The Ruiz sisters have been going to concerts since they were children. Xochitl and Mayte Ruiz were only seven and 12 when they saw the British boy band One Direction at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena in September 2014. While they had tons of fun dancing and singing at the time, they couldn’t help but notice the disconnect between the fans and the crowd.
“I felt like the fans went with their own expectations and didn’t want to embrace the crowd so much,” said Xochitl Ruiz, now 22 and still an avid concert-goer.
In the past several years, concerts have been one of the most prominent places for teenagers to go to create bonds with others. According to Statista.com, 2023 was the biggest year for concert ticket sales of all time, amassing over 70 million concert tickets sold.
But aside from just meeting people at shows, there are other ways to connect with people and groups that you identify with on social media platforms like Tik Tok, Instagram and X, which are casually known as fandoms.
Social media platforms have evolved to help users find any niche that fits them, and many teens have found their perfect niche in music fandoms. Fan projects are communicated about through Tik Tok videos and posts on X under certain hashtags, and when you arrive at concerts, fans organize different lines and arrange numbered wristbands to make sure everyone is in the loop and on the same page.
Xochitl Ruiz was at the Zayn Malik concert in San Francisco on Feb. 4. Malik is a British singer-songwriter who formerly was a member of the band One Direction. Given the nostalgic feeling of seeing Malik live, Xochitl recounted her experience at that One Direction concert she and her little sister had gone to 11 years ago while she was at the Zayn Malik concert this month.
Xochitl Ruiz emphasized that even though she was young, she felt that the crowd kept to themselves and didn’t interact with each other as much as fans and crowds do now. She added that she felt disengaged from the crowd around her despite all of them having one thing in common: their love for One Direction.
Ruiz’s younger sister, Mayte, 17, also added that now she felt that concerts were “better for [her] and much more comfortable.”
Being in huge spaces with people whose interests are similar to yours, it’s easy to get involved in the community around you. While fans had been making steps toward inclusivity and unity towards the end of the 2010’s, Covid-19 suddenly caused the whole world to go on lockdown, and human interaction and community became hard to come by.
When lockdowns were lifted and concerts started to pop up in various venues, arenas and stadiums all over the country, it became quickly evident that the isolation of Covid-19 had stunted any sort of growth that was leading to a safer and united environment.
According to The New York Times, there had been a rise in being disruptive at concerts in the years following the pandemic, with the article stating that “disrupting a celebrity — inserting yourself into their narrative — may now be the ultimate concert souvenir.”
From 2021 to 2022, people had to essentially relearn concert etiquette and how to act in a room full of people who weren’t the family they were on lockdown with. Many unfortunate incidents occurred in the early years of the 2020’s, such as artists getting items thrown at them on stage that, in extreme cases, injured the artist.
This happened to British pop singer Harry Styles during his Los Angeles residency at the Kia Forum, where a fan threw Skittles at his face and injured his eye, causing him to wear an eyepatch for a day.
In 2023 and 2024, big steps were made by fandoms towards concert etiquette and what is acceptable at concerts and what isn’t. Communities online made huge efforts to unite fandoms through fan projects and small little gifts like customized pins at concerts.
Both Ruiz sisters went on to mention that concerts have become a safe space for everyone now. “I think that now there’s more of a sense of unity amongst the crowd,” said Xochitl Ruiz. She emphasized that it didn’t really matter whether you’re a casual listener or a super crazy fan that loves the artists, you feel more “immersed in the community and fans around you,” as she put it.
Xochitl Ruiz mentioned her favorite concert she has ever been to, which was the BTS Permission to Dance concert in Los Angeles, and attributed its memorability and fun to how united the crowd felt. Mayte Ruiz mentioned an artist of a different genre, Beabadoobee, and talked about the community and light-heartedness of the concert, and how much more exciting and comfortable it was compared to her concert experience from 2014.
With all these efforts being made, it’s evident that the best moments of concert culture are yet to come.