Question of the Week: What’s your worst, most bizarre or most miserable concert experience?

Local Spins’ Question of the Week (March 10, 2021)

What’s your worst, most bizarre or most miserable concert experience?

This week’s winner of Local Spins merch: Email subscriber Matthew Fouts, who responded to the Question of the Week and was entered into a drawing for Local Spins merch. Sign up for email updates and the weekly newsletter here: https://localspins.com/subscribe-local-spins-mailing-list/

THE READER RESPONSES:

John Kissane – I, too, saw Phish – at any rate, I saw them take the stage. This was at Bonnaroo. I skipped the show in favor of an air-conditioned tent showing the Lakers game. Not a sports guy, but REALLY not a Phish guy. Strangest show may have been Major Lazer, given its frenetic hypeman (“Whattup, Bitchfork?”), dancers diving onto prone audience members from ladders, and besuited Diplo.

Stephen Aldrich – Filter, Orbit Room, too drunk to play anything, attempted about 3 or 4 songs, yelled at crowd the rest of the time. And I mean really, really bad drunk, demand your money back drunk…

Rick Wilson – Rolling Stones, 78, Soldier Field. Guy next to me was drunk and kept passing out on me before he finally puked.

Mary Ellen Murphy – Some form of Jefferson Airplane with Paul Kantner at the Orbit Room. It was painful and I felt bad for the guy. I felt bad for everyone.

Mitch Meleen – Loverboy at 54th St. Lounge. Mike Reno was gasping for breath — he was at least 120 lbs overweight.

David Marin – Pine Knob – Willie Nelson, Keb’ Mo’ and Lyle Lovett. Music was superb but guy behind us was so drunk he wobbled while sitting, never shut up yelling (“Yeah Willie! Willeeeee! Yeah Bro!…), and “sang” along with every song for all three acts – never mind he didn’t know any of the words and basically scatted and yelled between falling over and groaning before getting his second wind and starting up again.

Martin Marino – Blue Oyster Cult at Orbit Room. So loud we had to leave.

Derek Ketchum – Definitely Counting Crows/Alex Chilton show at the Orbit Room back in the ’90s.

Don Clapham – Phil Collins Big Band Concert at Meadowbrook Amphitheatre during the late 1990s. Although billed as a big band music concert, many fans thought they were going to hear Genesis/Phil Collins music. When it became apparent that wasn’t the case, a lot of people either walked out or began booing very loudly. Phil Collins became visibly upset and abruptly walked off the stage and didn’t return. The band followed, the house lights went up and the concert was over.

Mike Dodge – Easily Ted Nugent at the Civic Auditorium — 1981 with Krokus opening. With nothing better to on a weeknight, and none of us being fans, we decided to go last minute. We purposely got there late because we knew Krokus would suck, but not late enough to miss them completely and painfully listened to their last two or so songs. Then Nugent came out. On this tour, he had two or three other guitarists with him who were a step down from Ted’s “musicianship level.” It was horrible. With 3-4 guitarists all trying to be louder than each other, along with the Civic Auditorium’s acoustics, it was a wall of noise. We decided to stick it out to hear “Stranglehold” which was practically inaudible and then walked out, that was maybe song 5 or 6 into the show. I’ve seen a couple stinker shows over the years, but that was the worst $9.00 I spent on a show.

David Marin – David Bowie with Nine Inch Nails at Auburn Hills was pretty much a suck show, too. Bowie wasn’t especially into the gig, obviously. When NIN was done he just came out and joined them and they loudly dicked around for an hour or so. Loud and sucky pretty much describes it; like a bad bar band that you stuck around for only because your son’s buddy was playing in it.

Darlene Cooper – Led Zeppelin, Silverdome. An hour late, M80s flying off the balconies, huge fight arena on the floor, my cousin passed out before the show started, horrible sound. Robert Plant cruised by in the parking lot before the show in a limo, best part of the show: He rolled his window down and smiled.

Scott Stefanski – I really haven’t seen any stinker shows, aside from Dylan at 5th Third Ballpark (he was SO bad I was laughing in disbelief). Now rude and drunk fellow concert goers? Oh yeah…

Ron Clause – Oh where do I start???

Matthew Fouts – 10/28/98: 12th row center for Joni Mitchell & Bob Dylan at the Palace Of Auburn Hills. Joni played first and was magical. We left during the third Dylan tune, bad mix that was too loud along with an unintelligible Bob.

Mary Cope Brennan – Todd Rungren, circa 1980, GR. Man couldn’t hold a note in a bucket. Thought I was going to wretch.

Jim Plasman – Diving For Pearls at the Orbit Room. Marshall Tucker at the Ottawa County Fairgrounds is a real close second.

Greg S. Lewis – Going with “bizarre” in retrospect……Peter Gabriel solo at GVSU. This was when he just left Genesis and was in support of his first solo LP. Television was the opener, and the GR prog crowd was NOT feeling them and basically booed them off the stage.Then, we basically sat on our hands while PG played his new album, which by now is a classic radio staple. The applause was more suited for a golf match than a concert. When Gabriel came out for an encore and did “Back in NYC” (from Lamb lies) we roared and leapt to our feet. Lights came on, show over, hard to know if the audience or Peter was more disappointed. Looking back, I think this began my transition from a prog to a punk.

