The Concert Story Hour

When I first sat down to write this post, I had this whole introductory section that focused on how I had been reminiscing after dropping off my best friend Hailea at a concert on February 20. I had been laying on my bed, looking through my huge Google photos album that's just a compilations of every concert I've ever been to -- minus the first one as I have no evidence of it -- and I was getting incredibly nostalgic.

I have a lot of stories from concerts that I love to tell. And I really, really love telling stories right? So, naturally, the conclusion I came to was I wanted to make a post where I tell those stories.

Wow, let me just say, I didn't realize how big of an undertaking this would be.

I thought I could do it easily while Hailea was at her concert but it turns out I was entirely wrong.

Since this post was supposed to go up last week but didn't because I didn't finish it in time, I had to scrap the introduction. It didn't make sense to set a scene that just...didn't apply anymore.

It's now almost a week later and I am just now sitting down, ready to write more of these stories again.

Actually, truth is, I am unbelievably stressed out right now and, instead of doing homework and other projects, I wanted to reminisce some more, so that's what we're doing now.

I started going to concerts when I was like 9 years old. didn't really start picking up more and more of them until I was in college but they've always been something I've really greatly enjoyed.

This post goes back as far as me being 11 years old and goes as recent as couple weeks ago. I've been fortunate to see a lot of really incredible shows over probably the last couple years more so than the last decade. I walk out of every show with at least one story to tell from it, and I know I'm very fortunate for that.

I've told most of these stories before, typically to my friends, but I've also shared some of them on the podcast I co-hosted last spring, Casual Vibrations. I wanted to give the stories new light, though, through my own writing.

So if we're going to do this right, we've got to go all the way back to the beginning -- or at least as far back as I can remember -- and work our way back up to earlier this month.

Buckle up: this one's going to be a long one.

That time my mom pulled me out of school to take me to my second concert ever

May 2012 -- I was 11 years old at the time, in the final month of my sixth grade year. Back then, my parents had a deal with my two siblings and I -- if we got straight A's in a semester, they would reward us with something. I don't remember if there were parameters or not, I'm sure there were.

My first semester receiving letter grades, the fall of my sixth grade year, I got straight A's and all I wanted was one thing.

See, I never really got into boy bands when I was younger. Never really cared about One Direction or even Big Time Rush (at least, not until I was older). But, for some reason or another, I really loved The Wanted. Not to the extent that preteen girls stereotypically love boy bands, but I really liked them.

And as it turned out, they were playing this show in Chicago (Rosemont, technically,) that the local radio station (103.5 KISS FM) put on every year at the time, called Fantabuloso. Ten artists and bands were slated to play it but all I cared about was The Wanted.

But it was a Friday, and I had class until 3:20p.m.. Regardless, my mom agreed to take me -- she may or may not admit it, but she also loved The Wanted. Since we couldn't wait until I'd get home around 4 to leave or else we'd be pretty late, my mom picked me up from school during my eighth period science class. I had never been pulled out of school early at that point in time, and that just made it so much more exciting for me. I was shaking in my seat, filled to the brim with excitement, and when the secretary over the intercom told my teacher to send me down to the office with all my things, I couldn't run out of there fast enough.

To this day, the details of the actual show remain pretty foggy to me, but every time I look up who exactly played, I lose my mind. I remember exactly four artists from that day. Obviously, The Wanted, could never forget them. I remember Enrique Iglesias was the technical headliner -- I remember this because my friends at the time loved him. And I also remember knowing Carly Rae Jepsen was there, but I had somehow never seen her prior to that to know what she looked like, and I knew exactly zero of her songs outside of "Call Me Maybe," so we had no idea when she was on stage. The other band I remember, we actually originally thought was Carly Rae Jepsen, but it turned out to be Karmin. They're a brother-sister duo who no longer make music under that name, but I remember my mom and I really fell in love with them then. We danced throughout their entire set, and, despite the fact there are six other bands on the lineup I can never remember, I will always remember them, even though I didn't know who they were until we looked it up later. But hey, I own two of their three albums on CD, so that helps too.

For what it's worth, these were the other six bands/artists on that lineup:

Adam Lambert
B.o.B.
Cobra Starship
DEV
Gym Class Heroes
Havana Brown

So please, understand how I lose my mind every time I think about how great of a lineup that was in 2012, and how much I kick myself for not remembering most of it.

That time I was three feet away from Brendan Urie

March 2017 -- I've told story on another post before, but I'm about to tell it again, because this concert really changed a lot for me.

My brother and his friend had a spare ticket to see Panic! At the Disco on their Death of a Bachelor Tour and, since we were (still are) close, he invited me to join. I'm not going to lie, I barely knew anything by Panic! at the time. Like any other casual music listener, I pretty much just knew their singles that got radio play. I agreed to go, mainly because at the time, I had only been to roughly four concerts before this and I genuinely enjoyed them and wanted to take the opportunity to go to another one. So I tried to prep for the concert, borrowing my brother's CD to listen to on my way to badminton practice and back that morning, but I never actually got any farther than track two. I got really into "Don't Threaten Me With a Good Time" that morning and just kept repeating the track.

