Who did you see live before they were big?

My first 2 concerts were Oingo Boingo -- Hollywood Palladium, Greek Theater -- and while they owned SoCal they hadn't really gone big nationally which always seemed weird. Weird Science was a massive hit for them because of the movie. That said, the world hadn't really heard about Danny Elfman who became massive because of his movie scores for Tim Burton among others, and for creating the theme song for The Simpsons.

 

There was also a concert at Central Park in the early 70s where Rita Coolidge was the headliner. Prior to the show, it was suggested that she not go on last, as there was a young man and his unknown band who would be better at closing the show. Rita’s people said no, because she was the headliner and she should go on last.

So the young man and his band go on; they rock the place; everyone loves them; they finish, and then Rita comes on with her soft and sweet tunes. The fans shit on her, and after she finishes, she leaves the stage in tears.

Later, they find out Rita was following Bruce and the E Street Band.

 

Saw REM open for the Questionnaires and Jason and the Nashville Scorchers at the Exit/In on my 16th birthday.

 

Nickelback opened for Everclear at my school in the mid/late 90s. They were the openers of 3 bands and had the best live set actually.

A following year, Train played that same stage before getting big with that "Drops of Jupiter" song.

I met a then 17-year-old Leigh Bingham sit on a stool on a stage in front of maybe 20 people at a music festival (summer of '94?) and looked like a deer in the headlights while introducing the band she fronted: Sixpence None the Richer (had the hit "Kiss Me" years later that is a staple of those JumboTron kiss cams now at sports events (probably no more...thanks COVID!))

My buddy and I were walking through Wriggleyville one night after hitting some bars and a Wings/Hawks game during the 2000-01 season and a band was loading up their van after a show at some club. We were drunk and mouthy so I walked up and asked if they needed some roadies. They said sure and we carried some cords and amps for them while BSing with them. They told us their band name and we laughed about it after we walked away. Then a few months later Puddle of Mudd came out with the single 'Control.'

 

Went to high school with Lisa-- I mean, Elisabeth Shue. She was a junior and had done a Burger King commercial at that point. Anyway I'm in the Stuft Shirt one night and my friend points her out. So I go over and straight out ask her for a date. She was very nice about it and we've been very happy ever since.

 

My brother went to Grad Night at Disneyland in 1973 and came home raving about a singer he saw. It was Olivia Newton-John, but I think he was more taken with her looks than her talent.

 

Canuckleheads of a certain age may get this one - The Stampeders played one of my high-school dances in the early 1970s, just as their first single (Sweet City Woman) hit it big.
Saw k.d. lang for free at the old Ontario Place Forum in the summer of 1985 just as she was making noise in Canada.
First comedy club I ever went to, the Comedy Store in LA in 1980, had some guy named Jay Leno on the bill.

 

I went with a friend to a divey little comedy club in Memphis She'd just broken up with her boyfriend and I was being stalked by an odd guy who came into Barth House one afternoon while I was filling in at the office and waiting for Evensong. (Alice Tinker is one of my spirit animals.) The guy asked me to come back to his place for pizza rolls and that evening's edition of McNeil/Lehrer. As hard as it was to resist, I said no, and he took it hard. So J. and I decided to escape into the Ha Ha Hut or whatever the place was called. The headliner was a ventriloquist. Not something either of us cared for, but how bad could it be?

I need to mention here that J. was a gorgeous Nordic blonde from the midwest. She is also one of those people you have to drag away from awkward situations when she gets tipsy. She was tipsy before got to the club. So this ventriloquist brings out a talking vegetable(?) and then a monkey-lookin' alien called "Peanut." Peanut saw J. and it was game on. After it dragged on for a while, I made eye contact with the ventriloquist and mouthed, "Please stop." He just shook his head and gestured at the puppet and J. as if to say it was between them, he had nothing to do with it.

Dunham took a break and I coaxed J. out of there. To his credit, Dunham came out (minus Peanut, thank God) and apologized. He asked for our contact deets. All I could do was give him one of the cards Barth House had printed up for me to take to SIFU events and other ecumenical things.

"You're a minister?" he asked.

I didn't say yes or no. I was tired and mad and snapped, "You're going to HELL!"

J. looked incredulously at me and said, "I thought Episcopalians didn't believe in Hell."

"Just get in the damned car!" I snapped.

Years later when I dated a standup comedian, we crossed paths with Dunham. He kept looking at me like he was trying to place where we'd met. I told Biffren' about it and he said he wished he'd known. He would have bought me a dog collar to wear to the gig.

I might have been there. One of my friends used to dance in Jason's videos and we caught a few of his shows.

k.d. lang's first appearance in Nashville caused quite a stir. Who was that odd-looking cowgirl from Canada?

Norman, the guard at the Acuff used to dial in and let the phone sit so I could hear the various acts that played there. He called me one Saturday afternoon during sound checks and said, "Who does this sound like?"

I thought he was being silly. Sometimes acts would play old recordings of other artists and sing along.

"That's Patsy Cline," I said, not impressed by what I thought was a lame joke. Then she sang something else and I realized it was not a recording.

"You ought to see what she looks like. Just crazy!" He had someone run one of her 8x10s to the office. For about a year, I wondered if she would ever get a following in the U.S.


I need to get back to work, but I'll leave a few other encounters:

Some genius in LiveE booked The Kids in the Hall for Church of Christ Youth Weekend at the park. Then LiveE closed early for the weekend. That left me to handle the fallout. Kevin McDonald and Mark McKinney called afterward to apologize and make sure I was okay.

I saw Todd Snider at different small venues in Memphis and Nashville before "All Right Guy." Years later, my mother, who has never met a stranger, started chatting him up at Turnip Truck. They got to be "cheese friends." One day I asked her if she enjoyed talking to Todd Snider every time we needed hippie food. Her response: "Who?"

 

Sorry, but I was intentionally vague about the act I referenced as not to give away too much about myself in terms of outing. If I mentioned them by name, I'd pretty much give myself away based on location, history, and other details about my past life as a sports writer (if anyone was so inclined to do a couple of seconds of searching ... not that they would).
I don't exactly live in a major metro area, but truth be told, we actually have at least three Grammy winners that I know of living here.

 

More Canuckistan contribution. Saw The Tragically Hip at least 20 times before they hit it big. They played the university club I was a bartender at. After first show called all my friends and said you gotta see these guys.

Saw Guns and Roses open for The Cult. Fucking terrible. 6 months later the video for Welcome to The Jungle is on tv and the band blows up huge.