Nowadays when people talk about Michael Frendo, it’s nearly always in connection with whether he heard Labour MP Justyne Caruana vote in favour or against that all-important vote on the opposition motion on the power station contract.

Since he hails from Swieqi and has often stood for election in my district, I remember a few other episodes which highlighted his political career. There were the ever-youthful posters (the photo of him never seemed to be changed from one election to the next), snaps of him giving his graduation speech where he provoked a walk-out by the president and the minister for education and, of course, the bus ticketing controversy which was the Mistra scandal of the 1990s.

Perhaps others will point out his role in the pluralisation of Maltese media (We now have Net and One pumping out propaganda, instead of just TVM – the wonders of progress) as his most noteworthy accomplishment. But in my view, the most positive thing that happened on his watch was the Tina Turner concert.

It might sound strange, but that was two decades before Malta became the Isle of MTV and Lady Gaga and Elton John and Sting and Joe Cocker. The Brotherhood of Man had been along to sing, ‘We’re Ready For Eddie’ at the Gżira stadium, and somewhere along the line we had Festivalbar on the Granaries, but Tina Turner was the first superstar icon to rock across a Maltese stage.

For just a few Maltese liri, we saw the Queen of Rock and Roll belt out her hits as she and her backing dancers gave a dynamic performance. I went away feeling it had been the best night out for ages, having been totally transported by her music and energetic performance.

However, the positive afterglow did not last long. The very next day the grousers were already complaining. They couldn’t get close enough to the stage, they could only see Turner in the distance, the seating area was too far away, it was too crowded, the buses to the venue had been full up, the soft drinks being sold on site were lukewarm and too expensive... You get the picture.

There was a cacophony of gripes from people who insisted on sweating the small stuff and letting it cloud over the event. And it started off a trend for practically every concert that ensued. When Cocker performed at Marsa, there was grumbling about the venue being muddy (apparently people expected to traipse over to a rock concert in white patent stilettos and not to dirty them). The “exorbitant” cost of the ticket for that performance – a fantastic one – also came under fire, as the whiners listed all the ways in which their money (all Lm6 of it) could have been better spent.

I felt like asking them why they didn’t buy those three pizza Margheritas instead and let the rest of us get on with enjoying life, but this would have probably attracted even more comments about my insensitivity.

The whingers were back in action following last week’s glorious concert by Joseph Calleja. This time they felt mortally slighted because he hadn’t sung in Maltese (perhaps they expected an operatic rendition of Lanċa Ġejja w Oħra Sejra). They were also miffed that the tenor had not addressed the audience in Maltese. Someone even moaned about the concert being too long.

Then there was the belly-aching because those members of the public who had been admitted from one entrance, were not allowed to enter from another. As someone who had stood throughout the concert, entranced by the magical voices of Calleja, Riccardo Cocciante and the heavenly children’s choir, I couldn’t believe what they were on about.

The grousing about the Rod Stewart concert came as no surprise. The kvetching reached a peak online as the Moaney Brigade dashed off angry comments punctuated with multiple exclamation marks (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) about how annoyed they were to have to join long queues to be let in and how they felt they had been ripped off at having to buy drink tokens.

There were mutterings of discontent about the distance of the stage from the standing audience and also about the poor sound quality during certain parts of the show. Offence was taken because Stewart apparently glanced at his watch at some point throughout the show, and because it was felt that he did not engage enough with the audience.

Well, what can I say? Out of all the complaints made by the Grousers, the ones about the sound quality were justified, but I think we’re going a bit overboard with all the whinging.

I’m getting the impression we’re a bunch of mollycoddled moaners who just don’t get what a rock or pop concert should be about. In the first place, a rock concert is not about being so close to the singer that you can see the open pores on his face. If you want to get up close and personal to Stewart and be serenaded privately by him, then you’d be better off transforming yourself into an Amazonian blonde with legs right up to her chin, because that’s the type he goes for.

For €35, you get to sway along in the audience. Also, if you simply can’t make it without your timpana and other sources of sustenance for the duration of the concert, I would think it is best to stay away from a concert where the idea is to sing and dance to the music, instead of hogging up a huge area close to the stage and designating it a VIP area.

If that’s what tickles your fancy, go to a Las Vegas-style cabaret show. But if you insist on sitting throughout a rock concert, don’t be surprised at the lack of singer-audience interaction. If I were Stewart, trying to fire up a crowd, I know I’d feel rather rebuffed to see a great swathe of seated diners more intent on munching their canapés than on singing along to my hits.

Perhaps there should be a rethink of the whole concert concept in Malta. Having taken all our past experiences on board, organisers should now think of a way of ensuring that audiences can hear music without any sound distortions whatsoever, in air-conditioned comfort and with suitable provisions of food and drink at hand.

The thing is, that exists already. It’s called television. The only drawback is that there wouldn’t be that much to complain about then.

cl.bon@nextgen.net.mt