Whats the weirdest concert you ever attended?


I have to say this is only bought up by one particular concert I attended in 1970 in Birmingham England.
I went to see a German band called Faust. They had a bit of a reputation for being more weird than most, and that's saying something given other bands around at the time and had an underground following along with Henry Pig and Hatfield and the North.
So.... I was in row two and eagerly waiting for the show to start. The auditorium was completely dark except for the lights on the amps. At each side of the stage there was a big old 36" colour TV set and a pinball machine.

In due course, everyone assumed that the band came on stage as the light on the amps went off in sequence as if someone was walking past them. Then, eventually, odd sounds started emanating from where we assumed the band was. Still no lights. Then the TV's burst into life and were showing a different channel on either side of the stage. Still no sign of the band.
Next a guy walks on stage in just his underpants (1970's Y fronts)and starts playing the pinball machine. Every time he used the flipper the TV channel changed.

This was how the whole one and a half hours were spent until the guy on the pinball either got bored or the band got bored but he just walked off, the music stopped and the lights on the amps flickered again so we assumed that the band had left the stage.

During the course of the "concert", there was all sorts of aromas of illicit substances. To put the icing on the cake, about half way through, a woman in the front row turned round to me and said "would you hold this for me" offering a newly lighted special cigarette. After passing it to me she proceeded to turn back to the front, lean on the stage, have very quick very rough sex doggy fashion with someone I can only assume was her partner and then ask me for her joint back!

My head was really messed up for weeks and I'm still not sure if it was the concert or the side show which was to blame.
rob-in-spain

Showing 4 responses by czarivey

I envy you to see Faust live.
I mostly attend weird concert so it's fund to list:
1. Art Ensemble of Chicago -- early 90s
2. Larval at NYC Jazz festival at South Street Seaport
3. Nils Petter Molvaer at NYC Coney Island High
4. Gong with Daevid Alen and Steve Hillage at KnittingFactory NYC
5. Acid Mothers Temple japanese noise prog band at King's in Raleigh NC,
6. Death -- neo-punk band at Hopscotch Raleigh festival
7. Pere Ubu -- at King's in Raleigh
8. Few times attended Residents in NYC (they wear eyeballs and play weird tunes with weird videos displayed on whiteboard during their performance)
9. King Crimson ProjeKCts in Irving Plaza NYC
The last one and the most weird was with Gretchen Parlato(voice, marakas, hand-claps and beat-boxing) and Alan Hampton all instruments.
Normally Alan Hampton would play string double-bass, but he expanded himself to play other instruments: guitars and keyboards. Apparently, while Alan is descent bassist, he wasn't able to keep up with other instruments and made this concert truly messy. He wasn't able to catch the loop on the right key and on the right time and was often off the key in guitar and piano YAK!. Also I noticed he was sweating heavy and pale. This happens if dope was used. When you're on dope and trying to be useful, you need to 'catch' the moment when you're not in withdrawal pain, but not too high to be able to function. I guess Alan just got the dose right before performance and probably too big... Dealing with dope consumers is complicated indeed.
Frank Zappa had very strict policy in his band -- ZERO tolerance to alcohol or recreational drugs during rehearsals AND of course stage. His music was SCORED by Steve Vai before each rehearsal while he wasn't familiar on reading sheet music. Listening to his music you would really think that it's pure improvisation, but....

Being weird in unique and interesting way is art and talent. It's clearly different from being disrespectful to the crowd especially due to the excessive amount of alcohol or recreational drugs present on stage.

After several years from my last post here, I've been in Nationwide Arena and seen Roger Waters...

I realized that Roger Waters urgently needs help of professional, because he became more mis-aligned than Syd.