up stairs in a SEARS in So Cal waiting for the ticket booth to open so I could get tickets for a show.

A ticket salesperson came around the velvet roped barrier and announce that REO Speedwagon tickets were not going to be sold that morning after all.
Nearly everyone left except for a handful of us eager to get tickets to see Elvis Costello & the Attractions,
The Rockpile and Mink Deville.

The June 4th 1978 show was a Sunday afternoon show at The Hollywood High School Auditorium.

The Tikkis

a High school auditorium?!
I'm not sure why I find that so funny.

I believe someone here said they saw The Beatles at a State Fair!

Was it a good show? I like Elvis C, but no way I could afford to see everyone I liked.

Oh, the days standing around, or staying overnight at a venue, or ticket outlet for tixs! 😄😑😄

I definitely remember twice overnight: once in Phillidephia for Who Tix at The Spectrum, and outside MSG for The Concert For Bangladesh. 👍

On Friday August 15th, 1980 we lined up outside the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium waiting
to enter for the first night of a concert series: URGH! A Music War.
So many amazing bands were appearing that night.

We had heard that the series might be filmed for each night's performances.
And we were greeted on a continuous audio loop with the following announcement:

"Attention, Attention..by entering these premises you are allowing your likeness to be used
in a Major Motion Picture..."
The voice in the announcement surly sounded like Claude Bessy.

The Movie and Soundtrack came out a year or so later. We did not see our likeness.

The Tikkis

So many awesome bands!!!!
Urgh is basically the soundtrack of my life!!!

I need to find a VHS to DVD place to convert the VHS, it has bands on it that never made it to the DVD version, but I can't remember which ones off the top of my head....

show that hadn't been released before. It is Vol. 2, labeled.
We have a 45 rpm released of three songs from that 1978 show.
I believe we got the Hollywood High live 45 rpm in January 1979 bundled with the Armed Forces album.
The marquee shot of the venue and band from the 1978 Hollywood High 45 rpm vinyl cover says
7:30 pm. Believe me the show with Rockpile and Mink DeVille must have started around 4:30 pm
or so.
?v=1709757518&width=1080
The auditorium was possibly 500+/- capacity.

We were pretty close to the stage and what I remember was soon after the show started we all stood
on our chairs.
It was very memorable.

I will be looking for the Vol.2 vinyl.

The Tikkis

Then they released a full CD a few years later.
Costello's CD catalog is a mess - seems like he moves it from label to label every few years and everything gets reissued with different bonus tracks and discs.

Last edited Fri Mar 29, 2024, 10:01 AM - Edit history (1)

Of epic proportions but I can't do it justice right now so I'm bookmarking to come back tomorrow and write it out.

It was all on a Friday the 13th!

to do two nights at Winterland. My buddy and I were big fans and always saw them when they came to town. This was the first time they were doing two nights and we got tickets for both nights. I wanted to find out where the band was staying so we could stay at the same place and maybe get to meet them.

My mom was a travel agent at the time and her and her boss tried hard to find out where they were staying, but to no avail. So we just made reservations at a cheap motel and went to the first show. Great show, we went back to the motel and goofed around the city the next day. We went to the second show and after it was over we discovered that someone had stolen my buddy's car.

We looked for the car for a long time, but it was gone. we were stoned as could be, and we started walking to find a pay phone to report the car stolen and call a friend to pick us up.

We walked up to a very high end Hotel called the Miyako which was Japanese themed. We looked pretty rough an didn't think the door man would even let us into the lobby, but we explained our situation and he said we could come in and use the phone. We made our calls and went toward the door and a limousine pulled up. The doors opened and out stepped The J Geils Band. They looked pretty exhausted, but we got to meet them and chat a bit. All really nice guys.

The police recovered the stolen car a few days later.

It was in the 30s below zero that night. Many folkies, but the ones I remember (the ones I went for) were Odetta and Claudia Schmidt. Might have been Peter from Peter, Paul and Mary, and others.

