20.4 – Monsters of Rock

The following day, Marty got up early, and waited in line for over two hours to get tickets to the “Monsters of Rock” concert.  There was going to be another Day on the Green at the Oakland Coliseum, with Ted Nugent, Aerosmith, AC/DC, and a couple other bands.  He got eight tickets and sold them to his friends at face value, when scalpers were already doubling and tripling the price.  Boobers and his brothers gratefully bought four of them. Mike told Annie it was a “male bonding” ritual, so there were two tickets left.  Bart and his little brother Tom were the happy recipients just a few days before the big concert.
 
Mike drove his Stanger, with Marty riding shotgun, and Bart and Tom in the back seat.  Dennis drove Boobers, Steve, and Derek in the Enterprise.  After their first stadium concert experience, they knew what to expect, and where to park near the freeway onramp to make a quick exit before the demolition derby started after the show.  As soon as they got out and started walking, they were solicited by ticket scalpers, pot dealers, and a couple of freaks selling acid.  The band of brothers had everything they needed, so they just smiled and walked briskly past.  Clusters of punks and skinheads, who sulked as if they didn’t have any tickets, were milling about near the gates, and a few police cars were parked along the main street outside the stadium.  The vibe was very different from Marty’s first Day on the Green, when there was a communal sort of fellowship to the crowd.  The people in line were a rough bunch, and those who wanted to be in line but didn’t have tickets were even rougher.  Beer and booze were being consumed at an alarming rate, although it was just getting light out.  Most everyone looked as if they had stayed up all night.
 
The eight “doobie brothers” packed onto the sidewalk, holding their place in line as it surged and rippled with an erratic life of its own.  There was no opportunity to relax at all.  Over 90 percent of the crowd was male, Marty noticed wryly.  Dennis explained to the young bucks, Derek and Tom, that when the gate opened, it was imperative to stay together.  “We’ll all get in, and we’ll be near the front, trust me.”  They had bigger gates this year, and when they opened, the immense crowd surged with the pent-up energy of a broken dam.  Some skinheads who had been waiting for this chance jumped the queue, and a few fights broke out.  Dennis steered their little platoon away from hazards, and they got a good spot in line for the inner gate that they hoped would be closest to the stage.  The hardcore partying resumed in earnest, and an army of yellow-jacketed security soldiers fanned out to try and maintain order.  The sound of smashing bottles was everywhere, and Marty thought he heard gunshots out on the street.
 

Their gang wound up really close to the stage, and a bit off to one side.  It was decorated in a corny jungle-dinosaur theme, which gave a cartoon impression that appealed only to Marty.  He and Mike were excited to see AC/DC close up.  They had all their albums, and had seen clips on TV of their performances, and the lead guitarist, Angus Young, was amazing.  He dressed in an Australian schoolboy’s outfit and ran back and forth on the stage incessantly, thrashing his guitar and bobbing his head in time to the chords.  He had enough energy that he didn’t need an amplifier, but speakers the size of dumpsters loomed ominously over the spot they had chosen.  The first couple of bands were good, and they played a song or two Marty recognized, but he could tell everyone was waiting for the true Monsters of Rock to take the stage.  When it was AC/DC’s turn, everyone surged forward, rapidly filling all available space until they were all pressed against each other.  The Australian band launched into their raunchy set with a new song: Highway to Hell, and Angus boogied all over the stage like a demon, shredding all three of the chords he knew. 

“Living easy, living free
Season ticket on a one-way ride
Asking nothing, leave me be
Taking everything in my stride
Don’t need reason, don’t need rhyme
Ain’t nothing I would rather do
Going down, party time
My friends are gonna be there too!”

It was hard to say exactly why AC/DC was so popular with Marty and his friends, and party animals of all species.  If you asked any of their fans, they just looked at you as if you were missing the obvious, and exclaimed, “Because they ROCK!!”  Their music was generally frowned upon by polite society, which was always a good enough reason for teenage males to like the band.  If you listened to their lyrics closely, you could tell why it made adults cringe with disgust.  There had rarely been such vile, repulsive, and downright sociopathic words ever set to music before.  Marty was able to tune out the words – although he always appreciated excellent songwriting – and instead focused on the music itself.  The rhythm section of Cliff Williams on bass and Phil Rudd on drums was deceptively simple; laying down a solid foundation for Malcolm Young, the metronomic heart of the band.  The elder brother of Angus, he distilled the essence of rock & roll into catchy riffs and chord progressions, playing the “straight man” to his wild and crazy little brother.  Bon Scott adopted the annoying habit of trying to sound as evil as possible, but his vocals were always grounded in superlative rhythm and blues.  And then there was Angus… the lead guitarist and on-stage spectacle, with a motor that never stopped, cutting to the heart of every song with gut-wrenching guitar solos.  Where other bands rocked, AC/DC was a relentless avalanche of sound.

The speakers were twice as loud as the previous bands, and you had to yell right into someone’s ear to be heard.  Fortunately, people were smashed so close together that ears were not hard to come by.  There was relentless pressure from the rear of the crowd, and everyone in front strained to push back, but Marty could see some guys were getting crushed up against the barricade right in front of the stage.  There were many yellow STAFF jackets there, trying in vain to exert some kind of control over the situation.  Finally, they formed a human wall of security and took down the barriers, herding the smashed concertgoers off to the side and away from the crush.  Naturally, once this movement started, it never stopped.  Their gang of eight brothers was soon right in front, where they could see the lead singer, Bon Scott, leering down at them as he belted out,
 
When it was their turn to be shuttled to the side, they stayed together and joined the flow of people that were circling back around to reclaim their rightful places near the front.  They had waited in line four hours to get those spots!  By the time AC/DC finished their set, they had pushed their way twice through the human recycling machine.  During the next break, everyone went to get some grub, and stood in line so long that Aerosmith started playing.  They wolfed down their food like starving cavemen, and pushed their way back into the melee.  They got a good look at Aerosmith’s flamboyant lead singer, Steven Tyler, performing several of their hits before they were shoved off to the side again.  “Train kept a-rollin’ all night long… with a heave, and a ho, but I just couldn’t tell her so…”  There were remarkably few fights, as the concertgoers recognized that all the pushing was on a huge scale, beyond the control of any individual, and everyone was just trying to keep their feet and avoid getting trampled.  To Marty, it felt as if he was part of a gigantic school of tuna on a feeding frenzy in the big blue ocean.
 

By the time Ted Nugent came on, most of the concertgoers were pretty worn out, and what was expected to be the climax of the show became more like an epilogue.  The scoreboard was still displaying the familiar message, “For medical aid go to third base dugout.”  The band of brothers found some empty seats and smoked their last doobie, saving what remained of their energy for the dash to the cars after the concert was over.  The aftermath wasn’t as crazy as the last concert, because about half the crowd simply stayed put, being too tired or wasted to move.  The scoreboard changed to “Drive Home Safely,” and they all joined the outpouring of party people being disgorged from the stadium exits.  The crew got to their ships safely, and entered the freeway ahead of most of the traffic, and rushed back to the safety of Marin to gain some elbow room and breathe the fresh air.  The “Monsters of Rock” was an epic experience, similar to joining an army of Orcs for a day, but Marty decided it was more enjoyable to listen to great rock & roll on a loud stereo, in the fresh, clean redwoods, with a cold beer and all his friends.