LIVE: Psychotic Reaction
Two years. Locked inside, face obscured by mask, events across the whole United States canceled or delayed until “this blows over.” For nearly two years. THIS was our chance to catch up on lost time. The drinks we never drank, the songs we never sang, the sights we never saw.
The shows that never played.
After being pent up, the city would come out of its shell in the most spectacular and dramatic way. Everyone in town and people from the surrounding countryside would flow into the five blocks that Music Fest occupied. Only the biggest local bands would play. People would camp out on the asphalt for the whole weekend. Drugs would be passed around like parade candy. The smoke would be so thick, you wouldn’t be able to see five feet in front of you.
Of course, this is all speculation. I didn’t know what to expect, but I knew this Fest would be unlike any of the Fests previous. After a long lockdown and a winter that had overstayed its welcome, Music Fest was just what the town needed.
If Norman’s Medieval Fair marked the unofficial start of spring, Norman Music Fest marked the official start. A three day long invasion of upper Main Street, with shows playing every hour in the backs of the bars and at four big outdoor stages. Local artists and national artists alike converged on our college town for three days of drinking, dancing, and MUSIC. A huge, long party downtown that only stopped when the crowds went home to sleep and rest up for the next hectic day.
Under clear skies in the cool of the afternoon, I added nothing to the conversation walking down the tracks towards Main Street. My hands were in my pockets and my gaze cast towards my feet. All I needed was a can to kick to complete this sad scene. Sam took notice and suggested stopping into a small bar on the way to the Fest. Not having planned on drinking on the Fest’s lame night while in a dour mood, I wasn’t quick to agree. But I’ve never been one to resist the temptation of a tallboy.
Inside, it was incredibly pathetic. My eyes met the dead stare of the tired bartender. The harsh sunlight streaming in through the windows cast shadows onto every heartbreak and late night that wore on her face. Even without the lights on, it was too bright. It felt shameful to drink a beer here, in this void of personality. The worn out bartender took care of some frat boys crowding the back porch and a group of forty-somethings at the end of the bar. We sat on the opposite end, faaaar away from these red faced seven-in-the-afternoon drunks. All I could do was listen to their conversation from my barstool, watching some D-league basketball game while the bartender cleaned glasses. One of the men was talking about his teenage daughter and his work as a contractor. I fit right in with my sour mood, but in the company of these hunchbacked cretins, I started to feel worse.
“And I said, “I’m Jason. Jason Bourne.” The receptionist laughed, but her little assistant didn’t get it. She didn’t know who Jason Bourne was… “He’s like, one of them action movie badasses. Like James Bond, or Liam Neeson. Or, uh, shit. What’s that one movie? About that badass, who’s like, an assassin or something… Keaunu Reeves… Hey, what’s that one movie?”
I slowly turned my head. I couldn’t imagine these drunk strangers were trying to talk to me.
“You’re thinking of John Wick,” I said quietly.
“Yes! That’s it! John Wick! He goes to kill this guy and…”
The final straw. I’d had enough. I finished the tallboy off and made it clear that I was ready to leave. We hadn’t even made it to the fest and I’m already repulsed by the Public. Maybe we could do another year inside. These masses of fat, wrinkles, and beer deserved to be locked away in their McMansionesque dungeons for just a little longer. As we left, the waitress invited us to karaoke at nine. Karaoke? On the first night of Norman Music Fest? I didn’t expect much from the Fest tonight, but I had hoped to God that it would be better than college kid karaoke in Norman’s most pathetic bar.
I headed for the door, disappointed. This was a part of town that was modernizing. Tall and sleek apartment buildings loomed above while manicured lawns and well-maintained sidewalks sat below. This neighborhood bar had the potential to be the meeting spot for a new generation of young urbanites, and I would expect it would reflect the trends of the high-density housing surrounding. From the outside, this place seemed “cool” and “hip,” much like this neighborhood. But on the inside, the walls are painted a solid color without patterns, pictures, or personality. If this is what the future looks like, we should be on our knees begging for nukes.
“Was it worth it?” I asked, bursting out of the liminal bar and onto the empty streets.
“No. And when I went there with Isaac, it was the same way. We had gone before and I thought maybe that night was just off, but no. That place sucks.”
“I’m never going back. That place was pathetic. Those people were pathetic. Frat boys and dads. I’d bet they were both there for the same reason, too. I can say with certainty that they were there for the same reason.”
“Oh, yeah? And what’s that?”