The only interesting part for us was the walk in from very far away - we're Minnesotans and used to this, so we dressed extra warm, but on top of the basic temp, the wind chill was killing. We got there to find that the musicians had all made it as well. Their instruments....

In the distance from the vehicles to the building, every single instrument (all stringed), went right out of tune. Guitars weren't that much of a problem; once the six strings warmed up, they could be re-tuned pretty quickly. However, there were dulcimers. Autoharps. Claudia Schmidt had brought her pianolin, which was not going to be in any shape any time soon. The program was a whole lot of "We're going to have to wing it here. Don't worry, it'll be fine."

It was better than fine. It was amazing. I was 8 feet from effing Odetta, man! She had incense through the strings, just like Richie Havens used to. I grew up with her music and still listen to it. Tom Paxton was there, because I remember he did "Not Tonight, Marie". Claudia Schmidt's always good.

And we managed to get the car started when we left.

Woah, on the instruments! Glad everyone got there ok.

I guess if you as a Michigander we're saying it was really cold bc of the wind I believe you! Eeeks.

Think Odetta sang at a couple of St John Divine events.

Richie! My mom pointed him out to me on ?Johnny Carson. 👍
Did see him live twice. Once at Carnigie Hall? And once he was earlier in the day for a whole day, and night Benefit Concert at ?Shea Stadium for Anti Vietnam War groups! That was a blast of a concert!

only to be some of the first few to miss out.

As many of us, reluctantly, started drifting away, we saw this huge open truck with all sorts of monitors and speakers inside, so, of course, a bunch of us lingered.

Somebody came to tell us we had to move along but before we got far, a woman came out and said, "The artist said to let them stay."

We were allowed to watch the whole concert standing by the recording truck.

Last edited Thu Mar 28, 2024, 05:53 PM - Edit history (1)

We were in the nosebleed seats...up high and very steep.

When the band came out on stage and were just tuning up, I was already dancing.

Someone had spilled a beer and I slipped.

I went flying through the air like a dove. My arms were outstretched and I could not get them out in front of me in time.

I landed three rows down. My mouth hit the back of a chair and I knocked out two front teeth and turned my bottom lip into hamburger helper.

Edit: My mistake. It was Philadelphia, not Canada.

(Sort of an uplifting one actually.)

SO, in 1994, I went to see the Pulse concert in Raleigh, North Carolina. It was at Carter-Finley Stadium, right beside the fairgrounds. (GO PACK!) The concert was beyond incredible and many people's lives were changed that night. (It sounds hokey, I know, but those concerts were an experience that some could not handle. I find that wild, but it is true. They were overwhelmed by the lights and the surround and the band.) So, I had managed to score some very good cannabis and had it packed into a device and was hitting it and sharing it as well. The whole section was a fog bank.

Around the time that 'Comfortably Numb' was going to start, I noticed that there were these two boys, around 15-16 I guess (I still say they were too young to drive, but I don't know). They had been smoking a few joints during the show, and it was obvious that they had some... well... less than average cannabis. (We used to call such quality 'dirt'.) I had smelled it during the whole show but now could identify the source. Because of the shifting crowds in our section, they ended up almost in front of me by this time. So, as one danced and turned towards me, we made eye contact and I held out my device to him. He almost split his face from the grin that he got and he nudged his buddy. They both started hitting the device. It was obvious that they were not very well acquainted with what my crew always called 'the good herb'. It was at this time that the song started. I indicated that we were going to pass it around the three of us and we did so as the tune soared. Then, Gilmore. (Nothing more to be said about that.) Those two were transported to another place. They were so blown away that the song ended, they were just standing there. I waited for them to turn so I could retrieve my device. They were motionless. I finally had to gently remove it from the boy's hand. A few minutes later, they both seemed to come out of it and started frantically hunting for my device, which they thought they had dropped into the stands. I showed them that I had it. I could not stop laughing about that. Neither could they.