So, needless to say, I went into the concert fairly blind. We had floor seats, too, at the Allstate Arena. But we were in the back of the floor and I am not a very tall person, not then at 16 and not now at 21, and the people in front of us were tall as hell. So I couldn't see almost anything. But what I could hear, wow, it was amazing.

At some point, closer to the end of the set than the beginning, Brendon Urie was suddenly right next to us. And, yeah, to me at least, it felt sudden. I look to my left and a piano is revealed from under a sheet. Next thing I knew, my brother and his friend were nudging me forward with the crowd so one, I could see, and two, I'd be literally right there on the banister. It was the one chance I was given to actually see anything at all at this concert, and I tried to take full advantage. When he got off the piano, he did his "death walk" -- which means he sang "Death of a Bachelor" while walking through the crowd back to the stage. As he started this walk, he was three feet in front of me.

To me back then, this was a huge deal, a moment I'd tell all my friends about for weeks until they were sick of me telling them. To me now, it's not that cool of a moment. Perhaps it's because I lost a lot of my connection to Panic!'s music, perhaps it's because I've had way cooler and way more genuine interactions with artists over the years, that this one feels so lack luster to me now. But it's still a fun tidbit I love telling people who actually know who he is. And I do wish I could go back and relive it, sometimes, because I want that kid in a candy store feeling back that I had just after this concert.

Truth is, at the time, this concert meant a lot to me for that moment, and looking back, I really truly wish I could do this story justice. Now, nearly five years later, it means a lot to me because of everything that came afterwards. Look, most days I don't know if I believe in fate or whatnot, but that concert changed a lot for me. From that moment on, I was no longer just a casual listener of music. It launched a period of discovery for me, where I really fell into and found the genres I call home. It opened my eyes to the world of pop punk, which then pushed me into punk and metal, and, even though they're not the only genres I listen to, they're the ones I can easily say I love the most. And I cannot say I would've found them as soon as I did, had it not been for this concert. And I can easily say I've been chasing that feeling I had at this concert ever since.

That's why this story makes this post. As a testament for everything a concert and music can do, if it's the right thing for the right person -- that, and for old time's sake, and, most importantly, for that kid in a candy store feeling.

That time a band was genuinely concerned for our wellbeing because we were on ice

April 2018 -- With two more concerts under my belt after the Panic! At the Disco concert, my brother and I planned on seeing All Time Low in Milwaukee. They were playing Lollapalooza that coming summer, which the contract for has a location/exclusivity clause which prevented them from coming within a certain amount of miles of Chicago on tour a set amount of months before and after the festival, but this show was kind of a work around to that.

How? It was a post-game show to a minor league hockey game.

It wasn't necessarily easy to convince my parents to allow my brother to drive me out of state for a concert, but it was at least a Saturday, so that made it easier to convince them. So after my badminton invite that morning -- the first varsity one I had ever placed at, but that's besides the point -- we got straight into the car and started driving north. We missed the start of the hockey game, but neither of us really cared. I mean, it was minor league hockey.

Near the end of the game, we went downstairs as we had tickets to actually be on the ice for the post-game show. Okay, to be clear, it's not like we were standing on ice. Between us and the ice was a fairly thin rug. They rolled a narrow rug out so we could walk to the middle of the ice where a larger one was waiting for us. To this day, I'm not certain the band knew that.

There's a point in the set, I believe it's right before "Something's Gotta Give" where lead singer Alex Gaskarth usually asks the crowd to get on each other's shoulders. However, they recognized that we were on ice -- that they were performing on a stage put together on top of ice, and that we were standing on ice. Alex was actively telling the crowd not to do it because they were genuinely concerned we'd slip and fall and everyone would get hurt. And I'll never forget the look in his eyes as he's actively warning us against it, and he just sees, slowly but surely, people in the crowd going up on people's shoulders. It was pure concern and fear. Eventually, he gave up, and they played the song anyways. To my knowledge, no one fell.

All Time Low's going to come up at least one more time, so I think it's fair to mention here, they're wild and they're so fun on stage. Their onstage banter are genuinely some of my favorite moments of their shows. At one point in this one, guitarist Jack Barakat was determined to create an inception-style moment. He discovered that they were also on the big screen on the arena and he just kept staring at them on the screen. In between songs, he expressed that all he wanted was to stare at the screen, but in a way that made it seem like he was staring at everyone else. Which, he realized, meant a camera person would have to go up to the screen and film from there, which was borderline impossible and definitely dangerous and absolutely never going to happen. But he tried his best, and I'll commend him for it.

