What's Not To Love About Concerts?

We all love concerts, but let's face it, sometimes they're not the most pleasant experiences! Let's take a look at why:

• Ticket troubles: OMG, your favourite band is coming to town! The first obstacle you face is acquiring tickets. If you're part of a fan club, perhaps you'll try a pre-sale. This may seem like a good idea, but crashing websites and slow internet connections are familiar problems which often result in the employment of some choice four-letter words. In other cases, perhaps you'll pop off down to your local ticket outlet, and spend some time almost crying as you will the people in front of you to finish quickly in fear that tickets will sell out just before you get to the front of the queue.

• Travel issues, and not just your own. Concerts often require some travelling on the part of the concert go-er, thus we must book flights and accommodation and make any other necessary plans for our trips. Once this is out of the way, the only thing we need to worry about is whether or not the band will make it to the country in time. What if the Iceland volcano erupts again and all flights are cancelled? What if a band member pulls a muscle in their shoulder (cough cough, I'm talking about you, Nathan Followill) and the tour is postponed? You're likely to only stop fretting once the band tweets "TOUCHDOWN!".

• The battle for the barrier. If you have standing tickets, a true fangirl is likely to want to get as close to the stage as possible, and this often requires hours upon hours in the queue. Queuing may involve sitting on hard, cold ground for long amounts of time, without the luxury of ducking out of the queue for a quick snack. Thus by the time the gates open, your blood sugar levels are probably not at an all time high. In the queue, fights for position may get physical and violent, but the security guards tend to check your handbags for pepper spray, how unfortunate.

• Keeping your position. Once the gates have opened and you've attained your barrier spot, you may have a hard time keeping it until the end of the concert. Introducing the heel of your shoe to the foot of the person behind you should keep him or her at bay...Don't worry, I'm just kidding (kind of).

• After show pains. Be it a traffic jam of 19000 cars trying to exit one gate, or 1000 people fighting to exit from one door, leaving a concert is never fun. You're tired, your body aches, and you can barely feel your legs. In addition, if you were anywhere near the speakers, your ears are likely to feel like they'll never be the same again. I recommend patience, calmness and a good sense of humour. If all else fails, go on twitter or facebook and see if the band have any words of encouragement. 

• The morning after. Oh dear. The morning after a concert, you will probably wake up exhausted, with no voice, stiff legs and hearing that is still not quite normal. Your brain will feel fuzzy, and you may still have the closing song pounding through your brain as though determined to etch itself there for all eternity. 

You may wonder if it was all worth it, if you should ever go to another concert in your life. The answer? Of course you should! All the pain and more would be worth it, because for the duration of the time that the band was on stage, everything was them, and nothing else matters, and it was all worth it in the end.