Maru Martinez – FIRST CONCERT EVER

In this First Concert Ever segment, the progressive metal guitarist, Maru Martinez, talks about the story of her first experience with live music. You can check out the story, after the break.

My first concert was the Uruguayan rock band NTVG (short for No Te Va Gustar). The show was in my hometown Montevideo, in an arena venue called Velodromo. I was 12 and went with my older brother, we were both huge fans of the band. It was the first live show my parents finally allowed me to go to after years of begging, so I was pretty stoked.

The venue was packed shoulder to shoulder and I remember jumping on my brother’s shoulders to get a better look because we were pretty far back on a packed 15,000 cap stadium. Then an angry woman behind us started yelling at me to get down while calling me all sorts of things, so I spent the rest of the show mostly tiptoeing to get a better look behind a wall of people way taller than me. Even though I couldn’t see much I was still so incredibly excited to be there seeing one of my favorite bands playing live.

The energy throughout the entire show was insane, people were bouncing and singing along the entire time. There were soccer flags and banners being waved around and everyone there knew every single lyric to every song.

This was before everyone had smartphones too so I don’t have a single piece of video footage from the show, everyone was just enjoying the moment and having a good time. This was also right around the time before I first picked up guitar, and having experienced live music like that definitely made me want to pursue that.

Keep up with her on Instagram and YouTube.