Soundtrack of Life

Music has been a part of my life since before I was born. Not a single moment of my life has happened without music. The moments I feel most alive are at concerts. There's nothing better than feeling so bad, but being surrounded by a group of strangers being loud and sweaty screaming the lyrics to your favorite band. During those moments, everything else just fades away.

My first concert was in 2015—Black Veil Brides and Falling in Reverse, the Black Mass Tour. My mom picked up my then-best friend, now significant other, and myself early from school. We went home, ate pizza, and got on the road. I don't remember the month, and I don't want to go find the ticket as it is one-thirty in the morning, but it was sleeting. We were wrapped around the block, huddling with my mom and strangers for warmth. Walking into the venue was chaos. It was so hot, I had never seen that many people before. I spotted the merch line and got into it. I carefully counted all the money I had worked hard for months to earn and ended up getting a Black Veil Brides jacket with a demon on the back of it. I wore that jacket every day for the next four years, no matter the weather. That jacket was the first piece of clothing I had ever felt so strongly about. It was mine no one at school had it, and I got bullied for it, but I didn't care, it became my armor. There was nothing better than that jacket, which I still wear well into 2022.

We made our way to where the concert was, and I had never seen anything like it, yet again. My mom had noticed that I would get into it but then look at her and stop. After a few times of this, she tapped me on the arm, bent down to my ears, and yelled, "I'm gonna sit down, let me take your jacket." I handed her my jacket and that's when my life changed.

We met a group of people that we ganged up with after the first set and managed to make our way to the barricade. Ronnie Radke, the lead singer of Falling in Reverse, drank from a water bottle and spat it into the crowd, some of it got in my mouth and that was the best moment of my life, at that point. Someone offered us a hit from their joint, but we declined, we weren't ready to try weed yet, and while my mom wouldn't have cared, she made it very clear that if I were ever to try it, she wanted me to be with her.

Once the concert was over, we found my mom, I put on my jacket, and we headed back to the car. Our throats hurt, we were equally hot and cold, we had the driest of dry mouths, and we smelled like weed and beer. I mentioned how hungry I was and my mom stopped at McDonald's. Collectively, the three of us ate 50 chicken mcnuggets, two cheeseburgers, and three large fries. We washed it down with three large sweet teas. My mom told us we were contact high. It was the best day of my life.

That night in 2015 felt like my life had finally begun. We've been to well over 15 concerts together. Warped Tour (RIP) was that year, too.

We spent months working for our family working to earn enough money for tickets. Finally, we had enough money to get tickets. We armed ourselves with a notebook for signatures, cash, and portable chargers. I ended up with a sunburn on my back so severe, that my back was still pink three years later. I didn't care. I met Bryan Stars, Johnnie Guilbert, Jordan Sweeto, and Jake Pitts from Black Veil Brides.

I actually spotted Jake from behind a stage he was walking behind. It was Mallory Knox, and we were the only ones into the music. Not the whole group I was with walked over to him, but I had to. I ran up to him asking if I could hug him. He said yes and I cried.

Once my significant other and I went to college, they went to the bathroom and I saw on Twitter the announcement for Sad Summer Fest. They came out and I said "will you take me to Chicago? There's a concert." Within minutes we were figuring out how old we needed to be to get a hotel room, that financially it would be best if we traveled with two others, and they were on the phone with their mom informing them. I did not inform my mom of the plans until they were solidified. By the time I turned 16, while I didn't have a car, my mom told me that I was basically an adult and I didn't have to ask permission for things anymore.

Sad Summer was in 2019, the year later, COVID hit. If I had known Sad Summer was going to be my last concert for two years, I would have gone harder. We traveled for 16 hours to spend a week in Chicago. It was such an amazing experience.

After COVID died down and concerts started back up, in August 2021 we went to see Grayscale, The Maine, and All Time Low, I felt alive for the first time in two years. My favorite song by The Maine is "Black Butterflies and Déjà Vu" and I cried when I heard it live. Every time I hear it, I remember hearing it for the first time live and smile.

In October 2021, we saw Machine Gun Kelly, it was by far one of my favorite concerts. It was the "Tickets to my Downfall" tour. There was a box for the next album for preorder on sale, so naturally, I got it. However, a few months before the box shipped out, they changed the album name from "Born With Horns" to "Mainstream Sellout". In the box came a CD and a shirt. The shirt says "Born With Horns" on the back, but other than those shirts, I don't think there is "Born With Horns" merch.

I have been beaten and bruised from concerts. I'm short and demand to be in the pit. I have left school to go to a concert and come back covered in bruises all over my body. I've come back with a shattered phone. I got punched in the mouth once so now my front teeth are too far back in my mouth, that happened at an All Time Low concert.

There were concerts that I got home in time to go straight to school, I would go in my newest concert merch, smelling like weed, sweat, and beer, and be dead tired. My voice would be gone and I would be covered in bruises.

My favorite thing is having two concerts a day or two apart. The first time this happened was a sold-out Bring Me The Horizon and Underoath concert, where someone snuck in and I got tackled by police, and two days later we saw Blink-182. Seeing Bring Me The Horizon was great. That was a show where I got black, blue, and purple bruises all over my arms, chest, and stomach. It was the best time of my life.

A few years later, Bring Me The Horizon released "That's the Spirit" and about a year after that was senior skip day, where my significant other, my best friend, and I got Friday the 13th tattoos. I was the first one to pick my tattoo from the flash book and they both got the same one. It was an umbrella with four raindrops. We got into the car, and I noticed that that was the album cover for "That's the Spirit".

One of my best friends asked me if my significant other and I would accompany him to his first concert, Fit for an Autopsy, with him. Naturally, I said yes. We traveled four hours to his house and stayed the night with him. It was a small concert and I wanted to be in the pit. The very tall men picked me up and moved me out of the pit, I immediately jumped back in and was greeted with the same removal, so I tried again, but they gave up and I was in. Once the concert was over, my friend told me that 1. he would never go into one, 2. was surprised that I wanted to be in that, and 3. tried to keep an eye out for me but everyone was too tall, so sometimes he would just catch glimpses of my hair and knew I was alive due to that.

The next morning we woke up and drove about 5 hours to see Twenty One Pilots. They had amazing graphics and those two days are days I look fondly upon.

Music has a way of bringing people together and wiping away all your worries, it marks every point of life. Growing up hunting and fishing with my dad he would whistle Guns'N'Roses "Patience" and since he died, that song has been on repeat. I can hear him signing it and whistling to it. It feels like he's with me.

My mom always listens to music, it's something we share. Things can be so shitty, but we always have music. It fills the void. It tells the world what we don't have the words for. Not a day goes by when I don't listen to music. Music is the air I need to live, without it, I am dead.