FanGirl: (n) Typically pre-teen but in some cases can be older. Found at pop concerts, loitering around stage doors and clogging up band message boards. Emit high pitched noises such as squeaks, shrieks and cries of “OHMYGODILOVEYOUMARRYMEEEEE!!” Highly annoying.
I am suitably ashamed to admit that when attending certain band’s gigs, I tend to be unrecognizable from the type of person described above. Outside of a gig situation I refrain from posting on message boards and papering my bedroom with the faces of my favourite band members, but if my conduct at pop band McFly’s concert last Saturday (19.03.11) is anything to go by, when in the vicinity of certain celebrities I have a tendency to shriek, squeak and all the rest. However after encountering other (female) members of the audience, I realised that I am nowhere near as bad as I could be.
Tom Fletcher and Danny Jones - Photo Courtesy of Louise
After the show on Saturday (which was amazing by the way) a girl in a plastic tiara was shouting over the barrier to the roadies clearing up the stage, trying to get one of them to throw her one of the plectrums attached to the microphone stand that guitarist and lead singer Danny Jones had used. I should mention at this point, that these were unused plectrums, untouched by anyone but the roadies that put them there at the beginning of the show. One of the roadies threw one out to her, but it sailed over her head and landed in the row in front of me, two rows behind her. Suddenly she was shrieking for her friends to grab it, lest someone else get it before her. In the nicest way possible I looked at her and saw she wasn’t going to be able to easily lean or climb over the chairs to get to it herself, so I leaned over and picked it off the floor for her. I straightened up see a look of sheer desperation in her eyes… she thought that I’d keep it for myself. As it was I handed it to her with a smile, and she gushed that I was “way too nice for a McFly concert”. I don’t know about the McFly boys, but if I was a musician I would be pretty disappointed to discover that my fan base was inherently mean.
Sadly this is not the first time I have witnessed desperation for something a band member has thrown off stage. Lead singer of Scouting for Girls Roy Stride threw a towel offstage at one concert, and fifteen minutes after they had left the stage two girls were still stubbornly gripping onto it, refusing to sacrifice it to the other. I felt pretty sorry for the one of the girl’s boyfriend, stood behind her saying “please let go so we can go home…”. Again I have to confess to getting involved in this kind of thing, only I politely asked a roadie if he could give me the set list taped to the stage. I doubt I’d have fought tooth and nail with some other girl for it; I just wanted a souvenir to stick on my wall.
Set list from Scouting For Girls 2010 Tour
These are the kind of girls that profess to be “[insert band/artist name]’s Biggest Fan”. And I have to question if this level of obsession really counts as fandom. The main attraction for these kinds of FanGirls seems to be predominantly aesthetic, placing much more emphasis on how attractive the band is as opposed to their ability to play a good show. So it was interesting at this gig to meet a different kind of fan. Before my friends and I even took our seats on Saturday (three rows from the front, for anyone who’s interested…), we met up with some of Louise’s friends also attending the concert. One girl did not at first appear to be a rabid fan, especially compared to some of the other girls walking past decked out in McFly’s last tour t-shirt and with “<3 Dougie/Tom/Harry/Danny” scrawled on their faces. But suddenly she mentioned that “the support acts only do about three songs each”. How did she know this? She’d been to see the show in Sheffield the night before. This seemed like dedication, until she said that she would also be seeing the show in Glasgow, Birmingham, London and Nottingham. That’s six tour dates, on one tour. Now I’m a big fan of McFly, but I’m pretty sure I couldn’t handle (much less afford) the exact same show and set list six times over, especially in a short space of time.
Is this a true fan? Or the shrieking, near-sobbing girls fighting over objects the band may or may not have touched?
I was listening to SFG today actually and Mountains of Navaho came on and when it got to the "cos I'm only trying not to be lonely" it reminded me of you at Preston when he held your hand :') <3
ReplyDeleteI don't get people that shriek consistently at gigs. During the gaps between songs, maybe, but I've heard many a recording where they don't even seem to be listening :/
ReplyDeleteI'm glad I'm not the only one that likes to nab souvenirs from gigs, mind. :D