So Mandie, Holly and I walked down into the main ampitheater to watch them do Barbie Doll, all the while wondering if Sarah would A) remember to look for wristbands B) find any wristbands and C) come meet us back at the gate even if she couldn’t find any to let us know that. Emily, Sarah and Jedd doing Barbie Doll with Jack was so much fun and we were like one-two people away from the stage for it. It was a pretty cool angle, although the two guys in front of us were super tall and my arms definitely were feeling it taking video of that song haha When the song was over, we watched them walk off, and walked back over near the gate to wait and see what would happen.
We didn’t want the security lady to think we were trying to go where we didn’t belong or were annoying so we sat on a stone wall across the way so we could still see in the gate since it was open. We watched people go in and out of backstage, wondering what would happen. About 10 minutes or so went by when all the sudden we see someone walking toward the gate with flashes of green. As the person approached, we realized it was Sarah with wristbands in hand! We got up off the wall and met her at the gate and came face to face with the same security lady. Sarah looked at the lady, flashed her the bracelets and with a look of triumph said again, ‘Can they come back now?’ The lady said, “yep,” and Sarah handed each of us a VIP wristband.
We walked back to the bus with Sarah, and there were a lot more people on it than the day before. Everyone was just hanging out, and Troy was there and we told him how nice his sign looked on the bathroom door haha We also saw the purple wall hanging on the window in the front of the bus for everyone to see. It looked really cool there above the table. We sat and talked to Troy for a bit, while everyone else was going in and out of the back of the bus. He said, “Who wants to start a party with me? Come on, I’m trying to get one started” and he grabbed his guitar. He started playing La Bamba haha Then Emily came on the bus and he told her to sing French Blues or something. Not sure how that gets the party started, but it was really funny. Emily sounds amazing singing anything, and it was kind of neat to hear her make up her own “French Blues” song. Jedd and Sarah had been trying to figure out what song they were singing with Jamey Johnson that night, but when they came out from working on that, the one tour manager said we had to clear the bus because they were doing interviews. Sarah walked off the bus with us and we thought she had to do interviews, but lucky for us, she didn’t.
Sarah, Holly, Mandie and I started walking across the open lot backstage, and Sarah recited the words to “Copperhead Road”, which was the song she and Jedd would be performing with Jamey Johnson. None of us knew the song, but it was pretty cool to watch Sarah walk along with us and tell us the whole song, like we were at a poetry reading or something She was pretty proud of herself that she remembered them all after just looking at them a few minutes prior. After she recited the words she asked if we liked Jamey Johnson and looking back, I have to laugh because Jamey Johnson is probably one of my least favorite country artists. But Sarah LOVES him haha She told us how nice he is and how “real” his music is. We told her we didn’t know much of his music, though “In Color” isn’t bad. Sarah was so excited to be singing with Jedd with Jamey Johnson, and although we don’t like him, we were really excited for them.
As we were still walking, Sarah then asked if we knew Copperhead Road and we told her no. She told us how it was a Steve Earle song. I wish I could remember exactly how Sarah explained the song to us, because the look on her face and the way she described the song caught my attention and had me interested. I think she said the song was about Vietnam maybe? It’s definitely about a war. She asked if we knew anything about Steve Earle/any of his music. I told her, “Anything I know about Steve Earle is from the Sugarland song” haha At this point we’d stopped walking and stood in a circle on a grassy area backstage. Sarah asked about Sugarland’s song “Steve Earle” and Holly got out her iPod touch, which luckily has the external speaker, and played the song for her. We all swayed along to the song and in the middle of it, Sarah was like “Oh, I have heard this from the record!” When it was over, we all cracked up and Sarah said how she enjoys Sugarland a lot as well.
Of course we gushed about how much we loved Sugarland and LBT. It might have been at that point when Holly and I brought up seeing Sarah rocking out to LBT the night before from side stage. I asked, “If you go watch them tonight from side stage do you need some people to rock out with?” She nodded and said, “Yeah definitely! Jedd and I have to rehearse later for playing with Jamey tonight but if we’re done then for sure.”
Again, I wish I could remember the exact order of the rest of the conversation, although at the same time, it kind of jumped around to different topics anyway. I think it was after talking about Sugarland LBT when she asked me if I’d seen her tweet to me from the night before about the letter I’d written her. She asked if I’d seen it and I told her I had and she said, “Jedd and I cried reading your letter.” That floored me. I’m pretty sure we hugged and I know I told her that I cried reading her tweets in the middle of the show.
While the four of us were standing there together, it was so comfortable, like the three of us were just simply catching up with Sarah. We talked about music. We talked about being on tour. We talked about friendship. We talked about life in general. We must have stood there talking with Sarah for a half hour.
