Please Read This And Tell Me If I’m Crazy And The Only Person That Experiences This At Concerts. Please And Thank You.

Last night, even though we’re way too old for these kinds of shenanigans on a school night, I dragged Mr. Mock to go see one of my new favorite singers, Teddy Swims, in concert here in Indianapolis.  (Side note:  HELLO! to the couple of awesome women who recognized me and said hi/wanted to take pics with me.  I LOVED THAT!)

The last concert I saw, if you recall, was basically one of the best nights of my entire life – and it was when I got a lap dance from my MOST FAVORITE SINGER OF ALL TIME AND SPACE, Robbie Williams.

ANYWAY.  That’s really neither here nor there, except that what I loved about that concert aside from the obvious is that the sound was perfect.  And that is SO OFTEN not the case anymore at concerts, that I’m starting to feel like I am either super super old (which, let’s face it, is true) but ALSO that I might be crazy, and I’m looking for either confirmation of my crazy so that I can get my ears checked or reassurance that I’m not, in fact, crazy.

Allow me to explain.  At big pop/rock concerts – no matter the venue – too often it seems like the sound engineers forget that many of the attendees want to Actually Hear The Singer.  It’s like – the whole reason we come, even.  And I keep doing this thing where I forget that I have this problem at concerts, and keep expecting them to be awesome, but then I end up leaving and feeling like I’m crazy again because I could barely hear the singer over the rest of the band and the horrible distortion.

The superbly sound-engineered concert in Vegas was an exception, unfortunately.  It seems like most concert venues just turn everything up to 87 skabillion and think that the louder it is, the better it is.  But that’s just not true.  And when you have an artist as amazingly vocally gifted as Teddy Swims is, it’s a damned shame to drown him out with the other instruments. I did try different parts of the room (it was a standing room only concert) but unfortunately no matter where I stood, the distortion was still present.

You know what I need?  I need an acoustic Teddy Swims tour.  In fact, maybe I just need an acoustic EVERYONE tour so that I know I’m gonna be able to hear the singers.

The real problem for me is this:  I’m a person who knows all of Teddy’s songs, so theoretically, when he plays them, they should be recognizable to me.  But because everything was so loud and distorted last night, it would sometimes take me practically the whole song to realize what song it even was.  And yet, people around me were dancing and smiling and having this awesome time as if it all sounded completely fine to them. Whizzah Whuzzah???

So what is that?  Is it my specific ears? Is there something wrong with them?  Or are concert-goers just all participating in a collective game of pretend?  Because I CANNOT be alone on this. Obviously, because of the Robbie show, I know how great it can be when the sound is engineered well and you can hear the vocalist.  Plus it’s not like Robbie doesn’t have up tempo full-on rock out songs that require a full band.  And yet, even live, at his shows, the sound is perfectly mastered:

So WHAT IS THE DEAL, you guys?  Do sound engineers just suck now?  Do they not understand that people want to hear the vocalists over the other instruments?  WHY DOES IT FEEL like this is a problem that is unique to me?

HALP.

All that said, the songs that weren’t completely drowning out Teddy’s amazing voice last night were great, and Mr. Mock and I had a great time.  If you haven’t listened to Teddy yet, check this out!