Sometime, in between going to Billy Joel last year and last night when I saw Kelly Clarkson live, I do believe I aged approximately 45yrs. I loved Billy Joel – it was loud, it was rock and it was completely awesome! Last night, I left Boondall feeling an odd sense of discontentment because I had spent a fair portion of the night irritated at the volume of noise pumping out of the speakers. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t regret going. If I hadn’t gone, I would have missed out on what I considered the surprise of the night – a fantastic set by Eric Hutchinson, one of the supporting acts.
So I can pinpoint my mental time warping into geriatric years to being the interval between the conclusion of his set and the start of Kelly Clarkson’s time on the stage. I don’t know what they did to the sound mixing in the interval but there was something distinctly not good about the balance during her performances with full production (i.e. synthesisers, guitars, drums, keyboards and the works). My head felt like it was about to explode and I couldn’t hear her clearly. I couldn’t even understand what she was singing. She could have been singing a Chinese traditional song to the backing music and I would have been none the wiser because the band’s volume was that loud. The only time I felt they got the balance between backing music and vocals right was during the acoustic or almost acoustic songs she sang.
When I could hear her, I was reminded of why I went in the first place because I do enjoy her music. It’s just a shame that whoever was responsible for the sound mixing thought that all the audience wanted to hear was maximum volume noise I momentarily turned into a geriatric last night. 
A lot of geriatrics are quite hip.Coming from the 50′s/60′s era, most of us can’t see or hear it anyway. We just listen for the *Good Vibrations*.lol