Escaping the crush

Early in high school, my friends and I became big fans of Australian band Boom Crash Opera. They visited our local shopping center and I’ve still got the autograph of the former guitarist, Richard Pleasance, who signed his name as “Rich” with lots of dollar signs.

A gang of five or six of us bought tickets to a concert that was going to be held at a large sports stadium nearby. The tickets were incredibly cheap, but nobody had designated seats. It was a first come, first served affair, and we had one neat trick up our sleeves.

Actually, it was more luck than a good trick. When we arrived at the stadium, there were already hundreds of fans lined up at one of the entrances. We knew there was another set of doors, and we had a look – nobody there. So we decided to chance it that they might just open those doors first.

They did, and we raced in and stood directly in front of the stage. Thousands of people came from the next doors and crushed in behind us. We were relatively young girls at this stage, and enormous men were crowding in at our backs. We didn’t enjoy the support band that much, because we were feeling so crushed.

When Boom Crash Opera themselves came on, the crowd surged forward, and we were all immediately claustrophobic. While they played my favorite song, Dancing in the Storm, my friends and I were getting lifted out by the security and sent under the stage to escape the crowd. We ended up in seating at the back of the stadium, enjoying the music but not such a great view.