I’m not going to name the band in this post. I know it’s not going to be hard for regular readers of this blog to identify the gig, but I don’t think it’s fair on the band themselves to have such a negative post showing up in Google searches for their name.
I’d love to have been able to write a glowing review about their actual performance, since the band themselves were excellent, but unfortunately what should have been a wonderful night was ruined by the behaviour of a segment of the audience. I’ve had gigs spoiled by intermittent distracting talking before, but this was the worst instance I can ever remember. This wasn’t just a buzz of chatter coming from the back of the hall, but selfish idiots talking continually at the top of their voices clearly audible from the front row even during the loudest parts of the set. There was even one group of knobheads who ignored repeated requests to keep the noise down.
I very nearly walked out the gig after two or three songs in disgust.
I have never seen a worse case of disrespect for both the band and that part of the audience who was actually there for the music. It’s as if the band were nothing more than the soundtrack for a lads’ night out. Audiences for free-entry gigs by pub cover bands behave better than this.
I know from speaking to the band afterwards that it distracted them too, and it’s difficult to imagine that the behaviour of these clowns in the audience didn’t take the edge off the band’s performance. The dynamics of live music means the best gigs are those where the band feed off the energy the energy they’re getting from the crowd. This was not happening here.