Tegan and Sara
By Abigail Bainbridge
Last week one of my childhood fantasies came true: I went to my first Tegan and Sara concert.
Tegan and Sara, a grammy-nominate indie-pop Canadian lesbian twin-sister duo, have been on my radar since some time in late elementary school when my dad was listening to their (then) new album The Con (2007) and used that as an opportunity to explain to me what lesbians are.
Now, I would go on to learn that I’m not a lesbian, specifically, but knowing that women are allowed to be attracted to other women was revolutionary to a 10-year-old living in a rural farming town in Indiana. And Tegan and Sara were an integral part of that revelation, as they have been for millions of women over the 20+ years that they’ve been making music.
I was so excited that when I convinced two of my friends to come with me to the concert, I also coerced them into taking my four-week discussion course (you can find my syllabus here), which highlighted the major points of the band’s 20-year career.
So, I took my pack of bisexuals and fled to Chicago for a long weekend, and when I tell you I was the most excited out of the bunch it’s a major understatement. I had been obsessively watching the band’s Instagram all week. Tegan had gotten laryngitis and they had canceled their show the Sunday before. They’d performed two mid-week shows, but I still wasn’t convinced ours was gonna happen until I watched them walk on stage at The Vic. And, as it turns out, my fears weren’t so far-fetched because they ended up canceling their show that was scheduled for the next day.
I was so excited that got my nails painted to match the cover art, did my hair to mimic their Crybaby (2022) photoshoot, and wore very toddler-core overalls to the show.
I knew that neither of the girls was feeling particularly good, and I worried that it would impact their performance. For the first song or two, I thought my fears might have been correct. But the crowd’s energy, and our love for their music was infectious.
The performance was great. We got to see first-hand the twin banter that their live shows were known for, and they played all the hits that I had been scream-crying the words to since childhood.
But, as is true with any live show, the act is only half the experience; there was also the audience to consider. I jokingly told my roommate (the one I watched Hill House with) that I had brought her to the Mecca of Middle-aged Midwestern Lesbians. It was the kind of joke that was a joke, but only kind of.
To give you a picture, the women took over both bathrooms, because there weren’t enough men in the building to justify taking up half the available toilets, and I love them for it.
The show, and the number of lesbians, would’ve blown 10-year-old Abi’s mind for sure.
