pátek 26. dubna 2013

ANOTHER LAMP IN THE WALL


Col. Chris Hadfield, the twitter astronaut star that entertains us with his videos of daily routines in space, made an interesting observation from the orbit. Even though it's 23 years since the fall of Berlin Wall (or as I Berliner Mauer), the division between west and east Berlin is still materialized in the form of different street lamps used in each part. Whereas in the former East Berlin there are sodium-vapour lamps that emit rather yellowish light, the western part uses fluorescent lamps (gas lamps and mercury arc lamps) whose colour is more white. 
Interesting fact: Berlin with its nearly 44 000 gas lamps owns currently more than 50% of all of the worlds remaining stock of 80 000. However, the city wants to get rid off them  as it plans to become carbon neutral by 2050.


RANT ABOUT THE ANNOYING AUDIENCE

This Sunday I went to see Ellie Goulding in concert. She was cute and energetic which was nice and the sound was SHITE which was anything BUT nice. I was, however, lucky enough to stand right under both a giant speaker AND the ventilation so I had the exceptional luxury of being able to breathe and actually (most of the time) hear what she was singing. I know, jackpot, right? 

Well, I love going to concerts. I usually attend them on my own and even though I'm not sure what the actual reason for that is, I came up with a few possibilities:
  1. I'm single, therefore I'm missing the one person that would be obligated to go with me (meaning other lesbians' taste in women suck)
  2. I listen to artists none of my friends finds interesting enough to see live (meaning my friends' music taste suck)
  3. My friends know I would spend the whole way home ranting about the audience and its utterly annoying and obnoxious behaviour (meaning I suck
I guess the correct answer would number 3, because:
  1. I don't want to insult all my friends
  2. Number 3 is the only possible answer but I made up the other two because everything sounds better when listed in a group of three
  3. Ummmmm



Oh yeah, anyone who has ever been to a concert with me (OR just spent ANY amount of time with me for that matter) was probably forced to listen to my complaints about other people's stupidity. 

_________
note
My friends sometimes say that I am a pessimist. I'd like to defend myself and state here that this is most certainly not the case (or as I say, that's just bullshit) because everything that's not pointed out as wrong or just-not-good-enough is considered fine by me. And let me say that the number of things I'm NOT complaining about is far, far bigger than the number of things I am.
end of note 

And this Sunday I was once again reminded that there's one element that made this concert (and almost every other concert I've been to) a reasonably less enjoyable experience that it could be. 

PEOPLE.
HOW I LOOK ANNOYED


I am perfectly aware that the concept of audience is somehow crucial to
the whole concert industry, however, there are just some types of people that shouldn't be allowed in because all I'm thinking when I encounter them is “I paid for my ticket and now I'm now all my attention is focused on your utterly annoying manners instead of the artist I actually came to see!”


And because everything is better organized and categorized, here's my angry typology of

PEOPLE THAT SIMPLY PISS ME OFF AT CONCERTS

(note: if you've never experienced any of the following, you are most probably one of them)


THE LOUD SINGERS
- sing scream at the top of their lungs to make the artist hear how they know ALL of the lyrics to ALL of the songs
- 99% out of tune, often hang out with the clappers
WAYNE, ONE BAMF CLAPPER


THE CLAPPERS
- Loud rhythmic song? CLAP ALONG! 
- Slow acoustic ballad? YEAAAAAH CLAP ALONG!!
- 99% clapping out of rhythm, often hang out with the loud singers


THE CHATTERERS
- in their simple minds there is only ONE place they can possibly discuss everything from local gossip to the latest cuts in NASA's budget - and that place is a concert, apparently loaded because they don't mind paying a considerable amount of money for a ticket and not even bother to listen to the artist
- on the other hand, it's the only type of annoying people in audience you can say to shut the hell up and have a slight chance they actually will (but you also have a slight chance of being called a cunt)


THE SCREAMERS
- the ones that start randomly screaming at the top of their lungs and you're not sure if they're just that psyched out or someone's trying to kill them
     - either way, I don't care, shut up, people, because I can't hear anything but your stupid screaming!


THE DRINKERS
- can't exist without a beer in their hand; after they're done drinking, the plastic cup is tossed on the ground for other people to try avoid stepping on it and they are assertively making their way through the crowd to the bar and few minutes later back to their spot, spilling beer on everyone else along the way


THE LOVEBIRDS
- couples in your field of vision displaying a wide variety of PDA - from aggressive French kissing to occasional and frankly highly disturbing necking or petting
- side effect of spotting The Lovebirds: nausea


THE EMOTIONALLY OVER-INVESTED FANS
- take advantage of every precious second of silence to scream "I LOVE YOU xxx" and embarrass everyone around
- also enjoy holding big signs usually saying something fabulously creative like "I love you" or "Kiss me" (yeah, that's surely gonna happen, gurl!), thus blocking your view


THE TECH SAVVY 
TARGET AUDIENCE OF
SAMSUNG GALAXY NOTE
- their philosophy seems to be "unless I photograph and shoot the whole concert, no one will ever believe I was here"
- they take out the smartyphones that start glowing with their screens all over the place, which makes the people standing behind them move so that they can see what's actually going on on the stage which subsequently forces the tech savvy ones behind those people to also move thus creating a perpetual unrest andmovement all. over. the .place.- and let me just say, some of them screens are just out-of-this-world-gigantic!
        - Oh yes, I am indeed talking to you, Samsung Galaxy Note!


THE DUTCH
– usually all of the above PLUS the tallest people in the world...you do the math...


I could probably think of one or two (or twenty) other types, but hey, there's only a certain amount of procrastination I'm willing to sacrifice for this blog entry that no one gives a shit about.