“College. Pussy. Those dads were in there to stare at college girls in some sad, vain hope of taking one home. And the frat boys were there for the same thing. Getting a bit of confidence in them before testing their luck at the main bars… Maybe one grows up to become the other. Things never change… Do you hear that? The screaming?”
By now we were near the epicenter, walking parallel to the carnival. A ride called “the Zipper” was lifting and spinning brave Fest goers into the air as they screamed either in fright or in ecstasy. Perhaps both.
“That’s the screaming of the souls in Hell. Tortured for eternity.”
Sam just laughed at me and I laughed at myself. The tallboy had done me good. And making fun of strangers helped me feel better. It might’ve been the “slow” night of the Fest, but we were there with good reason: Psychotic Reaction was playing the Opolis at ten. And it was imperative that I see them. As far as I knew, they had only played in Norman once before. Back in late October.
Psychotic Reaction wouldn’t play for another two hours. Sam was hungry, so we made our way down the sparsely populated sidewalk into an equally crowdless restaurant. A few tables of well-dressed winos surrounded us and I prayed they weren’t an indication of the music we could expect tonight. Beyond the window, more tame looking people meandered down the street and my hopes began to sink. Our near future was doomed to be indie folk and soft pop. Where are all the punks? Where are all the drunks?
The sun is sinking and the drunks are crawling out of hiding. As the booze crept into my stomach, I was crawling right along with them. Finally, after some sort of whisky concoction, everything was hitting RIGHT. I was feeling like myself again. Back out on the sidewalk, the crowds were starting to fill in. Distant music filled the air from every direction. It was starting to feel like Music Fest.
It certainly sounded like Music Fest. We hung out in the alley behind the Opolis, idly listening to whoever was on the big stage with the ten or twelve other people standing by the dumpster.
It wasn’t our thing.
Evidently, it wasn’t anyone else’s thing either. Not even the wine moms were tempted by this act. Sam broke and said he needed a cigarette, and I knew I could go for one too.
The booze was working slowly. And only the buzz of nicotine and the dull euphoria that comes with it could make it work faster. We’d gone through a lot of trouble already to get here, and in order to survive the hellish uncertainty of the night ahead, we’d need to arm ourselves with all tools available.
There’s a gas station at the other end of the alley. But the farther down we looked, the thicker the crowds became. This was the most direct route; we had no other choice. Music could be heard from the backdoors of the bars and businesses to our right, locked in battle with the main stage to our left. We must’ve heard every genre going down that filthy alley. The liquor had been aflow since before we had even made it to Main Street, and wild laughing and screaming could be heard all around. The noise was reminiscent of an insane asylum. Nearly to the end of the gauntlet, a large crowd of people rushed towards us. We fought back this stream of people like one would fight the flow of water in a creek. Not really pushing forward. Only standing our ground. The crowd passed and we finally had the sweet, sweet nicotine we had so craved.
Returning to the dumpsters, we smoked our cigarettes away from the quickly growing crowd. The sun had already gone down and whatever blank spaces there were a minute ago were quickly being filled in. Maybe we weren’t in for such a lame night after all.
A woman walked up to us and I could see it in her eyes before her lips had even parted to ask the words “could I get a cigarette?” She hung around for a bit as Sam and I tried to glean as much as we could from her. She was local, uncomfortable around drugs, and according to her, a lot older than we thought she was. She mentioned that she was a therapist. As soon as she said so, I slapped my knee and prepared to lay down right there in the black grease leaking from the disposal.
“A therapist! God knows I need therapy. Listen, I wanna tell you about this problem I’ve been having for the last twenty-four years.”
She didn’t seem to enjoy my humor, giving a cold chuckle and politely but firmly making clear that she doesn’t work off the clock. We continued the interrogation, and then I asked:
“Have you ever had a patient tell you something and you were just like “holy shit. That’s a lot.””
She exhaled a long, slow stream of smoke and let out a deceptive chuckle.
“Oh yeah.”
She quickly sniped another drag and changed the subject. She hung around for a bit more before fucking off back to her own group. As soon as she departed, Cedar arrived. I hadn’t talked to her since she invited me to the last Psychotic Reaction show.
The conversation was going strong in at least seven different directions, between me, her, her partner, Sam, and another person who strolled up and joined in. The conversation started innocuously enough, then took a sharp, downward turn toward conspiracy theories. It was a little after nine. Close to showtime. Well past time to go.
Sam and I left our friends and their pet weirdo, headed for the front door of the Opolis. Our friends didn’t have their vaccination cards and didn’t want to be turned away at the door. We knew they wouldn’t be. The Opolis didn’t turn us away the night before. But after enduring the stream of psychobabble we just heard, we didn’t feel like convincing them to try anyway.
