And it's happening with increasing frequency. Don't know if it's my collapsing attention span or that I don't get out much now and, when I do, I'm at my happiest sitting down the pub talking to mates.

I think with age, comes the fear of missing the last train

To get last train (Peter Gabriel), to relieve babysitter (Crosby and Nash) and to save what remains of my hearing (Buzzcocks).

I left an Elbow gig after two songs because I had a panic attack (nowt to do with Mr Garvey & Co). If I go to a gig I tend to to stay to the end, though I almost always get bored and want to leave early. I'm not really a live music kinda guy.

We left the site just after the Manics - the Sunday headliners - started their set.

I've been a huge Manics fan in my time, but I'm one of those tedious bores who thinks they got rubbish as soon as they ran out of Richie lyrics (i.e. about halfway through recording "Everything Must Go") so there was nothing much to keep us.

So yeah, we left. There was no traffic. It was GREAT.

Two examples, both in the Shepherd's Bush Empire, strangely.
Antony and the Johnsons: It was too quiet. The place was full of chin strokers who glared at you for making any noise at all and it was the wrong venue. RFH or the Barbican, fine. Not the Empire. Did the cardinal sin of talking to my friend as we were so bored. Got shushed and told to go outside if we wanted to talk. I said to her, that's the best thing I've heard all night and my friend and I went to the pub next door and had a great time chatting and watching the steady stream of like minded souls leaving after just twenty minutes.
Dinosaur Jr: they just came on far too late. I think it was nearly ten by the time they shuffled on stage. On a Tuesday night with work the next day? No, sorry J you deserve just half an hour of my time particularly as it was so lacklustre. Long train ride home and early start.

Free ticket. Lasted one song.
Crosby/Nash...got bored with Nash's ramblings after about twenty minutes. In the past I'd have just smoked a tab while he pontificated but in the non-smoking libraries that pass for todays venues that's impossible.

- Lou Reed at Shepherd's Bush Empire because he was being even more of an arse than usual.
- Television at the same place because, apart from the drummer, they clearly couldn't give a stuff about the audience. New York cool is one thing, this was just plain rude.
- Shane Macgowan and the Popes at the Forum. Presumably Shane lost his way there, but he came on past 10 pm, was even more bedraggled then usual and I went home annoyed because I just fancied a nice cup of tea and had a job to go to the next day.

I was at that one. I don't think I've ever seen so much time devoted to tuning between songs while the audience were left to talk among themselves. Tom Verlaine's guitar strings must have been made from old elastic bands.

at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester on the Nine Horses tour.

I'd seen him dancing onstage in Nottingham a few years previous, but this was him at his po-faced worst. Combine that with the constant flash of cameraphones and the hushed reverence of the chin-strokers and I'd had enough of the joylessness of the spectacle and bailed.

Meta-posting alert...

http://www.wordmagazine.co.uk/content/just-a-grumpy-old-man#comments

I left the Black Crowes playing at the Sheps Bush Empire at 2215 last night - so I could get an earlier train and not wait an eternity for the last train.

I was at the back the gig and was constantly annoyed by talkers and those obsessively checking their facebook pages on their mobiles.

Its a pity groups come on so late - I like the way Rumer did it - she came on at 8pm and had finished by 9.30pm.

Empire Pool Wembley, 1975.... they were so outa their feckin heads it was embarrassing.... walked out, not alone I must say, after about 45 mins.

although this was unplanned as I spent the following hour throwing up in the Brixton Academy gents. In hindsight this would seem to have been a remarkably apt critique by my 19-year-old self.

