Talk:Shows

Archived Discussions

London 4/2/16

Shouldn't some-one change this venue to Electric Ballroom?

Formatting

What happened? I see vertical lines and stuff. --veggieman.//(leave a message after the click?) 15:30, 26 September 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, sorry. That's my fault. There was a disasterous attempt to edit with my phone internet and my phone and the Wiki apparently don't get along. Now it won't let me fix it. I'd be much obliged if someone could fix that for me. BlueCanary

Ticket stub uploading, etc.

I am able to take photos of my tickets, but I do not have a scanner currently. Would you prefer if I wait until I have a scanner available? --Lemita 20:23, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I would say to wait and scan them, probably. In the meantime, if there's any info on them that we don't have (show time, opening acts, etc), you can help fill them in! Thanks. --Duke33 01:32, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Should mystery shows be added?

TMBG posted on Twitter that the KNOW they'll play in San Diego, Portland, Seattle, San Francisco, New York, Washington DC, Chicago, Boston, and Atlanta.[1] Should we add those with question marks in most of the info slots, or should they be left out until we know more specific details? --SMB 03:07, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

no. no point in adding things we know nothing about yet. -- 03:18, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

On Setlist But Not Played

When adding a song to a show page that was on the setlist but not played, it still gets counted in the known performances tally. Any suggestions on how to handle this? -thevince 22 September 2011

What we do is place an html comment (<!-- -->) between the asterisk and the song name. This prevents the song from being counted by the system, and it's applied on most show pages, but if you see one that doesn't have it commented off the setlist, just edit it in! -Apollo (colloquia!) 15:50, 22 September 2011 (EDT)

Okay, here's sort of the opposite situation. Hall Of Heads is listed as having three performances. The 2003-06-08 entry is for two shows. The song was played at both shows. This means this song's actually been played four times. So, how does the count get corrected? Split the 2003-06-08 page into two? Are most two shows in one day entries combined on the same page? -thevince 28 September 2011

Days on which there were two shows should be divided into "show a" (earlier show) and "show b" (later show), e.g. Shows/2003-06-08a and Shows/2003-06-08b. These should each have individual setlists, etc. Sometimes this is impossible because there isn't enough information about which show was which, but in this case it looks like both sets were the same and two pages can be made. I'm not sure which the recap belongs on, though. -Apollo (colloquia!) 16:48, 28 September 2011 (EDT)

It's the 7:30 PM show. It says Spin The Dial on the recap.

Since there are no more 2011 shows...

Is it a good idea to make a 'Shows/2011' page now? SamuelMan36 20:02, 10 December 2011 (EST)

What about the secret show? ~ magbatz 20:32, 10 December 2011 (EST)

Australia 2013

There aren't actual venues or cities yet, but the Australia tour dates are listen on High Road Touring. 11 shows between April 26th and May 11th of 2013. It seems a little premature to make individual show listings for them when the only available info is the date, but would it be worth it to include a sentence about the planned dates on the show page, similar to what we did with the announced cities last year before the tour was official announced? Something along the lines of "They Might Be Giants plan to tour Australia in 2013, with 11 shows tentatively scheduled between April 26th and May 11. Cities and venues have yet to be announced." Thoughts? --BlueCanary 21:03, 2 November 2012 (EDT)

HRT source link

Can someone with the power to fix the template update the link to High Road Touring in the Sources section? They updated their website and the current link no longer works. The new one is: http://www.highroadtouring.com/artists/they-might-be-giants/itinerary/ Thanks! --BlueCanary 11:39, 3 January 2013 (EST)

Fixed it! The template is at Shows/Source, if you ever need to edit it. :) Great seeing you at the last 3 shows! -CapitalQ ♫ talk ♪ 12:17, 3 January 2013 (EST)

Oh cool! I was assuming it was one of those protected templates I couldn't fix on my own. Thank you! And also likewise on the shows! --BlueCanary 12:45, 3 January 2013 (EST)

