Model Child – FIRST CONCERT EVER

In this First Concert Ever segment, the alternative rock artist, Model Child, talks about the story of his first experience with live music. You can check out the story, after the break.

I’m pretty sure the first concert I went to was the United We Stand concert in Washington DC, which was a 9/11 Benefit concert, organized by Michael Jackson. According to Wikipedia, he was supposed to attend a meeting on 9/11 but “overslept.” Crazy. I have almost zero recollection of the event except being in the nosebleeds in a huge stadium and I’m 99% sure Michael did the moonwalk. I’m looking it up right now and apparently, Destiny’s Child, NSYNC, The Backstreet Boys, and Usher also performed so that’s pretty cool. Again, I have zero recollection lol.

The second concert I went to was in 8th grade with my best friend at the time (who I had a crush on) and his full-grown adult cousin who in retrospect was probably only like 19. There was this group of drunk college girls in front of us smoking a joint and they offered me some. I really wanted to smoke it but my friend’s cousin gave me the stare of death so I didn’t. Very eventful! Dave was wasted on stage, per usual, singing his little drunken heart out. I honestly love DMB. A friend of mine (turned stalker) used to blast recordings of them playing live at random ass places In his jeep when we were in high school. I don’t talk to that dude anymore, lol.

BUT – The earliest concert that actually sticks in my mind was going to Warped Tour with my best friends (who I also played in a Ska band with) the summer before my freshman year of high school. It was packed with all these greasy punk kids wearing all black and smoking menthols. COOL! I saw a bunch of bands like Less than Jake, the Suicide Machines (where I crowd surfed for the first time) and Rancid, but in the middle of the day, we saw one of my favorite bands when I was in my ska faze, Big D and the Kids Table, at this tiny ass shoebox of a stage. I just remember moshing and skanking for the entire set and absolutely freaking out with my best friends and all these other kids, catching knowing looks with people of “WTF, this is fucking crazy!” I love that feeling of completely losing myself at a performance. After the show, we went to the front of the stage and met the band, who were literally Gods to us. It’s funny looking back because the band must have only been in their early twenties but they seemed like these seasoned, older legends, who had been touring for decades. I brought a disposable camera and took a photo of my buddies and the band together, that I still have.

That show was definitely a rite of passage for me. It’s crazy that those dudes have no idea how much that tiny ass show meant to me and my friends, but it really was an important experience for me as a musician and also just as a human being. It’d be so sick to give some younger peeps that experience at a Model Child show. I hope it happens!

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