I got to chat with them for a bit after the show ended and we were waiting for our section to move towards the exits. They were smart, funny high schoolers who had just had a life experience they would never forget. I guess I was a part of this, as we did discuss the show as we were leaving. I am sure that they became 'believers'.

Witnessing a Gilmore solo live can do that.

right?
I only indulged in the '70s occasionally, but it was quite nice! But some neighbors smoked the nastier stuff in the '10s?

Cool for them to have Gilmore as their background for a good space out.

Was this an all day, eve affair?

There were others that were more musky.

This was an evening concert. It started while it was still light out but once it got dark... man oh man.

Floyd had no opening act. They never needed one as far as I am concerned.

I was glad of the chance to chat with them as the line to leave was not moving at first, so we decided not to even try to get into the tightly packed line until it started moving. It gave us plenty of time to talk about things. I can only hope that those two became intelligent Democrats who are not fooled by (and see the dangers of) the insanity that is the NCGOP.

at a bar in Sacramento CA in 79/80? The kid in front of us was very drunk, could barely stand up. Finally, he went face first into the sidewalk, when the medics finally arrived and he woke up, he had a broken nose and three or four teeth missing. We found his teeth a few minutes later.

I was 17, driving three friends from Boulder.

Concerned that my stoner pals might forget their tickets, I asked them to show them to me upon picking them up. They all had tickets.

Arriving at the arena well in advance, I made the embarrassing discovery that I had left my ticket at home, so I bought a second general admission ticket, which I somehow managed to lose.

I bought a third ticket, the one that got me in.

As concert time approached, I was standing near one of the entrance doors, and had been chatting amiably with the bruiser security guy there. When the door was opened from within, the mini-Butkus lowered a shoulder and shoved me forcibly backwards. When I asked him why he had done that, he replied, "well... I had to hit somebody."

During the show a small explosive device exploded on my left forearm, raising a painful welt and opening a crack, which bled.

Other than that, it was a lot of fun.

?Firecracker on your arm! And some security guy being a dick! 😬

I'm glad you had good time in between all that!!

Not to mention the Longhorn Steer, the Bison, the Turkey Vulture, and the Tarantula.

And ZZ Top.

exact name of the warm up band, but it had a member or some members of Duran Duran in it.

Anyway, before the concert, my roomate and I drank way too much Southern Comfort. I passed out at the concert during the warm up band. Came to on the floor of the Carrier Dome during the song Synchronicity and somehow made my way out of the Dome. Thankfully, our dorm was a short walk from the Dome and I did make it home safely, but the next day I was really pissed at myself for drinking so much and missing The Police concert!

It was kind of worth it though. Although our tickets ended up being behind the stage, the concert itself was broadcast live to Europe and recorded on video to eventually sell on video tape and DVD. I rewatch the concert all the time. Prince was 'ON' that night in the Carrier Dome and thankfully it's recorded for all of history!

Sounds like it might have been even colder than when me & friend stayed up all night standing by the Philadelphia Spectrum for The Who tickets in Nov '75!

How neat you have it as a official live show which you can actually watch,and sync your memories of the music with the visuals you missed!

for tickets.

I got there super early, another friend from high school showed up and we waited together.

The other folks lining up just did not vibe INXS fans, but I kind of blew it off because sometimes scalpers would hire homeless people to wait in concert ticket lines.

Finally, I got to the front of the line to buy my tickets. I didn't bother specifying what band I was there to buy for, just asked for two tickets please.

And much to my horror!!!! I had AC/DC tickets!!!!

Apparently, both concerts were going on sale the same day!! Everyone but me and my friend were there for AC/DC!!
(This was probably 1985 or 1986).

When I got the correct tickets, the cashier said, "OK, here are your two tickets for........Inks?"

For INXS it was the "Listen Like Thieves" tour with the Del Fuegos opening.
They became pretty huge during that tour, but at the time I bought the tickets, they were still largely unknown in the US.