Opening acts helping TMBG

I attended the Indigo Girls concert last night in Orlando and they had the opening act, The Shadowboxers, play some instruments for them almost throughout the show. It got me thinking, how many times has TMBG "allowed" the opening act to come back on stage and play with them? And if so, to what extent? A lot of these show pages don't specify anything more than a setlist and the fact that the opening act was so-and-so at such-and-such venue, so I'm not sure this is a topic that is viable to research based on such scant information... --MisterMe 11:44, 28 March 2013 (EDT)

all i can think of off the top of my head is corn mo. -- 12:16, 28 March 2013 (EDT)

Festival shows set times

If TMBG are doing a festival show (ie the "Groovin The Moo" festival shows in Australia), do you add the time the festival gates open to the show time, or do you add the time the band is set to go on stage? --JustinBoy (talk) 07:26, 12 April 2013 (EDT)

The time TMBG goes on. --BlueCanary (talk) 17:07, 12 April 2013 (EDT)

Duplicate Show Attendance

There is something wonky going on with the show page. The first show on the upcoming list is showing up twice on the show attendance records of each person marked as attending. Once like normal, and then again with the time and ages listed in the "notes" section. And it is always the top show on the list, even after shows are moved down to recent. You can see an example on my own show attendance list. Right now the Iowa City show is on there twice. But when that gets moved, it'll be Des Moines that is doubled. I've hunted around a little on the page to see if I can find anything that might be causing it and I haven't turned up anything. Time for the experts to take a stab! --BlueCanary (talk) 02:17, 2 June 2013 (EDT)

Thanks for letting me know. I'll take a look. --Duke33 10:35, 4 June 2013 (EDT)

two things

1. i think it's time to start archiving this page. it's ridiculously long, and we could easily knock off the first fifty discussion threads.
2. i think we need to establish a standard for shows played in New York City. I can't really tell which is more common, but sometimes we put "New York, NY" and sometimes we put instead "[Borough], NY". lately it seems like we're leaning more toward borough? to be honest, i don't have much of a preference, although i am kind of drawn to the specificity of distinction between each borough — on the other hand, that separates NYC shows in show search results. either way, i think we should stick with one format. -Apollo (colloquia!) 15:50, 21 July 2013 (EDT)

i don't plausibly see anyone replying to #1 so i just did it. i'm putting it here. -Apollo (colloquia!) 20:28, 21 July 2013 (EDT)

1. I second the need to archive so thanks for that.
2. Some quick internet research tells me that, unless you are in Manhattan (which nearly always uses NY, NY), listing the borough where you are located as your city is common practice in mailing addresses. Personally I would tend to go with however the venue lists their own address on their website/tickets, which is usually Borough, NY. I can't speak for all of the very early NYC dates, but on a quick spot check, the last decade or so of shows listed as NY, NY actually took place in Manhattan. There is a not insignificant list of shows that claim Brooklyn, NY as their location, and a very, very small smattering of listings for Queens/Long Island City. My point being that I think the format of "Borough, NY" is pretty well established, considering that Manhattan and Brooklyn are most likely to be the site of a venue in NYC.
3. This question also brings up another point. I have noticed that there is a semi-frequent issue of consistency in show listings, in general, which affects the show search results. For example some venues have some entries with a "The" included in their name as well as ones without. Spelling theater with an "er" versus an "re" on the end has also split some listings. And the one I see most often is inconsistency in the city where a venue is located. For example, though I actually fixed this already, there had been listings for Mr. Small's both in Pittsburgh and in Millvale, PA. The venue is actually located in Millvale. The band tends to list Mr. Small's tour stops as being "Pittsburgh." Should we be siding with the generalization or actual geography? (The most confusing example of this I have seen is with "Cincinnati" shows which are sometimes actually in Kentucky.)
4. And lastly, how difficult would it be to make the archived show pages searchable by state alone, without a city? Because I know, personally, I have at times been curious how many times they have played a particular state, or when the last time they visit a state was, and was unable to find that information without examining the pages for each individual year. I feel like someone, perhaps new to the wiki, who was trying to locate a show they saw way back when, might easily remember what state it was in but not the specific city or venue or even year. (It also would have been helpful just now when I was trying to see how many NYC boroughs had show listings, and it would help identify other inconsistencies in venue listings.). I know absolutely nothing about how that search feature works so it might be impossible or far too cumbersome, but it might be something to consider. --BlueCanary (talk) 20:45, 21 July 2013 (EDT)

