On a recent post for Lynda Elstad or Lyndahere's (@lyndahere) blog Between the Rock and Hardplace (“You’d Live A Whole Lot More” Part Two – Great Big Sea XX Tour, First Leg, Edmonton to St Paul (Videos and Set Lists): The Great Big Happy and Truly Satisfying) she discussed the audience at Great Big Sea XX concerts, their behaviour and their motivations for going. I felt like she was crashing my domain (lol). However, I seriously feel the need to defend my fellow fans. I also feel the need to defend Sean McCann as a result of Lyndahere using her blog to spread rumours that this may be the last tour for a while based on absolutely nothing. When quoting from her post I have written the quotes in the correct English with no capitals for nouns out of respect for Alan Doyle.
I must congratulate her on her inclusiveness of all the members of Great Big Sea in this post who received a brief acknowledge followed by long waffly paragraphs about how Alan Doyle and his music changed her life. The photograph of Bob Hallett on fiddle wasn’t half bad although I didn’t watch the videos.
I will start off with Lyndahere states she never goes to a Great Big Sea concert to be happy or as a respite from being unhappy. No not her (although at the end of the post and much soul searching she too is happy). She goes to concerts for different reasons (the words she uses sound kind of like an elaboration of happiness for example thrilled, amused, entertained but never mind) and to think more deeply about the music. To be happy is not illegal or a crime even for just a couple of hours when I last checked in Canada or America nor is it anywhere in the Western world. Lyndahere writes “Others feel differently, I know. Many others and much differently. I have been hearing about – and witnessing the great big happy for years now, some of it on occasion a bit disquieting (especially when the great big happy transforms swiftly into the great big mean mere moments after the show’s closing cord) some of it genuinely impressive and powerfully inspiring”. Whatever the reason people pay for a ticket while interesting is not really important. I think it is fabulous and I am sure that Great Big Sea do too, that people with whatever time they have and whatever money they have left over from life decide to spend it going to a folk music concert. It gives them an opportunity away from the preoccupations of life around of a job, raising children or going to school, family and friends. Important stuff.
“But I have never before seen an equivalent depth of post-show satisfaction as I’ve observed at their first leg of the GBS XX tour shows”. Lyndahere writes “There was next to no bitching to be heard about songs that weren’t done, no jealousy spawned snide comments about who was winked at by whom and for what reasons, no immediate onset desperation about the next GBS fix. Almost all the time the smiles lasted all the way to the venue doors. Almost every time the smiles felt true…I can think of a number of reasons for this the most important of those reasons originating on stage….” A smile that lasts all the way to the door. Imagine that. Big praise indeed for Great Big Sea. Yes I can image that most of those smiles did last all the way to the door and beyond because of what happened on stage. I gather the audience were not given free beer or merchandise before they went in.
I can also imagine the reasons why the audience was generally pleased. Many of the shows were in Canada and Great Big Sea are some of their favourite sons. Tickets to the show are expensive and would only attract really interested fans or perhaps some ‘newbies’. If they were great fans then yes I imagine they would get their fix. I have never brought a greatest hits album I wasn’t happy with and according to her reports they have played many old favourites as well as some new stuff.
Lyndahere continues…“There have been differences to be found in the audiences as well. I’ve never before seen so many couples at GBS shows, an observation which made me curious enough to send me on a chatting mission with a rather large number of those couples at numerous shows. Over and over again, I was told the same story; the pair of tickets had been a gift (from the fellow to the gal, but occasionally the other way round) given for Christmas, Valentine’s Day, or an anniversary. This was especially true of the tickets shows where the ticket prices were the highest: the result of a steep price tag appeared to be that the GBS show had become an evening out, an event, something to get dressed up for, to arrange a babysitter for, maybe to go out for a nice dinner beforehand – an occasion to share with someone special”…or an opportunity for her to show off her privileged and position in life to other fans.
“And therefore perhaps a bit less of an evening to get stumbling drunk, emotionally overwhelmed, and/or in a near fist fight pushing match over a prime stage side notice me position”. I seriously think that position has already been taken and permanently occupied by Lyndahere unless a fan has a favourite other than Alan Doyle. In a tweet Lyndahere wrote to Sean McCann “And you not only put on a great show, you’re a hero to all of us who have been pushed around and/or hurt at shows. Well done” 14 April 2013. I can understand why she may get hurt at shows in particular, when she insists on occupying a prime stage notice me position. People make polite requests for her not to shine that video recorder and camera in their face or not block their view. And she tells them politely to get stuffed and refuses to budge. Yes, I can see how pushing turns to shoving and someone ends up getting hurt. A great sense of entitlement will get her hurt and in particular when she is blocking someone’s view they are entitled to.
Lyndahere discusses the behaviour of fans at concerts in considerable depth “It hasn’t been all couples and newbies at the XX shows, of course. And it hasn’t’ been all foolishness -ree or all meanness-free either.” Whether it is foolishness or meanness while not very nice it is not illegal unless it is drunk and disorderly conduct. It is also not illegal to express an opinion. I have never left a concert, event, play or sporting event where people don’t talk about what they have just witnessed. Not everyone is going to agree or have the same interpretation of the event they witnessed and it would be a boring old world if it were. It is not illegal to express an opinion that is different than her own despite what she may think. What is illegal are her actions of bootlegging entire performances without a license and stalking a person at their place of work.
Lyndahere writes “There’s a great deal of (mostly whispered) worry about how many more GBS tours the future might hold – a worry the flames of which have been definitely been fanned by Sean’s series of tweeted “farewells” as the band leaves many of the XX tour cities and perhaps some fans have decided to come while they can…” She has never written anything on Twitter about this so I find this statement kind of interesting. It is just the way he writes. Sean McCann is the only Great Big Sea member not to acknowledge her on Twitter. And perhaps wishful thinking on her part with the emergence of the Alan Doyle band permanently.
