You could say this adventure started for my neighbor Lisa and I back on July 27, when we went to Idol tour together with tickets I had won from a radio station. We politely enjoyed most of the concert, then David came out with his preening and swagger and bling. After his incredible set, we turned to each other and squee'd in unison "he's such a rock star!" and on the way home made a pact that if he ever came near on a solo tour that we were definitely going to go see him.

We left home around 12:30 the day of the show for a 2 hour drive to Niagara Falls. We had a fun time in the car. Lisa actually has a life and hasn't gotten into any of this online madness that is our daily ration here. I had loaded up my iPod with the lovely MP3 goodness provided by Queen Maeva, as well as original versions of the covers being played on tour. I put together a few playlists to catch her up on the details of the whole DNA continuum and and what's been happening so far on tour.

Plans were to meet up with Becky and Renee at the casino once we had checked into our room, changed our clothes, and fixed ourselves up a bit. We pulled into Niagara Falls and missed the turn into our hotel, so had to drive around the block. We turned into the street leading up to the front of the casino, and Lisa says "is that the bus?" and I said something articulate along the lines of "holycrapthat'stotallythebus" at which point she screeched into reverse so we could take a picture of the bus from inside the car. The fangirl madness had begun.

The texts and twitters had already been numerous before we even hit the road, and by the time we got to town, things had already reached a frantic level of stalking. The one band member I *really* wanted to meet was Joey, and the whole day for me turned into an epic slew of near misses and brief glimpses, never to meet the object of my affection. Sigh. While we were changing and organizing ourselves for the evening, I received a frantic slew of calls/texts/twitters, and a mad dash on foot to the casino only resulted in us being Too Late. Everyone had met Dave, Andy, and my beloved Joey, and they were gone by the time we got there.

There were a lot of fans lingering and loitering in the lobby area of the casino, and we all took the opportunity to meet each other, and put faces and real names to online monikers. At one point I saw Becky zoom away on an odd trajectory, so of course I followed her! Kyle! Poor dear looked like a rabbit caught in the road, suddenly surround by a couple dozen women! Everyone was pretty cool though, we formed a semi-circle around him at a pretty respectable distance of at least 6-8 feet. We took turns darting in to have him sign, give a hug, or pose for a picture, and he was very sweet and gracious to each one of us, until he was rescued by someone older and larger and with much authority in his voice and the glint of his eye.

I jumped in to get a picture with him, gave him a squeeze, and blathered some manner of idiocy at him. This is my only picture with a band member. Kyle is very pretty, taller than I might have expected, and very, very thin. The whole time I was talking to him, it was really hard to take in that I was really standing face to face with flesh and blood Kyle, and I was terrified I'd made a terrible mistake and was actually talking to Andy but was calling him Kyle.

Next order of business was soundcheck. Those who had arrived earlier had scoped out the venue and a balcony overlooking the entrance to said venue. You had to go in the elevator to get to the balcony level, so a group of us went up to try to hear or see anything. So up to this point, Dave, Andy, Joey, and Kyle had been encountered, but no sightings at all of Neal. We were so nonchalant in hanging around aimlessly on this balcony! A second group joined us, who had come down form their rooms. Eventually our patience paid off - we saw the EEB (no Dave) come up some stairs below us and round a corner into a side entrance to the venue. Neal! First time he'd been seen that day! We were probably two flights above them and saw them from the back. Eventually a security guard came along and escorted us to an elevator, as access to this area had become restricted during the time we were there.

We hung around in the lobby some more, meeting each other and comparing and updating each other on stories thus far. As the meeting time for dinner approached, we moved on to the buffet, where we had planned for a large group from here to have dinner together. We had a great dinner together, checked operation of our phones for cellcast and discussed where to hide our cameras should they be searching and confiscating. After dinner, we went back to the lobby and had a drink at a lobby bar while we waited for time to get in line. At some point during this loitering, Joey and Andy zipped through virtually unnoticed. They were gone before anyone who had actually seen them had time to glue their synapses together to realize who they'd just seen. Joey near miss #3 of my day.