That time I met a band for the first time

July 2018 -- If you've never been to Warped Tour, or have never even heard of it, it can be a fairly difficult thing to explain, as most attempts to recreate it haven't gone well.

Warped Tour was a traveling music festival for alternative music -- anyone from pop punk to metal was welcome on the tour. It was an all-day affair at one city before moving to the next, with around six stages. Each of the bands -- as well as the charities that worked with the festival -- got their own tent for merchandise, where they also did free meet and greets. A lot of artists got their start on Warped, and it's how you would've earned the B.S. that is "street cred" in the scene. I only went to one, in 2018, the last cross-country one, and I can safely say that there's nothing really like it. It's a different atmosphere, but in the best way.

That year, I went in with one goal in mind: meet As It Is. They had quickly become one of my favorite bands after their single in February of that year, "The Wounded World." I really wanted to meet them and I wanted to give them some art that I had created. There were some other artists or bands I wanted to meet too, but they were the ultimate goal.

Look, I'm not an artist, I wouldn't even consider myself to be good in the slightest. But 17-year-old me wanted to give them something, and since they inspired me to start drawing again, I took a step out of my comfort zone and gave them some art I had been working on, along with a letter.

To say I was terrified would be an understatement.

A lot of our plans for the day kind of got thrown up in the air by a rain delay amongst some other factors, but we made sure that we would make As It Is' signing. And we did,

They met people one at a time, so I made my brother go first. I was still working up the courage, but my sister and cousin made it very clear that I was next. My brother had met several artists before and is perhaps the most chill person I've ever seen with that whole thing, I swear. At this point, I mainly just panic internally, but there's definitely still panic.

When my brother's turn ended, he told the guys to be nice to his sister. So when I walked up, I was greeted with "hi sister! We were told to be nice to you."

Which, let me tell you, surprisingly or not, made me even more nervous. But the lads in As It Is are the nicest people in the world.

When I showed them my art, they were so appreciative.

"Holy shit," one of them said.

"Everything alright?" a security guard asked.

"Oh yeah, just absolutely impressed by this art."

I know my artwork wasn't that impressive, but they treated it like it was. And realistically, I know that they probably had to get rid of most the things that they were given throughout Warped, but that interaction was everything to me. It has stuck with me over the years, living in my head fairly rent free. It also encouraged me to keep drawing. I don't think I'll ever have the guts to give my art to someone again like that, but I was so unbelievably happy from that interaction for at least a month afterwards.

And they absolutely could've been acting so impressed, and honestly, they probably were -- my art now isn't that great, so four years ago it wasn't any better -- but they were so nice and kind about it, and so grateful.

Since then, the band has added a member and lost two, but they're easily still the nicest I've met. You don't even have to meet them yourself to get that feeling from that -- listen to any interview they do, see what they post on social medias, see what they write about lyrically -- they're some of the most genuine guys on the scene, and it'll always be so refreshing.

Besides, regardless of what anyone else says, it'll always be the positive interactions that really stick with you the most.

That time a band threw their entire set into the crowd

August 2018 -- In the summer of 2018, Sleeping With Sirens did an acoustic tour across the U.S.. Chicago was the last show of the tour, and it fell just a few days after my birthday, so my mom, my best friend Savannah and I made a day out of it.

And, to be clear, "made a day out of it" means we went to Lincoln Park Zoo in the morning, got lunch, realized we had planned nothing else to do, so sat outside the venue for three ish hours. The building is black bricks, by the way, and it was early August, so it was incredibly hot. We made some mistakes, but it is what it is, we survived. After this one and then the All Time Low Christmas show in December 2018, I learned my lesson about getting there really early for shows.

Seeing a usually heavier band perform their songs in acoustic was kind of wild. It was a seated show (although I believe everyone stood for Sleeping With Sirens' set), which was weird too, and there were tables and everything. Not the kind of set up you anticipate when seeing Sleeping With Sirens. Kellin Quinn would walk across the tables like they were meant for that -- they weren't, but nobody stopped him.

Their last two songs, though, they played in full electric. Just before the last one, Kellin pulled someone up from the crowd who had gotten in trouble with security I think for standing on a chair -- I wasn't sure the reasoning then, and I'm not sure now. He told him just do whatever you want on stage while we do this next song, just have fun with it. So for the last song, there was just some dude throwing around and running around on stage while they played "Kick Me." It was actually kind of unreal.

After that, though, the band started doing the usual of throwing the rest of their guitar picks into the crowd, the set lists, and the drum sticks. But this was the last day of tour, and they likely weren't going to do another tour just like this. So obviously there was only one choice here.

They started throwing everything into the audience -- and I mean everything. The light up palm trees? Into the crowd. The umbrella? Into the crowd. It was the definition of "everything must go."

