I'm happy I didn't read reviews or watch interviews. I loved hearing his stories for the first time. I knew of the band's history, but he added details that were insightful and humorous.
The show moved seemlessly from story to song. There were small settings on the stage he would move to in order to set the scene whether it was at the pub with his father or on an operating table. From the moment he came on stage (that brought happy tears to my eyes) to the moment he left, I was glued and immersed in Bono's life. What a great way for him to share the stories of his life.
This blog post isn't meant to review the show. There are more qualified music and show writers who would do it more eloquently.
The show left me once again pondering something I have often thought of and talked about.
Do we remember moments at concerts better when we have photos and videos to remind us or do we lose the magic of being in the moment by using our camera?
At the Bono show, it was a camera-free show. Our phones were locked in pouches when we entered the venue and not unlocked until we left.
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It felt a bit like a flashback to earlier days when we needed to plan on where to meet up after we separated rather than texting each other and also to trusting our brain to remember moments from the show ... or moments being forgotten.
In a way, it was a relief to just enjoy the show and not worry about when to take a photo or video. I have learned over the years what type of lighting and sound are best for photos and videos, so sometimes part of my mind is on the lookout for these moments.
In 2013, I wrote a blog post "To video or not at concerts". I offered my tips for capturing some memories while still staying in that moment. Since then, I have used the term "memories bliss point" to describe the balance of enough memory capturing to optimally enjoy and not too much that they end up lost in photo/video collection clutter.
I personally love some reminders of concerts but last night's show was a perfect one to not be distracted. There were new stories and new songs that were part of the overall story. Focusing on each word was important in this context. Without photos and videos, we at least have Bono's book to remind us of the show.
In contrast to Bono's show, I feel I don't have to be "in the moment" the whole time at a concert where I know every song very well. I love to capture parts of my favourite songs and even sometimes "magic moments" like I did with Amazing Day at the Coldplay concert in 2017. I still get goosebumps and tears in my eyes when I hear myself tell my son "It's Amazing Day" when I realized they added one of my favourite song to the setlist. The excitement in my voice takes me back to that moment. You can read a blog post about that here. I also love capturing special moments when the artists stray from the regular lyrics or have an interesting introduction to a song.
So how do we enjoy our concert videos? Some of my favourite concert moments are uploaded on my YouTube channel, but I still have others that are buried in my photo/video collection. I also know that someday YouTube may no longer exist. I uploaded many (all?) of my videos at lower quality, so that's not a preservation strategy, but it's a temporary way for me to enjoy some of my videos.
In 2009, while performing at Sound Academy in Toronto, Travis encouraged their audience to video their last song (Flowers in the Window) and upload it to YouTube. That song was the first video I uploaded to YouTube. I had already taken a few years worth of videos at that point, but hadn't done anything with them so I uploaded some of my previous favourites. I have since uploaded almost one hundred more concert videos. From 2009 until 2016, I uploaded individual songs whether in their entirety or clips of them.
It wasn't until 2017 that I created highlight videos. I combined a bunch of clips into one video using Final Cut Pro (or iMovie). I wanted to share the clips with my friend who invited me to see P!nk in concert. She wasn't one of my favourite artists - although I was blown away by her performance. I didn't want to upload a bunch of her songs on my YouTube channel but choosing one song wouldn't do the concert justice - so I thought a highlight video was the way to go. You can see the video by clicking here.
The following year when I went to England to see my favourite band, Keane, I created another highlights video. I had already seen them eight times so I wanted to enjoy the concert more than take videos. I recorded a few clips of my favourite songs and the one song I hadn't yet heard them perform live. I love the idea of these highlight videos..to just capture little clips from various songs.
When I saw Jason Mraz this summer, I collected my song clips together and started editing them down for a highlights video. This was the process I put in place to choose the clips right away when the performances are fresh in my mind. It's faster that way to easily skip through to memorable moments. I edited them down to fifteen minutes but wanted to reduce it even more. This blog post is reminding me that I didn't finish or post it so I continued to edit it down and am reminded of moments I loved that I had already forgotten about. This is confirming that I love having videos to remind me.
It's also encouraging me to go back to my older concert videos and continue to make highlight videos. Going to concerts was a major part of my life for fifteen years. I want to preserve my favourite concert memories. YouTube is not a preservation strategy that I recommend so organizing them on my computer or external drive is a priority.
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