1. yay, post facto consensus
2. well that just confuses things more. i'm still not sure which we should go with — although, and this is related to #4, it might be best to list boroughs if we could have them all show up in a search for "New York City" or "New York"! it should be easy to figure out where earlier shows were just by googling the venue.
3. i have no idea what to do about Mr. Smalls, to be honest.
4. i think that's within the realm of possibility, if the data in city parameter were just exploded??? or, perhaps, whatever that new fangled MW thing is. in any case, all the information is there for this to be a valid possibility, so i don't see why not. but i'm bad with most parser functions that don't have "if" in them! anyway, i think the show search function can and should be expanded. i guess it's just a matter of time. -Apollo (colloquia!) 22:54, 21 July 2013 (EDT)

While we are on the subject of potential improvements to be made to the Shows page, I have two other suggestions.

First, when shows are moved from the Upcoming list to the Recent list, some of the information in the listing is lost. Most of it, like the ticket link, directions to the venue, age limits, etc, are no longer necessary, but there are a couple of pieces of information that are, most specifically the time of the show and the opener. These pieces of info are added back in when the show page is created for the show. This is fine when the show page is created immediately. But in some instances it can be weeks or months before someone makes that page. At that point it can be difficult to remember/track down in the history the time/opener info. It would be great if there were some way to carry this information down with the listing when the show is moved to recent. I had previously discussed this with Apollo, and she suggested we could make an HTML note on the Show page after each listing when necessary, that wouldn't be visible on the actual page. Which is a workable solution but might be difficult to get every user moving a show to remember to do? And a novice wikian might not know to look there for the info when creating the Show page. Is there any way to build that info into the Recent listings so that it would auto-populate the Show page when it is created in the same way the date, venue and city do?

And second, we have practically every piece of info needed about a show listed on our page. Directions, tickets, age limits, openers, etc. But we don't provide info on what time doors are. That seems like info that would be helpful for someone using the show page as the gateway to their concert experience, and can be very different from the Time we do list (as well are varying widely from venue to venue). I wonder if this might be worthwhile info to incorporate into our listings? Just a thought. --BlueCanary (talk) 09:16, 22 July 2013 (EDT)

I've considered it previously, and I think it's a good idea. The only problem is that I have built a complex parser that is a nightmare to maintain. I think we have a better long-term solution though. See the discussion on the TMBW To-Do List about wikidata. This might fit in nicely with that potential solution. --Duke33 12:11, 23 July 2013 (EDT)

Busted Template

So I went to add in the first announced show of 2014 (at the USA Science and Engineering Festival in DC the weekend of 4/26-4/27), and the shows template is totally borked. Doesn't work anymore at ALL. It used the Date Added as the show date, showed raw javascript on the top of the page, left out half the columns, stacked most of the data in one column, didn't list city or venue at all and showed a big grey box where the Attendance functions should be. Basically, it was one big pile of ugly. I'm assuming it's a remnant of the upgrade, and WAY beyond my know how to fix, though I'll happily add the show data if someone can get the template working again. BlueCanary (talk) 01:31, 30 January 2014 (EST)

Show pages not working

Variables don't seem to be working on the show pages (particularly $attnmessage). Also it seems to be converting special characters to their htmlencode equivalents. for example. Google Chrome 32.0.1700.107 Windows 8.1 -Oldpinebox^Talk 23:18, 20 February 2014 (EST)

How many shows?

Anyone have a rough idea how many shows TMBG has played through the years? It's safe to say "hundreds" but I was wondering if there was a way to find out a specific number. I also realize there may have been shows in the 80s and early 90s we are not 100% sure of. --MisterMe (talk) 11:31, 8 January 2015 (EST)

i'm restricted to my phone due to an internet outage right now, but i have in the past assembled a master list of (known) tmbg shows and i believe the total number is about 1500 or thereabouts. i can put a more exact number out there later. -- 15:15, 8 January 2015 (EST)

Those Under 14 May Keep Their Hash Pipes, Pornography, and Booze on 5/2/15

HOBA website has been updated to specify the show is 14+, however, I lack the necessary access and/or know-how to update the show's entry here. Just lettin' you WikiWizards know--feel free to delete this after you do your thing. --FallenOutWithMyHead

thanks, i've updated the entry! Apollo (colloquia!) 19:07, 8 January 2015 (EST)

