Yeah, that's right: real hippies." The drunken gentleman behindme and my friend Rachel wore a tie-dyed shirt that said "Stoned at the Stones" on it.
He probably has a wife named Sally, two kids, a cocker spaniel and takes medication for minor hypertension.
But he was here last week to rock out with Mick.
One day, I thought to myself, I will be that man too.
The last two weeks reaffirmed why I listen to music, go to concerts and specifically, why I wish I could move my hips the way 62-year-old Mick Jagger does.
I saw Coldplay at Nissan Pavilion a few weeks ago, for the closing show of their American tour.
"It was life-changing," I said to my friend Nick a few days later.
His response is unprintable in a respectable college daily newspaper.
Laugh it up, I can take your worst shots.
I love Coldplay.
I can't help it. They were my first "real" concert.
That is unless you count the Third Eye Blind show I saw the week before. Picture 237 people in a college gymnasium screaming "PLAY JUMPER."
It had to be the most depressing two hours of their lives.
I got seats the night before the concert, and was thrilled because a girl I had a crush on at the time would be there too. I stood next to my friend Matthias, who got hammered on the train ride over (I didn't drink at the time) and sang every word. I mumbled my way through a few of the lyrics, but for the most part rocked out just as hard.
It always strikes me as strange that events like these really do set themselves apart in my memory. I remember what I wore (in fact, the jeans I'm wearing right now). I remember fumbling my words when I talked to the girl after the concert. And how it rained as I walked uptown on Eighth Avenue with Matthias to Times Square. I remember leaning back in the seat on the train ride home.
All these memories came flooding back at me at Nissan, coupled with a host of others.
Whether it's Coldplay or Christina Aguilera or The Killers or the Stones, the memories that our favorite music invokes keeps us coming back for more.
That tingling sense of recognition, of familiarity, of 25,000 people screaming the same lyrics.
Or, in the case of the Stones -- 52 thousand.
Chris Martin is not Mick Jagger.
Chris Martin will never be Mick Jagger.
When Mick took the stage on Thursday night, Scott Stadium exploded.
Literally. There was fire.
But no bomb, according to Charlottesville's crack team of superdogs.
"Oh they're probably just sniffing for drugs," said the obnoxious girl sitting behind us when the dogs appeared onstage.
I thought of a friend of mine, who said the most dangerous drug at the Stones concert would be Cialis.
Where Coldplay made me pensive, nostalgic and, well, misty-eyed as I rocked out to "Clocks" (yeah, keep laughing), Mick simply dominated.
At Coldplay, I could think of all sorts of emo memories that really, like, totally, for sure, connected me to the music.
And yes, that's one reason to go to concerts, even if it makes me a superwuss.
For me, the best part about the Stones concert, aside from Mick's staggering presence, was knowing how many people in that stadium have been following the Stones for almost 45 years.
Maybe 45 years from now, wearing my "KEEP TRADE FAIR FOR CHRIS MARTIN" T-shirt (which will sell for roughly $4,000 in 2045), I'll be in Charlottesville with my family when Coldplay comes to Scott Stadium.
I just hope I'll be able to move like Mick when I'm 62 years old.
A-J's column runs bi-weekly on Tuesdays. He can be reached at aronstein@cavalierdaily.com.
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