I thought it might be fun to start a thread about travelling to see live concerts - how far did you travel, to see who ? Was it all worth it ?
I’ll kick it off. In 2012 I was living in the Middle East when the Rolling Stones announced 2 dates at London’s O2 arena, to celebrate 50 years together. It wasn’t a grand tour, just 2 nights.
As with every Stones gig since the late 1970s I was convinced it would be their last (how naive). So I dutifully flew Muscat to London, about 3,500 miles each way. Brilliant concert, guests included Clapton, Bill Wyman and Mick Taylor.
I like the theme. I flew from London to Detroit with my brother for his 40th birthday to see Rush in 2011. We then drove to Toronto and Montreal to see the next two concerts on the tour also.
This depends if you mean going to a place only for the concert or if it was a happy coincidence that an act you wished to see was in a place you were visiting. I would guess travelling specifically for a concert would be around 100 miles.
Mine remains Manchester to see Halestorm. We did it again to Newcastle on their next tour.
It should have been Madison Square Garden to see Rush on their final tour, but we convinced ourselves that they would bring it to Europe.
Of course they never did… EDIT
I forgot, we travelled to Italy for 4 operas last June. Florence, Lucca, Verona and La Scala Milan😊
London to LA, approx 5.4k miles to see Springsteen in 2016 on the River revisited tour…heard the album start to finish on three occasions and as this was my intro to Springsteen back in 1980 it has always remained my fave album of his…so worth every penny of the trip…
Bruce Springsteen at NY Giants stadium, New Jersey. September 2003, The Rising tour. Last day of a world tour, and on the 2 year anniversary of 9/11. Thinking of them playing “my city in ruins” that night still sends a tingle down my spine…
In 1992 I flew from Bristol to San Francisco with tickets for a Grateful Dead three night run at the Shoreline. Jerry was taken ill and the shows were cancelled…
In 2006, we happened to be on holiday in Lido Di Jesolo, in Italy, and on a visit to nearby Venice, noticed that loads of scaffolding had gone up in St. Mark’s Square., in a shape which looked suspiciously like a stage.
A couple of enquiries revealed that Pink Floyd, well, David Gilmour actually, would be playing on Friday and Saturday evening, so we returned on the Saturday where, in spite of a wet start where it was teeming down, they played a blistering set to a wet, but happy crowd.
Extra ferries had been laid on, as hotel rooms were like gold dust, and we only just managed to catch the last one back to Lido.
New Zealand to England, twice, to see Pendragon play at Riffs, just outside Swindon for their MegaDaze weekends. We made holidays based around getting there. The first time, we travelled to see Magenta as well. Second time, a young Miss Mike was with us:
Lancashire to San Francisco 2 weeks ago to see Dead and Company at Oracle Park. We turned it into a holiday spending time in Monterey and Yosemite as well but the concert was the main reason we went. We only went to one of the three shows they played but I think we picked the best night. It was definitely worth it.
