Thursday May 27th, I went to the Country Throwdown Tour in Charlotte with my friend Holly. We really had no idea what to expect from this tour. All I was hoping for was to see Emily, Sarah and Jedd play, because LBT was on the main stage so I knew I'd see them; and to maybe get an LBT meet & greet. Oh boy, little did I know.
Holly and I got there around 12:30 and found the table to pick up our wristbands for our LBT meet & greets. Check one thing off the list :) This was Holly's first time seeing LBT live, let alone meeting them, so I was so excited to be able to be there for that. We also were listed for a wristband for a meet & greet for Sarah. We weren't sure what a Sarah meet & greet really meant, but we hoped to be able to talk to them after their set to make sure we knew what to do.
Once we got in the venue and walked around, we eventually found where everything was. We won some free stuff at some of the tents, and then staked out our spots right against the barricade in front of the Outlaw stage where Emily West was playing. Emily came out and rocked it. She saw us and waved and if she saw us taking pictures, she'd pose...it was adorable.
After her set, she was signing at the Capitol tent so Holly and I went over there to wait for her to come. We were standing in line, when all the sudden I saw a guy walking around by the Blue Bird Tent which was just across from the Capitol one. The guy was Jedd Hughes, and Holly and I quickly got out of line and went over to say hi to him. I called out his name and he turned around and when he saw us, he got a big smile on his face. He gave both of us big hugs and asked how we were. We talked for a few minutes, and we told him that we couldn't wait to give him and Sarah their surprise. He told us that they were excited too and had been trying to figure out what it might be. We said we'd see him later and we went back to get in line for Emily.
When Holly and I got up to the table, Emily gave me a big hug and I introduced her to Holly. Then I gave Emily a bracelet I'd made her and when I showed it to her her eyes lit up. She told me, "I haven't been feeling well with my allergies today and I really needed a pick me up. Thank you so much Michelle, you're so sweet." So I tied the bracelet on her wrist, and we took a picture. Emily had burned her own CDs to sell since her record still isn't out, and when I went to buy one, she gave me one for free. Then Holly got her picture and we asked her if she needed any help. She said she had to go do press at the moment but she'd come find us afterwards and we could help her sell stuff. That actually didn't end up happening because Emily took a much needed nap instead, but she tweeted Holly apologizing to us for not finding us, it was cute.
After we got food and picked at it, we staked out our spot in the Blue Bird tent right in front of the stage. While Holly and I were sitting on the ground eating the equivalent of 1 chicken tender, all the sudden we saw someone standing next to us; we look up and it's Sarah! We called out her name and she turned around and was SO excited to see us. It was kind of funny in an awkward way because Holly and I had stuff in our laps and couldn't get up right away haha But once we stood up she gave us each a huge hug. She and Jedd finished setting up their stuff on the stage, and then their set began. It was them with Walker Hayes, who I hadn't heard of before, but quickly grew to love. He's awesome! And hilarious.
At the beginning of the set, Sarah pulled out her shaker and tambourine and I jokingly said, "Sarah, do you have another tambourine?" She heard me and replied, "Yeah I do!" And pulled out another one and handed it to me. Then she asked if anyone wanted her shaker and she went to hand it out to someone and I thought she was going to give it to Holly, but then she said, "Give it to that man" and I was like who? Turns out, she wanted Holly to hand it to my dad! haha When I realized she wanted my dad to use it, I told her that was my dad. Sarah's eyes got big and she said, "That's your dad?! You're Michelle's dad?! We love Michelle!" So Holly gave Sarah's shaker to my dad, and while Walker played his first song, we used Sarah's stuff as we stood in front of the stage. I had thought that Sarah gave me the tambourine for that purpose-to play it while I stood in the audience. I should have known better.
After Walker finished his first song, it was Sarah and Jedd's turn to play. They started with Outside My Window, and Sarah and Jedd told me, and my dad to get up there to do the song with them. This other random girl also came up on stage as well. It was unbelievable to stand up on the little stage in between Sarah and Jedd as they played Outside My Window. It was so much fun to play the tambourine with Sarah Buxton and to look over at her during the song and just laugh and smile and sing along.
It was honestly something I will never forget. After Outside My Window, I went back and stood next to Holly and jammed to the rest of Walker and Sarah and Jedd's set. When they were done playing, Holly and I got in line to get a picture with Walker, and we waited for Sarah and Jedd to finish meeting people so we could see when we could give them their surprise. Holly and I had gotten wristbands marked for Sarah and Jedd for some sort of meet & greet, but none of us had any idea really what that meant. Joe, one of the tour managers, was sweet enough to explain to them and us what our wristbands meant. He told them that they could take us backstage with them/to their bus as long as they escorted us. Sarah and Jedd were pretty excited about that and really wanted to know what their surprise was.
