Guess the Year -- .Rick Springfield and REO Speedwagon Concert!

It seems so long ago now, as I am going to be 46 this year. Hard to believe it was 30 years ago that I saw my first concert. I am reminded of this, and many other fun times at concerts, now that my daughter is 16 and wanting to attend numerous concerts. The times have changed, the music has changed, kids have changed....but one thing that endures is teens love of music.

My mother drove me and my two friends to Providence, RI from Coventry, RI....we were three little country girls in the "big city" going by ourselves to see a concert at the Providence Civic Center. My mother and father were nervous, but decided that since I was going with two other friends we could watch out for the "hoodlums" that would be there (there would be many according to my Dad). I can remember getting dropped off at the front entrance and being so excited about seeing one of the biggest teen heart throbs of the time....RICK SPRINGFIELD. WOW....he was gorgeous!!!!

For those women my age reading this, you know what I mean! Rick was on General Hospital, which was also a huge hit during that time. As this was the days when you did not have cell phones to text with, computers to be social with, and MTV was just beginning (oh yeah and actually played videos)...many teen girls watched soap operas and dreamed! Many of us dreamed of Dr Noah Drake!!!

So back to the concert....we were so excited. The best part of it was that we had FLOOR seats! That's right, we all thought maybe Rick would come running down the aisle and we would get a really close look at him. Again, very very excited. So we went into the venue and proceeded to show our tickets to the usher and were walked down to our seats. We were about in the middle of the floor, which was pretty good.

The atmosphere was electric...the Civic Center was filled with screaming teen girls and teen guys who had taken their girlfriends to the concert. The other band that was playing was REO Speedwagon and they were pretty popular at that time as well. I am sure that many guys wanted to go see them and their girlfriends wanted to see Rick Springfield. We could not wait until the lights went down and the music started.

As soon as the lights dimmed....the shrill of thousands of teen girls screaming filled the air. We were among the loudest, at least I thought so. We began to jump and one of my friends was even crying! It was apparent that we would have to stand on the chairs if we wanted to catch a glimpse of Rick Springfield...so we did just that. Everyone was singing songs throughout the performance, and then the best song...all of the audience was singing along with Rick Springfield to "Jessie's Girl". I was wishing I was her!