I think I’ve seen more concerts on the road than I’ve seen in my hometown. Our area can’t consistently draw headliners year round to the big stage or even lesser known bands to the smaller venues. Tours don’t seem to want to make the push past Richmond or DC when they are moving up and down the east coast. So, we often have to turn a concert into an overnight trip or long weekend away. It wasn’t always this way.
In the 80s, I saw U2 at the Hampton Coliseum. During the 90s, I saw the Beastie Boys at The Boathouse in Norfolk and Sting at the Amphitheater in Virginia Beach. In the aughts, I saw Morrissey at The Norva. These shows were glorious nights out on familiar streets, stepping out from our houses and into a sound cloud of favorite songs and dynamic performers.
My mom and dad tell stories about seeing Jimi Hendrix at The Dome at the oceanfront in 1967 or ‘68 and Bob Dylan at the Norfolk Arena in 1966. We all thought we would be young forever listening to our live music, singing and dancing through the night, coming home with our ears ringing and revering sound above all delights.
I hoped Pharrell’s Something In The Water music festival would put Va. Beach back on the tour map and artists would once again push east on the interstate to the water’s edge and play for us at home. Instead I have to push west and north and south to find the bands I want to see live.
So, I’ll go on the road like I’ve always done following the music. Nights waiting with the crowd as the lights go down as we call for the band with screaming adulation, a beckoning chorus with our wild instruments of holler and whistle until movement on the stage becomes a frenzy of anticipation and then there is light and there is music, sometimes a drum solo that sets hearts thumping as if the beat seeped into our skin and we become sound itself. Sometimes the guitar is the first spark, a wailing hello from the band as the singer revs up at the mic with lyrics from our bedrooms and cars, speakers and stereos, playlists and DJs.
The band I’ve probably seen the most on the road with Chris is The Cure. We went to see them early in our marriage before kids at the Patriot Center in DC. The show was sold out, but a new network made it possible to get tickets: the World Wide Web-circa 1995. Specifically an AOL chat room for Cure fans. Someone named Sorrow had tickets for sale. All we had to do was meet him in DC with cash.
For a couple of Gen X latchkey kids raised on afterschool specials about kidnappings and pedophiles at the playground, you would think we would have run from the chat room and from Sorrow. Instead we found ourselves in the growing darkness of a DC night looking for the address Sorrow gave us to exchange cash for sold out tickets. We decided I would stay in the car while Chris went up to the door.
The house was in an industrial area on the outskirts of Washington and not one light was on in the house. It actually looked abandoned. Chris walked up to it anyway and knocked on the door. After a minute or two, the door barely creaked open and Sorrow said “Hand me the money and I will hand you the tickets.” Sorrow did not reveal himself. Sorrow said nothing more. Chris saw only pale, veiny hands. The exchange was made and Chris returned to the safety of the car with our new prized possessions. In the end, the music was great but the seats were decidedly not.
A few years later, we traveled again to the DC area to see The Cure at an all-day festival. By this time, we were parents out for a glorious weekend unburdened and anxious to check in on our youth convinced we hadn’t changed that much. The Cure was scheduled to play last, but we spent the day in festival form visiting the small stages to see The Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Modest Mouse. On the big stage, throughout the day we saw the Violent Femmes, Cypress Hill, Jay-Z, and a raucous Offspring set that had the whole stadium bouncing. At times, we roamed the grounds looking for shade in the blistering heat. We found a few scraggly trees that we tried to sit beneath as the scene at RFK became more and more taxing. People were passing out from the heat and stumbling drunk and vacant past us. I ached for their mothers and wanted to put sunscreen on everyone. By the time The Cure took the stage well into the night, the young people had scattered and the area in front of the stage had room for us to stand with our last reserves of fuel and stamina. We left exhausted in ways we never knew even after late night feedings with the baby and endless playtime with the toddler.
The last time we saw The Cure was in Charlotte, NC. The kids were with us for the road trip, but we left them in the hotel for a night out together. This time we were not really looking for our youth but maybe reveling in the collective beauty of years gone by. The night was thick with nostalgia, and Robert Smith was poised to deliver a gift to me as we took our seats in the arena.
I wasn’t sure I could relax and enjoy the show completely because I carried my mother worry around like a wet blanket, heavy and boring but persistent in its heft. If The Cure spent the evening lost in a nine minute rendition of A Forest, I knew my mind would wander to the hotel and all the ways my kids could be in peril without me. But as the band took the stage, Robert Smith told the waiting crowd that tonight they would play the Singles which meant all my favorite Cure songs back to back to back. Beside me, Chris actually sagged as his instrumental heavy Cure playlist went up in flames.
But by the fourth encore, we were both mostly satisfied. The Top 40 faves mixed well with a few radio unfriendly gems: Pictures of You was followed later by Primary, Just Like Heaven by The Hanging Garden. In the end, we both got our WISH.
The Cure taught me from a young age that life is a kaleidoscope of mood, and Robert Smith showed me whimsy and playfulness as much as he showed me despair and longing. Through all the moods of life, I know I can always just put on some lipstick and rub some smooth gel in my hair and greet the day with a soundtrack playing in the background to help “Kick out the gloom, Kick out the blues, and Tear out the pages with all the bad news.”
And here’s some good news.
Concerts and festivals are returning to pre-pandemic schedules. In a few weeks, it may be time for all of us to get unstuck and “Get up and GOOOO!”