For AC/DC it was the "Who Made Who" tour.
Never been a fan, but Berlin's lead singer Terri Nunn can really bellow out "Highway to Hell"!!

At the time, two totally different music scenes.

I still remember that because I was so excited to have such good seats for INXS!

I was even more excited when I gave them back for 2nd row INXS tickets!

Then, tragically, the show got moved from Compton Terrace to Mesa Amphitheater.
My 2nd row tickets didn't mean squat at a GA show!


I sure miss good ole Compton Terrace.....

Great memories of that place!

Shit venue for parking though. I remember sitting in a traffic jam and missing the first set of a Grateful Dead show there. And not getting out of a Scorpions show until around 2 am.
Missed Perry and Dave getting into a fight at the first Lollapalooza because we wanted to avoid traffic when we left.

Comparing notes of the first Lolapalooza show on DU sometime ago.

My party left (at my insistence, I was the driver) because one of my sister's friends started puking non-stop due to heat illness.
We left during Ted, Just Admit It.
I didn't want to bring a dead teenager back to her parents.

There were many epic tales of traffic leaving that place.

I vividly remember chanting “Sex is violence” during Ted.
looking at the Setlist, I think we left during Stop ( that’s never been a favorite of mine anyways)

I could have happily left after Siouxsie and the Banshees.

It's not that I DON'T like JA, I can take or leave them.
However, I grew to detest "Jane Says" because I heard it way too many times on the radio.
I actually prefer the hard rocking JA over that whiny snit of a song.

Ted, Up the Beach, Mountain Song, 3 Days…
Can’t stand the funk/radio hits for the most part - reminds me of douchbags in college.

Man, this is really taking me back to my salad days.....

buying my tickets. A pair $35 tickets I was selling for $70 apiece so my buddy and I got our seats paid for. There were a couple tense seconds there where he wouldn't let go of the money and I wouldn't let go of the tickets.

$35 for that show and The Fixx opened. Festival seating too. Those were the days.

I was buying Spring training tix for the Diamondbacks the year after their World Series win and couldn't figure out why there was a line at ticketbastard. Turns out there were Metallica tix going on sale the same day. Still managed to get some great seats for the D-Back, right behind home plate, and Randy Johnson ended up pitching a few innings that game.

Second one - I had a pair of comped tickets for Ratdog and my Plus one cancelled at the last minute. So I had an extra ticket and there were people needing a miracle. So I gave one to some random crustafarian girl. I told her it was free and not to worry about paying, but she kept insisting, "I have some rocks!"

I figure she probably meant meth, but I've always wondered if she just found some shiny rocks and was offering them.

If she was stoned she could have meant literal shiny rocks.

Otherwise I guess it could have been meth... Though I have no experience w with that (thank goodness!), and didn't know that term was associated w it.

Otoh...it just came to me... There's a Ramones? song called "Chinese Rocks" which refers to heroin.

was made famous by Johnny Thunders (RIP)

The Ramones did record it on End Of The Century a few years afterwards.

on edit: RIP for Dee Dee too. Richard Hell, against all odds, is still with us!

Rollins did some anti-drug song that started “You must think you’re going to live forever!”
During the spoken -word part he said something like “Just because you aren’t famous like Johnny Thunders” - I guess he’s died right before the tour.

RIPs

Richard Hell, ha, alright

I didn't know Tom Verlaine passed away ? last year! 😔

Was a Television fan, then followed both Verlaine, and Lloyd in separate shows

I can't even remember what concert we were heading to at the Memphis Coliseum. There were six of us stuffed in a Volkswagen bug. I was sitting in someone's lap in the backseat. Smoke filled the interior. We were all "altered". One of my friends was complaining about a headache. Someone offered her an Alka Seltzer and she put it in her can of soda.

