Judging by the reports coming back from those of you who have attended the shows so far, and the boys’ reactions onstage and off, I think they are having a bit of an existential moment/crisis right now.

For most of their careers, they have been touring to “hometown advantage” crowds; crowds that match their fan demographic pretty well. This meant that they could feed off of the energy of the crowd, interact well with them, and basically make it a big 5sos party every night.

Based on what I’m hearing about this tour, that is not the case here, and 5sos are realizing this. I think they hoped that they could win the CS crowd over, but it doesn’t seem to be consistently happening. You can immediately tell from their post-show social media posts (or lack thereof) how a show went. You can tell by videos posted by 5sos fans who attended how it’s going...and it’s not going anywhere near as well as their previous tours did. 5sos are doing everything awesomely given the circumstances...just to the “wrong” crowds.

Calum’s message tonight on Instagram in particular brought this home. I’m certainly not saying that they didn’t appreciate their fandom before...but I bet they damn sure appreciate them now, because they are now feeling what it’s like to lose that “hometown advantage.” It’s not easy to play your heart out to a crowd that is neutral at best and uninterested at worst.

I give props to those of us in the 5sos fandom who have gone or are going/can go, and give their all during 5sos’ set. The guys need all of the energy from you that they can get, because they are definitely feeling the difference, and I can tell that it’s affecting them. I’m definitely planning to try and be at the front of my show, cheering them on. 

I...never said that? I really didn’t care too much about them and still don’t avidly follow them or their music. If anything, they’re the ones avidly following me since they always show up AFTER I do at said pub where I always see them. 

I will say that I was going to write an article about a Rolling Stone interview they did since they are also a Syco artist and I wanted to compare what they were doing to their image to what they were doing to Louis, but it was in the drafts section of my Buzzfeed account and I think we all know what happened next. 

Anyway...I love the song they did for the Ghostbusters film. I had it on my summer playlist in 2015 and listened to it just about every day. 

But until very recently I wouldn’t have been able to tell you what any of their names are. They were just: 

“guy who literally ran into me” 

“the cute lil shy emo one who looks too young to be in an American bar”

“the super hot one who for some reason is always sat directly across from me and who I make awkward eye contact with and one time drunkenly spoke to about Russia for like two seconds”

And then there’s THIS one

aka “the one who called me fucking ‘ma’am’ once”

Other than that...I’m not sure I’ve ever had strong or negative feelings about them. They’ve never come across as dicks and are always very nice to the staff. One time there was a waitress who was clearly overstaying her welcome and talking to them for like way too long, but they just politely listened to what she had to say and when she left they weren’t like “omg can you believe her?” or anything they just went on with their lives. 

I know it sounds like I have a lot of information or was a total stalker, but let me be clear. I go to this pub a lot. So much so that they just bring me a pint of cider automatically and know all my dietary requirements (one of the waitresses has celiac and became my personal menu advisor when I found out I can’t eat gluten). Also, I always sit at the same table. It’s outside, and the one furthest against the wall because I like to write there and I like to be able to see everything. I was raised by people who had a weird obsession with never having their back to a door, so I always sit against the wall. I don’t know if they consciously have their own table that they sit at, but every time they come in they sit at the table directly next to me, which isn’t that far from me, hence being able to overhear or witness a lot of stuff. Which is also why that one guy spoke to me because he was like, “Excuse me ma’am but may I please use this chair?” and internally I was like 

because I thought I was still a couple years away from my ‘ma’am’ stage of life, but in reality I was like