Having never been asked for proof-of-vaccination, Sam and I slid in with ease. The dark room was packed full. Even the bar seemed to have tucked itself into a corner to make room for the horde. We stood at the back of the dense crowd and tried to make sense of what we were hearing. Repulsed, Sam claimed a table at the back we could wait at until Psychotic Reaction came on. I sat down then immediately shot back up.
I wasn’t broke, but I didn’t have a lot. I hadn’t paid for anything so far, but I had to thank Sam somehow for pulling me out of my funk. So I bought us a beer and a shot of tequila each. We downed the shots just as Issac walked in. Then Sam and Isaac started talking, and in an effort to preserve my mood, I left to smoke on the back porch until this band’s set finished.
The butt had broken off my cigarette, and without my filter, I’d have to smoke it straight. It was one of the harsher cigarettes I’ve had. The show ended and the crowd of young women who came for this show joined me on the back porch. I tried to isolate myself against the wooden fence separating this tiny concrete-floored cattle pen from the big stage behind me. Watching the girls bounce between each other through the growing haze of smoke that floated up toward the pergola overhead. A member from the band just onstage started setting up his merch right next to me. Drunkenly, I tried to strike up a conversation, but the man was quickly distracted when people approached wanting to buy stickers and tee shirts. Escaping this deteriorating scene, I rushed back inside as a guitar started to strum and a voice started to sing. Psychotic Reaction slipped by and I didn’t even notice.
I edged my way towards the front of the stage, standing right in front of the smaller guitarist. A group to my left were holding each other by the shoulders and swaying side to side as music that fell somewhere between rock, punk, and blues filled the air. I wanted to go over and join them, knowing I’d be welcomed, but I delayed a second too long and the group broke. Sam and Isaac had disappeared and I was alone with the music. The experience had become much more intimate than I had expected. As far as I was concerned, I was completely alone in an empty room. The crowd had vanished and Psychotic Reaction was singing to no one but me. I thought back to October and wondered if I had made the right decision. And was it worth it? To miss THIS?
I had never heard any of these songs before. This was all a new experience. I nodded my head and tapped my foot as the amplifiers took me by the ears and filled my head with an album’s worth of brand new melodies. They performed one more song, then disappeared back into the chaos growing outside.
I bolted back out to the porch, cigarette between lips, demanding a lighter from anyone in my group who had one. By now, quite a few friends had joined us. As soon as I let out my first exhale, I was surrounded by ecstatic voices. I couldn’t follow any of them. I don’t know if it was the booze soaking me through, the amplifiers beaming directly to my brain, or a strange combination of the two, but I was fried. Any effort to communicate with me was hopeless. The only words I could make out between my grinning and giggling was “yeahyeahyeah alriiiiiight. Niiiice, man! What’s next? Where to? This is nice! Wow!” and other ecstatic nonsense.
I was energized. And if the energy didn’t come out through my mouth, it would well up inside me until I exploded or had an aneurysm. Tanner, just now joining us, needed weed. He crammed me into the claustrophobic backseat and drove us to the nearest dispensary. My high was quickly fading and my babbling turned to silence. I sat basking in the neon glow of the green tubes overhead as my cells sizzled. The night air was cool and the light coming from the windows and the sign seemed to be a beacon standing alone in the black. Just a few blocks away, the lights of the fest glowed against the dim stars and dark skies as the music of the stage echoed faintly.
“Think you’re gonna hang around to catch the Limp Wizurdz' show?” Sam asked from the front seat.
I sat and thought for a minute. I needed a rest. I have work tomorrow. I drank too much. And I don’t think anything could beat what I just experienced anyway. Why drag this night out? I already got what I came for. Before I could answer, he continued,
“This is the last night the Opolis is doing shows. They’re closing after Music Fest. And this is the only time Limp Wizurdz is playing this year.”
“Fuck, it’s an historical moment then. I have to go.” I said tiredly. Back on my feet at the Fest, we flanked the Opolis and tried to get in through the back, but the door man said they were at capacity. I felt a pang of disappointment, but knew damn well I could hear the music from back here anyway. Even if I didn’t get to see it, I could say I was there. That night. The night Limp Wizurdz played their final show. The night the Opolis shut off the lights for the last time.
My self consolation was interrupted by a short guy with an open red shirt frantically approaching us.
“Heyheyhey, when I scream “LIMP!” you guys scream “WIZURDZ!” okay? Can you do that for me? Alright, here we go, LIMP!”
“WIZURDZ!”
