Congratulations! You’re ready to go a good old fashioned rock and roll concert. And a mosh pit, at that! You’re surely ready to be suffocated and pushed around by a plethora of strangers for three hours while something akin to blaring white noise permeates the gentle skin of your baby ears. You’ll be fine, probably. Here are some things to help you ensure your continued survival.
1) Dress for Success.
One of the most important things to remember about mosh pits is that you will be extremely uncomfortable for an extremely long amount of time. So the number one thing to remember is this: dress for success. And by success, I mean wear something that will survive getting completely abused. You will face many bodily fluids—sweat, tears, spit, piss—and depending on what kind of band you’re seeing, perhaps even blood. Yes, blood. Always prepare for blood. (That’s just generally pretty good life advice, honestly.)
A standard outfit is shorts, t-shirt, and closed toed shoes, such as Converse or Vans or Nikes or New Balance or any other kind of dad/mom shoe you may own. Do not wear open toed shoes. Do not wear sandals. Do not, under any circumstances, wear high heels. Or heels of any kind.
One time at this Fall Out Boy show I attended, someone broke their pinky toe. Actually, a more accurate way to say that would be: One time, at this Fall Out Boy show I attended, a girl broke someone’s pinky toe by smashing into it with her high heels and grinding it to dust. Decidedly uncool.
The most important thing is to make sure that you’re setting yourself up to be as comfortable as possible in the most uncomfortable place in the world. And to make sure you won’t hurt anybody else. (Unless they deserve it, which will be addressed next.)
2) Hands Off.
Don’t touch. This is directed towards you self-identifying men between the ages of 14 and 30. (You may find yourself wearing a fedora if you fall under this category.) If so, please remove it before continuing. You may feel that in a mosh pit, you assume the Mask of Zorro and nobody knows who you are or what you’re doing. This is not true. You may see the luscious female form, seemingly spread out there like it’s for the taking—or groping. Let me assure you right now and for all of eternity that is not okay to touch someone without their consent. Ever.
I was once at a Marilyn Manson show, and I actually got peed on there, but that's irrelevant. There was some guy behind us who felt was necessary to touch my friend’s chest without her consent. I had a head full of tiny braids (don’t ask, it was 2008 and I was 13). Since this dude was getting up so close and personal, his lip ring got tangled in my braids. Long story short, I ripped his lip ring out. It was pretty cool. The point is, don’t f**king touch anyone who doesn’t want you to touch them. Ugh.
3) Help Each Other Out.
If someone falls—PICK THEM UP! This is where things can get dangerous. If someone’s on the ground, depending on how bad the crowd is (this is directly proportional to how popular the song is) they can get seriously trampled in a matter of minutes. Pick them up. See if they need to get out. This is another big one—if the pit is bad, and someone is struggling, help lift them up so they can crowdsurf their way to the front, lest they puke on you/die/pass out. Help get security’s attention to liberate them from the masses. There is nothing worse than being stuck in a pit when you need to get out. It is much like suffocation.
5) Beer F**cking Sucks Anyway.
Do not bring your goddamned stupid f**king drink into the pit. I know you paid $12 for it, I know that you just totally want to get so f**king drunk because this is your favorite band and you don’t want to remember ANY of it tomorrow, but just drink on the edge of the action. Your overpriced drink WILL spill, and probably on someone’s face. Also, if you’re drunk, you’re a total asshole anyway. A woman who was intoxicated at five in the afternoon at a My Chemical Romance show once threw her extremely full drink in my face when she thought I pushed her. I did not push her, but I spent the rest of the night sticky and smelly. Which brings me to my next tip…
6) And Finally...
Don’t be an asshole. Also shut up, please. People aren’t pushing YOU in particular, so bitching about it won’t change anything. We know it’s crowded. We know it’s hot. We know the band is late. We know the openers suck. There’s no need to say what everyone else is thinking.
The whole point of concerts is to have fun, or something. You can’t have fun if the people around you are being assholes, and you won’t have fun if you’re being an asshole—unless you love being an asshole or something, in which case, you’re a sociopath and you should be reading other listicles more topical to the things you enjoy, like murder.
Before we go, it is important to philosophize a little. Why are you in the mosh pit? Because you love music so much you feel the need to be physically close to it. Sometimes, a concert is the only place you’ll feel like you belong. You’re with thousands of people who feel the same way about the music that you do. You’re with thousands of people who look the same as you. You are not alone there, especially if you usually feel alone in your day to day life. You are not alone in a mosh pit. When mosh pits are good, they’re great. When they’re bad, they can be pretty bad, and the spirit of unity can be snuffed out pretty quickly.
Do your best to follow my golden rules and maybe you’ll have fun, or at the very least, not get your pinky toe snapped in two.
