Last Saturday, the music industry suffered a devastating loss when Christina Grimmie was gunned down while signing autographs after a show. Various musicians have voiced their condolences to her family, and her voice coach, Adam Levine, has offered to pay for her funeral expenses.
While the industry deals with this low blow, they cannot slow down. The show must go on, as performers would say. So tours continue, fans carry on going to shows and using concerts as a safe space to release their energy and leave their troubles behind. However, the fans have a new sense of awareness while also trying to have a good time.
Wednesday, I attended a concert. I wasn’t concerned about anything happening because the incident with Grimmie was an isolated event with a single assailant who killed himself. I wasn’t worried that anything would happen because I was with my friends and the same people who are always at the local shows I go to. I was surrounded by people I knew, and we were all trusting one another to look out for each other. Nothing bad happened, as I expected, but it was reassuring to know that the room packed full of people had my back if anything were to happen.
It’s not how concerts should feel; we shouldn’t have to worry about anything but the music while we’re at concerts. But after the tragedy in Paris that involved the Eagles of Death Metal, and the incident in Orlando with Christina Grimmie, you never know what could happen anywhere. Unfortunately, we live in a world that is also inhabited by sick and twisted people. Because of those people, we need to look out for the people around us, even when we’re at concerts where we’re supposed to be able to let our guard down and just have fun.
My absolute favorite part of the concert was that there was such an easy energy around the venue the entire time. Never once did I feel unsafe, or like I needed to double check that everything was still okay. The artists kept the energy fun and easy, and the fans accepted that with open arms. I’ve seen those same bands a handful of times before, and the energy was no different than it was any of the other times I saw them. It was reassuring to have that sense of sameness; that familiarity in the wake of such tragedy was much appreciated.
Even though it was the same energy that it’s always been, it made Wednesday’s show stand out to me for some reason. The energy made the lyrics and performances mean so much more than they’ve ever meant before. We can’t back down when things are tough. We need to stand up and make our voices heard. We need to stay true to who we are and keep doing what we love. If we let the bad things that happen in the world stop us or slow us down, we’re letting the awful people in the world win. But when we keep going, we show how resilient we are. We show how passionate we are about music. We show how music brings people together and makes people stronger than ever.
There’s a Paradise Fears song that I think describes exactly how music and concerts should feel for fans. It’s called Sanctuary. If you don’t walk away with anything else from this article, I want you to remember the words to this song and think about what they mean. Especially the lyrics, “that’s the thing with music; when it hits, you feel no pain.”
