When I was a kid growing up in the 1970s and early 1980s, it seemed that every other weekend, there was some rock concert that filled up tens of thousands of seats at the local football stadium. Now, except for the rare concert by a 1970s-era supergroup, rock concerts at stadiums have disapppeared.
Concerts at large indoor sports arenas seem to have mostly vanished, too, at least in small and medium-sized cities. In the 1980s, there was one or two converts a week at Memorial Auditorium in Buffalo. Now, it seems like popular bands appear at much smaller venues, like the House of Blues or a local nightclub.
I think they’re still happening, but maybe not as often. There’s Lollapalooza.
I grew up in the 70’s, it did seem like we went to concerts every week, especially in the summer. These days I am mostly done with stadium concerts. They were very affordable back then, and I enjoyed the circus-like atmosphere.
Neither of those descriptions apply much anymore.
I now prefer smaller, more intimate venues; they usually come with fewer hassles and an overall more enjoyable concert experience.
Well Lollapalooza, like Warped Tour, Ozzfest, Lilith Fair, and so many others, is an outdoor festival atmosphere with multiple bands on the bill. It’s a better entertainment value than the traditional stadium concert, which is now usually reserved for the hugest of the huge acts – people like Paul McCartney, the Rolling Stones, or U2. Let’s face it – there are very few musical acts capable of filling entire stadiums or even arenas, and concert tours are extremely expensive to book, promote, manage, etc.
Yeah, later I thought about this–you’re right. We just bought tickets for the Voodoo Music Fest in New Orleans.
Yes.
Perhaps concert tours weren’t as expensive in the old days as they are now, with advertising, making videos etc.
And I suppose not every band wants to be sponsored by Michelob or Pepsi whatever.
This is the key, I think. Tickets for most concerts are damn expensive. Your average pop group just doesn’t provide $70 worth of entertainment. Small places like nightclubs are about the best they can hope to fill.
Think of it from a demographic standpoint for a moment:
Boomers: Something like 70 million
Gen X: Something under 20 million (last I heard)
There just aren’t enough of us to generate that kind of interest in modern bands. That’s why the older bands still draw those shows but the younger ones (not that I’m young anymore) play smaller venues and clubs.
They haven’t gone away. Only the biggest acts play those shows, and that’s probably always been true. I have no idea why somebody would pay nearly $100 to see the Rolling Stones when all they can see is a Jumbotron, but obviously, somebody pays for it.
I’ve seen a couple of stadium shows myself, most notably Metallica at Madison Square Garden at the Meadowlands.
> Boomers: Something like 70 million
> Gen X: Something under 20 million (last I heard)
This can’t conceivable be true. This would mean that there were over three times as many babies born in one given stretch of years than in another stretch of years, which would make the amount of babies born per female to be hugely larger. There just wasn’t that much difference. Even if one were to define the Baby Boomer years as longer than the Generation X years to make this slightly more possible, it doesn’t seem to be true.
Here’s a website about this issue:
It says that there are 76 million Baby Boomers (from 1946 to 1964) and 41 million Generation Years (from 1968 to 1979). 76 million over 19 years is 4 million births per year. 41 million over 12 years is a little more than 3.4 million births per year.
Around here they’ve moved to the open air arenas during the summer. The experience is much better than a stadium since it’s a proper theater, and they still hold 17-25,000 people. Around here, they can play Hartford at the Dodge Music Center, then Long Island at Jones Beach, and then New Jersey at the PNC Arts Center.
Maybe after the fiasco of the Woodstock anniversary concerts, and violence and injuries at other outdoor venues, promoters shy away from the potential liability?