Chrissie Hynde Wants Fans to Stop Bringing Their Phones Out at Concerts: 'It Reminds Me of Monkeys Wanking'

Rachel DeSantisTue, June 2, 2026 at 10:43 PM UTC

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Chrissie Hynde performing in London in October 2024.
Credit: Robin Little/Redferns for ABA/Getty -

Chrissie Hynde criticized fans for filming concerts and compared the behavior to a distracting mosquito buzz and a "wanking" monkey

She praised Bob Dylan's no-phone policy and shared frustrations about phones disrupting shows by Emmylou Harris and Sarah Snook

Hynde said phone use at museums and concerts ruins experiences and questioned society's obsession with documenting everything

Chrissie Hynde has a bone to pick with concertgoers who would rather watch the show through their phones.

The Pretenders frontwoman, 74, shared a message to her social media on Tuesday, June 2 lamenting fans' filming during concerts, and asking someone to please explain the phenomenon to her.

“Hi All! Question: What is it with people and their phones? Why do people have to know how many steps they take every day? What difference does it make?” she wrote. “But my real question is: why do people have to film or take pictures at concerts or museums? Why???”

Hynde said she'd recently had dinner with country legend Emmylou Harris in London, and the subject of phones at concerts came up.

The “I'll Stand by You” singer said it didn't matter if venues warned attendees in advance that they were not allowed to have cameras — people “feel entitled, even though the artist clearly has asked them not to do it,” she wrote.

Hynde gave a shoutout to Bob Dylan's no cellphone policy at his shows, and said she thought it a shame that people had to seal their phones away in bags instead of just respecting his wishes that the concerts not be filmed.

“It reminds me of monkeys wanking in full view of the people standing around their enclosure.. and frankly, in that case, people deserve to be wanked at because monkeys should not be in an enclosure in the first place.. However, an artist on a stage?” she wrote. “And no one seems to be able to understand why artists don't like it. If you've ever had a mosquito buzzing around your head when you're trying to go to sleep, you will get a vague idea of what it's like to have people filming your show or taking photos while you're on stage.”

Hynde's message then circled back to her conversation with Harris, 79, and said that shortly after, at Harris's show at the Royal Albert Hall, her experience was disrupted by a fan in front of her who filmed the set.

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“The concert was obscured by the bright light of his phone throughout the whole show..,” she said. “(Someone did eventually tell him that he was being rude and his filming was distracting. His response was, ‘Mind your own business.). It happened when I went to see Sarah Snook do her one woman show The Picture of Dorian Gray.”

Hynde said she no longer bothers going to museum exhibitions anymore after a “nightmare” experience at a Vincent van Gogh retrospective, in which “morons [were] holding their phones up in front of the masterpieces so that no one could see them.”

Chrissie Hynde performing in Barcelona in July 2024.
Credit: Xavi Torrent/Redferns/Getty

“My conclusion is: If Jesus Christ were to walk into a room the first thing everyone would do would be to pull out their phone,” she wrote. “Can someone please explain?”

More and more artists have banned phones from their shows. Jack White has long encouraged fans not to take out their phones at his shows, something inspired by a similar policy comedians often enforce when practicing new material.

“Because I don't have a setlist, I really react to the crowd just like a stand-up comedian would,” he told Apple Music in 2018. “If I finish a song and it's ‘Ta da!' and it's crickets, I'm like, well, I don't know what to do now… What I don't like is, is that how they really feel, or are they just not even paying attention because they're not engaged because they're texting?”

Sabrina Carpenter also said last year that she was open to banning phones at her shows after having a great experience locking her phone away at a Silk Sonic concert.

“I've grown up in the age of people having iPhones at shows,” Carpenter told Rolling Stone. “It unfortunately feels super normal to me. I can't blame people for wanting to have memories. But depending on how long I want to be touring, and what age I am, girl, take those phones away. You cannot zoom in on my face. Right now, my skin is soft and supple. It's fine. Do not zoom in on me when I'm 80 years old up there.”

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Source: “AOL Entertainment”