He had approached a few people about this, evidently. A small concentration of us in this remote pocket of the crowd had shouted.
“LIMP!”
“WIZURDZ!”
Even the leader of the band breaking set on the outdoor stage had taken notice.
“LIMP!”
“WIZURDZ!”
“LIMP FUCKING WIZURDZ WHOO!” he shouted and darted off in an unseen direction as the rest of the crowd halfheartedly cheered. We approached the door guard again just as two people walked out. Limp Wizurds was just getting started as we reached the side of the stage. The sharp guitars. Explosive drums. Killer voice screaming at the crowd. Someone climbed up on stage and jumped off.
“Yo! You gonna stage dive?” Sam yelled.
“I don’t know.” I yelled back, trying to think of a good reason why not to.
“C’mon, don’t be a pussy! You don’t get a lot of opportunities like this.”
There was an anxious part of me that said “don’t.” What happens after my feet leave that stage is completely up to the crowd. They could catch me, they could drop me, they could tear me limb from limb like some kind of ritual feast. But most likely, I’d just throw up. I was full of booze and it was threatening to come out at any moment.
“You do it first, then I will.”
“Hold my beer.” And without hesitation, he walked up the stage steps and fell forward into the crowd, being quickly swallowed up. Fuck, he actually did it. Meaning I have to do it! I ignored the sickness growing in the pit of my stomach and walked on stage. I threw myself into the sea of people and never broke the surface. I floated on the hands of strangers who turned me onto my back and buoyed me for what felt like an eternity. I didn’t know what to do, so I just laughed. This was my enlightenment. I didn’t fully understand the appeal of live shows until now, being hoisted above the crowd while Limp Wizurdz shredded the April night to pieces.
The crowd let me down, gently, feet first. I ducked down a bit as I found my footing, and my head emerged from the waves as I took my first breath after this baptism. Sam found me and asked if it was worth it.
“Fuck yeah it was!” I was still laughing. Somebody behind me got shoved into me. Not knowing what to make of it, I kept laughing. I fell into another person, who in turn fell into someone else. The shoving switched directions and I was in the eye of a shoving party. People pushing to and being pushed fro. I felt like a bouncy ball in a dryer. All I could do was laugh until I wised up and shoved someone. I got shoved right back and almost got knocked off my feet. Struggling to stay afloat, I waded towards the tamer end of the crowd and found Sam at the seats we had occupied earlier. We had to catch our breath, but as soon as we did, we rushed back in to the front row, into the chaos. More pushing, pulling, shoving, MOSHING! It was my first mosh pit! At the last show. On the last night. Sam started to go down, and as soon as the crowd noticed, there were outstretched hands thrust from every direction grabbing him to keep him up. The mark of a good pit. He came back up covered in sweat. I was sweating too. The bodies around me were glistening and the clothes they wore were damp from pit to tit. A girl next to me told me she wanted to stage dive but was too nervous.
“It’s a lot of fun! Try it! We got you! I was nervous too, but it was worth it!” She still seemed iffy. The short guy in the red shirt reappeared. He was covered in sweat too. I grabbed him and explained the girl’s desire and he promised to catch her. She helped herself onto the stage and as she leaned back, every hand in the crowd was reaching over to help her experience the height. Letting her down, I asked if she had fun. Her gleeful smile said it all. A man behind her picked up a shoe and held it up. He held it up to his ear and then held it towards me.
“It’s for you!” I snatched the shoe and put the foul smelling thing next to my head.
“Hello!? Is this the suicide prevention hotline!? What are you wearing!?” The people nearby laughed and I turned to pass the shoe onto the next victim. Sam refused and there were no immediate takers. I thought I was going to be stuck with this damned shoe for the rest of the night. An unseen hand took it from me shortly before I found the person missing it: red shirt guy. He put his socked foot on stage, showing the artist, who, as expected, did absolutely nothing about his predicament. I crowd surfed again, and as I was let down, the lead singer climbed up into the rafters of the Opolis. While hanging upside down, he let the mic slip from his hands. It was still attached to him via cable, but now it was in my hands. This is my chance. I’ve got a captive audience. What do I say? Death to the capitalist? Epstein didn’t kill himself? Deez nuts?
“LIMP FUCKING WIZURDZ WHOOO!” Sean Reidy snatched the mic back from me and continued whatever song he was screaming. After the song, they selected two guys from the audience to come up on stage and play “rock, paper, scissors.” The man on the left won, and our champion’s prize was to piss his pants. I started chanting “PISS YOUR SELF! PISS YOUR SELF!” and the crowd joined in with “PISS YOUR PANTS!” The man couldn’t do it so they kicked them off stage and continued to blow the crowd away.
