Same folks up front

Shaindli1 · May 22

julieooliern said:

PJINFLA said:

julieooliern said:

CantKeepmedown said:

GlowGirl said:

CantKeepmedown said:

I saw a video on IG of Ed spotlighting the front row and calling out the regulars who keep them on their toes. I assume he was seeing the same faces for nearly a month lol. Maybe the band is in on it haha

That was in Pittsburgh. He was mentioning how great the community is and how people travel to see them. And how we are all going to miss each other when it ends. I don’t know the exact wording but it was nice. He was definitely giving recognition to those that travel to all the shows. When the Pitt2 bootleg comes out I will listen to the exact wording.

No he was definitely praising the audience and the folks up front. Like I said, I think they like seeing familiar faces and obviously know the friendships and relationships that have grown out of it. It was right before Faithful and looks like he handed something (harmonica maybe?) to a women in the front.

Yes, Ed has seen these faces at many shows throughout the entire DM tour ‘24/25. They are known to gather, reconnecting from around the country/world, for PJ tours. They have built relationships with security too. All that being said, Ed does say this speech before Faithfull regularly. But he was recognizing their connection with each other (missing each other after the tour) as well as their “faithfulness” to the band.

Please just stop.
We are tired of hearing how special you think you are.

I am not a camper. I have only had GA twice in my life and I KNOW I am not special.

But you are special to me!

Shaindli1 · May 22

reedrothchild said:

But hey if spending your vaca days sitting on the pavement hoping you get a pick from Mike or Ed to sweat on you I guess good for you enjoying crowded space and inferior sound 🤷

I got some of Ed's spittle. Am I special now? 😉

julieooliern · May 22

on2legs said:

I think Ed is sincere when he talks about the people up front. But sincere in the way like when he says the band will be back real soon to whatever town they’re playing that night.

+1

lastexitlondon · May 22

I got eds illness in Manchester. Am I special?
Seriously this thread is just ridiculous.
Like it or not it's this way.
Do it, don't but don't hate the player, hate the game.
We have established there are under 20 people who go everywhere 2 days early. After that it's different people most shows and countries.
Until next tour enjoy your memories you made with the others you met and now call friends.
We all love the same band, some in different ways , that's life.
Spread love and kindness.

pdalowsky · May 22

lastexitlondon said:

I got eds illness in Manchester. Am I special?
Seriously this thread is just ridiculous.
Like it or not it's this way.
Do it, don't but don't hate the player, hate the game.
We have established there are under 20 people who go everywhere 2 days early. After that it's different people most shows and countries.
Until next tour enjoy your memories you made with the others you met and now call friends.
We all love the same band, some in different ways , that's life.
Spread love and kindness.

Bingo, The band are playing sold out shows to crowds singing every lyric back to them. I'm not sure they'll lose too much sleep over how people line up. I understand its a bit annoying, and on occasion unfair but once we are all in that venue we are going to have a great time. When the position you are in with regards to the rail determines how good your night will be its time to realise you have a problem, not the band.

Poncier · May 22

on2legs said:

I think Ed is sincere when he talks about the people up front. But sincere in the way like when he says the band will be back real soon to whatever town they’re playing that night.

"See you next year".

reedrothchild · May 22

Shaindli1 said:

reedrothchild said:

But hey if spending your vaca days sitting on the pavement hoping you get a pick from Mike or Ed to sweat on you I guess good for you enjoying crowded space and inferior sound 🤷

I got some of Ed's spittle. Am I special now? 😉

You sure are bro! 👊

CROJAM95 · May 22

CG658530 said:

CROJAM95 said:

THE REAL question to me

is this crew wealthy or piss poor....

Seams like one or the other....I always say us middle/ upper middles are always getting fucked by those 2 demographics

I can promise you the piss poor aren't fucking you or anyone else over. Be an adult.

I have compassion/empathy....also have eyes/ears and a brain.

Gern Blansten · May 22

It is likely a weird vibe for the band though to go from hot babes in the front row when you start out to 60ish grandmas 35 years later....