I was starting college in a few weeks, and you could bet I wanted one of those palm trees. But my mom was there and she was not cool with that. So instead, I got the very cherished memory of this band throwing everything into the crowd and I will never forget that -- hell, I think of it every time I go to a show. And, I guess, I also got one of Nick Martin's guitar picks.

That time I went to a concert alone for the first time

November 2018 -- The first time I ever went to a concert alone was my freshman year of college. It was The Night 103.3 Stole Christmas and that year The Struts, AJR, and CHVRCHES were playing.

I didn't have a particular love of any artist on that lineup at the time, but I did at least vaguely know of all of them. In all honesty, I went to that show because I could more so than because I wanted to.

So because of that, I showed up to the venue about ten minutes before the show was supposed to start at 7p.m.. By the time I get my ticket scanned and everything, I walk out onto the floor of the arena where my seat is with five minutes to spare.

Except the Struts were already playing.

I couldn't believe my eyes. Concerts are typically late and they're sure as hell never early. By the time I emerged onto the floor, they were at least halfway through their first song.

And now in the darkness I needed to find my seat.

The chairs were all folding chairs and their numbers were written in chalk on the seat. I could barely even find my row -- row 3 -- so trying to read the seat numbers was actually impossible. I made an educated guess and took a seat.

At the end of the Struts' set, I'm making chit chat with the people around me -- the guy to my right offered me earplugs, the couple to my left talking about life and why they're there that night. Eventually, someone approaches the row in front of us and tells someone that they're in their seat. A tiny misunderstanding ensues, and the people who were in the wrong seats leave to find theirs.

Conversation resumes among our row.

"Could you imagine sitting in the wrong seat?"

"Right? How embarrassing! And then to argue over it on top of it!"

The conversation moves away from that incident, and next thing you know, AJR is on stage. And they're an absolute hoot. So much fun live -- I've seen them now three times since.

At the end of their set, I'm observing my surroundings. Suddenly, in my observations I notice the seat in front of me was labeled "8."

But wait. How could that be? I'm seat 5, how could the seat in the row in front of me that's half the size be seat 8?

And then I realized I was sitting in the wrong seat.

I had started on the wrong side of the isle. I thought I was starting at the beginning, but it turns out I was starting at the end.

I was doing exactly the thing we all agreed was so embarrassing.

But hold on, we're two out of three sets through this show, no one's really coming in at this point anymore, so why hasn't anyone told me I'm in the wrong seat?

So, super casually, I peer down the row, find seat five and I realize. Someone's in my actual seat.

It's a man who's also on his own.

Turns out, we did the exact same thing.

And I, to my knowledge, was the only one who noticed.

My luck that night was through the roof.

That time they discussed microwaves and time shares on stage

December 2018 -- As mentioned previously, All Time Low has some of the best on stage banter, even if it doesn't always make sense.

In 2018, the band played two Christmas shows, one in Chicago and then one in Milwaukee. I was fortunate enough to get tickets for not only myself, but my two best friends and my mom and my sister. Well, my sister and mom got their own tickets and could only get balcony ones. My sister ended up finagling the system and was on the floor with my friends and me, which meant my mom was all alone up in the balcony, surrounded by strangers.

She survived though, albeit a tad bit annoyed to be left behind.

I'm getting ahead of myself here.

Prior to the doors, All Time Low had a pop up shop in the venue. Me being who I am, I really wanted to get there early enough I could get some good merch, because the pop up shop was first-come, first-served. If my memory serves me right, we still got there a lot earlier than anticipated. I want to say somewhere around 2 or 3 in the afternoon.

I ended up buying a blanket at the pop up shop, which is still very well used to this day. But then, it ended up being a life saver.

It was middle of December in Chicago and we had nothing else to do but wait in this line until doors, which were probably around 6 or 7 that evening. It was absolutely freezing outside, and none of us five were dressed well enough for that weather. If I didn't have that blanket to wrap myself up in, I don't know what I would've done. Come close to hypothermia, probably.

Somehow, some way, we survived until doors, but oh boy did we learn our lessons. Fortunately, we warmed up quickly among the crowd.

The Chicago show only had one opener, The Wrecks, so it wasn't long until the boys in All Time Low were on stage.

They've got a total of two whole Christmas songs and only played one, albeit their most iconic one, "Merry Christmas, Kiss My Ass." I will likely never have a chance to see that song live again, so I deeply cherish that moment.

But it wasn't long before their on stage banter began. It started normally, before diverging into chaos relatively quickly. As the video above demonstrates.

The chaos begins when Alex Gaskarth interprets the screaming from the balcony to be someone asking him to buy a timeshare with them. Jack Barakat quickly jumps in on that action. Throughout the course of the show, he keeps coming back to that. They'll be talking about anything else and he'll be like "hey you know what's nice? Park City, Utah. Did you know you get a timeshare there for only" and then continues to spurt some super absurd amount of money. It was constant and always hilarious.

