Not My First Concert
It was not mine, but it may have been my son Danny’s first concert.
Although, after what we saw that night, I’m surprised he ever went back to see another.
When my kids were younger, during the age of the CD player, they would compete to find music that I would like best. They’d burn CDs to play while we were in the car, to see which of their music I liked best.
Because of that, I gained access to music and bands I never would have heard of before. Bands like Alkaline Trio, Reggie and the Full Effect, and My Chemical Romance.
Which is why I found myself in a mini van with three teenagers on our way to The Tweeter Center in Camden, New Jersey.
All three of the above mentioned bands played a concert there on this cold October night. Once we entered the venue my daughter Amanda and her friend (both fifteen) disappeared toward the stage, not to be seen again until the concert was over.
My youngest son Danny (eleven) and myself (forty-seven) went in search of our general admission seats.
We found two, middle row halfway from stage, and settled in for the show. At least, as settled in as you can be when surrounded by hundreds of teenagers, all in various degrees of sobriety.
And then there was Jason, whom we knew his exact level of sobriety.
Zero.
Jason was at zero level of sobriety.
When we took our seats, we didn’t know Jason, he was just a stranger who sat in front of my son and me. Jason and his girlfriend (we assumed his girlfriend) telegraphed their intoxication by barely moving and leaned against each other in some very awkward (and uncomfortable) positions.
This drew the attention of a bouncer, a large tall bald man who snaked his way down our row and stopped next to us.
“How old are you?” he asked the young woman, remarkably the more coherent of the two.
She rose her head a bit, “twenty-one,” she slurred.
The bouncer turned to the crowd and laughed, then repeated the question.
“How old are you?”
“Twenty,” she replied.
She went on like that until she Benjamin Buttoned herself down to sixteen years of age.
“And what’s your boyfriend’s name?” he asked her.
That’s when we learned his name was Jason.
The bouncer turned to Jason, but he never had the chance to reply to the questions, because at that precise moment, Jason threw up on everything.
And by everything I mean himself, his seat, the seat in front of him, the floor, and anyone within the flight plan of his vomit.
At that point, I was very happy we were sitting behind Jason.
It was also at the point that Danny (age eleven, remember) wanted to leave and buy a t-shirt (or poster, or anything for that matter) just to get away from this disaster that was Jason.
We left our seats, and ventured to the gift shop.
When we returned, the scene had drastically changed.
Jason was no longer in his seat, instead he was strapped to a gurney in the middle of the aisle, paramedics on either side. In my mind, I pictured that the huge bouncer simply lifted Jason by his belt and placed him gingerly on the gurney.
Not sure where Jason’s girlfriend was, but she could not have gone far, not in her condition.
Once again, Danny wanted away from the scene, so we roamed the arena.
After a time, we returned to where we sat, and it was like nothing happened. Jason and friends were gone, and our seats were occupied (which was expected). Unfortunately (at least for them), there were two new people in Jason and his girlfriend’s seats, blissfully unaware of the vomit that still covered the area.
When the concert was over, we were back in the minivan. Unfortunately, when I left the parking lot, took a wrong turn and got lost for a while in Camden (story for another time).
Eventually, we all made it home.
Now, you might wonder what prompted this twenty year old memory.
The other day Danny (now thirty) told me about a show he played in a Philly. At that show, he spoke to the sound man. Not sure how this subject came up, but turned out this was the sound man’s first concert.
Danny didn’t tell me, or didn’t know, the sound man’s name.
Could it be possible…
...Jason, is that you?