Sadly Shawn Joy at Cardiff Uni during his Comet world of electricals /Have You Fed My Hat phase. He was angry angry angry with his band and the crowd. So I left left left midway after Silent Sigh.

moz, dundee caird hall may 2009:
i'd seen him do one or two lucklustre performances in the near fifty times i'd seen him from 1984...but this was genuinely terrible..and all the worse with the sycophantic audience loving every half arsed minute..

fat bob and the cures, dundee caird hall april(?) 1992:
another end of my tether performance as the same dudes who provided a fine evening on the prior tour revealed themselves to be a bunch of fucking dullards who played too long and fell, critically, from the tightrope they strode between the early heavy shit (with attendant fans thereof) and the pop ones where he makes those stupid baby noises...
pissed on pernod i hurled abuse at bob smith before bumping into billy mackenzie..

radioheed, aberdeen exhibition and remand centre 1997:
(apologies in advance)
wherein said inky favourites prove (to me at least..and aesthetically there is no other currency) that they are as dull, play as long and, yes, are middle class navel gazing wankers on a par with that incarnation of the above.
basically it was all a bit fucking floyd.

I left their Leeds Academy gig last month after about 20 minutes.The sound was too quiet and the band seemed tired and lacklustre. At the back the crowd were inattentive and talkative and at the front sulky and passive-aggressive. The final straw was Stuart Murdoch repeating an "ad-lib" I'd heard a year earlier during their (wonderful) Latitude headline set.

my review on another website sums it up.

"The miserable weather rather affected this festival though all credit to the promoters for getting together some legendary acts from the Emerald Isle and a few American folkies, including His Bobness. I was able to catch The Waterboys' show which was a lot better than I expected as I was never a fan of them in their heyday. The Gaslight Anthem, a good punk pop outfit from N Jersey, delivered a respectable set, as did the reformed Cranberries and the lovely Dolores, although its still hard to get over the trite lyrics in that band's songs. I was glad I saw Nanci Griffith singin "From a Distance" in the tent, though a legendary folk singer from W Texas dressed in an anorak in a craphole like Finsbury Pk on a wet Saturday afternoon seemed rather incongruous. Slightly later, my favourite moment of the whole day came when Shane Magowan appeared in an alcoholic haze and growled a typical edgy set of Pogues' classics starting with my favourite "Sunny side of the Street" and including singalong favourite "Dirty Old Town". I watched Christy Moore do his melancholy celtic folk thing on the main stage but I felt that the intimacy of his music was probably more suited to an indoor arena than a park full of Irish pissheads in plastic macs. Then croakin' Bob Dylan, dressed like a Mexican mariachi, proceeded to confuse those with a mere passing interest in his back catalogue by delivering some of his finest songs in various unrecognizable tempos, including classic 60s protest anthem "Hard Rain's Gonna Fall" in a waltz time signature. I hung around for a while longer but then left early to get home for a well deserved bath."

Whitehaven civic 2003 - left after about 4 songs - They were quite dreadful, possibly the dullest live band I have ever seen.

Wembley Arena, mid-90's

Fairly early on Ray and the band left the stage to allow a troupe of dancers to flap about on podiums to tapes.

I've no idea how long for. I was out and on my way to Wembley Park tube within moments.

Also, Kiss at the same venue in 1996. My great friend Mickey bought tickets for a gang of us to see them. I'm not a fan but he figured an evening of crass cartoonish rock would do me good. A relationship had just ended and I was in a low place. All he wanted to do was cheer me up. Unfortunately 30 minutes was all I could take of fake blood and fireworks flying out of Les Pauls and I was at Wembley Park tube first again

Zappa!Zappa!Zappa! The pompous f*&#.

Oh, and Motorhead (but only because my ears were bleeding as I was within 150 ft of the stage - otherwise, they were fab).

I go to classical concerts, and at the Barbican in particular, the last notes of the last piece will sound but some of the audience are flying out of the doors before the conductor has turned round to take the applause. Amazingly ungracious, really. I know the Tubes can be busy, but even so...

The Unthanks at the weekend. Doors were 7.30. Started at 7.35. The support was free and outside the gig in the bar beforehand.

On the tube by 10.30ish, and that included a pint with fellow Massivistas after the gig.

Perfect.

Turgid interminable Clapton gig at Earls Court, late 90s. Decided to bail before the doubtless hour and a half of encores. BEST decision. We shot out, straight onto a tube and away. My pals who remained (they were on corporate jolly so had to) reported that after the gig the police closed the tube station and allowed people in in batches, resulting in them missing the last train and incurring a £75 taxi back to Dorking. We were home and in the local by 11.00.