Trying to dig up old shows

I've been using my Newspapers.com account (which I use for genealogy) to try to find reviews of old shows for old show pages, and have had some luck such as with the O. T. Prices show in 1988, but searching for this band is HARD. Each word in "They Might Be Giants" is a common word, I get lots of sports pages for the New York Giants football team. Searching for the band name together (in quotation marks) brings up every last TV listing for the film. Searching for John Linnell or John Flansburgh you get many papers around May 6 and June 12 celebrity birthday columns saying "Alternative Rock Musician John [Name] is X years old". Any suggestions on how to narrow my criteria down are welcome, otherwise I think the well has run dry.--Pittsburghmuggle (talk) 04:08, 14 April 2015 (EDT)

Streaming Anaheim

With mention of the fact that the Anaheim, California show is being streamed on Yahoo we may want to set up a separate "Show" page for people who stream it to say they "Attended". It's not that it's really necessary, but "Attending" that concert via internet falls into a gray area that ought to be cleared up ahead of time, before people start saying they attended when they actually attended virtually. We can't just assume people won't put their names in if they watch virtually - we may have some younger editors/users who are looking forward to "attending a show" or adding one more to their list.--Pittsburghmuggle (talk) 17:19, 21 April 2015 (EDT)

I don't really think people would do that; if they can't make it to a show at all it would screw up their right to complain! When it comes to whining vs. exaggerating, I think most TMBG fans pick whining. P.S. Love you guys. Sonderling (talk) 18:38, 21 April 2015 (EDT)

I want to state my point a little more clearly, I didn't want my main point to be about fans. Restated: "Maybe we ought to have a separate show page for the streaming show, so people who watch the show live can be counted for because it does raise the question - does watching TMBG live streaming count as "attending a show"

No. Why would it? Watching a show online is nothing like being there. It's not like this is the first streaming show/webcast they've ever done, and we've never thought of it that way before. If you wanna go down that path you could say watching bootlegs is like being at a show. That makes no sense whatsoever. --Self Called Nowhere (talk) 21:46, 21 April 2015 (EDT)

Well, there are some similarities between a stream and a live show, like how you can't hit pause or decide when the show starts, and you're watching something that's currently happening. But none of us would count watching an episode of Saturday Night Live as attending a taping of the show, right? This stream is really just like watching the concert on TV. I think most people would agree on that distinction. --Sonderling (talk) 23:30, 21 April 2015 (EDT)

Worth noting complete album shows?

The two upcoming shows in Texas have been announced on Facebook as being Flood shows. Is it worth noting things like this on upcoming shows? — ACupOfCoffee (talk) 16:32, 11 March 2016 (EST)

You can add it in the Notes section as Featuring full performance of Flood on those shows

Thanks. Not familiar with this template, SL I didn't know there was a place for that stuff. — ACupOfCoffee (talk) 17:35, 12 March 2016 (EST)

Ogden Theatre web site

Hi - The web site link for the "theatre" for tonight's show in the Shows list is incorrect - it's linking to "ogdentheater.com" but should link to "ogdentheatre.com" - just FYI! Tried to update it myself but it's protected. TomInBoston (talk) 14:04, 23 March 2016 (EDT)

Gen Con Show Aug 17, 2017

Tried to edit the Shows page with more details but I see it is protected.

Show time: 8PM Ages: All

Better link: https://www.gencon.com/events/116122

Note: Must have a Gen Con badge to buy a ticket and attend.

It's only protected from being edited by anons, people with no account. Registered users can edit it. I don't know if you're going to see this reply, so I'll go ahead and add this stuff. But yeh if you/anyone else does see it, for future reference that's the deal. --Self Called Nowhere (talk) 05:46, 16 July 2017 (EDT)

2nd Brisbane Show Feb 2019

There is another Brisbane show the day before the on already listed, on Thursday the 21st Feb 2019. The details are here:-https://thetriffid.com.au/gig/an-evening-with-they-might-be-giants-2/

2020 show pages

The 2020 show pages aren't displaying the venue and city. On each page the line for them is present but has only the word "in". --Nehushtan (talk) 09:54, 7 March 2020 (EST)

Should we make showpages for TV appearances?

