The Happy Camper Tour

Good Day Everyone!

I'd like to start this by saying that at every concert I have attended over the past few weeks for my research I have had the pleasure of experiencing new things that I had never seen happen at the Marquee before. And out of every concert, Hoodie Allen certainly takes the cake (pun intended) for the most unusual performance.

So on Valentine's Day, I open-mindedly headed over to the Marquee Theater for The Happy Camper Tour. I'm not going to lie, I am not a big Hoodie Allen fan, and I was kind of bummed out that some artist I had never listened to was going to be my fiftieth concert. The line outside the venue extended past the parking lot and began forming several hours before doors were opened at 6:00 p.m..

Hoodie Allen is an (All) American Jewish, independent rap artist who self-released his first album All American in 2012. That album featured his hit song No Interruption. You only continue to gain success with the release of his Next full length album people keep talking in 2014. At the beginning of this year, 2016, he released his most recent album Happy Camper.  

The night finally began with a performance by another rap artist, that goes by the name Blackbear. I personally had never heard of him before but apparently he is fairly popular with the BASIS crowd. He performed well, but seeing as he was the first opener he had a pretty standard performance. He was followed by an artist named Super Duper Kyle. His performance was very unique. The stage was dressed with 8-bit props that were based on video games like Super Mario and Pokemon. The performance started with a light saber battle, featured many many choreographed dance moves, and at some point included a massive pikachu costume. The crowd seemed well engaged and receptive to the SuperDuperKyle’s performance.

After the two opening acts came the headlining performance. Hoodie Allen sang an eighteen song set. The set began fairly unoriginally, with him performing his songs, but a couple songs in, it started getting weird. He ran off the stage and across the floor to the lights and sound station, where we stood on the railing and energetically threw two large Costco sized cakes. I guess it had some relevance to the song, but I was too shocked that the general manager of the Marquee Theater had allowed the musician to throw cakes around the venue.

For the first half of the night there was a tall guy standing behind my friends and I. He looked like he was probably a student at ASU. Either way, he was wearing a very distinctive green tunic and smelled pungently of marijuana. At some point he disappeared and the next thing I knew, he was on the stage dancing in a style I could only describe as interpretive next Hoodie Allen himself. The dancer was up there for a good ten seconds before anyone did anything about him; and when he was finally addressed, he was removed by Hoodie Allen’s onstage DJ. Hoodie Allen himself remarked on the event, chanting that security shouldn’t get paid that night.


Obviously there was a substantial breach in security. What happened exactly I can't be sure of, and security members of the venue made no comment. This is definitely something I will be considering in my research as I move forward.

Word Count: 573

Guster & CO

Hello all!

So this post is about a concert unlike any concert I have ever been to before. On Tuesday, February 9th, my friends Emily and Viktoriya (they also have blogs, check them out) and I headed out to the Marquee to see a band that the two of them had heard of before but I myself had not had the pleasure of being familiar with.

Guster is an alternative rock band from Boston, Massachusetts, originally formed in 1991 when the members were students at Tufts University. So clearly, they have been around for a long time and subsequently draw an older fan base. The band stayed underground until the release of their third studio album, Lost and Gone Forever, in 1999 which ranked on the Adult Top 40.

Doors opened at 6:30 p.m., and at that time only eleven people had been lined up for the show. In fact, we arrived at the venue 10 minutes before doors opened, but upon seeing the lack of people in the line, we decided to make a quick In-n-Out pit stop. When we actually got to the venue, it was about ten minutes after the doors were opened, and there was barely a first row against the barricade.

That was my first indication that this show was gonna be unique. Only 700 tickets were sold to this show, and most of the people in there were older (like in their 30s and 40s). The Marquee has a capacity of about 2,500, and seeing the venue more than half empty was a very rare occurrence for me.

When the people did in fact start arriving on the general admission floor it was probably 30 minutes to 8 (the opener went on at 8). What blew my mind was the amount of space I had despite standing second row in the center of the stage. Most of the people around me stood stationary during the openers' set, and everyone was at least two steps away from the people around them. The concert itself was mellow and relaxed as were the attendees. Between the opening band and Guster's actual performance there was a thirty minute intermission.

It is typical to have thirty to forty-minute intervals between when one band will end and the other will begin to play. The stage techies will often use this time to dress the stage for the next band and check the sound mixing for the performance (I'm not an expert on this aspect of the experience so forgive my lack of extensive terminology).

When the headlining band finally came on, everyone was hyped. They played an hour and a half long set of all their classic hits. I really enjoyed Guster live but being at that concert really led me to a realization about the venue. The reason that the concert went so well was because everyone had an ample amount of space. Maybe building venues with a bigger expectation than their set capacity would allow for a safer and more comfortable concert experience. It's definitely something I will bring up in my conversation with the venue's general manager.

