In celebration of our All Singing! All Dancing! issue, I will eschew the normal biting current-events commentary (or over-indulgent navel gazing) and instead spin the way-back machine to the Mid 80's and discuss my first big boy's rock and roll concert.

When I was a kid I hung around with this older kid we called Trombone. He had three tickets to see Elvis Costello, sans Attractions. One he was giving to his older friend who had a car, who would act as chauffeur, and the other, he hoped, he'd give to a girl. This second part didn't work out as planned. He had this problem a lot. When I was a Freshman, I had a coveted ticket to he Senior Prom due to his similar poor planning.

So I was to be carted off to see Elvis Costello, sans Attractions, with my datless older friend and his even-more-dateless older friend who had a car. I hardly knew the driver, and my mother was concerned about her youngest baby being driven off to rock concerts by strange Seniors with cars. She told me flat out that she would let him come pick me up at the house, but if she found him in any way to be an "unfit" driver, she would disallow me to go.

I was mortified, but I so wanted to go to the rock concert that I put up with it. And I had never even heard any of Elvis Costello's music. I knew "Accidents Will Happen" and "Every Day I Write The Book", the second of which I didn't even like much. But I had to go to a rock concert. At this stage of my life, I was obsessed with rock concerts.

I was entering the age when it would be accepted (and expected) of me to go to rock concerts. I had two major visual reference points with regard to rock concerts. The first was the spirited anarchy of "Woodstock", a film, culture and musical milieu I was in love with. The second was the mid 80's MTV bang yer head footage of blond feather-haired boys with menthol cigarettes and black T-shirts with skulls. In the short film clips seen, from Ozzy, Priest or even Poison concerts, no one was sitting down. I became fascinated with the seating arrangements at rock concerts. How could they assign tickets if, in all these videos, everyone is on their feet rockin' out? It was curious.

I focused many of my sleepless nights on the madness of rock concerts. The illicit drugs, rampant sex, screaming, yelling, girls in denim with mascara on the bottom lash . . . and the music, the music, the music. They said you never heard a band until you saw their live act. That the songs were always different, longer, and filled with solos. There was a rumor that the Grateful Dead had a whole different set of songs, just for their rock concerts. Remember: this was the tail end of an era where a quick trip to the Leisure Time arcade would find a pageant of concert T's with logos etched indelibly in many of our minds. The Pink Floyd prism. Rush's naked man in a pentagram. The Rolling Stones tongue. And of course, the granddaddy of them all, Led Zeppelin. Led Zeppelin was so huge and so popular, they didn't have just one logo. There was a separate logo for each member of the group, then there was the old dude with the lantern, and the druids on the rocks, or the Hindenberg . . . it was a great time to be in Middle School discovering rock.

I would not let my mother's mothering keep me from this show. I warned Trombone in advance to make sure his friend looked respectable when he came to pick me up. I had to go to this concert. My burgeoning masculinity depended on it.

He came to pick me up, passed the safe driver test, and we were off. Off to the Garden State Arts Center to see a rock concert. Trombone had a Costello tape, to play for the driver and me. The driver had hardly heard him either. The music didn't make much of an impression on me. At this stage in my musical development, I was insistent to only listen to music that was highly technical and difficult. If it was, that meant is was performed by skillfully trained musicians, worthy of my praise. Thus, I was a fanatic of Van Halen, The Who, Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin. If something wasn't fast, or doing three things at once, it was pop-music shit. Elvis Costello sounded like pop-music shit.

I never got a chance to voice my opinion, because after ten minutes on I-195 we got in a car accident. That's right. After my Mom all but forced this poor putz to parallel park for her, we got in a fender bender. Bumped from behind, smooshed trail light.

The poor driver, who up until this point I was convinced was cool . . . because he had a car . . . practically broke down and cried. I then began to question why a senior would be hangin' out with Trombone and me.

We finally made it to the Garden State Arts Center, which is one of these 80's semi-outdoor places that looks a bit like EPCOT Center. I was nervous. Would the anarchy of the rock concert be too much for me? Would there be fights? What if someone offered me pot? As we parked the car, my head was spinning, looking for the depravity, the lawless behavior, the communal love for music, sex and togetherness. What I found were a bunch of yuppies.

"Doesn't Elvis Costello have fans?" I asked. Everyone there was kinda . . . bland. No yelling, no home-made signs, no one biting off bats' heads. Everyone just calmly took their seats.

Seats? What the hell was this? Where was the massive throng of adoring fans? Costello came on, sang a bunch of songs I never heard to a crowd who listened and applauded at the end of each one. At the end!?!? What happened to the maddening constant shrieking?! The women fainting like at the gate of Idlewild Airport when the Beatles came?! Was I being gypped?

This barrage of boring songs I'd never heard before seemed to last forever. Trombone fell asleep at one point. Every time I looked at the driver he was white and sighing, muttering about his car insurance going up. I felt a little guilty about the whole thing, and then projected my inability to have fun at the concert as a result of his bad vibes. Despite being young, I was already able to do things like this. There was an encore, and a song called "Pump It Up" which, lo and behold, I actually had heard before and thought was cool. Then we all went home. None of my rock and roll brothers offered me pot. I did, however, spend $18 dollars on a black concert T-shirt. I needed something to show off how great a time I had. The Elvis Costello show? Aw, man . . . you shoulda been there! It was AWESOME!!!!

(Post script . . . in my later, more mature years, I have grown to understand and admire Elvis Costello's music, particularly the albums "Blood And Chocolate" and "King of America".)