By Staff
Scot Beard
This past weekend my wife and I went to Nashville for the Dave Matthews Band concert with two of our friends.
We were expecting a great time as we had gone to see the band before and had a pleasant experience.
Not this time.
From the moment we decided to go, unseen forces have conspired to make this trip one of the most miserable experiences of my life.
To start with, Ticketmaster goofed up our ticket order. They charged us twice for one ticket, which led to a week-long ordeal in trying to get our money back and get the number of tickets we needed.
After that problem, we thought everything was fine. Boy were we wrong.
Last Thursday our friends called and said they might not be able to come. Since we bought all of the tickets and were waiting to be refunded, my wife and I began searching frantically for someone to buy the tickets in case our friends could not attend.
There was little interest and fortunately, our friends were able to attend.
We finally get to the concert, which is being held in Vanderbilt's football stadium, and the lines to get in stretch around the block.
I asked one of the workers if the line was to get in or for something else. He told me the line was to get into the stadium and there were only three gates opened – one of which was for field access only.
For Vanderbilt to have a reputation as one of the best academic institutions in the nation, the school came across as pretty stupid.
Whoever hired the event staff needs to be fired. The person that thought trying to funnel more than 60,000 people through three gates was a good idea is an idiot.
I guess if Vandy had a real football program, this would not have happened. I have been to football games at several Southeastern Conference stadiums – most of which seat far more people than Vandy's stadium – and getting people in, or out, was never a problem.
So we finally get to our seats midway through the opening act, and I get a horrible headache. The show was great, but sitting 30 yards from a speaker tower is not the best place to be when it feels as though someone is trying to floss your brain with a hacksaw.
The show ended and everything was going fine until we were three miles from the Alabama state line.
That is when one of my friends – without any warning – pukes in my car. Not out the window, but all over himself, my seat and my floorboard.
Unfortunately, the experience has turned me off from ever going to another concert. It had nothing to do with the show itself, as the band put on an excellent performance.
I am just getting too old to deal with the stress, long lines and vomit.