An Ode to the Bangor Auditorium

Submitted by egoodkowsky t3_11c4dlt in Maine

We are coming up on ten years since the last tourney game played at the Bangor Auditorium, AND I MISS IT.

Yes the roof leaked, yes the temperature could vary, yes it looked old, WHO CARES.

That place. The barn, the loud house, MECCA had the best atmosphere of a basketball arena anywhere on the Eastern Seaboard. Butler Fieldhouse, Cameron Indoor, BAH, HAD YOU EVER BEEN TO BANGOR.

The sound of the crowd was what they base video games and movie crowds off of, the rattle, the jeers! Looking up from the floor, did it ever stop?

The lovers of modernity couldn't wait to be in a 'state of the art' arena. I gave it a chance for many years. It may be great for Stevie Nicks and ridin bulls, but for basketball... IT SUCKS.

The Cross Center is a soulless, godless, feckless place, run by an out of state company that couldn't burn enough sage to turn it around.

Love the relics people, nothing lasts forever.

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Comments

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78FANGIRL t1_ja1not8 wrote

I have a lot of fond memories from the auditorium, The Monkees, the globetrotters, etc. It is overall a nicer building, but the parking is still shit. And not that it matters, but Stevie Nicks played the waterfront.

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micro_mashup t1_ja34wvx wrote

From Molly Hatchett to Hall & Oates (the Auditorium was the first stop of their Big Bam Boom tour what seems like a hundred years ago), that place was magic.

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Breezy207 t1_ja5lqyl wrote

My sister got a guitar pic at Hall &Oates!

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lobstah t1_ja30w45 wrote

My older sister took me to see The Beach Boys there in 1968...I think the Box Tops were with them.

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JimmyJackJericho t1_ja3q576 wrote

I remember going to a WWE show at the auditorium in the middle of July...It had to have been 90+ degrees in that building...

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Buckscience t1_jaarazp wrote

My ears never recovered from a Bill Chinook show I saw sometime in the early 80’s. and I swear I saw a cheerleader get thrown all the way up to the mid court scoreboard during the state cheering meet one year.

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HIncand3nza t1_ja4tgph wrote

What I hate about it is you feel like you’re being watched by the old men in the uniforms. Like they are just waiting to pull you aside and chew you out for something

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Forward-Operation514 t1_ja5h55w wrote

I remember seeing Quiet Riot in the early 80s Instead of Bang your Head. They were singing Bangor Maine!

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mrtlwolf t1_ja5nckw wrote

Fell out of love with it after working the circus as a souvenir salesman. Lugging a tote full of noisy, bright junk that no parent actually wants to buy for their kid sucked. Miss it even left knowing that it was full of asbestos.

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hike_me t1_ja6btpv wrote

I think the last time I might have been in the old Auditorium might have been to see a certain senator from Illinois making a campaign stop in Maine on February 9th 2008.

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