Yesterday in the paper I read in the paper (Boston Globe specifically) a concert review. It contained several paragraphs on the headliner, none on either of the opening acts. Now as it happens the headliner was Imagine Dragons, a band that's gained ubiquity and climbed to the top of the somewhat devalued charts but have never quite done it for me. One of the openers was Metric, who I really do like and who've appeared in some of my Random Ten lists. But that's actually immaterial.
What is germane is the fact that nobody seems to care about opening bands at all, and that's gotta rankle. But I can sort of back this up. Some years ago the Ramones played at my college. I was on the staff of the school paper, but I didn't cover the show. Went to it, didn't write about it. The reporter/reviewer who did spent time with the band before the show, and he was duly heedful, not to say a little awed. And yet, when I asked him out of curiosity what the name of the band who'd played before them was, he didn't know. And didn't find out afterward.
Mind you, this is a profoundly First World problem, not being recognized because you're a second banana. Still, I'm sure it's a job that many artists work hard to achieve, so it must bother a few that no one notices, as a rule.
As for the aforementioned Random Ten, it's coming tomorrow.
Wonder if these guys have made headliner yet.
What is germane is the fact that nobody seems to care about opening bands at all, and that's gotta rankle. But I can sort of back this up. Some years ago the Ramones played at my college. I was on the staff of the school paper, but I didn't cover the show. Went to it, didn't write about it. The reporter/reviewer who did spent time with the band before the show, and he was duly heedful, not to say a little awed. And yet, when I asked him out of curiosity what the name of the band who'd played before them was, he didn't know. And didn't find out afterward.
Mind you, this is a profoundly First World problem, not being recognized because you're a second banana. Still, I'm sure it's a job that many artists work hard to achieve, so it must bother a few that no one notices, as a rule.
As for the aforementioned Random Ten, it's coming tomorrow.
Wonder if these guys have made headliner yet.
1 comment:
We've also wondered how it's possible for bands to earn any kind of living at all in current circumstances. I'm sure some very few actually manage to do so, but the whole music scene has changed so much in the past decade or so that even headliner bands aren't getting the exposure that once was so routine.
Only the Pythons could have come up with that one and only you could have found it again.
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