Ever see a professional band get booed off stage?

[Talktotommy]

I went to see rush at the Boston Garden early to mid 80s I would say. The opening act was a blues band. They were playing fine but people started booing so much that the singer actually apologized and said they would only do one more song. I think they only got through three songs.
I felt really bad for them- never seen that before or since in any setting.

 

[gretschdrummer]

Supertramp
St. Louis about 1989

They didn’t play Long Way home during their set

They didn’t play it on their encore
Either

Booed as they were walking off the stage

 

[Rich K.]

Golden Earring opening for King Crimson, NYC '74 got booed mercilessly.
Eddie Money opening for Santana, Syracuse '78. Booed pretty badly as I remember.

 

[afwdrums]

Prince was booed offstage opening for the Rolling Stones in 1981...it was pretty early in his career and he wasn't well known yet, but still, Prince

That Time Prince Got Booed Off the Rolling Stones’ Stage

Prince wasn't yet a huge star when he opened for the Rolling Stones on Oct. 9, 1981. Fans booed the singer off the stage while throwing food at his band.

ultimateclassicrock.com

worst I've personally seen was James Brown's last wife Tomi Rae, they had her out during the beginning of the show, backed by James' band but before James first came out...she was singing some Janis Joplin tunes, and got heavily booed...I don't think putting her out there was a good call, for a variety of reasons, not sure how long that went on

 

[nolibos]

Eddie Money got seriously booed, but he didn't stop, during halftime at a very intense early 90s SF Niners game. No one was in the mood for "Two Tickets to Paradise".

 

[richardh253]

I believe Jimi Hendrix had a rough ride opening for the Monkees. Imagine the parents of those teenage girls...."Wild Thing!"

And Bruce Springsteen early on opened for Anne Murray in Central Park. You can't make this up.


August 3, 1974 | Schaefer Music Festival: Wollman Rink, Central Park

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street band were a substitute for headliner Boz Scaggs, as part of a triple bill along with Anne Murray (known at the time for her hit single, “Snowbird”) billed second, and acoustic duo Brewer & Shipley in the opening slot. Anne Murray’s managers vigorously objected to Springsteen taking precedence over Murray on the grounds that she was “more commercially successful” (which was not an untrue statement). Springsteen’s manager agreed to move to the middle spot, as long as Bruce could perform his full 80-minute set.

(You can probably guess what happened next.)

Halfway through Springsteen’s performance, Anne Murray’s managers realized they’d made a serious tactical error, and attempted to coerce manager Mike Appel into ending Springsteen’s set early. This did not happen, and Robert Christgau’s Voice review of the evening (which began, “The evening was professional at both ends and inspired in the middle”) would also report, “But it was Springsteen’s night, probably the biggest of his life, a standing ovation from a full house of 5,000,” and that at least a quarter of the audience had left by the time Anne Murray took the stage. This would be the last time Bruce Springsteen ever opened for another artist (with the exception of multi-artist benefit shows).

 

[Skinsmannn]

Saw Johnny Couger open for Queen at Denver's Mile High Stadium......got booed right on out of there. Queen killed!

 

[musiqman]

Either Lauren Hill or Erykah Badu.

Because of hours late.

 

[mebeatee]

Didn't see these in person...that's below..
Most bands that opened for Kiss....I've heard.....
Nickleback.....that vid from Portugal.

Have seen in person.......myself!!!
This from a long time ago but still good fodder....
We played a high school in East Vancouver.....Templeton if I recall.
It was a lunch hour concert and they wanted a real "big time punk rock band" to play. Not that we were huge but were at about a Commodore Ballroom level which back then was 1200 capacity....then we were off to arena stuff...never liked and still don't like those places to play.
We did not leave the stage but kept on playing....now more intensely to the few folks that liked us as that's the punk thing to do.
The kids who didn't like us booed, screamed, and pelted us with their lunches.....mostly threw the whole bag....when folks took their lunch to school in a paper bag. This worked out great as we were able to collect the still good ones and had lunch and dinner for that day!!
Worked out good in the long run as since I've had a comfortable(ish) drumming career and that bands records are still being re released....with a live album supposedly coming....

Loving reissue of the Young Canadians' Hawaii EP raises the question of who was Vancouver's greatest punk band

May 13, 2020 - Maybe there's no answer, but there's a pretty good case to be made

www.straight.com

bt

 

[Squirrel Man]

Couple years ago I saw Shinedown being the second act behind Godsmac in Vegas.

The Shinedown show was totally high energy, crowd was all into it but for Godsmack not so much, maybe half the crowd left a few songs in and while they weren't booing or anything like that the change in atmosphere was deafening. Godsmack played a super long set until 1am, we hung around for the entire show but not a lot of people did so much that Sully basically at one point told the crowd they sucked.

 

[underratedcowbell]

Didn't see these in person...that's below..
Most bands that opened for Kiss....I've heard.....
Nickleback.....that vid from Portugal.

Have seen in person.......myself!!!
This from a long time ago but still good fodder....
We played a high school in East Vancouver.....Templeton if I recall.
It was a lunch hour concert and they wanted a real "big time punk rock band" to play. Not that we were huge but were at about a Commodore Ballroom level which back then was 1200 capacity....then we were off to arena stuff...never liked and still don't like those places to play.
We did not leave the stage but kept on playing....now more intensely to the few folks that liked us as that's the punk thing to do.
The kids who didn't like us booed, screamed, and pelted us with their lunches.....mostly threw the whole bag....when folks took their lunch to school in a paper bag. This worked out great as we were able to collect the still good ones and had lunch and dinner for that day!!
Worked out good in the long run as since I've had a comfortable(ish) drumming career and that bands records are still being re released....with a live album supposedly coming....