Until next time,
Sabrina


Word count:524

The Drought Tour

Oh hello there!

So, a lot has happened since I have stopped attending school! I got a day job, dyed my hair black (it was basically black already), and attended two concerts at the Marquee!

The first of these two was the Arizona show of the five-stop, Drought Tour, headlining The Neighbourhood. Doors opened at 6:30 to let the seemingly infinitely growing line of edgy-looking youths into the venue. I arrived an hour before doors opened and still found myself waiting at the back of the line. Security populated the parking lot and the front entrance. The venue, that has a capacity of 2,500, held between 1,200 and 1,400 people on the night of The Neighbourhood concert. Though this is far from a sold out show, the Marquee plays lots local bands and often sees events with much smalls attendee numbers (look for my upcoming post about my second research concert at Marquee, Guster). When the doors of the venue finally opened, males and females were divided into two lines to be patted down. Per usual, the female line was substantially longer than the male line, and as a result not only were groups split us, but also, females who had been waiting substantially longer than males were pushed behind them in their entry into the venue. Post-concert I observed the mass number of selfie sticks, sharpies, and unopened gum that had been confiscated during pat down. Now, I feel it’s important to mention why entering the venue sooner rather than later is so desirable; the people that attend concerts for the particular musician or the actual concert experience prefer to be as close to stage as possible. The closer to the stage, the easier it is for the individual to become involved in the show. It is in fact this region of the crowd that is relevant to the research. There were only six crowd surfers over the course of the night and all were removed by security once they reached the barricade. After a rush to the stage and an hour and a half of being casually pressed against strangers, the first opening

The show began at 8:00 p.m. and started with a band called Casinos. From a musical standpoint, the were absolutely atrocious. Most of the attendees were confused by the performance and didn't show notable enthusiasm. The second opener was better received but drew an equally unimpressive amount of enthusiasm. It was only when The Neighbourhood came on at 9:30 that the crowd began to fall into a frenzy. As soon as the band took the stage, the middle of the crowd rushed forward, smashing those against the barricade. The biggest issue that I observed with operation of the venue was the disconnect of the understanding between the security guards and the attendees; the individuals in the front of the crowd misunderstood the role of the security officers to be more than it actually was. Security is expected to maintain the safety of the attendees and remove/ handle any disruptions or individuals in need of medical assistance from the crowd. People around me, generally the younger fans, were requesting security to bring them water, and I even observed at one point a group of younger girls calling an officer over simply to voice complaints about their discomfort as a part of crowd. And once I observed this, I began to notice it happening all around me. Attendees would feign serious need of security attention and hail the officer over without legitimate purpose. Now I'm not saying that these fifteen year-olds had the intent of distracting security from their job, but rather they didn't have a realistic understanding of their role. This behavior and lack of prior knowledge of venue protocol is interesting and will likely be a factor I consider in my analysis of the causes of aggression in the crowd.

This was only the first of many concerts (the next one is Guster) I will be attending and I look forward to reporting my experiences to come.

Until next time,
Sabrina

A List Of Concerts I Have Attended

Hello readers!

The following is a list of every concert I have attended in my approximately eighteen years of life:

