In the moment

thirty quid for The 1975 + supporting act: A Sea of Mobiles

"Everybody put your phone away, I want to see you."

That is Matty Healy's simple request at every show before they launch into the emotional song, Me.


We're at the O2 Apollo in Manchester. The crowd is buzzing. It's The 1975's local stomping ground. Energy and emotions are running high. I'm packed into the middle of a punishing mosh pit, everyone wants to see, everyone wants to get their money's worth, everyone wants their photo for Instagram or Snapchat.
It's already been an eventful night. People are fainting, being pulled out of the pit, drinks are being spilt on everyone. At one point, an unknown girl throws an arm around me in a bid to stay upright. We sway and jump to the electrifying sounds coming from the stage.
"We have to push our way to the front! We need to go and get a picture." The unknown girl screams into my ear as The 1975 sing about a lost love intertwining their soul with Somebody Else. 

There's the common theme of the night. As spectators we all wanted to get a picture or video of the night to either remember the night or use it to prove that we were there. As performers, The 1975 wanted to human connection without it being mediated through phones.

Can this new phenomena of the need to document and broadcast where we are, 24/7 be put down to FOMO? Are we documenting these moments for our sakes or just so we appear to be the social beings we're told we are supposed to be?

You can't dispute the fact that documentation has moved away from the preservation of memories and towards the presentation of self. Perhaps this is how we're using the technology now and in coming years we'll come to appreciate our overdocumentation of our lives.

I'm not going to lie and say I'm above this excessive documentation of my life for others to see. I'm guilty of pulling out my Snapchat anytime I go anywhere new. I've caught myself zoning out of experiencing life in the moment for the sake of capturing the right photo for my Instagram.

Maybe what we need is someone, like a Matt Healy, to explicitly tell us to stop documenting and actually live it.

Then again right after his command at the concert, a girl standing next to me whispered to her friend, "I want to get a picture anyway, can you cover me so Matty won't yell at me?"