On Halloween night, I traveled to Glasgow to see a HAIM concert that I had been anticipating for months. The following Saturday, I returned to the city to see flipturn, a smaller band that had only recently appeared on my radar, but whose music I had really started to enjoy. Though both HAIM and flipturn are known for their dynamic energy onstage and their indie rock sound, I had drastically different experiences attending each concert. Let me be more specific: I had way more fun at one concert than the other (and it may not be the one you’re thinking of).
Reflecting on these concerts, I’ve realized that it was neither the artists nor their musical performances, but rather the concert venue and concertgoers, that pushed one of my experiences – spoiler alert, it’s flipturn – over the top. While HAIM performed in the OVO Hydro, a massive, domed cavern of a venue, flipturn’s show was held at the Classic Grand, a small, intimate space with a tiny stage. More importantly, the Classic Grand was a standing-room only venue, while at the OVO, those who didn’t want to pay 100 pounds (including my friends and I) made our way up three flights of stairs to a set of seats above the stage.
Based on prior concert experience, I’d come to HAIM under the assumption that these seats in the so-called ‘nosebleeds’ wouldn’t deter me from having a good time. At Katy Perry’s Witness stadium tour, for example (the climax of my 11-year-old life), arena seating served as more of a formality – I struggle to remember even one person sitting down throughout the whole two-hour ordeal. This could not have been further from my reality at the OVO Hydro that faithful Halloween night. Not only did everyone around me stay seated for the entire duration of HAIM’s performance, they also scoffed at my friends and I for attempting to stand up, even when Alana Haim earnestly (and a little desperately) asked the audience to get up and dance.
I left HAIM feeling decently satisfied, yet slightly bemused – I’d had a good time. Hadn’t I? Este, Danielle, and Alana Haim were incredibly dynamic performers; their songs were great, and I’d finally gotten to see one of my favorite bands live. Why, then, did I feel like something was missing? Why wasn’t I buzzing from the noise, the excitement, the post-concert bliss of it all?
Mid-jump at flipturn’s concert the following Saturday, I formed the answer to my rather half-baked feeling of discontent. It was the seats. Those damn seats, from which no one budged the whole concert: not to dance, not to jump, not even to stand. I can’t stress enough how different my flipturn experience was compared to this one, but I’ll try. First, I want you to picture someone at a concert politely clapping – maybe even throwing in a little shoulder shimmy to the beat – and firmly planted in their seat (not by choice) for an hour and a half. Next, I want you to picture that same person three feet away from the stage jumping, screaming, and smiling so hard their face looks as though it’ll fall off. I’m pretty sure all of us would rather be the latter, at least at this young stage of our lives.
So, concertgoers of the world (but particularly those in my section at the HAIM concert), I implore you: get up from your arena-style seats. Move around. Feel the rhythm. Dance. Life is too short not to appreciate the music of a powerhouse band at the top of its game. After all, isn’t that why you bought your concert ticket in the first place?
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