One problem. Sherlock Holmes. I had an exam that morning in my college Lit class that I couldn't miss. I went and took my exam (which I got graded a D on by the way, I blame pre-concert excitement... Or more so the fact that I was starting to not care about school in general) and then we were off to First Ave by 9:30am.
We were numbers 28 and 27 in line, which to us was the best thing in the world. The MN street team had made official name tags with our official numbers on them. Beth brought homework and did an entire book report while sitting in the sidewalk outside of first ave. We brought pillows and blankets and a whole grocery store worth of junk food. I even dressed in camp out clothes to "look like a Hanson fan" and try to blend in. (Which apparently worked because a few girls in Starbucks started talking to me about the show while I was in there to use the restroom. They even said "is she a fan... she looks like a fan!" before they started up a conversation with me) The truth was we were still what we self titled ourselves- "fraud fans." We still didn't know every song, barely knew any aspects of their personal lives and didn't even own more than 1 or 2 of their CDs. But we were exited to be there early to try and get a closer look at the whole experience of a Hanson concert.
Hanson eventually came out in the early afternoon to do this thing called a walk. We still had no idea what that meant or what it was for but we knew one thing. We were not going to leave our spots in line so we volunteered to be the ones that watched everyones stuff while they were out on some walk with Hanson.
A few hours before doors, we ran back to the car to change out of our "camp out" clothes and into our concert outfits. On the way back from our car we had to pass the back door to the venue. I heard the door open and close but I didn't think anything of it until I heard a person clap their hands at the back of our heads. Both beth and I whipped our heads around at the same time then looked back at each other like "is that?... Yep." we slowed our walking and he was smiling at us as he walked toward the tour bus. Our faces immediately lit up and I started giggling and grabbing on to Beths arm. Apparently Zac Hanson thought this was amusing because he stuck his head back around the corner of the bus to watch our reactions again. This time I couldn't help it I let out a small girly squeal which immediately was covered by my own hand covering my mouth in embarrassment. We had just had our first up close and personal encounter with a Hanson brother.
It came time for doors and we rushed in to the venue (after being flagged with underage black Xs on the back of our hands of course) we opted for the closest spot to the stage, which was 2nd row directly in front of Isaac. Taylor's side was already up to 3 or 4 people deep.
The concert was awesome. It's hard to explain to anyone who has never experience it, but all the waiting all day paid off and it makes the concert experience better than normal just by being that close to the band in action. Being so close to Isaac in particular was great. If he catches your eye, he will lock a gaze with you for what seems like forever. It made the concert that much more personal and meaningful. I remember the song "Get Up And Go" was a real bonding moment for Isaac and Beth and myself.
From where we were standing and the height of the stage we couldn't see Zac at all up on his drum set. I made a mental note to not let that happen again next time we were choosing our spots to stand. Zac came down to where we could see him during the acoustic set and I remember him looking quite primate- like which is not my favorite look on him. (Let it be known, the less hair on Zac Hanson, the better. In my book anyway.) For the past 9 months, it had been my goal in life to get a picture with Zac... So while he was over on the piano (btw when did that happen?!) belting out a song we didn't recognize ("On the Rocks") beth and I turned around and took our picture with Zac in the background on the piano. It was my favorite photograph for a long time.
My favorite memory from this concert came during the encore- "Ugly Truth" while Taylor was bouncing around on stage and getting into the song. He decided to plop down onto the edge of the stage in front of me. I was freaking out, beth was freaking out and then Taylor Hanson reached past the girls head in front of me and grabbed onto my hand. The second he let go I started high pitch screaming like a 12 year old girl. Hanson seems to have that effect on people... Well maybe its just me. Also, as Taylor and Isaac were both exiting the stage, they both stopped and looked directly at us and waved goodbye.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNLl065x75U
It wasn't until we got home and we were watching our video clips of the concert back that we decided that we had liked a certain song but we couldn't figure out exactly who was singing it or what the song was called. Thanks to google and YouTube we found out the song was a Beatles cover called "Oh Darling!" and Zac sang lead on it. Now that we knew who sang it an what it was called, we learned the song better in hopes that we would hear it again the next time we were to see them. We were suddenly hooked and couldn't wait to see them again. I looked up their tour schedule and calculated road trip times- Chicago (6 hour drive), Des Moines (3.5 hour drive) and Wichita (5 hours drive) were our next closest options. We had done a couple of road trips to see a music group before we liked Hanson, but somehow this felt different. This other music group we traveled a bit to see knew us by name and were always surprised and happy to see us. Apart from the few eye contact moments with Isaac and the clapping incident with Zac, Hanson barely knew we existed. Taking a road trip for Hanson was different. It was more about the love of the music. We didn't want to miss too much school so we opted for the closest drive, the Des Moines, Iowa show. We immediately started counting down- exactly 40 days until our next Hanson concert!
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