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Pink Floyd Concert Field Observation

Recently I had the privilege of attending a Roger Waters concert in Indianapolis, Indiana. You may not know that he is one of the original members of the super-group rock band Pink Floyd. I theorized that despite the enormous amount of people in attendance and widespread drug use, I would not witness and negative or harmful altercations. My reasoning was that the type of music played would inspire a positive vibe and equate with enlightened and peaceful behavior. With too many rock acts today anger seems to be a fundamental part of the music and at shows such as these, aggression in the music can translate into negative behavior among the crowd. When listening to Pink Floyd music, usually the last thing on your mind is anger. So, I set out to find if about twenty thousand people could get along in a haze of alcohol, marijuana smoke, and hallucinogenic drugs.
The concert venue was the Verizon Wireless Music Center which was formerly known as Deer Creek (yes it's true, there is nowhere left without a corporate name). One thing to remember when viewing the numbers of the observations I recorded is that I obviously only saw and interacted with a small portion of the total amount of those in attendance. The concert started at seven thirty p.m. on September thirtieth, but most people arrived a couple hours early and socialized in the parking area. The activities included listening to car stereos, throwing balls, playing hackey-sack, and drinking alcohol. Out of the twenty people I overheard attempting to purchase hallucinogens (magic mushrooms or LSD) fourteen of them I witnessed in the parking lot. At seven p.m. most people still seemed to be in the parking lot. With the show starting in one half hour everyone made their way to the gate, creating quite a traffic jam. Even though there were thousands of people crammed together like sardines waiting in a line that didn't seem to be moving, no overly aggressive or harmful behavior was witnessed despite...

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