During the early part of my radio career, I spent four years as Morning Show Host/Program Director at a station in Killeen, Texas.  Killeen is the home of Fort Hood Army Base, the largest military installation in the free world.  The station had a rock format, so us DJ's spent a lot of time doing live broadcasts from nightclubs and pawn shops, especially around pay day.  The GI's loved to party when they had money in their pockets, and when they ran out of money, they pawned their stuff to get cash to make it to the next pay day when the cycle began all over again.

During that time I got to see some big-time rock bands in little dive bars.  Bands like Cheap Trick, Fastway, Michael Schenker Group, and Joan Jett & The Blackhearts.  I had the privilege of introducing Joan Jett to the crowd the night she came to town.  As I was running up the steel steps to get to the stage platform, I tripped and landed on my shin against the edge of one of the steps.  I remember Joan saying, "Oh, are you all right?"  And I'm like, "Yeah," as I feel blood oozing down my leg and the pain almost blinding me.

As you might imagine those shows could get pretty rowdy.  This was before the days of mosh pits when crowd surfing was all the rage; so, some drunk GI would get passed around the floor at least once a night.

Apparently crowd surfing is still a thing.  But this one crowd surfing incident was not just some drunk GI oblivious to what was going on around him.

It happened at Coldplay's July 8th concert in Dublin, Ireland.  A wheelchair-bound fan was lifted up in the air and the crowd "surfed" him to the front where he was hoisted up onto the stage.  Lead singer Chris Martin greeted the man, whose name turned out to be Rob, with a hug and then launched into an improvised song about Dublin and Rob. The video really gets to you when Rob pulls out a harmonica and accompanies Chris on the song!

In an article is US Weekly Rob said, "“I had a once in a lifetime experience.  83,000 people cheering as I was in the middle. I got a glimpse of a celebrity life. The video has gone viral since and my phone hasn't stopped."

 

 

 

 

 

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