One last couple came up to them as we were about to leave and while they talked to Sarah, Holly and I stood with Jedd and talked with him. I forget now how we got on the subject, but we started talking about Sesame Street. Jedd told us about how Sesame Street was his introduction to Blue Grass music, which I thought was really interesting. I told him he and Sarah should sing on Sesame Street, and he said it's a huge honor if you're asked to do that. That somehow led into Jedd telling us that he has an alter ego haha I asked Jedd if his alter ego had a name, and he replied, "Bert, you know, like Bert and Ernie" and then he started singing Rubber Ducky. It was awesome haha
Sarah and Jedd then led us backstage and on to their tour bus. It was really cool to actually see/sit inside one. They introduced us to Dave Pahanish and Troy Olsen who are also part of the Blue Bird singer-songwriter tent. Holly and I sat down and Sarah got us Dr. Pepper lol There were 2 other women on the bus that Dave had been talking to, so while Sarah and Jedd put their stuff away, we talked to Dave, Troy and the 2 women. Dave is incredibly entertaining and was really nice to us, and Troy is a sweetheart. Dave brought up an interesting topic of conversation and I have never laughed so hard in my life. It was so funny, that Sarah called her fiancee, Tom, and had Dave talk to him about it. After that conversation wound down, Sarah and Jedd looked at us and Sarah asked, "So where is it?! What's the surprise?!" It was adorable. Then Dave asked if there would be a big unveiling or something and we laughed.
I took the "Purple Wall" out of my bag and Holly and I un folded it. As soon as we unfolded the fabric, Jedd and Sarah's mouths dropped open. They were like "Is this...what is this?! Is this a purple banner for us?!" We told them, "It's your own purple wall" and they FLIPPED out. Sarah started jumping up and down a little and she and Jedd kept looking at it. Holly and I told them that the cloud was to represent Outside My Window and Big Blue Sky, the radio was for Radio Love, the ice cream cone was f or That Kind of Day plus Sarah loves ice cream, and the beer bottle was for the "beer bottle solo" inside joke from their UStream chats. (Go watch all the archive ones under teammuffin and buxtonhughes if you've never seen them...SO MUCH FUN). Dave and Troy thought the Purple Wall was pretty awesome. Troy joked, "Where's my sign? Next time y'all need to make me one too."
Dave suggested then that Sarah and Jedd should play for us on the bus. He said, "It's one thing to see someone up on a stage and play for a crowd. It's another to have them sing just for you." Sarah and Jedd we re all for it, and Jedd borrowed Dave's guitar. They sang Outside My Window and Sarah danced around the bus with the Purple Wall...it was amazing. When they were done, Sarah was still so excited and yelled "TWIT PIC! WE NEED TO TWIT PIC THIS!" Holly and I handed our cameras to Troy and he gladly snapped away pictures.
While Troy was taking the pictures, he asked Jedd, "Where's your enthusiasm?!" And Jedd replied, "What? This is my sexy Australian face!" Finally, when we got to Sarah's Twit Pic, this is the face he made.
After we were done taking pictures, Sarah and Jedd had to go do their press, so we walked with them to the press trailer, which was on the way to the gate where Holly and I had to go out. By that time, it was almost time to go to the Little White Church tent for the LBT m&g, so that's where we went. There, we met back up with my parents, who also had a m&g because my mom won the Little White Church contest that I entered her in haha While we were waiting, I somehow spotted Emily walking around and we went up to her and said hi. She asked us if we'd gotten her tweet, and we told her we had, and she apologized again for not meeting back up with us.
We told her it was cool and we totally understood. Then she asked if we knew where they had any Blue Moon hahaha Poor girl was on a hunt for it, but couldn't find it so she had to settle for some other brand and shell out $12. Her face was pretty funny when the guy told her that's how much it was. She asked us if we wanted to come back with her and hang out some more, but we couldn't because our LBT m&g was about to start :( So we gave her more hugs and said bye, then went to get in line for the m&g.
My parents were towards the front of the line, while Holly and I stayed towards the back. My parents were secretly excited to meet LBT again, which made me happy. Eventually it was my turn because Holly made me go first. I walked up to them and said hi to Jimi and gave him a hug. Then it was Karen and she smiled at me and said, "There's our faithful Twitter follower!" I thought that was cute. I hugged Kimberly and Phillip was well, and as I got in between Karen and Kimberly for the picture, I said, "I've missed you guys, it's been forever" and the girls agreed. Then I told them that I've graduated college since I last saw them and they were all like 'Oh wow!' and Karen told me congrats.