1. Celine Dion  (pre-high school)
2. Gypsy Kings (pre-high school)
3. Selena Gomez (pre-high school)
4. Ke$ha, LMFAO (pre-high school)
5. Taylor Swift (pre-high school)
6. Nicki Minaj, 2-Chainz (pre-high school)
7. The Second Law Tour (3/16/2013) - Muse, Dead Sara
8. Free Hometown Concert (6/04/2013) - The Maine, A Rocket to the Moon, This Century
9. Epicenter Music Festival (9/21/2013) - Plague Vendor, The Wonder Years, Falling in Reverse, All Time Low, Pierce the Veil, Pennywise, A Day To Remember, The Offspring
10. Modern Vampires Tour (9/27/2013) - Vampire Weekend, Sky Ferreira
11. Glamour Kills Tour (11/17/2013) - Mayday Parade, Man Overboard, Stages and Stereos, Cartel
12. Private Concert (2/01/2014) - This Century 
13. Burnout, Final Tour (2/07/2014) - Anarbor, Artist vs Poet 
14. Too Weird To Live, Too Rare To Die Tour (2/14/2014) - Panic! at the Disco, The Colourists 
15. Bangerz Tour (2/28/2014) - Miley Cyrus, Icona Pop, Sky Ferreira
16. Weird Kids Tour (3/16/2014) - Set It Off , William Beckett, We Are The In Crowd, Candy Hearts, State Champs
17. A Love Like War Tour (4/11/2014) - All Time Low, Man Overboard
18. White Teeth Teens Tour (4/17/2014) - Lorde, Lo Fang
19. Native Tour (6/01/2014) - One Republic, The Script, American Authors
20. Warped Tour (6/18/2014) - Mayday Parade, One OK Rock, Bayside, We Are The In Crowd, The Maine, We The Kings, Bowling For Soup, Breathe Carolina, Echosmith, Anberlin, Get Scared
21. Lollapalooza DAY 1 (8/01/2014) - Into It. Over It., Kodaline, Iggy Azalea, Portugal. The Man, CHVRCHES, Broken Bells, Lorde, Arctic Monkeys
22. Lollapalooza DAY 2 (8/02/2014) - The Temper Trap, Manchester Orchestra, Fitz & The Tantrums, Foster The People, Outkast
23. Lollapalooza DAY 3 (8/03/2014) - Bleachers, NONONO, Kongos, The 1975, Young the Giant, Cage The Elephant, Childish Gambino, Kings Of Leon
24. The Monumentour (8/08/2014) - Fall Out Boy, Paramore, New Politics
25. Come Alive Tour (8/10/2014) - Set It Off, Our Last Night, Heartist, Stages and Stereos
26. Glamour Kills Tour (10/05/2014) - New Found Glory, We Are The In Crowd, Fireworks, Candy Hearts
27. The AM North American Tour 2015 (10/25/2014) - Arctic Monkeys, Mini Mansions
28. World Tour (11/08/2014) - Piece the Veil, Sleeping with Sirens, Beartooth, This Wild Life
29. North American Tour (11/22/2014) - The 1975
30. ALT AZ Sweater Party (12/15/2014) - Cage The Elephant, Young the Giant, Andrew McMahon in The Wilderness
31. Pot of Gold Music Festival (3/16/2015) - Fall Out Boy, Milky Chance, Rebelution, Echosmith, New Politics, Knox Hamilton, Big Data
32. The Honeymoon Tour (4/06/2015) - Ariana Grande, Rixton, Cashmere Cat
33. ALT AZ Music Festival (4/10/2015) - Death Cab for Cutie, Panic! At The Disco, Glass Animals, Family of the Year
34. Brand New Tour (4/16/2015) - Circa Survive, Brand New
35. Chipotle Cultivate Music Festival (4/18/2015) - Bleachers, MS MR, Twenty One Pilots
36. Hozier Tour (4/19/2015) - Hozier, Low Roar
37. Future Hearts Tour (5/01/2015) - All Time Low, Tonight Alive, Issues, State Champs
38. North American Tour 2015 (8/15/2015) - George Ezra, Dylan LeBlanc
39. Summer Ends Music Festival DAY 1 (9/24/2015) - Hozier, Brandon Flowers, Cold War Kids
40. Summer Ends Music Festival DAY 3 (9/26/2015) - J Cole, Rebelution, Big Sean, Slightly Stoopid, G-Eazy
41. North American Tour (9/27/2015) - Glass Animals, LA Priest
42. Blurryface Tour (10/13/2015) - Twenty One Pilots, Echosmith, Finish Ticket
43. 2015 North American Tour (10/14/2015) - Alt-J, Sam Fermin
44. Neon Nature Tour (10/16/2015) - Marina and The Diamonds, Shamir
45. Back To The Future Hearts Tour (10/20/2015) - All Time Low, Sleeping With Sirens, One OK Rock, Neck Deep
46. School D'AZ (10/24/2015) - Best Coast, The Maine, Atlas Genius, New Politics, MSMR, Saint Motel
47. ALT AZ Sweater Party (12/13/2015) - Bastille, CHVRCHES, Wolf Alice
48. The Drought Tour (2/03/2016) - The Neighbourhood, Hunny, Casinos
49. 2016 Winter Tour (2/09/2016) - Guster, Vetiver
50. Happy Camper Tour (2/14/2016) - Hoodie Allen, SuperDuperKyle, Black Bear
51. At The Gates 
52. fetty wap
53. the mowglis
54. cage the elephant portugal the man
55. wye oak
56. twenty one pilots
57. lolla day 1
58. lolla day 2
59. Two Door Cinema Club after show
60. lolla day 3
61. lolla day 4
62. weezer, panic 
63. flume
64. sia
65. Two door cinema club

I'm going to be honest, I initially made this list as a means of showing off my concert history to my friends. I guess it was a happy coincidence that I also discovered that the Hoodie Allen concert I will be attending this Valentine's Day will be my 50th concert. In my humble opinion, 50 is a milestone, and with this new found information I can enjoy my 50th concert accordingly.

Until Friday,

Sabrina