Beach Boys Experience

This past weekend John and I celebrated our 9th wedding anniversary. My parents came up to visit and John and I had a night on the town, all to ourselves. With some (very) last minute planning, we ended up going to Connecticut to see the Beach Boys (who knew?).

As a child of loyal Beach Boys fans, I grew up listening to their music, so to hear them live on stage, after all these years, was a kick in the pants. And despite the fact that the band is down to only two of its original members, those guys have still got it! The group sounded good and they put on a fun show.

But much of the evening's entertainment did not come from just the music. Simply observing the... interesting crowd was just as entertaining. I would say the majority of the folks surrounding us were on the overweight, Hawaiian-shirt-clad, geriatric side. Not that there's anything wrong with that. As some of the youngest members of the crowd, we recognized that most of these fans were teenagers when the Beach Boys hit their prime. Regardless, some of the scenery was a bit humorous. Imagine seeing security batting down 70+ year-old men, before entering the arena, for example. Envision a sea of white heads sitting on the floor in front of us. Definitely not the typical concert experience we're used to, but it worked.

Despite our initial observations, what was even more interesting was the behavior of some of these people. What struck me was that most of them listened in their seats and didn't move! Okay, maybe some of them couldn't move, but still, how do you not move to the Beach Boys, live, right in front of you? Even Mike Love and Bruce Johnston, who are clearly in the same age category, were moving around on stage! I really wanted to get up and dance, but given my surroundings, I would've looked like a real idiot, so I refrained. But when the band broke out with California Girls, I couldn't contain myself. After all, I was probably the only fool in there from California, besides the Beach Boys themselves. Unfortunately, my hooting, hollering, and cheering was not well received. The couple in front of us turned around with hands clasped over their ears, and delivered their dirty looks directly to me, in response to my...uh...enthusiasm. I wanted to say, "This isn't a symphony, people!"

After that particular episode I got a whole new feeling altogether: our age group wasn't welcome there by some of the Beach Boys' first fans. I felt a little bit like a Red Sox fan in Yankee Stadium. (Although, at least I knew my safety wasn't in jeopardy). All in all, it was a fun and interesting evening. I just thought perhaps, it would be nice if we could all mesh together as fans a little more. Wouldn't it be nice?