Then it was Holly's turn and somewhere in there Kimberly, Phillip and I started talking about the Little White Church video and how awesome it is. They were really excited that we love the song so much. The guy who takes the pictures overheard me telling Phillip that Holly was my best friend and asked if we wanted a picture together with them, so after Holly got her's, we got one together and I stood next to Kimberly. Then Holly and I went to leave the tent and go find our seats, which happened to be when they were escorting LBT out of the tent to backstage. Somehow I got caught up in the crowd of people and ended up in the middle of Karen and Phillip haha I said bye again and told them to look for us in the 2nd row where we'd be rocking out.
Little Big Town was incredible as always. True to their word, they all saw us at some point during the show and smiled/waved/sang to us. It was so great. The new songs "Why Oh Why", "The Reason Why" & "Runaway Train" are AMAZING. I'm SO excited for the new CD on August 24th. After LBT's set, Sarah, Jedd and Walker came out on the main stage to sing 2 songs in between sets. The lame security guard wouldn't let us stand in front of where they were playing because we couldn't see from our seats, even though no one was sitting there the entire show. Eventually Holly and I went back up on the concourse and were sitting at a picnic table, wishing we could've said goodbye to Sarah and Jedd.
All the sudden I turned to Holly and said, "I have a proposition...it could be epic, but you'll probably say no." She agreed to hear it, as long as she could veto it if she didn't want to do it. I said, "What if we got tickets to Raleigh tomorrow and went there instead of Speed Street with Mandie? I'll call Mandie and see if she'd want to come so we could all still hang out, and we'll go pick her up in the morning and go. That way we'd at least get to see Sarah and Jedd after their set to say thank you and goodbye." She thought about it, and between the weather looking awful for Speed Street, our amazing time that day, and not getting to really say thank you to Sarah and Jedd, she agreed. I called Mandie, and she convinced her parents and our plan was in motion...which, little did I know at the time, would somehow top this day, and will lead to my next blog entry :)
We told her it was cool and we totally understood. Then she asked if we knew where they had any Blue Moon hahaha Poor girl was on a hunt for it, but couldn't find it so she had to settle for some other brand and shell out $12. Her face was pretty funny when the guy told her that's how much it was. She asked us if we wanted to come back with her and hang out some more, but we couldn't because our LBT m&g was about to start :( So we gave her more hugs and said bye, then went to get in line for the m&g.
My parents were towards the front of the line, while Holly and I stayed towards the back. My parents were secretly excited to meet LBT again, which made me happy. Eventually it was my turn because Holly made me go first. I walked up to them and said hi to Jimi and gave him a hug. Then it was Karen and she smiled at me and said, "There's our faithful Twitter follower!" I thought that was cute. I hugged Kimberly and Phillip was well, and as I got in between Karen and Kimberly for the picture, I said, "I've missed you guys, it's been forever" and the girls agreed. Then I told them that I've graduated college since I last saw them and they were all like 'Oh wow!' and Karen told me congrats.
Then it was Holly's turn and somewhere in there Kimberly, Phillip and I started talking about the Little White Church video and how awesome it is. They were really excited that we love the song so much. The guy who takes the pictures overheard me telling Phillip that Holly was my best friend and asked if we wanted a picture together with them, so after Holly got her's, we got one together and I stood next to Kimberly. Then Holly and I went to leave the tent and go find our seats, which happened to be when they were escorting LBT out of the tent to backstage. Somehow I got caught up in the crowd of people and ended up in the middle of Karen and Phillip haha I said bye again and told them to look for us in the 2nd row where we'd be rocking out.
Little Big Town was incredible as always. True to their word, they all saw us at some point during the show and smiled/waved/sang to us. It was so great. The new songs "Why Oh Why", "The Reason Why" & "Runaway Train" are AMAZING. I'm SO excited for the new CD on August 24th. After LBT's set, Sarah, Jedd and Walker came out on the main stage to sing 2 songs in between sets. The lame security guard wouldn't let us stand in front of where they were playing because we couldn't see from our seats, even though no one was sitting there the entire show. Eventually Holly and I went back up on the concourse and were sitting at a picnic table, wishing we could've said goodbye to Sarah and Jedd.
All the sudden I turned to Holly and said, "I have a proposition...it could be epic, but you'll probably say no." She agreed to hear it, as long as she could veto it if she didn't want to do it. I said, "What if we got tickets to Raleigh tomorrow and went there instead of Speed Street with Mandie? I'll call Mandie and see if she'd want to come so we could all still hang out, and we'll go pick her up in the morning and go. That way we'd at least get to see Sarah and Jedd after their set to say thank you and goodbye." She thought about it, and between the weather looking awful for Speed Street, our amazing time that day, and not getting to really say thank you to Sarah and Jedd, she agreed. I called Mandie, and she convinced her parents and our plan was in motion...which, little did I know at the time, would somehow top this day, and will lead to my next blog entry :)
No comments:
Post a Comment