One has already been made (not by me) for the Larry Sanders appearance. -T-boi

annual moving

i have had this thought for a while, but part of me feels like we are too deep in to make a change by now. but anyway, wouldn't it make sense to move this page to shows/<year> at the end of each year, and then start a new Shows page? for example, on Jan 1 2023, this page would get moved to Shows/2022. that way rather than starting a shows/<year> page by copy-pasting (and thereby destroying edit history), the actual history would be preserved for that year only, and the history of Shows wouldn't be an untamable eldritch beast. this talk page could stay here without being moved. obviously for the first year that we did this, that year would have an insane history; i think that's the main issue with the idea. but subsequently i think it would make this page and the shows/<year> going forward a bit more manageable, which would be handy if TMBG keeps playing shows for the foreseeable future. so there's my pitch. apollo (hiya) 10:52, 3 June 2022 (EDT)

I am not completely opposed, but one hiccup is that on January 1, 2023 (for example) if we ended up moving "Shows" to "Shows/2022" and then recreating a new "Shows" with the cut/pasted upcoming 2023 dates, the edit history for all the 2023 shows that were already announced the previous year would be forever attached to "Shows/2022," making it potentially even harder to find the history of those 2023 dates in the future. (And kind of similarly, the entire 18-year history of our "Shows" edits would arbitrarily live at "Shows/2022"!) -CapitalQ ♫ talk ♪ 17:52, 3 June 2022 (EDT)

i haven't come to a conclusion re: this proposal yet but this reminded me of something; i think we ought to have the rescheduling history of this tour archived somewhere, both individually (on the show pages) and together (cf. the tour "posters" they've been posting on social media). to start out with they could just be stuck somewhere in the bodies of the show pages. -- 18:01, 3 June 2022 (EDT)

yeah, guess i didn't think of that issue with the scheduled shows. too bad we can't just split the page history off in two. i think it's possible there could be some workaround by maintaining both the current year and next year's show subpages and transcluding parts of them onto the main Shows page, but not sure if it would get excessively complicated. apollo (hiya) 20:48, 27 July 2022 (EDT)

there's probably an extension that would do that. sigh. -- 21:02, 27 July 2022 (EDT)

RIP

Poor Linnell. He has to perform on his birthday.--You&Me!! (talk) 11:23, 7 June 2022 (EDT)

Big Hits and Deep Cuts

Looks like they fully shed the "Big Hits and Deep Cuts" label in the most recent email. --ColorOfInfinity (talk) 00:10, 3 November 2022 (EDT)

Since the recent Flood shows have basically been an equal balance of Flood stuff and selected deep cuts, it's no surprise if they don't see a need to distinguish between "Flood shows" and "Big Hits and Deep Cuts" shows anymore. FloridaFlamingoGirl (talk) 22:00, 3 November 2022 (EDT)

An added thought from me (FloridaFlamingoGirl): since the two San Diego dates were slated for a while as having a Flood show and then a Big Hits/Deep Cuts show the next day, are the two San Diego dates now going to basically be the same kind of show? Food for thought. We'll just have to wait and see.

The recent Flood shows have still been Flood shows, though. The idea was that these wouldn't be. --Self Called Nowhere (talk) 02:25, 3 November 2022 (EDT)

No, the first date in San Diego on the schedule has the # indicator, meaning it's not a Flood full album show. -CapitalQ ♫ talk ♪ 09:25, 3 November 2022 (EDT)

It's just the label they're using for shows where they won't be playing the entire Flood album. They revised it about a month ago to be called "Book, Flood Faves & Horns" instead of "Big Hits & Deep Cuts" - it means the same thing but is slightly more descriptive. Keep in mind TMBG's show is always full of TMBG "hits" and "deep cuts" for people who do not track every setlist (ie. most attendees). There was only one scheduled "Big Hits and Deep Cuts" show that already passed - October 8 in Virginia, and they indeed did not play the whole Flood album. -CapitalQ ♫ talk ♪ 09:25, 3 November 2022 (EDT)

Family Shows

I wonder why TMBG isn't doing family shows anymore. Why aren't they doing family shows anymore? I hope they do a family show for the Flood tour.