At the end of the show, with one song left, the conversation shifted. I, for the life of me, cannot remember how it got here, but they were debating microwaves, how they worked and how strong theirs were. It went on for a couple minutes. A dead serious, although half-joking, conversation between three grown men on stage regarding microwaves.

Finally though, Alex broke it up.

"Okay, okay. Look, we're going to play this last song and then we're going to walk back stage and continue this discussion about microwaves for like five minutes before coming back and playing three more songs for you."

He threw the whole "surprise" element out the window for the encore, but played straight into the banter in order to get the conversation to end.

I swear to you, I've never laughed more at a concert than I did at that show, or really, any of their shows. They're worth seeing for the laughs, as well as the good music.

That time I met a different band

March 2019 -- The second time I met any band, I had paid for a meet and greet ticket because it was surprisingly not that expensive. And, at the time, I really love State Champs.

The whole VIP experience thing, though, for 18-year-old, freshman in college me was terrifying and anxiety-inducing.

But fortunately, I made a friend almost immediately. She had driven up from Louisville for the show and had actually met the band on many occasions, doing VIP pretty often.

Phew.

State Champs did meet and greets differently. Most bands meet people one at a time as a whole. Instead, they all separated and met people on their own. It unfortunately meant I didn't meet the whole band, but I met three out of five of them and had an actual conversation with them.

And by I did, my new friend mainly did.

Each of the guys we met remembered her, greeting her by name and with a hug.

Immediately though, each time, she introduced me very simply:

"This is my friend from Chicago."

I'll never forget lead singer Derek's response.

"Hi friend from Chicago!" He said excitedly while giving me a hug.

"Okay but also what's your name."

Obviously I told him and whatnot, but my new friend pretty much drove the conversations. I was wracked with nerves. At the time, that was so unbelievably out of my comfort zone, and my friend was an incredible example of how not nerve-wracking it should be.

At the end of the day, they're normal people too.

I guess it helps, though, that I'm far less shy now, three years since, than I was back then.

Another perk of VIP meant we were at the banister for the whole show.

Funnily enough, the one moment from that show I will never forget, wasn't even State Champs set. It was one of the openers, The Dangerous Summer.

For their last song, the lead singer took the microphone and sang from the middle of the crowd. It was a fun moment, but at the end of the song, he just...disappeared. The crew reeled his microphone in, but he was gone.

To this day, I have no idea where he went, how he got out of there so seamlessly. My mind will forever be blown.

Anyways, I tell this story for two reasons:

One, this was the second show I had gone to alone, and the first one I genuinely made a friend at. I've made a friend at every show I've seen alone since, some of which I actually keep up with and try to see shows with. A lot of people don't want to go alone to shows, either because it's nerve-wracking to them or just not worth it. But I can say from experience that it's absolutely worth it. It takes some getting used to and it can definitely feel like stepping out of your comfort zone, but that's not a bad thing! I definitely struggle with social anxiety and I know I had qualms about people judging, but I actually feel it ends up being the opposite. There's no one there that's going to judge you, really, and if they are, you never have to see them again. It's just fun to let loose.

Two, meeting artists can be terrifying, at least that's what I thought. Somehow though after two incredibly terrifying moments, I was pretty over the nerves. Don't get me wrong, they can still be there, but, at the end of the day, they're human too and oftentimes, depending on the artist, they're just in awe that people genuinely care about them and their music.

That time my mom and I went to a show for the third opener and left before the headliner

May 2019 -- There was one week towards the end of May 2o19 where I had three concerts. This was the first of three.

I really love this band called Boston Manor who's from Blackpool, UK. I had just gotten into them a few months prior and fell absolutely head over heels. When I found out they were going to be on tour in the U.S., even just as support for another band I did not know in the slightest, I knew I needed to see them.

So naturally, I did what any broke college student would do, and I asked my mom. Who agreed, even though she had absolutely no idea what she was getting into.

I'm sorry, Mom.

You see, Boston Manor is a punk band. My mom likes pop punk but doesn't really like the heaviness of punk. But she didn't know really anything by Boston Manor at all. She just knew that I would never ask her to go with me to see a band that screamed, and she knew I really really wanted to see them.

We get through the first two bands on the lineup, Drug Church and Trash Boat, and my mom quickly realizes she is not going to enjoy this as much as I am. But it was too late -- we were already there, and she was already halfway through.

Boston Manor gets on stage and I swear the entire crowd was there for them. It was insanely loud and it seemed like everyone knew every word to every one of their songs. When they started playing, my mom and I were towards the back of the crowd. She looked at me and nudged me forward, "go on."

I didn't see my mom again until I sought her out after their set.

I quickly maneuvered my way deep into the crowd and was fulling having a good time screaming the lyrics back and jumping around. But it was short lived.