Loving reissue of the Young Canadians' Hawaii EP raises the question of who was Vancouver's greatest punk band

May 13, 2020 - Maybe there's no answer, but there's a pretty good case to be made

www.straight.com

bt

Wowww man, I was in that festival when nickelback were booed off stage! I also saw the same thing happen to Guns n‘ Roses here in Lisbon. Tough crowd here in Portugal!

 

[drumaniac]

Around '77 saw April Wine get booed opening for Rush

 

[dyland]

In 2012 or so J. Geils (the dude, not the band) played at the local theater in my hometown on New Year's Eve. This is a really small town and a really small theater (about 400 seats total). It was billed as the "J. Geils Jazz and Blues Revue". A couple friends and I are fans so we decided to go, thinking it was extremely weird that he was playing at our local theater, but ultimately excited to see him

When the band came out the bass player announced that J. Geils would not be joining them for the jazz portion of the show but rather on the blues portion after the intermission. There were some groans and murmurs but the band counted off and played about 45 minutes of really solid straight ahead jazz.

The intermission comes and goes and finally the band comes out again for the blues portion of the show. And there's J. Geils, coming out to a big applause with his guitar in one hand and a clear glass of a black liquid (I'm assuming it was Jaegermeister) in the other. He immediately sits down (the rest of the band is standing), takes a swig of his drink, and plugs in. The band starts to count off the first tune and right in the middle of the count he yells, "WAIT. What key?" The bass player is like, "G", and they count the song off again.

For the next 45 minutes J. Geils attempted to play the guitar but didn't exactly succeed. It sounded like when people mess up playing Guitar Hero. Just all kinds of string noise. He was clearly blackout drunk, tried standing a few times only to end up back on his chair. It was surreal. People didn't boo, they just kind of sat there awkwardly observing the spectacle. The theater ended up comping everybody in attendance tickets to another show to make up for it. We saw Florence LaRue a few weeks later and she was awesome.

Even though I'm telling the story kind of humorously it was actually a really sad sight and, knowing how the next few years of Geils' life went, it was rough seeing him in that shape. Poor guy had demons and wasn't able to overcome them. Damn shame. But Full House Live and Blow Your Face Out are still, for my money, two of the best live albums ever.

 

[dsop]

I saw a band called "The Jetsons" open for Missing Persons. They were sort of a surf rock band. They clearly realized that it was bad billing, and kept saying "We're the ******* Jetsons". They were booed heavily, but persisted for at least 20 minutes.

 

[RIDDIM]

That would be like having Ma

I believe Jimi Hendrix had a rough ride opening for the Monkees. Imagine the parents of those teenage girls...."Wild Thing!"

And Bruce Springsteen early on opened for Anne Murray in Central Park. You can't make this up.


August 3, 1974 | Schaefer Music Festival: Wollman Rink, Central Park

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street band were a substitute for headliner Boz Scaggs, as part of a triple bill along with Anne Murray (known at the time for her hit single, “Snowbird”) billed second, and acoustic duo Brewer & Shipley in the opening slot. Anne Murray’s managers vigorously objected to Springsteen taking precedence over Murray on the grounds that she was “more commercially successful” (which was not an untrue statement). Springsteen’s manager agreed to move to the middle spot, as long as Bruce could perform his full 80-minute set.

(You can probably guess what happened next.)

Halfway through Springsteen’s performance, Anne Murray’s managers realized they’d made a serious tactical error, and attempted to coerce manager Mike Appel into ending Springsteen’s set early. This did not happen, and Robert Christgau’s Voice review of the evening (which began, “The evening was professional at both ends and inspired in the middle”) would also report, “But it was Springsteen’s night, probably the biggest of his life, a standing ovation from a full house of 5,000,” and that at least a quarter of the audience had left by the time Anne Murray took the stage. This would be the last time Bruce Springsteen ever opened for another artist (with the exception of multi-artist benefit shows).

That would be like having Mahavishnu open for you.

 

[bigbonzo]

Some people are just rude.

 

[yetanotherdrummer]

I was at a Foghat concert in the early 70's and the opening band was a local jazz/rock group. People were booing and throwing things at them. Crazy!

I went to a lot of concerts when I was young, and that was the only time I ever saw that.

 

[Squirrel Man]

Some people are just rude.

Agreed.

I've seen some less than great acts but I could never boo or openly show my displeasure. I'll lean over to who I'm with and maybe say "wow, this is bad" but that's kind of my personality.

I stay for the entire show also, only once did I leave before the set was finished and it was close to being finished. Live two years ago in an outdoor Salt Lake venue, it was 12 degrees outside and my family who was with me was freezing miserable but we did see the set ending from the parking lot so technically...

 

[73Rogers]

Saw Loverboy open for ZZ Top on the Eliminator tour in a 6000 seat college arena. The crowd was in no mood for Loverboy and they got booed continuously from the intro. About 3 songs in, the front corner of the drum riser collapsed, spilling half the kit off onto the stage. They stopped playing and stormed off to a standing ovation.

 

[Buffalo_drummer]

Saw the Deftones open for Kiss in 96’ish. Boo’d mercilessly after every song. After one song Chino told the crowd “this is for all the old people in the crowd...” and they proceeded to play Keep on Loving You by REO Speedwagon, to which they were showered with even more boo’s. I had heard a few songs at the time but left with a ton of respect that they could make it through the gig and have been a fan ever since.