drownsoda

All that said, I got some really good pictures!
 

 

 

 

 

It was extremely frustrating. I got really angry with them and I scared a few of them because I was NOT being nice at all. If you have a chance to see her, I'd opt for a seated venue to be honest. The view from the barricade was amazing, but the crowd is beyond violent.

So I was at the Seattle show yesterday on the 27th, and I thought I'd share my experience just to give other people some insight into what they are really getting themselves into at these shows.
 
We showed up at 6am outside the venue and there were already a few people waiting. By 8am, there was a full line that had formed, and the venue staff gave us raffle tickets for being the early birds that guaranteed us first entry into the show, which was really nice. I was in a group of four— myself, my brother, my friend, and my brother's girlfriend. We hung out all day at the show and would leave in groups of two for food and bathroom breaks. By 10am there was a line around the building, and by noon they had herded the line into winding gates, and later formed more lines on the opposite side of the venue doors. By the afternoon it was a zoo there, and one lady told me about an hour or so before the doors opened that the line on our side had extended into three levels of the parking garage across the street. There were A LOT of people there.
 
As far as the tickets went, myself, my brother and his girlfriend all had will-call through Adventures in Wonderland, and my friend had gotten hers through the Ticketmaster presale. The staff kept telling everybody it was a paperless event and that you needed your credit card only to get inside, but they failed to acknowledge the fact that a lot of us had the AIW tickets which were made available to us around 2pm at the box office. Anyway, the AIW tickets were totally valid. Our line got first entry as promised when the doors opened at 6:30pm, and everyone of course ran to the stage against the staff's command. My friend had a hurt knee so we walked as fast as we could and were still able to get a spot up against the barricade. About 20 minutes later we were given the okay to stand, and then shit really got insane. My brother and I secured spots at the barricade and had the two girls in front of us with our arms extended around them so that they wouldn't get crushed against the barricade. 
 
I'm going to be honest here— the majority of the crowd was extremely rude. "Feral teenage girls" is the only way I can describe it. Fortunately my brother and I are both over 6 feet tall and weight 200 pounds each, so we were able to hold our ground, but it was a nonstop struggle from the time we stood until the end of the show. It honestly was the worst during the opening act— SO much pushing and shoving. There was a group of girls behind me who were physically assaulting me the entire show— hitting me, pinching my ribcage, kicking the backs of my knees, scratching me, pulling at my hair— it was ridiculous. One girl who looked like she was sixteen told me she was going to stab me if I didn't move. I of course didn't move, and she of course didn't stab me. One girl poured water on me. My point is, people are INSANE at these shows. My friend in Chicago warned me about it and I took her warning lightly, but now that I experienced the show, I cannot imagine being under 5'5" and lasting long on the floor. There were at least 20 girls who I saw get pulled over the barricade and taken out by security; some of them were stone cold passed out, and at one point during the show, cops came in and were arresting people. 
 
The large group of girls behind me who were attacking me the whole time did not seem to understand that I was physically pressed against a metal fence with a 5 foot tall person in front of me whom I was trying to protect from getting crushed— they still thought they were entitled and should have been allowed to be where I was standing. Before Lana came on, after the opening act, a security guard told all the guys in the front (myself included) to put our arms out against the bar on the barricade and push our bodies back to keep the girls in front of us safe, which I had to do multiple times throughout the show, and every time I did it all of the girls behind me screamed and acted like I was abusing them. Several of them tried to tell the security to kick us out for pushing back against them, but there was literally no other option— these girls did not seem to understand that our bodies were up against steel and that we were NOT going to move any further. One girl gave me a lot of trouble (the one who was pinching my rib cage) and she kept wedging her arm in-between mine and the guy's next to me on the barricade, and I told her repeatedly to get her arm out because when a pushing wave came she was going to end up with a broken arm, but she refused to listen to me. 
 
Luckily, I had a really nice Australian guy to my right who was protecting his girlfriend against the barricade, and to the right of us was a French female college student from Paris who was super friendly and had seen Lana before in Paris last year. I felt bad for her because she was against the barricade as well and people were pushing on her the entire time and she was fighting back. 
 
