Got a fun video for ya.
Besides being highly entertaining, I love this video because it takes us deeper into our Looky-Loo and other emotional experiments to explore one of our favorite live concert behavioral topics.
Kudos to Brandi for sharing her story and getting us to think more about how we do, or don’t, respond physically to the music during a show.
But after watching the video I started to wonder…
What type of behavior is more beneficial and rewarding for us: physically rocking out and drenching ourselves in sweat, like Brandi suggests? Or can we experience the same amount of pleasure by not getting physical and simply enjoying a more internal and cerebral rush?
I think it’s a mix of both. But if that’s the case, we must ask ourselves more questions because we might be selling ourselves short during our favorite shows.
Could We Be Selling Ourselves Short?
If we are selling ourselves short, should we push ourselves to rock out more externally if we tend to opt for the more internal pleasure route?
After talking with the Dancing Guy about his experience, it’s possibly that those fans who let loose and dance/mosh/crowdsurf at shows tend to have more fun than those who just stand around with their arms folded.
But on the flipside, during some of my recent favorite shows where the music didn’t make me want to dance or get physical, the music still set off a whole bunch of pleasurable emotional fireworks in my mind helping me to feel and process grief, joy and other concert emotions.
Are We Missing Out?
I know that having balance in general is good for us as a species, so I wonder about the negative effects if we do too much of either.
And if we’re unbalanced and rock out to much internally or externally, are we missing out on something? Are we keeping ourselves from having an amazing concert experience?
Brandi also got me thinking about our recent Bon Iver fan moment, where one fan was so moved that he wanted to inspire other fans to rock out but those Chicago fans didn’t want to rock out, they wanted to sit back, relax and chill out.
That said, one of my favorite parts of her video is at the 2:00 mark where Brandi shares her thoughts on watching a girl at a show who was holding back her desire to rock out for fear of being rejected by her friends. Should we add the “fear of being rejected at a concert” to our list?
How About You?
Have you ever given into the peer pressure when on the inside you wanted to let your inner fan rock out and not care what other people thought? What made you hold back? And if you overcame the pressure, how’d you do it?
Speaking of peer pressure, why do we care so much about what people think at show? We paid money and if we’re not annoying people or hurting anyone, then we shouldn’t care what anyone else thinks, right?
But we all know that doesn’t happen. Because peer pressure is strong and rarely do we rise above our society’s pressure or our own inhibitions at concert without the help of drugs or alcohol.
Overall, the video is great fodder to explore and I’d love to know what you think of it and the other points Brandi makes.
I’ll be thinking about this stuff during my next concert and I invite you to post your comments below and we’ll share them on a future episode of Live Fix Radio.
Thanks again to Brandi for post the video and we welcome you to the Live Fix community!