Continuing our exploration of concert fan emotions, here’s news about a 19-year-old who was attacked and nearly killed after a Tim McGraw show in Mansfield, Mass.
According to WHDH-TV and the video above, the details are pretty brutal and apparently the young concert fan is:
“…currently at college on a football scholarship but police had trouble identifying him because he had a fake ID belonging to a 22-year-old.”
The WHDH report also said that “the vicious attack at the concert is unusual… but the underage drinking is not.”
Sure, the underage drinking and the possible the lovers quarrel might have been factors.
But I thought it was also interesting that the officials said brawls aren’t usually an issue, because here’s what Chief Arthur O’Neill of the Mansfield Police Department had to say:
“If you look at the music today, particularly country music, used to be an easy night for us, but now we have serious problems with alcohol in the parking lots during the country concerts. But look at the content of some of their music, it’s all about the booze.”
And then the other thing that is worth considering, and adds more context to the story, are the fan comments on Pollstar’s report about the incident.
These comments paint a different picture of the Comcast Center and say otherwise about its live music reputation and history.
Here’s what two fans posted:
“It’s not the music, it’s the location. I was brawled upon on the lawn there at an Allman Brothers show…and that’s supposed to be a bunch of peace-loving hippies. It’s a rowdy bunch out there…”
“Worst place to see a show! Everything about it is bad ! See your favorite bands someplace else you’ll be glad you did. The days of it being Great Woods are long past.”
Then according to a new WHDH-TV report yesterday, six individuals were arraigned and charged with the assault:
It’s hard to watch a story like this unfold, but as we’ve said before in our happy and sad concert story exploration, there’s such a wide range of fan behaviors and experiences within the concert experiences.
Is There One Thing That Causes Concert Fights?
And with crazy stories like these, we can’t help but wonder what really makes concert fans want to fight each other?
Is it the emotions that get stirred up during the show?
Is it the drug and alchohol use?
Is it a certain type of person that gets the fights started?
Does one genre of music have more concert fights than others?
We hope the young fan recovers soon and we’ll continue to keep you updated on this story.
And we’ll also continue to share more info about what types of situations and emotional factors that create situations like these.
Were You There?
Were you at the Tim McGraw concert? Did you witness the incident? We invite you to share your concert experiences in the comments below, so they can be included in a future episode about concert fan behavior on Live Fix Radio.