It's been a few days, and I wanted to blog about the experience, but I'm extremely rusty when it comes to writing, and I'm finding it difficult to know how to start.
Perhaps the beginning?
Last October, when the press release was put out that Twenty Øne Pilots would be coming to Vegas during their Emotional Roadshow tour, I attempted (but was unable) to get free tickets to the show through a hook-up at work. (The show is being produced by AEG Live, and the salesperson who handles that account is sometimes able to acquire free tickets to shows from them. Not this time, it turned out.)
So. That was a bit of a bummer, but, you know, life goes on.
Then, last week it was announced by the (fairly) local radio station, X 107.5, that they would be giving out tickets (along with meet and greet passes) all week long.
Monday, I listened to 107 online, but that did no good, since the streaming station is actually delayed by a few minutes. So by hte time you hear them ask for people to call in and win, they've already gotten their winner.
So, Tuesday, I brought a radio in to work, and listened thru that way. The first pair of tickets that were being given away were by the morning show. At 7:21am, they took 5 callers to play 'radio blackjack'. They were then going to take 5 more callers at 8:21, and the two listeners with the best hands would be the winners.
At 7:21, I got through (!!) and was able to play. I wound up staying with a 13, which was not a great hand, but it was one of the top two from the group of five. (The first three listeners before me all busted. The listener after me stayed with a 20.)
At that point they took my information down and told me, that while it was a long shot, if the 5 players from 8:21 all busted, or none of them got higher than a 13, I would be a winner.
I was pretty excited at that point, but not putting all my eggs in my basket.
At 8:21, the next batch of players came in, and, the very first one wound up getting 20, so I was out of the running.
I stopped listening at that point.
Later in the day, though, the mid-day DJ was also giving away tickets. And all you had to do then was be caller 10.
Somehow.... I was.
Super excited at that point, I left work early to go pick up my prize. (The radio station is like 45 minutes away from my work)
When I got home, I told Harper about it, and she was absolutely ecstatic. (She is a really big fan, so this was definitely something that she was happy about.)
The rest of the week passed, with not a whole lot of TØP related news. Oh, Thursday night we realized we didn't own an actual physical CD of theirs. (So we could have them sign it at the meet-n-greet) Part of the drawback to the digital age. Almost all our music is now just files. And how do you have artists sign those?
Anyway, we drove down to Target to remedy that, but Target was sold out of twenty one pilots cds (from their incredibly small cd selection). Wal-mart was also out. And best buy was closed by the time we got there. So we STILL don't own any of their cds.
But we figured, worst case scenario, we could buy something at the meet-n-greet for them to sign.
Finally, Friday rolls around. Day of the show. Oh. I should mention that the papers for the meet-n-greet said to be at the Hard Rock at 3:45pm.
Fridays at my job are SUPER busy, so I was a little bit stressed out about being able to finish everything up in time to be able to make it there on time. But i'm getting ahead of myself.
So, yeah, Friday rolls around. I woke up at 5, and got in to work around 6. Blah de blahd, and busted my butt in order to be able to leave work by 2. The radio station called me around noon, to confirm that i was going, and also to get the name of my 'plus one', because they said that security for the band was being 'extra tight'. (Foreshadowing!)
I left work at 2:10, drove home, and changed my shirt. I don't own any TØP shirts like Harper does, and I felt like all my t-shirts were pretty lame, but wound up going with my ghostbusters one, because, eh, why not. And also 'cuz the new one opened that day.
Harper was wearing her newest twentyonepilots shirt - the red one we got her for her birthday. She had her hair done up and looked pretty awesome. She had a huge grin on her face. She had created a piece of art with the twenty one pilots logo on a piece of cardboard type thing, with "stay alive" printed on it, and she had a red and black sharpie so that we could have the band autograph it. We were pretty much all set. Harper had Steph's camera in her bag, and her phone.
I googled up how to get to the Hard Rock (I've been there before, but I'm not good with directions), and it said that it would take 42 minutes with traffic to get there. It was a few minutes before 3 when we left, so I knew we were cutting it close.
I took a wrong turn on the way (shoulda stayed in my lane boy), which set us back a few minutes more, and also made me extremely upset. But, we wound up getting to the hard rock, and parked at 3:44. We ran thru the parking lot and the casino until we found where we needed to go - there was already a long line of people. We spoke with someone at the box office, who directed us to the line, and we waited.
And waited.
And waited some more.
While waiting, Harper taught me how to use her phone for the pictures, and we discovered that Steph's camera didn't have the memory card in it. :( But at least I'd be able to take a pic with Harper's phone.
Eventually a few 107.5 employees came by and took my name. The line finally started moving after we had been there for almost an hour.
As we were heading in, we got to a first checkpoint, and the security there searched thru Harper's bag, and told her "no water bottles". (Which seemed extrmely random, but whatever.) They also said something that we didn't catch about "no sharpies", but they didn't confiscate the ones Harper had.
We moved on to another line, which was actually outside of the stage, where things were being set up for the show. A stagehand did a catchy little number called "check one, check two" that went on for AGES. We talked about what we would say/ask when we got there. I decided I'd ask them who they liked to race as when playing Mario Kart. Harper was going to ask them their favorite cereal.
And then a security guard came by and told us all the details that would have been REALLY nice to have known earlier:
This was going to be a photo only.
Our hands must be empty when we go in.
The picture would be taken by the band's camera-guy, and then posted on the band's website (twentyonepilots.com/sick) the following day, and would only be up for 48 hours.
If you had any gifts for the band, hand them over now.
Harper gave her art thing to the guy, even though she felt it wasn't really sufficient for a present (and it didn't have her name on it or anything)
We started moving up, and then... it was time.
We walked around the corner, and Josh and Tyler were standing there.
It went VERY fast. I shook both of their hands, (I remember that Tyler had the firmer handshake of the two) and maybe mumbled "nice to meet you" to them both. Or maybe just "hi". Or maybe I told them my name? I really don't recall, sadly.
Then we stood in between them, and...
And then we were escorted out. I turned back to them and said, "Thanks, you guys are both awesome."
And that was it.
I unfortunately need to get ready for work, so I'll blog part two (the actual concert events) later.
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