Boston Manor had started a thing on the last tour they did support for (which was in arenas) that they tried to open the absolute biggest pit possible, the size of the room. The Metro isn't a massive venue, by any means, but the entire floor was a pit, with people running around in circles until the song dropped and the moshing started. It was insane. I had never seen anything like it. I can't do the size of the pit justice, and I still wrack my brain because if our small venue made one that big, how massive were the ones in the arenas?

At this point, I had been moved over to the side. There was one person between me and the pit and the desire to jump in had never been so strong before. But my mom was somewhere in that room and I did not want to give her a heart attack by seeing me in the middle of it all.

Turns out, she was expecting to see me in there and was surprised I wasn't. Although probably a bit relieved.

Their set was glorious, absolutely so much fun. I had forgotten in the midst of it that they weren't the headliner.

When their set was over, I set off to find my mom. It took a surprising amount of time before I reached my mom at the back of the room. Neither of us had ever been to a punk show before, and, while I can say it's definitely my thing, it's not hers. I took one look at her and I was "okay we can go home."

Needless to say, she was confused.

Look, I knew exactly zero songs by Movements, the headliner. I don't think I know any to this day, actually. I didn't need to sit through another set -- at the time, I'd rather leave with the illusion that Boston Manor was the headliner. I was on such a high, I was beyond cool with leaving it there.

So, we made a pit stop at the merch stand where I bought some Boston Manor gear, and then we left.

My first punk show, in my mind, was an absolute success.

That time I saw my favorite band live for the first time and they insulted me

May 2019 -- Two days after the Boston Manor show I was getting ready for what would be the best concert I've ever been to.

I had so desperately wanted to see I Prevail on their TRAUMA tour when they stopped in Chicago. But my brother was adamant that there was no need for it because we were seeing them at Rock USA in July of that year, and that we had bought pit passes for their set. No matter how many times I pleaded for him to see my favorite band with me, he said no.

The joke was on him though.

I ended up getting free tickets.

And I was unbelievably excited. I Prevail was and still is my favorite band of all time. I love them so much. And after waiting for years for them to tour again, I was finally going to be able to see them again. While they were on tour for one of my favorite albums of all time, if not my number one favorite.

I'll never forget that when we got there, it was weird as hell. We had been to so many shows at House of Blues in Chicago before, but this was oddly different. I don't believe they ever scanned our tickets, and I know for a fact we didn't go through an security. And there's always security.

But regardless, we made it in and settled into a place in the crowd where we could see.

When it was time for I Prevail to come out on stage, let me tell you, I was vibrating with excitement. And it was perfect.

I mean, they played nearly every song off TRAUMA, including the ever-emotional "Goodbye (Interlude)" where unclean vocalist Eric definitely teared up -- and I definitely did too. When they played "Every Time You Leave," guitarist Dylan did Delaney Jane's vocals while Eric went off stage. But, ooh, surprise! Eric emerges from backstage with an acoustic guitar near the end of the song. This man -- and he admitted this -- did not know how to play guitar usually. Apparently, he was learning while on tour and finally felt comfortable enough to play a little on stage.

They even played my personal favorite "Rise Above It" with Justin Stone himself, as he was touring with them.

Every part of their set was absolutely magical.

Except one.

And I'll never forget it.

In between songs, co-vocalists Brian and Eric were engaging in a bit of banter with the crowd, They were explaining, at this particular moment, that they're from Michigan, and thus they are Detroit Lions fans. They were all "we can't support your choice of a team here in Chicago but at least we can both agree on one thing" or something.

At this moment, Avery and I look at each in pure panic. Our football senses were tingling -- we knew what was coming next and there was nothing we could do to stop it.

The band started a chant with the crowd -- it pains me to even type this.

"Fuck the Packers!"

The whole venue chanting these three words.

"Fuck the Packers!"

So my brother and I did the only logical thing.

We grabbed each other and held each other close and screamed in panic and pain and disbelief. We were being insulted in our own home by my favorite band.

Amidst all of our panic screaming and their spiteful chanting, Avery and I are both convinced we made eye contact with the band.

I'll never forget that moment.

I've been jokingly planning my super unrealistic revenge ever since.

That time a band threw a guy out of their show for throwing a punch

September 2019 -- Hailea and I went to this concert together, not knowing what to expect in the absolute slightest. Neither of us listened to PUP at all.

I had won tickets to this show in a contest I entered haphazardly, expecting literally nothing to come out of it. 2019 was an insane year.

I only remember one of the openers -- illumanti hotties. I'm sure Hailea might remember the other band(s), but illumanti hotties have come across my feeds so often since, it's impossible to forget them.

The show was fun, for the most part though, nothing really exciting to note. Nothing to write home about, so to speak.

But there's one moment I think about often and that moment is why this show makes the list.

They were in the middle of one of their songs. A mosh pit was going just to the right of Hailea and I -- we were on the edge and it was getting closer and closer to us.