Robert Biggie G Gill – There’s a few. Night Ranger (through no fault of their own) on their Man In Motion tour at Club Eastbrook/Orbit Room. They were a 4-piece then. Alan Fitzgerald (keys) left for a steady gig at Peavy and I can’t remember if Jeff Watson (guitar) was still with the band. They kept blowing out the PA… finally after the 2nd or 3rd time, Jack Blades threw his bass on the stage, cursed and walked off. Second one was one of KLQ’s Thursday night free shows at Club Eastbrook and they had a band playing from Amsterdam that was getting some airplay called “The Sleeze Beez” — this is early 90’s. They stopped in between songs to talk to the crowd, and the lead singer started bragging about getting a bunch of nasty hookers. Everybody booed! It was kinda funny actually. Last one, I think in 2015, Dokken was playing with a band that Jack Russell from Great White formed — this was at some park in Warsaw, IN. The band was OK but Jack kinda sucked and I felt bad for him. They played mostly covers (Hendrix) and a couple of the big Great White hits. Next up was Dokken, which was basically Mick Brown (drums) and Don Dokken (vox). Don sounded horrible, but the band wailed. He kept bitching about the sound (which was fine… he just sucked) and then vowed he was never gonna play there “in the Bible-Belt” again. It was too bad. Like I said, the band wailed. Don was used up. Sad.

Mike Thinnes – The Jacksons at the Silverdome. Biggest waste of money ever.

Jeff Frazier – Pete Texas and Rush, Starr auditorium, Ferris State College. The Starr had the worst acoustics in the world. Rush didn’t sound a bit like themselves.

Dave Adams – Most disappointed was I went to The Who’s farewell tour in 1982 with The Clash and Eddie Money was a late edition. Eddie was touring with April Wine and was supposed to play at Wings but opened at The Silverdome in front of 80-90,000. The Clash, being punk rock were literally booed their entire performance which lasted 2 songs. “Should I Stay or Should I Go?” and “Rock the Casbah” before they gave in and ended their performance. I never got another chance to see them again.

Greg Baxter – Post-show shenanigans that strike a chord was when Darius Rucker and some of the Blowfish stopped into Mulligan’s after their show in GR. One of the drunk regulars kept calling out “Hooooo-teeeee” to Darius. Darius finally had enough and there was a tussle and the local for his ass kicked by “hootee.”

Mike Dodge – 1979, Blackfoot opening for The Who at the Silverdome. They got “who’ed” off the stage and only played three tunes. I thought they were going an equal length encore but they never came back.

Michele Terpstra – I was at Lolla 93. That was insane.

Dan Terpstra – In the past five years, The Dandy Warhols takes the cake. Bad sound and lighting in Chicago. Luckily, the next day Johnny Marr knocked our socks off.

Scott VanderSchel – Front row, watching Jimi Page in The Firm. Cigarette in his mouth. His drool would reach the end of his cigarette and put it out. Immediately a roadie would replace it with a new one.

Gunnar Nyblad – We were supposed to open for .38 Special over east. 105-degree summer day was reason enough to cancel the very poorly promoted show. Insurance claim prolly saved the company. Or the company went under? Regardless, no one was there. Except us and .38 Special scratching our heads back stage.

Mark DeWitt – The last Who concert at Van Andel was fairly pedestrian. The orchestra was not synched with the band. Lacked intensity.

Brandon’s Page – Limp Bizkit with Method & Redman, and System of a Down – Peoria Civic Center 11/20/1999: The show started innocently enough with System of a Down opening the show with a set that culminated in guitarist Daron Malakian smashing his guitar, pulling his pants down, and waddling off stage with his bare-ass to the crowd. Method Man and Redman filled the arena with clouds of smoke…scandalous for 1999. But, the kicker was the headliner, Limp Bizkit. On the heels of the Woodstock 1999 riots, the band had created quite the buzz. Before long, the crowd had ripped up the plywood covering the arena’s ice hockey rink. Mosh pits on bare ice, led to multiple wipeouts. The plywood became mini-stages for girls to strip on top of while crowd surfing (ala Woodstock). It was insanity. To top it off, ECW was filming live on TNT in the adjacent exhibit hall….and walked onto the stage, live on TV. After insulting the crowd, the wrestler (name escapes me) was knocked out by Fred Durst with a chair. Definitely the most outlandish standalone show that I have attended.

Lee Chase – One of the weirder shows was Patti Smith Band opening for Journey at the Lansing Civic Center. Half or more of the audience got up and left before Journey hit the stage. Another was Leon Russell playing in a small bar on S. Division in GR on a Sunday afternoon. I can usually endure a loud house mix but not this one! It was distorted, WAY over the top volume-wise and the sound guy blew off our pleas for mercy!

Gregg Oonk – Definitely Motley Crüe at Van Andel arena. Tommy broke his drums. Vince couldn’t catch his breath and I was sober to boot! On a lighter note, the chick Vince hauled onto stage to sing to was my ex. I didn’t even know she was there, lol.

Brian Kelly Rampenthal – I went to see Aerosmith in the late 70’s and Steven Tyler could barely remember his own lyrics. Horrible show. Seen David Lee Roth do a Simi act in VH.

Rex Larsen – Led Zeppelin at the Chicago Stadium. Worst show ever. Really bad sound.

Copyright 2021, Spins on Music LLC