Last edited Thu Mar 28, 2024, 08:12 PM - Edit history (1)

Despite being a huge fan of that band, I somehow didn't know about it until the host mentioned on WXRT that they were playing The Vic. Tonight!
That was lunch time.
I made some calls to bandmates & other pals but nobody could make it.
I got home from work and my wife says "Why do you need someone to go with you? Just go alone "
Duh, on me.
So, I called the box office #, says tickets still available.
So, I drive to the Northside, park & head toward the theater.
As I'm walking up to the box office, two guys ask me if I need a ticket. I said yes, but they're still available.
Guy says "You don't understand. We have 3 tickets and our buddy decided to take the overtime & pass on the show. Tickets are $35. We'll take twenty for his ticket."
So now, my parking is paid for.
During the warm-up act, I notice this table for 5 with 3 guts sitting there. Just before the break I went over and asked if I could sit in one of the free seats. They said sure.
This table was at the front edge of the first raised area, where the dancefloor ends. Dead center of the room.
I was 25 feet from Cy Curnin and because we were on a raised floor, I never even needed to stand up to see. I was able to see everything all 5 guys were doing.
After a few songs, Cy announces that if fans bought any Fixx clothing, they could stay to meet the band.
I bought my wife a hoodie with the Calm Animals album cover on it.
We met the whole band, and they all hung out with the fans for nearly an hour.
I almost missed this show except for an intro by a DJ on the midday show! Plus, I just happened to be in the car. Great piece of luck.

🎶😄🧡😄🎶

What a great story, and meeting the band, too?! W000t!

Kottke was appearing with Joe Pass, Pepe Romero and Paco Pena. All great guitarists in different disciplines, but we were going to see Kottke. We got 4 tickets because we were going with another couple. A few days before the concert, I found out I was going to have to be out of town the night of the concert.

Since my wife didn’t want to go without me, we gave our tickets to our friends and told them to go with another couple. The morning of the concert, my trip was canceled. So, I walked to the box office, hoping there would still be two tickets left — even if they weren’t together.

Not only were two seat available, they were in the front row! This was a small studio theatre, seating about 150. We sat just left of center about 8 feet from the performers who were sitting in chairs on a stage about 6 inches high. I’m sure our friends, who were in the sixth row, thought we had ditched them.

Later that summer we were meeting friends from South Bend for a Saturday game at Wrigley Field. We got in Friday, and planned to go to the game that night. We didn’t have tickets, and planned to sit in the bleachers. Rain was threatening, and the bleacher box office wasn’t open. My wife and daughter huddled under the Wrigley marquee when I went — again — to check on the box office.

It still wasn’t open, and when I returned my wife was talking to a middle aged gentleman. He had 4 season tickets, wasn’t going to the game, and offered them, and his parking pass for face value. He didn’t care that we only needed 3. So we got 3 club box seats, 9th row, right behind the Cubs on deck circle— for $20 a pop! This year, those seats to see the Astros are between $325-$358, each, depending on the game.

Johnny Cash, when American Recordings came out - he was playing the Viper Room or House of Blues. My friend was in line at Will Call behind Eddie Money - who wasn’t on the list.
He was arguing, “I’m Eddie Money!” And pointing at his tour jacket he was wearing, but the ticket agent wouldn’t budge.
In the meantime, George Thorogood walks up, head to toe in snakeskin leather, with a girl on his arm, and gets waved in.
And my friend is still waiting behind Eddie Money arguing at will call.

With opening act U2.

I bought some blotter acid in the bathroom from a fellow stoner.

It was nothing but paper. Lesson learned.

Waiting to get in the crowd on the ramps leading into Veterans Memorial in PHX, and the it was stacked; everyone was there for Kiss. People were chanting Motley Who? Motley Who?

Their minds were changed after that show opener. Motley Crue showed up in jeans and tshirts, then blew the doors off the place. I bought their 1st album “Too Fast for Love” shortly after.

Also saw Jason Mraz in a bar called Martini Ranch in Scottsdale just out of the blue, same with Bare Naked Ladies (at the Pink Pony, which burned down a couple of years later) - just happened to find out they were playing there and walked across the street from where I was at originally and went in. Smoked a joint w Bob Weir behind a bar in scottsdale called Anderson’s 5th Estate, where his band was playing.

