Thursday night shows.

Night of the Shows: Part II

Featuring

Matt Kearney

The Head and The Heart

& headliners

Florence and the Machine.

and introducing:

Jessica Evans and Shawna Tagler

On the second night of shows, we visited the WaMu Theater in Seattle. We even managed to arrive early so we headed to the "Premier Club" entrance. Nope, not open for another hour. Well alrighty then! Since we directly next door to Safeco Field (where the Seattle Mariners play), there were plenty of sports bars to have a good, cheap beer at. After Shawna downed her brewski, we headed back to the theater where there seemed to be people passing quickly through security, having no issue with getting into the VIP area. Florence, here we come!!

Nope. Wrong again. I walk up, proudly holding 2 tickets in my hand with major anticipation only to be met with a grumpy ticket-scanner guy. He scans my tickets, the proper beep on his little magic machine is not heard, he is dumbfounded. He calls over his supervisor. Said supervisor is confused, as am I and the other 7 people in line behind me. They all have the same tickets, none of which work for unknown reasons.

With each passing moment, the crowd (all 8 of us) is getting more and more heated. After 30 minutes standing out in the bitter cold, and much foul language from the 'gentleman' behind me (it wasn't me, for once!), we were allowed to stand inside while they continued to attempt to figure out the mishap.

Now... a trip to the ticket booth to speak with some sort of a higher-up. Since I seemed to be the only one who had saved the original e-mail from TicketMaster and the only one who could speak without every other word being some sort of a profanity... I was first in line.

The boss-man behind the plate glass window asks my name. Clicks away on his computer. Reaches for the microphone, presses the 'talk' button down, and then says the words that will ring in my ears for days to come.... "Ma'am, I'm sorry but there are no tickets under your name. We have a sold-out show. No tickets are available for purchase."  Oh, dear GOD.  I almost lost it, right there. I can see it now... a soon-to-be 28 year old woman in a dress, curled up in a ball and crying on the street next to the ticket counter. No good.

We continued to haggle with the guy with the power. He says, "Do you want a refund?" to which I reply, "No, I want to see the show."

"I'm sorry, it is a sold-out show, we don't have any tickets."

"Let me stand in the back," I retort.

He pauses, then whispers into the microphone the sweetest words I have heard all week...

"I have 6 tickets."

Whhhhhaaaaaaatttt???!!! No one else in line behind me heard him; they were all too busy dropping F-bombs and demeaning the people who found all this mess at the door. I remain cool, step over to the side. I allow the others to brazenly demand their money back. When there are only a few of us remaining in line, I calmly make my way back to the front of the line and request "Two tickets, please."

Three minutes later, I have them in my hand. Two beautiful, glorious, resplendent, lambent, golden tickets. I turned on my heels, waved Shawna over, and boldly walk to the securtiy checkpoint. A few minutes later, and we are inside. Ahhh... pays off to know how to work your way around a situation. We even got into the theater in time to grab a bottle of water, plate of nachos for dinner and a T-shirt!  Thank you, Mr Higher-Up!

 'Victory Nachos' and 'Conquest Soft-Pretzel,' drowned in cheap, disgusting nacho cheese then washed down with a plastic-filled glass of Chardonnay. Really thought there would be better options, but truly at this point I didn't care.

 The first of a few self-portraits. I'm sure the poor people behind us were sick of the flash in their eyes. This is what happens when you let me out of the house.

 I didn't get a still shot of Matt Kearney, just video. I'll find a couple of good videos and post them soon. In the meantime, this is the band The Head and The Heart. They were amazing!! A little bit folk, a little bit alternative, a whole lot of cool. Makes Shawna and I want to start our own band. She can play guitar (I'll back her up with a sweet riff every once in a while), and I'll rock out on the violin. I'll sing, and she'll harmonize. Somehow she will slap the tambourine, and I will shake my maracas in between it all. Maracas, the instrument... sicko.

 One of the other unfortunate souls who had the messed up tickets helped us with another picture in between bands.

 The band had walked on the stage. She had a pianist, a keyboarder, a few guitar players, drummer, 3 or so back-up singers, and a freaking harp player! So stoked!! And then....

 There she is! Florence, with all of her red-haired glory and flowy dress, walked on stage. What an ASTOUNDING performance. She is just as much of a flower child in person, but she has such an angelic voice. What a powerhouse!

 SO worth all the trouble. (BTW, Shawna was supposed to be doing an 'excited face' too, but she must have forgotten.)

 I still had my "VIP" ticket in my purse. So what if it wasn't valid anymore... I still had the piece of paper that let me back there after the show was done. So this is where we WOULD have been, had I purchased the tickets correctly. Free hors d'oeuvres, free cocktails, but a side shot of the stage. We totally had better seats anyways.

Oh well, I was closer to her. Nah-na-na-na-nah!

Ahhhh.... tomorrow, off to Ashland!!