Michelle Grizzle was planning to take her 12-year-old daughter, Mia, to see Duran Duran, when her six-year-old daughter, Rhyan, piped up: She wanted to go too.
“I realized she’s three-foot- nothing, and I told her ‘you’re not going to be able to see anything over the people in front of you,’” said Mama Grizzle, a schoolteacher from Dallas, Ga.
"Then she looked at me with the sweetest blue eyes and said, 'but mommy, I can still hear them.'"
The blue eyes won, and the three Grizzles took in the Center Stage Theater show by the fashionable ‘80s rockers Monday night. Though Grizzle, 39, had to buy tickets from a broker at a price somewhere above their $60 face value, “Oh my god, it was worth every stinkin’ penny,” she said Tuesday.
The Grizzle family represents a new demographic: Increasingly, concerts at arenas, stadiums and theaters are drawing the whole nuclear family. Once a refuge for rebellious youth, the rock and roll show is now a family affair.
"I only wish I could have taken them to see the Ramones," said Kristina McAnarney, 41, of Woodstock, who brought her three daughters, age 13 to 20, to the Duran Duran show. McAnarney was calling out the favorite group of her younger years, and bemoaning the fact that three out of four founding Ramones are now counting off tunes (one-two-three-four!) in heaven.
Before death claims any more members of the Rolling Stones -- or they decide to stop touring -- Bill Fowler wants to get his grandson Chad to a Stones show. Fowler, 56, of Suwanee, said "We've already Bruce-ified him," meaning that he and his brother Jeff brought Chad to a Bruce Springsteen concert at Philips Arena several years ago. They spoke in the ornate lobby of the Fox Theatre, where the trio were waiting to see a John Mellencamp performance, another musician in Fowler's pantheon. "He's iconic," he said.
Schoolteachers Andrew and Shea St. John also feel that responsibility. "It is part and parcel of raising children: You try to expose them to as much art and beauty as you can," said Andrew. The Carrollton couple were also under strict orders from their7 year-old, Cole Fendley, that they'd better not leave him home the next time they went to see the Dave Matthews Band. "He was very angry with me" when he discovered they'd skipped out without him, said Shea.
Cole and little brother, Duncan, 2, were happily on hand when the St. Johns saw "Big Dave" last fall.
The emergence of the parent-and-child audience can be attributed to a variety of factors, including the perseverance of "classic rock" and the broadening of popular tastes. Ancient jazz giant Tony Bennett and foul-mouthed rapper Lil Wayne both share space on the same iPods, among youngsters and their parents, so expect the April 22 Bennett show at the Fox and the April 9 Lil Wayne show at Philips Arena to draw all ages.
Also driving this change is the way teenagers have embraced older music. Nick Howrey, 13, an aspiring singer from Roswell, lists the Beatles, U2, the Black Crowes, Boston, the Cars, the Eagles, Kansas and Johnny Cash among his favorite bands. When he was 10 years old he and his dad took a tour of Sun Studios in Memphis where Nick recorded "Folsom Prison Blues." "He nailed it on the first take," said dad Roger. "He's an old soul in a young kid's body."
The Howreys, who play in a band together, were also at the Mellencamp show at The Fox Theatre, a venue that attracts many families partly because the parents want to show off its minarets and gilded opulence to their offspring.
Further, an ensemble composed in part of surviving members of the Grateful Dead, attracted all ages to the Fox last Sunday, including mothers with newborn babies in their arms, said Fox general manager Allan Vella. Vella said the Fox has added snack packs for children to their refreshments, and also offers booster seats to accommodate the younger crowd, but adds "we would discourage the toddlers and infants from coming." Vella said he worries about lack of ear protection among the youngest listeners.
He's not the only one. Caroline DeCelles, a speech and language pathologist in the Clark County schools, has given away 7,000 sets of free earplugs through her non-profit organization We're Hear For You (werehearforyou.org/) at shows in the Athens area, including AthFest. She is troubled by the number of children exposed to high-decibel sounds at rock shows by well-meaning but hapless parents.
"Their ears are not as developed," she said. "They can be more sensitive. At that age they haven’t developed speech and language, and when a child gets hearing loss at a young age, it can affect all sorts of things."
At the Green Day show last August in Alpharetta's Verizon Wireless Amphitheater, one could observe boys and girls with no ear protection, although the most famous young fan that day, Zayn Jawad, came with his own earplugs. Zayn, age 4, was passed onto the stage for an audience participation section with Billie Joe Armstrong, and loved his moment in the limelight. "He was smiling ear-to-ear, he was high-fiving everybody," said Zayn's father Tariq Jawad, of Orlando.
Those unworried about sound levels are sometimes worried about language children might hear at some concerts, and the Green Day show was marked by repeated "F-bombs" from Mr. Armstrong.
Vella, of the Fox, took his 12-year-old son Thomas to that Green Day concert. The first thing Thomas said when they got in their car after the night was over, was "That concert wasn’t really kid appropriate was it?"
Said Vella, "My reply was, ‘You are correct, but I know that you are mature enough to handle it, and not repeat any of the words you heard from Billie Joe.' And I am pleased to say he has not shared any of the words he heard with his younger brother or sister."
Another rock-n-roll teaching moment.
