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True Life: I Went To A One Direction Concert

Katie Buenneke |
August 12, 2013 | 2:52 p.m. PDT

Theater Editor

One Direction performing "Best Song Ever." Photo by Katie Buenneke
One Direction performing "Best Song Ever." Photo by Katie Buenneke
I am not a "Directioner." I have friends who are, and I do my very best to be non-judgmental towards everyone, so I don't really care if they know the meaning of every one of Harry Styles' tattoos.

I personally don't care a whit about the personal lives of the British boy band, but they're all pleasant to look at and I enjoy listening to their music. I bought their first album and listened to it on repeat last summer while commuting, and I've played their second album a few times on Spotify. Occasionally-problematic lyrics aside, I find their music to be quite enjoyable.

I never thought I'd go to a huge arena concert for One Direction.
I never thought I'd go to a huge arena concert for One Direction.
So when, through the magic of the Trojan Family, I happened across a pair of free tickets to their concert and soundcheck on Friday, I was happy to take them. One of my good friends, Alyce, is a huge One Direction fan, and had seen them in concert.

I'd talked to her about a month before, saying how I didn't think I'd want to go to a One Direction concert just because of the shrill shrieking I was sure would fill the stadium (also I'm a snob who likes being able to actually see the artists who are performing). She recommended bringing earplugs, a note I filed away mentally for the nonexistent day when I would go to a One Direction concert.

But then the nonexistent day arrived. Luckily, since I'd just moved a few days earlier, I fortuitously found a pair of earplugs and stuck them in my bag (Alyce instructed me as to what to wear & bring). I brought one of my friends, Bijou, a bigger 1D fan than I, and we got there at 3:30 to try and find will call.

I'd never been to the Staples Center before, and we were tremendously confused. The thing that surprised me most, though, and I feel bad for saying that it surprised me, was how nice and helpful all the fans we met were. We joined line after line, asking "is this the right line?" and while no one knew, all the girls we spoke to were incredibly friendly. They were all so excited to see their idols, but there was no bitterness or jealousy over who got to go to sound check vs. meet the band vs. just see the concert.

This was the part that surprised me the most. Directioners get a lot of flack, perhaps because they are mostly young women who don't necessarily realize the power of the social media tools they wield, but I found no trace of anything more than earnest appreciation for the band in any of the fans we met.

Alyce taught me everything I needed to know before attending the concert.
Alyce taught me everything I needed to know before attending the concert.
Eventually we wound up where we were supposed to be, tickets in hand, and somehow at the front of the line for the soundcheck. I'll blame my long legs—after all, I was about a foot taller than most of the rest of the audience. It didn't hurt that we lucked into getting ridiculously good tickets, either.

We sat in the front row of the floor seats, waiting for the rest of the "VIPs" to trickle in (a VIP ticket is $250 and gains access to the soundcheck; an Ultimate VIP ticket is $350 and gains access to both the soundcheck and a meet & greet with the band, which apparently amounts to little more than a five-second photo shoot).

Everyone around us was smiling and happy, in awe of the realization that we would be thisclose to One Direction. That was about the point where Bijou and I realized we were old, tired, and hungry. This realization was compounded by the arrival of an Ultimate VIP who sat behind us and couldn't stop crying. She was really emotional about having actually met the band she so venerated.

Though I could wish she hadn't kept coughing all over us, I didn't feel I could judge her, as I may or may not have almost cried in front of a TSA agent the week before when she confiscated my Nutella at security.

Then, after quite a bit of waiting, the band came out on stage. It was intoxicating, I have to say. My fatigue and hunger galloped away, and I immediately stood and started cheering.

There was something so thrilling about being mere feet away from this monumentally popular band, whose songs I'd heard all over the radio for the past year. They launched into their rendition of "Teenage Dirtbag," and I was impressed.

In many circles, it's considered cool, or at the very least, acceptable to hate on One Direction for being untalented. I can understand that, as with the way most Top 40 music sounds today, it's easy to hide a lack of vocal talent behind layers of production. But One Direction isn't that kind of Top 40 artist—they have a genuine ability to turn in a great performance.

I guess that explains why they did so well on the British "X Factor" a few years back. They're not classically-trained opera singers by any means, but they are compelling performers.

Liam and Niall goof around while Louis sings. Photo by Katie Buenneke.
Liam and Niall goof around while Louis sings. Photo by Katie Buenneke.
That was the thing that got me the most about seeing them live. The guys have this tremendous sense of playfulness, and it's giddying. I couldn't help but stand there, grinning like a fool, watching them horse around with each other.

Maybe it's because I didn't have a boy band phase when I was younger (if you ask me which I like better, Backstreet Boys or N*SYNC, I'll say the former, but only because my mom got me a CD of theirs at Burger King. Why they were selling CDs at Burger King, I couldn't tell you), but I found myself just as smitten with the boys as the girls 2/3 my age around me.

I think it's for a similar reason to why I like celebrities like Jennifer Lawrence, Tina Fey, and Emma Stone, and am less enthralled by blander celebrities. It's their little quirks, the things that make them human, that remind me of myself or my friends, and make me feel like maybe I could be friends with these tremendously famous people too. Quirkiness is endearing, because it reminds us of our own weirdness and makes us feel less alone.

This impression of the band was furthered by seeing them do a Q&A during the soundcheck, all talking at the same time and running over each others' answers, but showing a great deal of affection for one another. The concert itself was similar, and I was struck by the gratitude the band showed to their fans.

Any performer is grateful for their fans, as those are the people who buy tickets and help them continue to perform or make art, but I would understand if One Direction resented their fans. They have fans (who are certainly not representative of the fandom as a whole, but are often responsible for the Directioners' public image) who are incredibly invasive, going far beyond the boundaries of what is an appropriate encounter with any person—and the boys in One Direction are just people, even if they have millions of Twitter followers and sell out huge arenas for their concerts.

It's easy for a few bad apples to ruin the whole bunch, as the proverb says, but the band showed a tremendous amount of love for their fans, who were ecstatic to be in their presence. And that speaks a lot to One Direction's character, in my opinion. No matter what is thrown at them (literally, like the many bras lobbed onto the stage, or figuratively, like the numerous invasions of their privacy perpetuated by some fans and some gossip magazines), the boys stay cheerful and happy, and grateful for their circumstances.

When you add that to the fact that they turned in a thoroughly entertaining and enjoyable performance of a 22-song set list, I can't help but respect them, both as artists and as people.

One Direction creates a genuine bond with their audience. Photo by Katie Buenneke.
One Direction creates a genuine bond with their audience. Photo by Katie Buenneke.
Of course, it doesn't hurt that my heart fluttered a little bit every time one of them looked over in my direction, or winked at my section of the stadium (for all that Harry Styles has a reputation as being "the flirt," Liam seemed almost as enamoured of us as we were of him).

I found myself remembering more of their lyrics than I ever knew I had learned, and singing along exuberantly, was transported to a happy place, full of love and sunshine and rainbows, far away from the stressors of the real world.

And isn't that what art is all about, whether it's the broadest pop culture or the most esoteric high art? We engage with art to take us to a place that's different from our own lives, and the One Direction concert took me somewhere unexpected.

Read more of NT's show reviews here.

Reach Katie Buenneke here; follow her on Twitter here.



 

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