A few comments on Knoxville concerts, concert-goers, and encores

Last night, we went to see Lou Reed in concert at the Tennessee Theatre. He sort of stumbled onto the stage and seemed, initially, disoriented. But, his band was great and the whole affair soon gelled into a pretty rocking affair, with a few Velvet Underground songs thrown in for good measure, including a fairly decent rendition of "Sweet Jane." After about seventy minutes, the band left the stage, returning a few minutes later for an encore of "Perfect Day." Then it was over.

One thing that I have noticed, over the years, is that Knoxville concerts often seem like a place to do everything but watch a band. Especially at the Tennessee Theatre. Cell phone calls, chatting with friends, CONSTANTLY getting up to go get beer or liquor. That can be distracting to those that want to watch the band. Especially when this is going on around you, like it was to us last night. A father and son sat behind us and talked through the first half of the concert. Now, for those of you unfamiliar with Lou Reed, he is recognized as one of the forefathers of punk music and, as such, there were several songs that contained walls of feedback and heavy riffing - quite loud and room filling. So, my peturbness, if you will, with this father and son was that their talking was intelligible OVER Lou Reed's band! I finally turned around and told them to please be quiet, which made them sheepishly cower down into their seats. The father apologized after the concert, and I graciously accepted his apology, but c'mon, we didn't pay $50 a ticket to listen to these yahoos talk about the son's flippin' troubles with girls at UT!

Finally, I have a word about encores. I HATE THEM! Why does a band or a performer think that we should have to scream for them to grace us with one more song after they only played the barest minimum of a set to begin with? Not that I am a big fan of his, but John Mellencamp refuses to do encores, believing that a band should come out and give 110% for 3 hours and then leave. I tend to agree with his philosophy. Are these bands and performers that big of ego cases that they want to lord it over us about the fact that we have paid lots of money to see them and THEY control the relationship? It was cool to see Lou Reed and all that, but c'mon, man, throw us a few bones!