Zigazig ah
Posted on March 9, 2004 @ 12:27 am
After Saturday’s Barenaked Ladies concert (which was spectacular, by the way) my less-than-impressive official concert tally stands as follows:
- Barenaked Ladies (1997, 1998, 1999 x 2, 2000, 2004)
- Bob Dylan (1998, 1999)
- Bob Dylan/Paul Simon (1999)
- Weezer (2003)
- No Doubt/Weezer (1997)
- Garbage (1999)
- The Spice Girls (1998)
That’s right, I’m one of the lucky few in this (spice)world that has actually attended a Spice Girls concert. It was smack dab in the middle of Spicemania, and one of my friends decided that it would be absolutely hilarious if we got tickets and went to their show in Charlotte, North Carolina. In our defense, the decision was roughly 75 percent ironic, with another 15 and 10 percent chalked up to “guilty pleasure” and “college stupidity,” respectively. Anyway, three of my friends (including Robin) and I piled into a car in the summer of 1998 and made the four-hour trip to Charlotte to see the show.
The concert was every bit as bad as you might expect, if not a little more so. The Spice Girls made a valiant effort to dance while singing along with their own prerecorded backing vocals, but ultimately failed on both counts. Also, it’s worth noting that Ginger Spice had quit the group just a few weeks before the show, and they hadn’t had time to change the video packages before the show. So, throughout the concert, Ginger kept popping up on the Jumbotron, flashing peace signs and mugging for the camera, even though she had just bitterly split from the group. Better still, when the group would get to one of Ginger’s lines in their songs, instead of one of the other Spice Girls taking over and singing the vocals, they remained silent and just let the backing vocals that Ginger had recorded before she left cover for them.
While this all probably sounds like it would be good for a laugh, the concert was actually a rather uncomfortable experience on the whole. As my friends and I probably should have guessed ahead of time, there weren’t too many other concertgoers of the male, over-the-age-of-14 persuasion at the show. As such, I imagine we must have looked pretty creepy given the crowd. In fact, the entire concert, I felt like mothers who were standing nearby were inching their daughters away from us before we started handing out candy or something. Needless to say, it’s not easy to enjoy the postmodern irony of a Spice Girls concert when half a dozen concerned parents are giving you the stinkeye and considering calling over security the entire time.
There was one bonus to having seen the Spice Girls in concert, though. Whenever my friends are discussing the most embarrassing concerts they’ve ever attended, I almost always win by default — assuming nobody made it out to see NKOTB live, that is. Plus, the experience taught me an important lesson: irony is great and all, but it’s never worth $12 worth of TicketMaster’s “convenience” fees.
Posted by Jess | Filed Under Pop Culture |
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I think Janet Jackson would be my most embarrassing concert, mostly because I went by myself. Even worse, I sat through Tony Toni Tone as the opening act. They played at the Thompson Boling Arena (UT campus) while I was going to school there, so at least I didn’t drive anywhere for it.
My first concert was The Oak Ridge Boys…um popa mow mow. How’s that for embarrassing? I was, however, only 5 or 6 years old and everyone should hold my mother accountable. I must say that Weezer puts on the best concerts of any band I’ve seen; I’ve been to three (’95, ‘97, ‘03) and was always thoroughly impressed. It’s a real bonus whenever the accompanying bands are good too (Weezer/No Doubt, Zwan/Queens of the Stone Age), which is pretty rare. Incidentally, my second most embarrassing concert was fairly recent: Korn/Puddle of Mud/Deadsy. Thanks to my brother’s weird taste in music and my residence being located within 5 minutes of a semi-popular venue, I was unfortunately persuaded to attend this crappy freakshow and waste 4 hours of my life. At least my brother had a good time. I must say too, that even though I’m not a fan of their music in the least, Puddle of Mud sounded really good live (not ridicuosly loud, easily understood, and sung/played in key) and I can appreciate that.
Oak Ridge Boys? I would assume everyone in east tennessee has seen them… That totally doesn’t count. And Spice Girls definitely wins, hands down. Franckie was telling me about that. Heehee. Blame it all on her.
Me? I’m not sure I’ve been to any concerts I’m embarrassed of.
I’ve been to quite a few shows myself…
* Lollapalooza, 1993
+ Front 242 (ugh)
+ Rage Against the Machine
+ Arrested Development
+ Alice in Chains
+ Primus
+ Fishbone
+ Dinosaur Jr (beh)
+ others I can’t remember.
* Lollapalooza, 1994
+ Smashing Pumpkins (ugh)
+ L7
+ Beastie Boys
+ P Funk
+ Green Day
+ again, others I can’t remember.
* HFStival, 1994
+ Afghan Whigs
+ James
+ Cracker
+ Rollins Band
+ Meat Puppets
+ Counting Crows
+ Offspring
+ Violent Femmes
+ …
* Atari Teenage Riot (ugh), 1996 or 1997
* Pietasters, 1997 or 1998
* Smoky Mountain Jam, 1998 (?)
+ Widespread Panic
+ V-Roys
+ Violent Femmes
+ …
+ DC 101 Chili Cookoff, 2001
+ Go-Gos
+ Train
+ I can’t remember who else…
* Bob Dylan, 2001
* Paul McCartney, 2002
* BB King, 2002 or 2003
* Aretha Franklin, 2003
* Ben Harper, Jack Johnson (beh), Kid Koala, 2003
Man, I wish I could actually remember a complete list. I will have to go look back at some of those old t-shirts…
Oh yeah… Poison, and Vince Neil, in 2003. We didn’t get there in time for the Sebastian Bach-less Skid Row.