Melodies and Memories: Boy Pablo (2019)

Though it was years ago, my first concert was an experience I will never forget. It was for a group of musicians from Norway; they called themselves “Boy Pablo.” I remember being excited to tell my sister of a new artist that I could do a deep dive on, though, at the time, it wasn’t much of a dive. In 2019, they had as many as 15 songs, and I was hooked with every single one of them. When they announced a tour in Jakarta, I was beyond excited, but I learned not to get carried away because concerts were always a big no in my family. Then, I met Kilan, a girl from my school who also listens to Boy Pablo. One day, we started to make imaginary plans to watch the concert together, and suddenly, we were gathering other friends who also wanted to come. This is when I saw the possibility and planned the conversation I was about to have with my parents. 

Tis them: Boy Pablo

After a nerve-racking hour of interrogation, they said really said I could go! Since tickets were sold out, I looked for cheap re-sells on social media and managed to buy four tickets from three different strangers. Looking back, that was a huge risk that I would never do today. Now we just have to wait until the concert comes.

On the day of the show, everyone gathered at my house to get ready. We wore our custom shirts, made last-minute signs, and took lots of pictures! The show started at 6 pm, so by 4 pm, we were ready and on our way to the venue. Not even 15 minutes after we left, my friend realized she had left her tickets in my room, and we lost about 20 minutes just because of that. Finally, we arrived at the venue. While lining up to get our wristbands, we met a couple of our schoolmates, and they joined us! Before we knew it, we got our bracelets, and they were scanned, in we go! Excitingly, we got pretty good spots! We waited about an hour, then the lights went out, and a blue light decorated the whole place; the show is starting.

Getting our wristbands!

Waiting for it to start

    The music played and the energy of the place was instantly elevated. The moment Boy Pablo stepped into the stage, deafening screams of fans started, and of course, I was one of them. They sang “Everytime” and it was the loudest I have ever sung in my entire life. That day was their guitarist’s birthday, so the band sang happy birthday with a cake and all the fans joined! During the whole show, everyone was dancing and having fun with each other. Even the band looked like they were also enjoying the crowd.

THE SHOWWW!!!

The last song was my favorite performance of the night. They told us to keep our phones away and duck. Yes, they told us to duck and dance like crazy when the beat dropped. The band started the song “Dance, Baby!” and when it was time, everyone got up and jumped like crazy. I was super dehydrated, but I didn’t care. All of us jumped and danced wildly like nobody was watching. I regretted not taking a lot of videos on my phone, but a few days after the show, the promoter posted an after-movie that perfectly captured the fun of it!

Post-concert picture :)

    Then the show ended. After processing everything for a second, we took some pictures and called it a night. We waited for my friend Nafisa’s parents to pick us up to eat at Mcdonald’s. It was 1 am when we headed back to my house for a sleepover. We spent the whole night looking back at the videos we took, and one by one, we fell asleep.

    The next day, after waking up late, my friends started to pack up and go home. Everything became super quiet when they were gone, and that night became one of my favorite memories of all time. Not just because of Boy Pablo but because my friends were there to share the excitement with me. I’m always looking forward to when we can relive that night and create new memories together!