KJ228171 · May 22

Gern Blansten said:

It is likely a weird vibe for the band though to go from hot babes in the front row when you start out to 60ish grandmas 35 years later....

You should see the PIT at a Rollings Stones show.

Air23 · May 22

Leezestarr313 said:

And all of us who are not on the rail who also travel and meet up and have meaningful relationships are chopped liver? You like to sleep on a pillow made of concrete, ok, but that does not make you a better fan. Let others experience the rail too. Stop being a "regular" up front. It would be nice to see other faces in the tour videos.

Well said

Gern Blansten · May 22

KJ228171 said:

Gern Blansten said:

It is likely a weird vibe for the band though to go from hot babes in the front row when you start out to 60ish grandmas 35 years later....

You should see the PIT at a Rollings Stones show.

GlowGirl · May 22

Gern Blansten said:

KJ228171 said:

Gern Blansten said:

It is likely a weird vibe for the band though to go from hot babes in the front row when you start out to 60ish grandmas 35 years later....

You should see the PIT at a Rollings Stones show.

More power to them! When I was at Paul McCartney a few years ago there were these two women who could have been at an original Beatles concert. They were so happy rocking their butts off. I hope that is me in 25 years

reedrothchild · May 22

Gern Blansten said:

It is likely a weird vibe for the band though to go from hot babes in the front row when you start out to 60ish grandmas 35 years later....

This made me lol. Well played.

josevolution · May 22

GlowGirl said:

Gern Blansten said:

KJ228171 said:

Gern Blansten said:

It is likely a weird vibe for the band though to go from hot babes in the front row when you start out to 60ish grandmas 35 years later....

You should see the PIT at a Rollings Stones show.

More power to them! When I was at Paul McCartney a few years ago there were these two women who could have been at an original Beatles concert. They were so happy rocking their butts off. I hope that is me in 25 years

My coworker of 29 years Nancy was at Shea for the Beatles concert I believe she told me she was 15! She retired last year

gotthebottle · May 22

Gern Blansten said:

It is likely a weird vibe for the band though to go from hot babes in the front row when you start out to 60ish grandmas 35 years later....

I'm almost 61.. not a grandma. You're being rude and demeaning to women

gimmesometruth27 · May 22

i've seen them 52 times. never had rail. never wanted rail because i hate standing in line. i'd rather hang out at a bar with my friends and walk in 10 minutes before showtime. my life doesn't revolve around the band and my time is too valuable for me to waste it standing in a ga line. i guarantee i have had just as much fun as the people down front, and that's ok.

people have their thing. some like the rail, some don't. its all good.

bootleg · May 22

I’ve got a lot of varying thoughts on this on both sides. I apologize if this is a bit all over the place. First I’ll say that I only went to the Pitt shows so can only comment on those. From what I could tell those in the front couple of rows brought plenty of energy each show. On night 1 on Mikes side they were dancing and having a good time all the way from Teen Jesus through PJ. They would let kids get up front for fist bumps, picks etc. generally a positive vibe.

I had GA on night 1 and didn’t get in line until doors opened. There were more people on Mikes side but most of them were sitting down on the floor at that point and I estimated that once they stood, that space would condense and we would end up being a lot closer. We had been sitting there for 45 min or so when at least 4-5 people who I had not seen yet began to trickle in and made their way up front, saying things like “I’m just getting back to where I was.” Now I have no way of knowing if they had been there before but I hadn’t seen them in the 45 min or so that I had been sitting there and to me that’s too long of a time to be gone in that situation. They were likely holding spots for people which isn’t cool but I have no way to prove it and who am I to argue when it’s just me against a group of people.

Even with those few extra people, that section still did condense when everyone stood as I expected and I was essentially 5 rows deep between Mike and Ed and was roughly in the same position as someone who said they got in line at 1pm. I couldn’t have been a much better spot so standing in line for an extra 5 hours would have provided zero benefit. The show was amazing, I ended up grabbing 3 picks from Mike and then had my PJ moment at the very end. I had been chasing Indifference for 15 years and they finally played it. Towards the end of the song Ed was right in front of us. I had a sign showing my quest for Indiff, Ed saw it and tossed me his tambourine.