Suddenly, the band stops playing.

The lead singer silences the crowd and tells one guy who was in the pit to get out. Security's trying to find this man, and everyone's in disbelief.

The band explains that that dude threw a punch and that, to them, that was an absolute no-go.

The lead singer said something along the lines of:

"Look, we might make a lot of angry music. We get it. But we're an angry punk band from Canada who's very against violence."

They looked out for everyone else's safety first and foremost, instead of just letting people do whatever and just playing their music and minding their business.

Since everything that happened with Travis Scott, that's a moment I think of often. And one I hope more artists have of their own.

Now Hailea and I both keep tabs on PUP to make sure they're doing alright.

That time an entire arena collectively pranked a band with no prior discussion about it

October 2019 -- This moment often lives in my head rent free.

In fall of 2019, Hailea and I stayed in Indianapolis over our fall break and saw AJR at the fairgrounds. It was an amazing show, all-in-all, but there's one moment we always come back to.

I can't remember for a fact if there were multiple openers, but I'm pretty sure there was just the one -- Michael Blume.

We had never heard of this man before, and to this day, I haven't heard of him since.

But there was a part of his set where during one of his songs, he asked us to put both our hands in the air and flap our hands. I don't know how to describe it properly. Think: hands out at a 90 degree angle, up straight in the air, then back down, over and over again and very quickly.

It was some weird bird arms shit.

And it was hilarious.

So hilarious that at some point in the middle of AJR's set, when they were between songs and just talking, someone in the crowd decided to do it again.

Needless to say, Jack noticed, and Jack was confused.

"What are you doing?"

Without any hesitation, the bird arms spread across the arena. Suddenly, the entire arena was doing this weird arm thing and the entire band was unbelievably confused.

"Who put you up to this?" Jack questioned.

"Was it him?" he demanded, pointing to Jimmie Lee Jr (also known as JJ Kirkpatrick), their trumpet player at the time. "Did he put you all up to this?"

And now the venue is trying to scream at them "Michael Blume," but it's several thousand people screaming at different times so you could only imagine it just sounds like "AaAAahHHhH!" back at them.

Meanwhile, the bird arms were still going strong.

Jack went down the line of possible culprits -- Chris Berry (their drummer) and even then to his own brother Ryan -- before they finally realized we were trying to tell them it was Michael Blume's thing.

The whole shebang took at least five minutes and I have never seen a band so thoroughly confused by the crowd.

It was absolutely amazing. There was no prior communication between all of us. Just the unspoken agreement that Jack's original confusion was hilarious, so let's confuse him more. Hailea and I hadn't even turned around before we joined in -- we knew instantly what was happening and we were absolutely living for it.

That time we saw a HUGE band front row in a small venue - for free

December 2019 -- 2019 was quite the year for me. That year I had gotten free tickets to six shows: starting with I Prevail in May, then I was given two free day passes to the last day of Summerfest when I was left unattended by my brother and his friend, a third instance I cannot for the life of me remember, PUP in September, State Champs and Simple Plan in November, and finally, Fall Out Boy.

They were playing the Big Ten Kickoff show the night before the Big Ten Football Championship. I saw online a sign-up for tickets -- I don't know if I have (had, more likely) incredible luck, or if I was just super on top of it for once, but I ended up with an email a few days before the concert with two tickets to see Fall Out Boy. The icing on the cake? It was presented by T-Mobile, so if you were a T-Mobile customer, you got early entry into the venue. For better or worse -- and for once, it felt like for better here -- I've had T-Mobile for as long as I've had a cell phone, so Hailea and I were able to enter into the venue early.

The Pavilion at Pan Am in Indy has a capacity for a concert of roughly 3,000 people. We were one of the first people in and we ended up pretty much at the banister. There was barely a person between us and the band (well, plus security). It was crazy. The whole time we stood there waiting for the show to begin, Hailea and I just kept looking at each other like "are we about to be pranked?" The band had said pretty much nothing about playing this show, and we didn't have the build-up we usually had: barely any warning with receiving the tickets only a few days prior, and there wasn't an opener.

But, fortunately for us, it wasn't a super elaborate prank. I can say with utmost certainty I will never have the luxury of seeing a band of that size that close ever again, especially not for free. At a Fall Out Boy concert, to get that close in an arena, you'd likely have to shell out hundreds if not thousands of dollars -- the kind of money I will likely never have to throw at that close of seats.

So with that in mind, it was a magical night. We vibed, we sang, we danced and we made mistakes. What mistakes, you must be wondering? What we did not know is that we were standing relatively right in front of the confetti cannon.

So as we were distracted during the last song, "My Songs Know What You Did In The Dark," by beach volleyballs in the crowd behind us, the confetti cannons went off, shooting shiny pink confetti everywhere -- and we were straight in the blast zone. We left there absolutely covered in confetti. When we got back to our room, we found confetti in places you hope to never find confetti. And, to this day, Hailea still finds the confetti in her car, despite having cleaned it several times in the 2+ years since.