At one point, Sarah said to us, “I know how awkward being in your 20’s can be. There’s school and work and real life and you kind of feel like you’re torn between all these different things. And you wonder what you’re going to do with your life and what’s going to happen.” That’s when she told us again, “Open your heart to life’s possibilities, they’re out there. You’ll find them.” She looked us in the eye as she said all that, as if she was urging us to believe her and just keep holding on. When she looked at me, it’s like we shared an understanding; that somehow she knew her words were what I needed to hear.
Another cool moment was when we were talking about music and how when we’re sad or angry we all just put music on to get those emotions out and Sarah was telling us how she listens to really angry music when she’s upset so she doesn’t have to write it, or something like that haha I said, “My playlist when I’m having a bad day is Remedy and Mississippi’s Crying on repeat”, and Sarah asked me to remind her how Remedy went because it’d been a long time since she’d heard Remedy, even though it’s her own song. Of course, it was one of those moments where I could sing Remedy no problem from memory any other time, but since Sarah had asked me I totally blanked haha
So Holly got her iPod back out and put it on for us to hear. It’s one of my favorite songs of Sarah’s, and I’ve been dying to hear her actually sing it. Sarah held Holly’s iPod up to her ear so she could make sure to hear it. It was pretty funny to see her listening to herself on Holly’s iPod because she really didn’t remember how the song went, but was totally swaying along. Until the one part “Everything you’ve locked away is beautiful and it’s ok” came on. She totally busted out singing the next line, “Let it out, let me in.”
Towards the end of the song she said, “Me and Jedd should cut this,” to which I replied, “Yes please!” Then she explained, “I just feel bad because you know, Fleetwood Mac is a big influence of Little Big Town’s…Fleetwood Mac is my only influence. So I always feel bad because this sounds Little Big Townish. I just wouldn’t want to step on any toes, not that I could or would, you know what I mean? But this sounds like a Little Big Town song.” I had honestly never thought that about Remedy until Sarah said it, but I could definitely see what she meant. I think that just means that she and Little Big Town need to collaborate ASAP haha I didn’t tell her that though…maybe next time.
While we were standing there, Jedd walked by and asked Sarah if she was ready to rehearse some more. We told Sarah we were going to get food and we’d meet her back at the bus later when LBT’s set was about to start to see if she was done. From there, we wandered out to the concourse and attempted to find food. Once we finally decided to try the sub place, we found out they didn’t have any bread left…uh ok haha We walked backstage still hungry and we went to sit outside the bus again to figure out what to do. As we were sitting there, Troy walks by with a plate of food that looked really good. We wondered if with our wristbands we would be able to get catering, too. While we were deciding if we should try to go find it, Troy sees us and says, “Little Big Town is around the bus! Go say hi to them!” The three of us looked at him in disbelief. We thought he was teasing us ha He said, “No really, they’re right over there! You should go say hi.” We laughed and said bye to him as he got on the bus to eat his food.
Mandie, Holly and I got up from where we were sitting and decided to try to find catering since we were still really hungry. We take 2 steps and there coming around the bus next to us is Kimberly! Troy really wasn’t lying when he said Little Big Town was right around the corner haha She notices us and stopped to say hi. I’m pretty sure we got hugs, too. I told her that we came back because we had so much fun yesterday in Charlotte and she laughed and said she was glad. We said bye to her and continued on with our quest for catering. We walked another couple feet and saw Jimi and Karen walking in our direction. We called out hi to them as we all walked by each other, and they waved and said hi and that it was good to see us.
First part of our quest for catering? Epic fail. After wandering around backstage we definitely couldn’t find it, and felt awkward walking around aimlessly because we didn’t want to look like we didn’t belong back there. During our search we saw other people with the same wristbands eating, which made us feel a little better about looking for it, but were still bummed we couldn’t find it; not to mention, still hungry. We walked back towards the bus in hopes to find someone we could possibly ask. Lucky again for us, we saw Emily walking toward the bus too with food in hand. We called her name and she turned around and stopped as we caught up to her. I begged, “Emily can you help us? We tried to get food on the concourse but they didn’t have any bread left and we’re starving. Can you tell us where catering is?”
Emily totally saved the day and gave us directions to the little building where catering was, and who to go to so we could pay to get the little ticket to go through the buffet line. We thanked her profusely and she said, “If you can’t find it or have any problems let me know.” Such a sweetheart. On our way again, this time we walked by Phillip and he stopped to give us all hugs. He told us it was great to see us again. Another total sweetheart. Love him. We found the building she was talking about, which turns out, was right where we had been looking before. I guess we just assumed catering would be an outside thing, but it wasn’t. Eventually we got our little ticket and found the other room where the food was. There were a bunch of people in there eating, but just as we were finishing going through the line a table opened up and we sat down. As we’re sitting there eating, I looked up and saw Heidi Newfield sitting at the table next to us haha We didn’t say hi to her, but I thought that was pretty neat anyway haha We also saw Chelsea, the girl who handed out stuff about the Blue Bird Café in the tent and she came over and sat with us to eat. It was cool to talk to her and share dessert haha
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