I went to a free acoustic show by the Church there around 93 or 94, but they ended up having flight delays and never showed - got a free ticket to the Horde tour out of it, at least.
It seems to me I've seen some other 80s acts there, but I can't remember now.
Anderson's was a cool little club until the owner got all transphobic and ended up shutting the place down rather than have drag queens use the bathroom there.
And I was at that KISS show too! One of the first concerts I went to - I think it was early 83, I was in 8th grade. I saw Rush for the first time around then too.

This was before Jerry Garcia passed for sure.

I know I was a freshman for the Kiss show, because I took the city bus to the coliseum after school with my buddy(my High School was on Central/Camelback), and that to was the only year I went to that school.

I was at the Coach House when I walked over to see Bare Naked Ladies.

I also used to go to the Rhythm Room all the time in those days also. There was a band from SF that used to play there on weekends that was great. Kinda Swing-ish. Can’t remember those guys’ name though. I’ll ask my one of my friends, they’ll remember. My head was not particularly clear back then tbh - which you probably can infer from my references here. .

We were probably at a couple more shows “together” also by the sounds of it. If Legend City and Mesa Amph are on your resume, I’d bet on it.

But that was where I saw my first show - Asia in 82. I saw Def Leppard there a year later when they were peaking with “Pyromania” as a birthday gift. Talking Heads were playing Mesa the same weekend doing the Stop Making Sense show, and I still kinda regret picking Leppard instead of Talking Heads.

A couple of them helped me buy and alarm clock at the Toledo 5 truckstop at some unholy hour after midnight once upon a time.

They were hilarious, ended up taking a half hour of my sleep time but well worth the entertainment. I'm sure the clerk was left with a memorable event to relate as well.

Neil Diamond, in Tacoma,WA. I am a huge Neil fan, went to buy tickets, JCPenny. Stood in line for 3 hours. And they announced "Sold Out". I was so bummed!
I needed some jeans, and was in the fitting room, when they announced a 2nd show.
I was 6th in line, wearing jeans, I hadn't bought, yet.
Got 20th row, center.
Neil took stage at about 815 pm. And left at 1230am.
What a show!!!

Koz

We got bags full of mushrooms and boiled 'em down into a slurry in a big stock pot. The Dead were playing at Miami Jai Alai, and we had tickets.

My best friend was in a wheelchair. We rigged a canvas wrapper around the lower frame of the chair. We filled wine bottles with the slurry, and of course, my wheelchair friend got a "courtesy check" at the door and we made it in. Of course, during the concert, as soon as you passed one joint on, two more were coming at you. I know our psilocybin slurry enhanced the concert for many Deadites. One little speed-bump: when you burped after consuming the mushroom juice, your burp tasted like cow pie.

My quote for the evening, which drew laughs: "I think I did more than I intended to."

Tripping in Berkeley in 1969, we went out driving and picked up a guy and a girl hitchhiking. They got in our car and the guy said, "You've just entered our acid trip." We burst out laughing and said, "You've just entered ours!" It became a memorable evening.

The girl lived in the projects down in Oakland; re-purposed military barracks. We started spending time together. I made enough money panhandling up on Telegraph Avenue to afford a couple of Jimi Hendrix tickets. A roommate had scored some dynamite green-bud, which was a rarity at the time. Nixon's Operation Intercept at the Mexican border had created a great dope famine, and any pot was hard to find.

Jimi was playing at Oakland Coliseum, right in sight of where my girlfriend lived. I brought down some of the green bud joints, and we were able to walk from her place over to see Jimi. My Hawaiian hippie girlfriend and her beautiful funky outfit. And Jimi.

glad you and your girlfriend got to see Jimi.

As for those mushrooms... Couldn't you have twisted off just the caps, and avoiding the "burp effect"!