It was absolutely worth it though.

That show ended up being the last one I'd see before the pandemic. It was a special one regardless, but that made it even more so.

That time we saw a show with the most good vibes I've literally ever felt at a show

February 2021 -- Earlier this month, Hailea and I saw one of the best shows I've ever seen in my life.

I had been super looking forward to it because, for one, it had been four months since my last concert, and two, I loved two bands on the bill, and liked the other two.

The atmosphere at the show was almost electric. I don't even know how to describe it.

When we got there, our first stop -- well, second, I needed to get a water first, I have a horrible tendency of being dehydrated -- was As It Is' merch stand. They were the second opener, but one of my favorite bands of all time. Plus, we knew the merch guy/tour manager, Andy, as he's in a different band we like, Point North.

We waited in that merch line for forever because Andy was no where to be found. While waiting in that line, we talked to a bunch of people. "A bunch" probably isn't an accurate description, but Hailea and I tend to keep to ourselves when we go to shows together, but this time, we actually made friends for the night. Everyone, and I genuinely mean everyone, was lovely, and that's a rare thing for me to say about crowds at concerts.

When Andy eventually got to the merch stand, he looked so out of sorts trying to get everything together with a line waiting and with No Love for the Middle Child already a few songs into his set. All Hailea and I wanted to do was ask if he needed any help.

Eventually we got to the front of the line, but he didn't have the sizes of shirts we wanted yet, so we agreed to come back later, and hopefully then we could actually talk to Andy for a second.

We go into the crowd and enjoy the last two songs of No Love for the Middle Child's set, which was just amazing. After his set, we spotted him at his merch stand, so we went to say hi.

Hailea was incredibly nervous. She might be mad at me for saying that. But I wanted her to say hi first, coached her through what to say, how to approach him. When it was almost our turn to say hi, she realized I wanted her to strike up a conversation with him and, oh boy, if looks could kill.

She was adamant that if she had to start a conversation with him, a conversation would never begin. She hadn't really ever met a musician before in that kind of setting. Not that I have met a lot, but I had the ability to work through my nerves before. So when we walked up to him, we said hi, I told him his set was amazing, he said thank you, asked our names, and Hailea then told him she loved his hair.

When I say this man is so nice, I mean it. We talked to him for a while about hair dye -- riveting, I know, but Hailea loved his purple hair, and I used to have purple hair and so did she, but hers was on accident.

Other people were waiting to say hi to him, so we took a photo and moved farther into the crowd because As It Is was next. To be fair, we didn't know if it was them or Stand Atlantic that was next, but context clues at the time told me As It Is.

I hadn't seen As It Is since I met them at Warped 2018 and since they had dropped two new albums -- the second of which dropped the night before this show. They've lost two band members since and gained one, but they were still absolutely electric on stage. Patty Walters is easily one of my favorite frontmen in the business -- seeing him just have so much fun on stage makes me insanely happy.

On their new album, As It Is has a song with Cody Carson from Set It Off, called "IN THREES," which also features JordyPurp. It was released as a single at the end of 2021, so naturally, with As It Is touring with Set It Off (also with the song being a banger), it was on the setlist.

Seeing Cody sing the song with them on stage (above) was unreal. When he came out on stage, his mic wasn't working, but he kept singing until he found one on stage that did.

And oh boy, did the crowd love that song. I don't know why I had my doubts about how hard "IN THREES" would go live, but that performance refuted any claim I could ever make regarding it.

And that was just the start of on stage collaborations.

During the next song on their set, "I MISS 2003," No Love for the Middle Child ran out on stage so Ronnie could roll across his back in super dramatic fashion.

Then during Stand Atlantic's set, No Love for the Middle Child came out to sing their song "deathwish" (right), which usually features nothing,nowhere It wasn't expected in the slightest (by me at least), but it was one hundred percent appreciated and enjoyed.

And then during Set It Off's set, they did a nine song medley, which ended with "Partners in Crime." To the surprise (not my surprise though this one was spoiled for me, hence why I was quick enough for a video) and delight of the crowd, Patty came out to sing it with Cody (left).

The crowd was unbelievably loud all night long -- even Cody said it himself on Twitter that night: "Loudest crowd of the tour so far. Legit made me plug my ears at times."

And when Set It Off's drummer Maxx played the ukulele and sang "Bad Guy" while Cody played the drums instead? Non-stop smiles throughout the whole room.

It wasn't a big show in the slightest. But a couple hundred people in that room that night made me feel right at home, and there's no feeling quite like that.

And that's where I'm going to stop this post. I had several more stories on deck to tell, but this post is already massive, so it's got to end somewhere.

If you made it this far, thanks for reminiscing with me, for listening to my stories.