The Rolling Stones at Washington, DC RFK Stadium July 4th 1972

I grew up in the late 1960s a large Rolling Stones fan. My godmother’s daughter (does that make her my godsister?) was U.S. president of the Rolling Stones admirer club in 1966. I had all of their documents and I desperately required to see them perform are living.

So envision my delight when in the Spring of 1972 tickets turned accessible for a July 4 live performance at RFK stadium. They sold out promptly but I managed to rating a few. Time passed quite slowly and gradually for me amongst that working day and the real working day of the concert.

We all piled into my friend’s VW and headed out. It was competition seating so we wanted to get there early sufficient to get first rate seats. As it happens we arrived about 1:30pm and obtained the excellent seats (for a baseball recreation – entrance row behind the 3rd foundation dugout) and as the phase was becoming set up at 2nd base superb seats for that night’s demonstrate.

So there we ended up, with 5 several hours to eliminate in advance of Stevie Question was to entertain us as the opening act. The pungent aroma of whacky tobaccy wafted by way of the air and bottles of low cost wine have been handed around. It was a splendid ambiance and everything was likely together swimmingly right up until we started to listen to a loud disturbance coming from behind us. It was shouting and chanting and it was coming from outside the major gate. Seemingly, some young ones had been striving to rush the stability manning the entrance and crash the scene!

Very well this was all mildly amusing right until anyone yelled out “they are shooting tear fuel!” Which acquired us all giggling correct up right up until the wind adjusted course and began blowing the gas into the stadium. We stopped giggling at that stage and experimented with to hold our breath. This worked for awhile, right up until we desired to really breathe, and then it was uncomfortable to say the the very least. Our eyes had been stinging and we ended up all suffering.

Last but not least the cops bought a clue and stopped with the tear fuel. The air cleared and the initial act took the stage. Stevie Wonder was high-quality. Almost nobody cared about him (which was a shame) but he did his point for about half an hour and then received off the stage considerably to the appreciation of the the greater part of the crowd. These kinds of is the lifetime of an opening act.

Then another 45 minutes went by and ultimately the Stones took the stage. If you’ve got ever observed the film “Ladies and Gentlemen the Rolling Stones” then that was the identical tour. Possibly their greatest tour at any time. They had been supporting their new album “Exile on Primary Street”. A lot of excellent tunes on that just one plus they did all of their hits to date (the really identical hits everybody needs to listen to nowadays). Mick famous the historic occasion (he majored in economics and record just after all at the London Faculty of Economics) and congratulated us all on our independence.

I have been to 4 Stones concerts around the yrs and each and every single one developed an environment that was so thick you could minimize it with a knife. I will not know what it is about that band, but they do two awesome issues each time. They create an awesome atmosphere as I mentioned and they relate to the group as however you ended up an equal. Certainly no indication of “hey I am a rock star many thanks for your bread person and we are going to perform what we want or not engage in at all, what ever”. It’s uncanny but you really truly feel like they are your buddies from subsequent doorway and that they’re just hanging out with you for that 2 hour period of time.

Very well they played for a tiny above 2 several hours and 3 encores and then it was time to stumble back again to the motor vehicle and try out to locate our way residence once again. All in all just the ideal expertise that a 20 year-previous could have had again then that didn’t entail Robert Redford and the Mormon Taburnacle Choir. Oh occur on, use your creativeness.