So me, and my friend were standing trying to stay warm waiting over night for Who tickets at The Spectrum in Philadelphia.

Friends of my sister, and acquaintences of mine had gotten there earlier, though I didn't know it yet.
I was wondering why, now. I think it was bc my sister's friends all lived closer together in our neighborhood, had a subway right nearby, so could meet quickly, and take off!
I believe they brought a tent w them!

While my friend lived a couple of miles north of me where there was no subway. She had to take a winding bus down to the subway. We met up, I guess, somewhere where our possibly different subway lines are intersected, or she met me at my stop. Finally off we went.

Anyway, my sister's friends find us on the line! They got somehow bumped up on the line. We were around #550+/-. They gave us their #400 line number! 👍

Next morning which at least was sunny, we're slowly snaking our way forward. Finally they call "400"!!

I go running up the stairs. As I do
some one yells out: "Who's 400?!".

I raise my arms as I'm running up the stairs and the crowd cheers for me!!! 😲

I felt like Rocky!😄😄😄

(and didn't even dawn in me till right now - and, yeah, I was in Philadelphia where the movie takes place!😲😄 )

Stevie Wonder played Phoenix for pretty much the only time in about 40 years in 2007 or 08. Tickets were pretty outrageously priced, but a friend and I decided to see if we could score some cheap scalped tickets at showtime.
We got lucky and immediately found a pair for $50. Good price didn’t really see exactly where they were, but they looked to be pretty low.
Got in and they weren’t just good, they were incredible - 20 rows back on the floor. As we’re waiting for the lights to go down, an entourage comes in and sits down in the row in front of us, and I was sitting behind a really tall guy, my friend had a shorter guy in a fedora - not who you’d want to be behind for a show. Then a bunch of people ran up to them and they turned around.
It was Mike Tyson and Cedric Ceballos.

Way back in the day, I lived in a southern NH town and was part of a neighborhood group of teens from a middle class part of town. We did lots of things together in various combinations of our group, there were around 30 of us aged 15 - 18. Sometimes we did naughty things like skip school and go get drunk under a lean-to we constructed in the woods - a practice that began during a prolonged teacher's strike. We also had flag football games on the grade school lawn or street hockey games.

As the counterculture was in full swing, going to concerts in Boston was one of our hobbies, some of us could drive and some couldn't, usually due to lack of access to a vehicle, but we would pile into whatever vehicle and get ourselves down to beantown for some great entertainment or a protest on a regular basis, concert tickets were so cheap back then and Boston was less than an hour away.

So the band Traffic was coming to town, one of their last concerts, Boston Garden - the basketball/hockey venue of note. Cool! Several kids in our neighborhood got tickets ahead of time*, some of us were unsure and decided to get tickets at the door. Turns out, there were a whole bunch of us who intended to go so making sure we all had a ride was interesting. I had a car at the time, a big Chevy wagon, 9 seater, got it from my dad for $40. With passengers set, we loaded up on that Friday the 13th and set out for beantown for a night of fun. It was summer so it was light well into the evening, the transportation portion of the following course of events took place before dark.

As I was gathering up the passengers, I let my BFF's boyfriend do the driving and remained our driver throughout, there was a question about the car's transmission, it was having issues and some passengers were uncomfortable so we decided to find another vehicle. The driver's dad owned a dairy delivery so we went to the shop and grabbed a delivery truck, all nine of us would fit. We had milk crates to sit on. But before we got to the edge of town we discovered brake problems and the sliding driver's side door wouldn't close. That presented us with a problem. A couple of the guys decided to split off and hitch-hike and another couple had come up with an alternate for them, no one could get a large enough vehicle for all of us. That left my BFF, her guy, two others and myself.

Not all of us had secured tickets, myself included, didn't seem it would be a problem as it was barnyard seating - the balconies had seats, the floor was the floor. The night's entertainment started before we crossed the state line, some substances were involved, primarily alcohol since that was easiest to acquire. Well, that stuff is liquid so it takes up room in one's pocketbook, my BFF's remedy was a large shoulder bag that held a substantial quantity but it did not have the capacity for the amount we had available for inside the venue and it all had to be transferred with each vehicle change. We just smoked pot on the way there.

