Do you remember your first time going to a concert?  Do you remember the sights, the sounds, who took you?  The first concert experience I have goes back to October 10, 1988.  Yep, almost twenty-five years to the date.  On that auspicious occasion, I ventured to the Dean E. Smith Center in Chapel Hill to attend Def Leppard’s stop on the Hysteria tour.  Somehow, my mom managed to secure floor seating, roughly 15 rows or so back from the stage, a stage in the round!  My mom also worked it out where my older cousin would take me to the show, thereby sparing her of the ear splitting guitar licks and screams of both band and crowd.  I thought my cousin, who was roughly 25 at the time, was just about the coolest thing in the world, so going with him was awesome.  While his recollections of that night will no doubt be different than mine, I think he’d agree it was a blast.  I remember the lasers, the ripped acid-washed jeans, and just how loud it was.  I believe it took my hearing days to come back.  And when I got to school the next day, I was actually cool, if only for a time.

Last night, I had the great opportunity to take Lucy and Ethel to what I consider to be their first show.  I pointed out to them that not every parent will take their kids to a concert on a school night.  I am sure that when they went to school they were essentially worthless, but memories were definitely made.  But what about the show?  First off, we went to Mellow Mushroom in Durham beside the DBAP for dinner.  Our server was attentive and I was glad to see Omission Beer on the menu.  The pizzas were great and we had enough to bring home.  The ‘Shroom is always a good choice for a gluten-free meal.  After eating, we walked to the DPAC for the local stop of Jack Johnson’s From Here to Now to You Tour.  They let us up to the seating area and we hopped in line to grab a shirt or something at the merch stand, and I’m glad we were near the front because that line was loooooong.  There was a display board where you could take your picture holding a pledge sign promising to do something positive for the environment.  Once you did that, you got to drop your name in a hat to win a signed ukulele.  Since I haven’t heard from them, I’ll just assume I didn’t win but at least I have a group photo.

By now it was time to head to the seats.  We were up on the balcony in Section 10, Row F.  We were high up there, but there isn’t a bad seat in the joint so all was good.  The opening act was a band called Bahamas from Toronto.  I thought the lead singer’s rapport between songs was more enjoyable than the actual singing.  I felt all of their songs were too similar.  However, the two backup singers were great and I think, carried the band.  Once their short set was up, we quickly went to the bathroom and to grab the girls a snack to keep them from crashing.  Again, speed was of the essence because the line were again loooooong.  Finally, at 8:30 the lights went dark and Jack walked out.  He picked up an acoustic guitar and plowed through three songs before the band came out.  I’m not going to provide a set list.  I will say that I did not leave feeling he kept a few songs back.  I appreciated that he played some of the older songs from his catalog like “Flake”, “Bubble Toes” (Lucy’s favorite) and songs from his most recent album.  He played hard for a solid two hours and once he closed with “Home” I knew that we had been a part of an experience.

I enjoyed watching my girls take in the sights.  I enjoyed answering their questions (What is an encore?).  I most of all enjoyed being with them and sharing that time with them.  I hope that by listening to music with positive vibrations behind it makes them as happy as it does me.  It feels like a more fleeting thing now-to be able to attend live music with your kids without having to worry about profanity, inappropriate lyrics or dancing, or obnoxious concert-goers.  Last night, we had that chance and I hope that we can keep on attending shows together for some time to come.  If you have the chance, take your kids to a show, introduce them to live music.  Maybe it’ll just spark something in them like it did to me all those years ago.