Why do we choose to see the same artists live, over and over again?
December 10; Simon Cowell’s new boyband. Image credit: Frank Fieber
Those who find greater pleasure in a set they know back to front over watching an artist hailed as this year’s breakthrough isn’t as strange as it may seem.
When I studied abroad in New Zealand aged 19, I flew from one end of the long white cloud to the other, purely to catch Wolf Alice in Auckland touring their second album, ‘Visions of a Life’, after wrangling a spare ticket from another uni student I met once and never again. I was in a foreign city of a foreign country – I couldn’t have been further from home if I tried.
Watching the band in front of me, watching them also take in how far away from home they were, in a room of people who knew the words to every song – songs I entirely associated with house parties and adolescent crushes within a tiny England-bound radius – deposited enough ‘don’t-delete-the-kisses-era-London’ in my psyche to keep homesickness at bay for the rest of my time there.
I saw plenty of local Kiwi and Aussie bands too, including Lime Cordiale in their infant stages. Now, conversely, watching Lime Cordiale brings back fond, fuzzy memories of Aotearoa. Some people take the attitude of live music as an artist checklist; ‘I’ve done Olivia Dean… I’ve already seen Sam Smith… why would I go again?
My approach is entirely the opposite.
A few years later, about a week before I moved to Australia, I caught The Vamps on their 10-year anniversary show at the O2 Arena. I’d seen them perform there aged 14… 16… 17… and now 23, about to uproot my life to the other side of the world – again. A couple of months after living in Sydney, I stepped into a music venue on a street I’d never walked down before, and found the same four musicians on stage. It was only after leaving the gig, with choruses stuck in my head I’d been singing ten years ago, when it finally sunk in that my life had actually, properly, shifted down under.
For as long as certain artists announce shows, I will do my best to attend them… and I will do my best to squeeze into the merch t-shirt I bought fifteen years ago. I know I am not alone with this mantra. For one friend, it’s Ariana Grande – though she’s graduated from waiting outside hotels to waiting in the AMEX lounge to see the artist she’s pledged her loyalty to. For another, it’s Taylor Swift… though these days it’s more about ‘if’ you can get a ticket, rather than ‘how often’.
So why do we choose to see the same bands, singers and musicians, over and over again?
“Gigs generally provide some level of escapism, but when it’s an artist you’ve been following for years, that escapism carries you off into a liminal temporality, suspended between your earliest connections to their music and all of life’s big bookmarks in between.”
Our favourite artists allow us to revisit familiar comforts, and past versions of ourselves. Whether it’s listening to a deep cut from their previous album that puts into perspective how much has changed since the last time you heard it live, revisiting memories of an old crush or heartbreak from the song that soundtracked it at the time, or going back to the earliest singles that conjure the reasons you fell in love with a band in the first place, these sensory experiences whip up the fragmented moments of our youth and pleasantly slap us in the face with them.
Gigs generally provide some level of escapism, but when it’s an artist you’ve been following for years, that escapism carries you off into a liminal temporality, suspended between your earliest connections to their music and all of life’s big bookmarks in between.
Harry Styles recently announced another run of record-breaking residencies for 2027, including three more dates at Wembley Stadium. Almost everyone I’ve spoken to who attended this year’s takeover intends to buy a ticket again, and that’s before remembering how many already went to multiple shows this summer.
Why? In the case of a mega-artist like Styles, it’s not just revisiting former versions of yourself; it’s recreating the safe environments where fans feel able and encouraged to truly connect with the artist, and each other. It’s like an immersive version of watching your favourite film; you know the characters, the plotline, the ending… you know you’re going to enjoy it.
The downside of such vice-grip devotion is the fear felt by new fans at creeping unvetted into pre-marked territory. Don’t know the moment in the song where you’re supposed to be silent? Don’t know the viral meme the audience recreates every show? Don’t know the outfit theme – or binding dress code – for the concert? Then expect to stick out like a sore thumb and leave feeling like an unversed +1 at a company dinner.
‘Heritage fans’ should not make concerts feel like cults. Nor is this to argue that we shouldn’t actively expand our music horizons. Rather, it’s to appreciate that those who find greater pleasure in a set they know back to front over watching an artist hailed as this year’s breakthrough isn’t as strange as it may seem.
“Watching an artist who’s soundtracked periods of your life is one of the only, and best, ways to revisit the uniquely individual feelings and experiences woven into the tapestry of our identities.”
Watching an artist you queued up at a meet-and-greet for as a teenager on stage with countable grey hairs is a strange and sobering experience. We often don’t notice these changes in the friends we queued up to meet them with, though they happen all the same. Your favourite artists grow up, get married (to someone other than you – how dare they?), announce a hiatus, gradually go quiet, or split with their band members. And some sadly pass away far earlier than anyone would deem acceptable, and we’re left with a bizarre resentment at them for doing so.
In the dizzying peak of it all, that reality seems impossible. So I implore young music fans (and those who feel their fangirling or fanboying days have already peaked), to go and see that artist again, even if you’ve already seen them 20 times.
Go with the friend you have nothing else left in common with. Go alone. Go even if they’re on a retirement tour and spend the entire performance sat down, in slippers. Go for your inner child. Go for your future self. Watching an artist who’s soundtracked periods of your life is one of the only, and best, ways to revisit the uniquely individual feelings and experiences woven into the tapestry of our identities.