I love concerts.

I love the energy, the feeling of knowing that everyone is there for the same reason, with the same love, connected by something as pure and beautiful as music. I love knowing that you have something in common with everyone around you, something that allows you to relate to them. I love seated concerts, general admission concerts, free concerts, paid concerts, basically any concert that involves artists I know and love.

One would think that a person who loves concerts as much as I do would also love festivals. After all, festivals seem like one huge general admission concert. At least, that's what I thought. But after attending Governors Ball for the first time, as my first festival, I have to say that festivals aren't all they're chalked up to be.

The food is good and the artists are amazing, but there's no sense of community like there is at regular concerts. It's every man for himself, a fight till the death, screaming, shouting, pushing, shoving and yelling. Sweaty bodies smelling like beer and weed pressed up against you at all angles, your personal bubble is constantly infiltrated, and the energy of anger is persistent in the air. I even almost passed out a few times.

As a person who loves concerts, I was disappointed that I didn't love Gov Ball as much as I thought I would. I was excited to go, excited to see my favorite artists like Kehlani and Chance the Rapper. When they were on stage, all these negative feelings went away, but until then, it was absolute torture.

Maybe for some people festivals are fun and the atmosphere doesn't bother them, but for me, I won't attend one again. It was a good experience that I think everyone should have once in their life, and decide for themselves if they like, but it's not something I would recommend even for someone's worst enemy.

I think I'll stick to regular concerts for now.