Sometimes you have to take the good with the bad.

Faith no More was an excellent concert. I had fun. Like most live events though your enjoyment of a show can really hinge on the audience itself. I’ve been to shows where because the crowd was lacklustre, the band was the same. It works the other way round too. It’s a symbiotic relationship. Faith no More I am pleased to say had the crowd eating out of their hands. The only thing that threatened to derail the show for me was “Missing Toof Guy”.

About two thirds into the set everyone is getting their groove on, and just enjoying themselves. I was in the General Admission area, because this didn’t seem like the kind of show I would want to be seated at. Most people that had seats were actually standing anyway. A big burly dude appears in my immediate proximity and recognises a friend of his who was standing right next to me. Dude had come from closer to the stage than we were, and was absolutely drenched in sweat. He kept going on about how he lost one of his teeth in all the action closer to the stage. It wasn’t the most eloquent of exchanges.

“Bro! Missing Tooof! Haaa Haaaa Haaaa!”

He was extremely obnoxious and arrogant. To make matters worse, he was rolling into people bowling them over and at the same time to greasing them up with his sweat something akin to how “Slimer” would goo someone from Ghostbusters. The slightest touch and you too were dripping wet from HIS sweat on one side. Unfortunately someone in front of him reacted to this moisturous effect. Turning around disgusted he pushes Missing Toof Guy. Missing Toof Guy (MTG) suddenly goes from happy go lucky mode into bar room brawler mode. He is not a small guy either. Things start to get very ugly, with the guy who pushed him immediately recognising it was a big error in judgement, and starts to back down. MTG needs to prove he is the Alpha male though and continues to pursue the possibility of a fight. I’m standing directly next to both of these guys, so now I’m totally out of the concert experience for at least two songs. I know that if shit goes down, there is a big chance I’m getting caught in the middle of it, whether I like it or not. All of this is happening while the song “The gentle art of making enemies” is playing. There is irony there I guess.

Like Murtaugh from “Lethal Weapon” – I can recognise that I’m too old (and crippled) for this shit.

Things eased a bit when MTG took off for a while. I was relieved. Turns out he only went for another beer and to bring some of his boys closer to the fight action. Great. He even made a point of tapping the pushing guy on the shoulder to let him know he had returned to start some shit after the show finished. I’ll give credit where it is due though. Before the encore had even begun, the guy who did the pushing bounced, and MTG and his brawler friends had to choose between their love of fighting, or the concert experience. They chose to stay. I was able to enjoy the rest of the show, and decided that not making eye contact with MTG was wise, seeing as he had that lost opportunity of a fight slip through his fingers, he’d probably look to start more shit if he could.

I might have missed two songs or so, but I am happy nothing transpired from it.

Be safe out there. Heh.

Thanks for reading!
Marc