Honestly though, the crowds— mainly teenage girls in flower crowns— need to CHILL out. I waited in line for 14 hours and we EARNED our spot against that barricade. Honestly I felt like 80% of the crowd were a bunch of spoiled high school girls who had gotten tickets through their parents, and they had absolutely no respect for anybody and were horribly entitled. One girl who was attacking me informed me she "knew more of Lana's songs than I did," and that I shouldn't even have been there— goes to show the maturity level/age group of these girls. I'm glad I was able to give them a wake-up call that they can't always get their way, especially when they are going to try to cheat their way to the front and threaten and hurt people to do so. As I said, I had the benefit of being a big guy who could easily handle their attempts at destabilizing me, but it was disturbing how aggressive and pissed off they were. When the show ended, the security guard near us came up to the barricade and gave me a thumbs up and told me I did the right thing by pushing back and holding my ground to protect my friend in front of me, and all of the girls who had spent three and a half hours mauling me scoffed and were appalled. It was a nice affirmation.
 
As far as Lana's show goes, it was of course incredible. She came down to the barricade and took pictures with fans midway through the set, but stopped and turned around literally FEET before us unfortunately. I got some great photos though and did my best to enjoy the music. 
 
But, yeah, the show was as insane as I was warned it would be. Worse than punk shows. I've seen Hole live before and the crowd was tamer than this. What it comes down to is that the majority of the crowd was immature, selfish, and incredibly mean-spirited. Beware of that. Unless of course you ARE one of these people, in which case all I have to say to you is: GROW UP.
 
Also: make sure you are hydrated and have eaten something, even if it's light. A lot of these girls were passing out as I said and many of them were pulled over the barricade because they couldn't handle it. One of my friends from college was there on the opposite side with three of her friends, and she told me that two of her friends collapsed one had a panic attack and had to be taken out. I guess my point is, yes, these shows ARE as crazy as people are saying they are, and this is coming from a 23 year old male who has gone to multiple punk and rock shows before and been in moshpits. BE PREPARED PLEASE.

I don't think singing is bad as long as you're not screaming at everyone around you. There are certain artists who I HAVE to sing along with at times when I see them live, and it's usually ones who I'm really enthusiastic about or obsessed with. When I saw Courtney Love last summer I couldn't resist the urge to sing along to some of my favorite songs of hers— I think I sang along with all of "Violet" and a few others, but she encouraged it by putting the mic out toward the audience at times. It's sometimes just a natural reaction, but there is a point where it's so obnoxious that you're distracting those around you from the performer onstage.

I was actually thinking of that. I like being on the sides because you get a full view from an angle and the scope of the view seems to be better. I've been to shows in the past where I was front row to the side and it was a great view to be honest.

I didn't realize how absolutely insane her shows were until my friend in Chicago told me about her experience. Now I'm mildly mortified.
 
I'm going to be staying in Seattle the night before the show at a hotel across the street from the venue, and we had originally been planning to park my car at CenturyLink field around 8am and then wait outside the venue all day, but now I'm wondering if that's even early enough. My friend in Chicago said people camped out overnight. Then again, there are so many factors, and this show is on a Tuesday so it's an odd day, but still.
 
I am in a group of four— myself, my brother, and two girls. We ideally wanted to be close to the stage, so I was wondering how feasible this is and what it would take to get in and make it close to the front. Three of us have pre-sale tickets through Adventures In Wonderland, and the other girl has hers through Ticketmaster; not sure if that matters. I'm a 6'2" 23 year old male and my brother is a 6'3" 21 year old, but his girlfriend and my friend who are going are both petite 20 year old girls, so I'm wondering how that is going to fare. I'm not worried about being able to see since I'm so tall (and presumably taller than most the audience will be), but I'm wondering about them. As I said, we want to be close to the front.
 
The way you guys have described the pits at her concerts though reminds me of punk shows I've been to in the past, and the time I basically had to fight for my life during a Hole concert. It is awful and not fun and you barely can focus on the music because you're mostly just trying to stand up. That said, many of these experiences it seems have been told by younger women, and my friend in Chicago is a petite 5'1" female, so she ran into some trouble; I'm a pretty big guy though and so is my brother, so I don't get shoved around easily. I mean, a Hole concert is like the antithesis of a Lana Del Rey concert— at least I THOUGHT it was until I read horror stories on here.