Jack Antonoff was an artist I was introduced to after he began his Bleachers project. When Strange Desire was released I was an instant fan of his work. The combination of his songwriting, and production and every single sound, voice and noise in his notoriously diverse production arrangements, all resulted in the masterpiece that was his first album (I mean he's even featured Yoko Ono!). 

The very first time I saw Bleachers perform live, was in May of this year, right before Gone Now was released. I drove up to Los Angeles with my friend to see him perform on Jimmy Kimmel's outside concert stage. Although he could only perform five songs, that performance meant so much to me just because I've been a fan for so long and to finally see him live was just the most amazing feeling.

For me personally, being front row at a show magnifies my experience at a concert by a thousand. My friend Bianca and I have a saying, "once you go front row, you cannot go back" and "barricade life is the only life", and it's so true in my experience. So when Jack announced a brand new Bleachers tour for his new album Gone Now, I knew I had to go, and do everything I could to be front row again. 

As it turned out, his show in San Diego was on a Wednesday night, on the completely opposite side of town from where I live. Plus, my art professor announced two weeks prior that we will have a test on that Wednesday so I knew I wouldn't be able to line up early in the morning as I had planned. 

Nevertheless, I got to the venue at about 4pm that day and surprisingly there were only six people in front of me and my friend, which meant we were basically guaranteed barricade. 

The venue was one of my favourites in San Diego, North Park Observatory is like a mixture of an actual theater look and the House of Blues, but bigger. The last time I saw a concert there was two years ago when I went to see The 1975.
An odd fact about this venue (if you ever see a concert there) is that an hour before the doors open, they separate guys and girls into two separate lines. I've never been to a venue that does this, so it was sort of strange, and I was scared that I would lose my spot in line, but everything was alright in the end because I still got a really good spot on the barricade.




The show itself was so energetic and it was radiating happiness and it truly felt like a community. The crowd was loud, singing back every word Jack wrote and making them their own. My favourite thing about this show was that Jack was smiling almost constantly, and that just made my heart feel warm. Here is an artist who gives his all to his art, and his payoff isn't the money, it's the feeling of a crowd absorbing all of his work and screaming it breathlessly back to him. It's pure happiness and pure enjoyment to watch it all happen.




The moment of realization during the entirety of the high at a show, that everyone around you is radiating positivity and happiness, is the moment I realize how many times I'd wait hours and days in line just to be able to experience it all over again.
I'm so devoted to attending concerts and being able to experience this feeling over and over again, it's better than any drug out there.


There are people I know who don't really understand why I repeatedly spend my money on concerts, and I don't think they will ever be able to understand, unless they experience it themselves. It's not about the money, at least not for me. It's about this feeling, it's about the community of people I choose to spend an hour and a half with singing the words to my favourite songs.
I feel so incredibly lucky to be able to attend music events, because if I didn't find this environment I might be looking for it somewhere else, or even worse, never find it. I also feel sad for the people who don't find concerts the most rewarding, because these experiences have truly shaped my adolescent years.

You can find the new Bleachers album, Gone Now here!

Setlist:
Dream of Mickey Mantle
Goodmorning
Shadow
Wild Heart
Everybody Lost Somebody
Hate That You Know Me
Wake Me
I Miss Those Days
Let's Get Married
All My Heroes
Rollercoaster
Carry On (fun. cover)
Like a River Runs
Foreign Girls
You're Still a Mystery
I Wanna Get Better
Don't Take the Money

For concert's I've been to, and the ones that are coming up, check here.