A PARTICULARLY noisy and talkative crowd at a recent gig got me thinking – what is the correct and acceptable etiquette for a live show?

Yes, the music was loud – that was the point – but large swathes of the crowd talking throughout was just rude, selfish and detracted from the spectacle on show.

Everyone may have paid their way to be there but surely the right to enjoy the music outweighs the need to have a non-stop shouted conversation?

Like the majority of others present,I was there with friends to have an enjoyable night out, but unlike the loud contingent we didn’t feel the need to try to catch up on the latest gossip while the acts were going about their business.

If you don’t like the music, fair enough – just do the decent thing and let everyone else listen.

If you do like the music, why are you ruining other people’s enjoyment of what we’re all there to hear? It doesn’t make sense.

It wouldn’t be natural to have a massed crowd lined up silently and neatly in rows but show a bit of respect to the bands and fellow gig-goers.

Part of the fun of live music is sharing the experience with like-minded souls and meeting new faces, though the chit-chat shouldn’t be at the expense of the shared enjoyment of the music itself.

With the rise and rise of mobile technology, another thing that irritates me about gigs is having to watch pretty much everything via a mobile phone screen held aloft by someone in front of you.

Enjoy the moment and live it there and then rather than being able to look back at some scratchy footage with an audio quality that sounds like it was recorded in a toilet.

By all means take a few snaps to capture some of it for posterity – other than that your memories of the event should be more than enough to keep you happy.

Being only of average height, it is hard enough to gain a good sight line to the stage in some venues or at festivals, so I really don’t want to rely on other people’s phone to see what’s going on.

Despite all this, if you ever see me at a gig I’m normally pretty friendly and won’t bite (unless you commit too many of these cardinal sins).