Here I was, completely lost in the music. It was too good to nod your head and tap your foot to, but I didn’t know how to dance to this. I just started swaying side to side and clapping. Like I was at a baptist revival service. Like I was in church. Look at these faces. Drunken. Sweating. Smiling. Eyes and minds transfixed upon the stage. These are my people. My congregation. I’m a complete stranger, but I fit right in. All of us united under one cause: music. Good music. Loud music. Fast, and hard. I didn’t even know this band. But it didn’t matter. I was having a good time, making me just as much a fan as any of the other faces here.
The music stopped and the show ended. Limp Wizurdz would retreat into hiding for another year, and I would be whisked away, back into the streets. I saw red shirt guy and immediately went in for a hug. To the passerby, it was an embrace between two drunk strangers, sweating and nearly in tears, expelling their feelings simultaneously and incoherently. But these two drunk strangers had just experienced something religious. Two witnesses to something that could never be seen by the passerby, and might’ve even gone unseen to the people at the show. I had something special. So many firsts at the last show of the first day. And a BELONGING.
Walking from the Limp Wizurdz show to the Blue Bonnet, I passed the bassist of Psychotic Reaction in the dim, dingy alley. Our conversation was brief. I told him I missed his last show and he didn’t seem to care. But it didn’t matter.
I was on top of the world.
I didn’t even plan on going Thursday night, arguably what’s expected to be the lamest night of the Fest. With most folks having to work the next day, none of the “big” bands playing, the crowds wouldn’t be out in full force. Would it even be worth going?
Absolutely.
This high would never end and I would never come down. If I could find a good crowd, I could ride this for DAYS.
I wanted more music, more people, more of THIS.
THIS is what I had returned for. Where are the screaming drunkards, promoting shows in crowded bars? The smiling crowds reaching towards the stage, to touch God, if only for a moment?
I stood there in the front row, stone sober, waiting for the set to end so I could light another cigarette. I was burnt out from the last two days. I wanted- NEEDED a rest. The show was over and we walked on to meet my friend’s friends. Among them was a girl I had known briefly and let haunt me for way too long.
The sun has gone down. Sleep is staring directly into her tired eyes. We’d kept each other up all night after the party. Neither of us had gotten much rest today. But this Hallow’s Eve is far from over.
“Psychotic Reaction is playing at Cedar’s place… Do you wanna go?”
“No… I’m… I don’t think I could do crowds right now.”
“Oh, I see... No problem. If I come back in an hour or so, will you still be here?”
“No, I’ll probably go home. I need to sleep.”
That’s what it came down to. Psychotic Reaction. Or her.
Her eyes glazed right over me. I hid behind my Ray Bans and smoked my cigarette. No acknowledgement whatsoever.
Good. I never said a word. I didn’t need to. For a long time, I wondered if I had made the right decision.
Now I know for sure.
The day faded into night. Crowds closed in. People surrounded me on all sides. The Drums were playing a show just after dark. Faces all around, friends nearby. Illuminated by stagelight, I was isolated. The music was slow and sad. I tried to play along, tapping my foot and nodding. But really, I wanted to turn from here and go. Jam my hands in my pockets and walk off into the blue night. Down dark, desolate backstreets. Scowling over a cigarette and sulking my way home to let this melancholy envelop me for the next few days.
The music touched me in a way I didn’t expect it to. It made me think. It made me FEEL. Trapped in the crowd, I had no choice but to listen.
“And I would never hate you
But you’re hard to love.
And I would never leave you
But you’re hard to love.
You’re hard to love.”
Damn you, Jonathan Pierce. Was this song for me? Or was it about me? It wasn’t about the girl I missed Psychotic Reaction for. She was just a small part of a greater problem that brought about this sorrow in the first place.
How many times have I thought that? “You’re hard to love?” How many have thought that about me? Had it ever been a mutual feeling, unspoken? Why does it matter now? Here in a massive crowd, where, inevitably, some sad soul felt the same way. Maybe everyone here had. If at least once.
This was my crowd too, unfortunately. They weren’t drunk, or screaming, or violently bumping into each other, but this is where I belonged. All here voluntarily, so there had to be some allure. Maybe this music was their therapy. The singer sang a feeling they could relate to. A gentle outreach to a broken heart. He tried to reach mine, but I resisted. It’s so much easier to ESCAPE. If just for a night. Intoxicated, energized, and being shoved to and fro by strangers seeking the same sedative while the music conducted a direct assault on your ears.