digressica.com

Saw Jack Johnson, Ben Harper, G. Love and Mason Jennings at Hyde Park with V on Wednesday. It ruled – FACT. Jack is so especially swoon-worthy.

Highlights included a conversation between two girls overheard while standing in the three hundred metre-long queue for the portaloo:

“Are you drunk?”

“No, I’m not like gahhhhhlalala, I’m just a bit like yeah Jack Johnson alright woo.”

“Oh. I’m like yeah woo alright woo.”

One thing that always makes me smile at live gigs is the encore fake-out. You know what I’m talking about. The process goes thusly:

1. Lead singer finishes song and makes announcement something like this: “Right, thanks for coming, we’re outta here, goodnight!”

2. Entire band makes an obviously over-hasty exit

3. The audience clap and cheer a lot, while some people (amateurs) standing around you make nervous comments such as, “Is that it? They’re coming back out aren’t they? I don’t know, maybe they’re not…”

4. A few audience members exit; these are the people who are more excited about an unobstructed departure from the car park or an empty tube carriage than about seeing the act’s best and most built-up-to performance of the night

5. But wait – what’s this? The band! They’re coming back on! Oh, miracle of miracles, it’s as though we’re the best audience they’ve ever had and they simply can’t bear to be parted from us! What ho!

Historically, surely this must be the most enduring public mutual deception in the world. We know it’s a charade. The band knows it’s a charade. But it’s a reciprocal lie that we all actively participate in and enjoy. The band feels like we’ve really, really proved our love for them by screaming ourselves hoarse and clapping our hands raw, and we feel like the band really love us and are giving us our money’s worth by coming back out even after what’s supposed to be their last song.

Just once I would like an act to perform the encore fake-out, but on their return to the stage admit they weren’t really finished anyway, and they’d actually saved their very best material to play only once they felt we, the audience, had properly earned it. Because paying the exorbitant ticket price to see us perform just isn’t enough, damn it. We need you to beg for it.