A little over three years ago, I wrote about going to the gig after seeing a longtime favorite band of mine, The Used, play in Baltimore. I didn’t realize that a month later no one would be going to any gigs because we’d all be locked away in our homes in the middle of a global pandemic. I had no idea how badly I would long to go to any gig - to sing loud, be with my friends, and just not be in my house.
Now that gigs are happening - a lot, actually, it’s like every band ever are all on tour simultaneously - I find myself filling my calendar with shows. Some of them are big shows (I am finally going to see The Cure this summer, for example) and some of them are small local shows at a venue where I like to stand near the door so I can easily escape when the headliner is finished. The show I went to last night falls somewhere in the middle.
If you follow this blog, you know I have a deep affinity for the music of Vinnie Caruana, especially his band I Am the Avalanche, which falls under the category of “Long Island Hardcore”. I saw IATA play the week previous in New York City at the end of their tour with fellow Long Islanders Bayside and Koyo. But last night they headlined a show at a brewery in Lindenhurst with Family Dinner and Stand Still, and I decided to go alone.
Going to shows alone can be a great experience. When I saw The Used in 2020, I didn’t have to worry about anyone else’s schedule or desires - if I wanted to leave early or stay for the whole set, that was entirely up to me. I could stand where I wanted, including flinging myself into the pit if I so desired (more on this later). But since returning to Long Island, my hometown as it were, going to shows alone feels tremendously strange and isolating in a way it just didn’t when I lived in D.C.
When attending a show in Baltimore (where I never actually lived) or Arlington, VA, I didn’t know many people and was used to the feeling of being another face in the crowd. But now that I’m back in a scene where one could argue I “grew up” (this is debatable, and I may never actually grow up if I can help it) it occurs to me that I don’t know any of these people. I was in a room of humans roughly my age, from the same place as me, who are into the same music I am…and I don’t know a single one of them. How did that happen?
First of all, I didn’t live here for a while. I went away to college in my early 20’s, and then there were the 5 years I lived in the D.C. area. Just before I moved down there, I was living on Long Island but I was also my mother’s full time caregiver so I wasn’t really going to a lot of shows; I actually wasn’t really going anywhere at all. Most of the friends I have from Long Island I met in high school, and while I don’t talk to that many of them anymore I can tell you that none of the ones I am still in touch with live here now.
So all of my current friends live somewhere else, and it’s been roughly 15 years since I was making friends in this place. That doesn’t mean I can’t make friends now, it just feels really hard. Hopefully by continuing to attend shows and seeing the same people over and over, a baseline acknowledgement starts to happen. I really enjoy going to concerts (especially ones where I don’t have to drive more than 30 minutes to get there). At different shows, people naturally start to gravitate toward different parts of the room and then those people form a little group. At last night’s show, I wanted to be kind of close which I regretted when I was accidentally nailed in the torso as the pit opened up right in front of me. Note to self; must be more aware, must also leave your glasses in the car lest they be lost forever.
Maybe I should be one of those cool people who stands near the back and bobs their head along with the beat. It’s just that, even though I prefer not to put my body at risk, I do like to be close to the band when I can, and really see what they’re doing. Also that head-bobbing group in the back are usually the beer drinkers, and as a sober person they’re not really my bag anymore. Obviously in a brewery I’m in the minority, but at least with the group up front there’s less beer because it’s just going to end up on the floor.
I wrote in a very lamenting sort of way at the beginning of last year about how no one warns you how hard it is to make new friends in your 30s. I still think that’s true, but I also think there is a way around that. I am on the periphery of the music scene that used to feel like home, but that is entirely my own doing. And if I want to build community here, it’s not just going to reach out and pull me in. I have to do it; I have to go to the shows. I have to put myself out there and maybe jump into the pit next time instead of just standing on the edge looking in, waiting for something to hit me.