Donald Glover, also known by his stage name Childish Gambino, headlined at this year’s Coachella festival in California. Known for his enchanting stage performances and the show was no different. Logically, it makes sense audiences would want to pull out their phone and capture the moment so they can relive these vibrant memories, right? Well, Glover thinks otherwise.
Next time you see him live, do not even dare try pulling out your phone for the ‘Gram or Snapchat. As tempting as it may be, Glover will happily call you out for it, and trust me it will get awkward quickly. After opening his set with a brand new song, Glover took a brief moment to address the crowd and lay out a few rules for the evening.
The first rule being, “we really need to have a good time and feel each other,“ Glover said. “Rule number two: put your phones down. This is not a concert, this is church. If you came here to hear your favorite songs, you should go home and do that. If you want to come here to just take Instagram pictures and shit, you should go to in the back and move right now. I want y’all to feel this shit. This is my church. I feel at home here.”
Fans may have mixed feelings about an artist requiring them to keep their phones out of sight, however, this poses a bigger question: How much do you really respect an artist’s artistry?
I had the pleasure of attending Glover’s “This is America” Tour stop in Houston in September 2018, and he gave a similar speech.
“If you have a ticket then that means you got a ticket to the last Childish Gambino tour,” Glover said to the Houston audience. “Which means two things, number one: I love you, and number two: that means you paid for a ticket to be in here. Which means, put your phones down.”
As sad as I was that I would not get to preserve these precious memories of seeing him live one last time, I am a die-hard fan so I happily obliged.
He proceeded to say something like, “You spent your money to be here tonight. This isn’t for the people at home, this is for you.”
What true fan could argue with that?
Although I stopped recording, the speech Gambino gave at the beginning of his set didn’t stop the others around me. No matter how you feel about the banning of video recording during concerts, most people don’t realize it is actually illegal to record without the consent of the artist.
This unlawful act is called “bootlegging,” and although it is rarely enforced, musicians still have the legal right to forbid viewers from recording their live performances.
The next question posed from this is, should artists and venues alike make the restriction of camera use at their shows the norm?
In my opinion, absolutely! We are currently in an era where it is damn near impossible to “live in the moment” anymore. Cell phones and the advancement of social media has complicated this for the past 15 plus years. Luckily for artists, there is a simple solution.
Yondr is a company that makes cell phone pouches with a proprietary lock, and a device for unlocking them. The Yondr pouch allows the owner to keep their phone in their possession but also prevents them from using it during an event taking place such as a concert.
Personally, I would not mind having events such as concerts and comedy shows being phone free spaces. We live in a digital era where all of our communication involves screen time. What happened to simply enjoying the company of other people, distraction-free?
