow job in order to let the nurse backstage. There must have been more attractive groupies there, ones that survived house fires or had their noses eaten clear to the bone from flour bag size loads of coke. How did my little whore of a nurse rate a backstage pass? Behavior at concerts makes no sense to me.

My first concert was epic. Not in scope or spectacle, but simply because it was the first time I stepped into Universal Amphitheater with the strict purpose to hear music. I won't bother defending the show, because it was the 80's and it was free. Untouchables opened for, are you ready,. The Psychedelic Furs. Ska meets Nu-Wave as only the age of the skinny tie could deliver. We won thickets from KROQ the greatest radio station in LA for years. Even as I grew older and started to find their constant shilling for the Red Hot Chili Peppers to grate on my nerve like a cat in a blender, I still listened to them from time to time just to stay loyal. Besides they were the only radio station in the City of Angels that spun Boingo, that and that alone vaulted them like Mary Lou Retton into a pantheon all their own.

My former brother-in-law was capital M, METAL. He went to shows by Judas Priest, WASP, Metal Church, shows that people showed up to in copious amounts of iron studded cow hide with a grimace on their faces, defying, begging, wanting to get in a fight. I never did understand the idea of paying $40 a ticket to go somewhere and be pissed off. I could do that at home and I didn't have to pay for parking, well most of the time. One day, back in the day, I took him to see Oingo Boingo. A vibe that was decidedly different than he was used to . At Boingo shows people laughed, they high fived as you walked by, the danced manically in the aisles. My sisters husband was slack jawed like Cletus the Yokel on the Simpsons. He couldn't believe the amount of pure joy that the collective displayed. There were no high fives at a Judas Priest show, there was no dancing to Pantera, just banging and moshing.

Boingo concerts to the contrary there are rules that must be followed. Holding your lighter lit and aloft through the entirety of Wanted Dead Or Alive, acceptable. Using your super glam dates hair spray in conjunction with said lighter to create the Aqua Net Fireball, unacceptable. It is acceptable to jump on your chair from time to time, however not during a 45 minute acoustic set by Elvis Costello. Taking a hit off the joint of the hippies next to you, totally cool. Taking the acid of the dirty hippy that has been to more Grateful Dead shows than Jerry Garcia will assure you end up in the first aid tent drinking Orange Juice while talking to a tent pole that sounds a lot like Morgan Freeman. It is okay to do a stage dive if: A) You do not weigh over 165 pounds, and that's pushing it. B) Don't stand up on the stage dancing like Courtney Cox in a Springsteen video, she was a plant, you look like a ficus. C) Don't try to sing a few bars with Billy Joel, we paid to hear The Piano Man, not you.

Other than those simple rules, feel free to act the fool, show your boobies, sing a long at the top of your lungs, and by all means, ladies, do whatever you have to do in order to get backstage, stage hands need love too.

What behaviors to you exhibit at concerts? Does the wild thing come out in you?

Dixie Cup of Love: Danny Elfman and the Boys.