Every year, a group of very admirable people put together a festival based on rock and metal music. Hungarian rock and metal music, for the most part. Then all the metalheads from Transylvania and beyond gather there for a few days of nothing but drinking beer, banging girls, headbanging, getting rained on, sleeping in tents and generally having a good time.
I, too, have visited this festival a few times and while I have never stayed the full length of it, I still got quite the taste of what it is like to be a part of it.
This year I went to see three bands : Piramis, Pokolgép and Agregátor. Classic rock, heavy metal and gothic/death metal. Three very different genres, three bands I like a lot nontheless.
The weather there is quite fucked up. It usually rains in the afternoon, and because the stage is located at the bottom of the valley, all the water pours down there, creating a moshpit that even a mudwrestling championship could envy. This year however, when we got there, everything was pretty dry. Yay. I hoped I wouldnt have to be cleaning by boots for the next few days.
Met up with some friends, had a few beers [their treat] and then off we were to the first concert.
A dear friend came with me and he spent most of the concert with his arms wrapped around me and we sang the familiar tunes together. I was getting kind of nostalgic. But I won't get into that. The basic thing is that we managed to get front row, center, as thats is where I usually stand during concerts. Because he was there behind me I was well-protected from all the drunk, fat, huge men around me. Plus the music was not something people headbang to like madmen. It was okay.
Then it was time for Pokolgép. My friend left and I was there, front row center, before a heavy metal concert, alone, surrounded by - as I mentioned before - drunk, big, fat, ugly, old, possibly crazy people. I tried to look cool and calm and everything and thought 'Hey, this might not be so bad. My boots help me not to feel if I'm stepped on, the railing is here to help me hold on. What can go wrong?'
And then I waited and waited and waited for them to set up the stage, do the soundcheck and get ready in general.
Finally, the first few riffs came trembling down into my ears. And then the rain also started trembling down from the sky. Goodie.
And then the concert started with an excellent song to headbang to. Thats when the fun started. Everyone wanted to get to the front row, pushing and showing little me from side to side. Did I say oh eff this and go a few rows back?
Oh hell no.
I held on to the railing like one clings on to dear life, getting my hands twisted and my body squished. But I didnt give up my spot.
At some point a mountain of a man started pushing me again. I shouted at him asking what the hell his problem is ,he said I took his spot. I shouted something about his mother back at him, and then a bodyguard came and took him away. Sweet, sweet passive-agressiveness finally bore its fruits.
After this little incident I could finally enjoy the concert. The rain didn't stop for a second, oh no. It was pouring down, as if to the rythym of the guitars and to the beat of the drums. And my hair was getting really, really soaked.
Have you got any idea how much better it is to headbang with wet hair? Also, how much it hurts other people when I hit them with said hair?
It was just me, the band and a sea of people I didnt know. I felt like I owned the place. The songs were excellent. The sound was excellent. And then they started to play a slow song. I relaxed a bit and took my time to look around. The rain was illuminated by the powerful lights. Yellow, red, blue, green. Yellow, red, blue, green. As if all the elements were raining down on me. Molten gold, sweet blood, salty tears and bitter absinthe.
The atmosphere was something that can not be retold in words. The crowd slipped away, the band faded into obscurity, it was just me and the music and the rain. If there is such a thing as paradise, I think I just got a taste of it.
And people wonder why I want to pay to go see live concerts in stead of just listening to songs on the computer. Those people should really go see what the deal is about.
These are the things that make one feel alive. Or, at least, some of the things.
What's important is that I will not stop going to rock concerts until I am bound to a wheelchair or I am pretty much dead. Then again, who knows what concerts are held in the skies?
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