We eventually found a car, my BFF's older sister had a new Saab we could use, not the bullet shaped kind, and we somehow all fit in it, off we went. At about dusk we were in Newton, MA where there was a route change and a large rotary, several lanes. As we entered the flow a cruiser behind us turns on its lights and we all have a heart attack, we'll be busted for substances and pot for sure and most of us are underage and, and, and... Shit! It's Friday the 13th, we're doomed!

So we pull over only to have the cruiser blast by us and nail someone else! a few seconds of realization and we're moving again as we marveled at our good fortune so far in our expedition only to find a parking spot right outside the front door of Boston Garden!! What?!?

We jump out, loaded up the liquor and into the cattle chute we go. Somehow, there didn't seem to be a ticket counter anywhere visible at the entrance so as we become swept up in the mass of humans slowly walking up the ramps, a strategy must be devised for those of us with no tickets. Hmm. My BFF was a highly functional drunk and as blasted as she was, came up with a totally credible, to us, plan to get me inside the concert. The rent-a-cops were thick, a line of five to seven at every door, I'm thinking, "Ok, BFF, I want to fucking SEE this!" like it was a challenge.

At my age, at the time, I wasn't hard to look at so my BFF had that as the weapon and my attire at the time was a workable option in her thinking. I was wearing a western style blouse with snaps and some kind of short shorts, very long hair and a figure I wish I could restore. She had me unfasten my blouse to a provocative depth and roll up the bottom and tie it around above my waist. If I wasn't so high I might have objected but I wanted to get inside so... She then briefed me on the story line that she was going to use and what my lines would be if I had to say anything.

And by then, we were up to the doors and the rent-a-cops. Cops were checking tickets and asking if you had any illegal substances in your bags, remember BFF has a large, decorative, leather sack full of bottles of alcohol on her shoulder and she's absolutely lit. Fortunately the line of cops we ended up dealing with were mostly hippies, one had hair almost as long as mine, and only one actual city cop who was asking all the questions and he starts asking us for tickets, this part went by very quickly. BFF starts in with,

"Well, I have my ticket and the others have theirs but 2na's boyfriend has her ticket and we got split up somehow and now we have to find him to get her ticket. How can we do that?

Cop, "Well we, I don't know, ma'am, but... (tells another to check her bag for whatever because it looks kind of heavy, raCop asks her if she has any liquor in there).

BFF, "But she'd have to stand out here and how are we going to find him in there?" As she's relating the rebuttal the raCop is asking her about the bag,

"Got any booze in there?"

Without breaking stride she turns quickly and says, "No" to the raCop as he pats the bag and says,

"You're lying"

BFF, "I know" as she continues on smoothly explaining the issue of why I don't have my ticket to the other Cop.

Another raCop, the one with the hair, has been observing the conversation, chuckling to himself at the banter while also looking me over, smiles as I notice. Then the real Cop decides, fuck it, let them go. And we got in!

...before the music started. With I don't know how many thousand people who were on the floor, we managed to locate the rest of the entire neighborhood group from our original vehicle and the rest of the neighborhood kids that went that night.

We had a great time and found our way back home, safe and sound. Best Friday the 13th ever.




*This usually required making an earlier trip to Boston area to get tickets at a music or record store.

Valley near Milwaukee a hundred years ago. Open air built on a hillside. Prior to the show starting here comes a naked guy sliding down the muddy aisle near our seats! Friend we were with says that is Ted the butcher at our local Kohl’s grocery store! Them were the days. Had a blast.

And he used it! "Get an atmosphere," he said.

The ex and I went to see Bruce Springsteen in Cincinnati. The best concert I'd ever been to. The only thing that ruined it was halfway through, the guy in front of me, turned around and threw up all over my shoes.