To me there isn’t really a way to top that. I had my moment and if I had GA for night 2, I would have traded out for seats. Let someone else have their moment. So to me it is a bit much to try to be on the rail for every single show. I feel like one time on the rail per tour should be enough and to go for it every single show seems to be a little greedy. I also don’t know how you do it physically. My legs and back were dead after that and I’m in pretty decent shape. I needed a full day to recover, sleep in my own bed etc…, I couldn’t imagine getting straight back in line and camping out for 2 nights.

And on that front things seems to be escalating out of control. Before I felt like people would get in line at like 8am to get the rail. Now people are camping out for 2 days, leaving early on N1 to get back in line etc... It’s too much, and potentially dangerous. There was bad storm that ripped through on my way home that night to where I had to pull off the road. 70mph winds, hail (hail!). Tornado threat. If that was just a little further north it would have went through where people were camping out. People shouldn’t be sleeping in the streets and it’s only a matter of time before some kind of disaster happens. Sometimes you need to put things in place to protect people from themselves.

The last thing I want to mention is some of the comments around how people are able to end up with GA for every show and that they just work harder to get tickets. I feel like this is similar to telling someone who works 2 jobs but still under the poverty line that they need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps when they dont even have boots. People may have worked just as hard as me to get tickets but I don’t know if anyone worked harder. I don’t have a network of PJ friends to work with and I got shut out in the lottery. I looked all day every day for 5 months and it was 4 months before I even got my first tickets in the nosebleeds. Only by chance did I catch a FB post at the exact second it was released for a pair of floor 1 row C tickets for N2 which I was able to convince him to try a link drop with me. I then was on at the right time when someone wanted to trade N1 GAs and agreed to trade for my N2 Floor 1 tickets and he agreed to share his login. The only way I was able to get one pair of GA tickets was to be in the right place at the right time twice and that required endless hours of scanning the forums, FB, etc day in day out.

The current ticket system has some inequalities built into it. If you have a low 10c number there is no penalty for requesting tickets to every show. No one knows what the demand is going to look like for 2 nights in Raleigh but if you have a low 10c number it won’t matter if you don’t get GA you still know that you will get great tickets that can then be leveraged to trade for other great seats at the shows you want to go to or will be easily sold through F2F. If you have a high 10c number and don’t get GA then you might get stuck with tickets that won’t sell if the demand for that show is lower so you likely can’t just put in for every show. Low 10c numbers might not even plan to go to any show but still put in for tickets as you will have great value to trade. People remember who helped them get good tickets, and then can return the favor for later shows. Over time this starts to form different groups of classes of 10c members. Some who always have great tickets to trade so it’s a lot easier to trade up for GA and some who start with nothing and have to fight just to get in the door. I thinks it’s worth trying to find a way to level that out a bit.

SVRDhand13 · May 22

gimmesometruth27 said:

i've seen them 52 times. never had rail. never wanted rail because i hate standing in line. i'd rather hang out at a bar with my friends and walk in 10 minutes before showtime. my life doesn't revolve around the band and my time is too valuable for me to waste it standing in a ga line. i guarantee i have had just as much fun as the people down front, and that's ok.

people have their thing. some like the rail, some don't. its all good.

I went to 8 shows during the DM tour. Didn't see one opening act... oops lol

KJ228171 · May 22

SVRDhand13 said:

gimmesometruth27 said:

i've seen them 52 times. never had rail. never wanted rail because i hate standing in line. i'd rather hang out at a bar with my friends and walk in 10 minutes before showtime. my life doesn't revolve around the band and my time is too valuable for me to waste it standing in a ga line. i guarantee i have had just as much fun as the people down front, and that's ok.

people have their thing. some like the rail, some don't. its all good.

I went to 8 shows during the DM tour. Didn't see one opening act... oops lol

Glen Hansard is really good.

Same folks up front

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