We had decided not to be first on line so we could scope the level of security before we got to a point of no return, but it turned out they were only scanning tickets and that was it. Merch table was just outside the door to the theatre and was swamped probably ten deep or more right up until show time, and again afterward, but the guys running the table are very fast and would prefer you to know exactly what you want and to list it quickly and succinctly and to have exact cash if possible. (These guys also turned out to control a certain level of access and info about the guys' whereabouts later in the evening, so I was glad I didn't piss them off.)

The venue itself was a basic hotel ballroom , with regular chairs lined up in rows, and therefore, no raised or slanted floor. there was a good sized, proper proscenium stage at one end. Renee and I inspected every inch and nuance of the stage and set-up. Gator on Neal's rig, sans accessories. Various pedal boards with lights. Joey's mic! A tech came out and taped down setlists, which Renee promptly twittered. As we were all checking out the operation of our cameras while people were still filtering in, the security guards started warning us rather strongly against using flash, and we each very politely assured our respective security guards that we would behave in that regard.

The energy of the crowd was fantastic, and we all milled around meeting more friends, securing last minute ticket exchanges, and chatting with seat neighbors. The couple right in front of Lisa and I were very kind, both much taller than us and concerned about blocking us if they stood. We both assured them that we'd be fine, that we would indeed be up the entire concert, that we were both seasoned rock concert-goers and to just do their thing and that we'd be fine. Lisa and I also decided to keep an eye on seats in front of us, because we were on the aisle and could easily scoot forward a few rows if something was open.

********show starts here*********

As soon as the lights went down and we saw shadowy figures taking their places, the crowd started making a serious amount of noise, and as soon as the stagelights went up everyone was on their feet and stayed up the rest of the show. Heroes has been my favorite song on DCTR since early on and by a wide margin according to my iPod, so I've been very excited that they open most shows with it (and that it's the one song Joey sings backup on). For me, that note Dave hits on "I know you'll never let me FAAAAAAAAAALL" was all I paid for to hear from him vocally, that was my $45 price of admission, and everything else from him after that was gravy. And you know what, I'll be the first to say it, there my Blingtrance ended. After I heard My Note, it was all about the band for me. I realized that in my mind I've already made the transition from it being all about The Guy Who Was On TV (tm Neal Tiemann, see bar convo later) to being into the whole as a band. I had to keep reminding myself to look at Dave once in a while.

We're Only Honest was my big Andy moment, his backing vocals on this song are solid, strong, and soaring. I've been listening to a lot of MWK and THH, and have a real fondness for Andy's unique timbre, but live his tone is warmer and rounder and mixes so beautifully with Dave's.

Declaration and LOTM are a bit of a blur, because I was just really getting into the experience of finally seeing them live, so I'll talk about Joey and Kyle here. I could tell from TV/videos/cellcasts that they were both very good at what they do, but seeing and hearing them live I was nothing short of astonished at their level of accomplishment on their respective instruments, and together they are such a solid, dynamic foundation for everything else that's going on musically. Dynamic is the word that keeps coming to me in describing both their styles. Kyle's drumming is rich and complex, really quite sophisticated for a 21yo rock drummer, and of course filled with drive and boundless energy. Beyond the fact that I <3 Joey, I was absolutely riveted by watching him play, and it went well beyond all the jumping around. That man is a monster on that bass, I don't think I've ever, ever seen anyone play bass the way he does. Again, dynamic is the first word that comes to mind. Very complex bass lines, played with incredible speed and precision and depth. He does some really intriguing stylistic things like playing high on the strings, doing incredibly long slides along the strings, holding the bass away from his body to allow a note to ring then shake the bass to get vibrato (I've seen Dr. do this, too). I think a lot of times the jumping is actually part of his style of playing, not just dancing and being into the music, but actually needing that extra burst of energy to dig even deeper for the note or explode it with the amount of pop he wants it to have. I think their styles and the way they sound together is an excellent complement to the rich and layered guitar sound that I think is a hallmark of the DNA continuum of material.

(I'm realizing as I type this that I keep using the words complex and complicated to describe Joey and Kyle's playing, and I'm feeling a parallel to Dave's lyrics writing style - complex, complicated imagery and phrases, sophisticated word choice.)

I've said before that I have little patience for CBTM because of the crap lyrics and top 40 feel, but the new arrangement is much better, and again Andy's soaring backing vocals (they've got the harmony down now) and the new arrangement are the only things that make it listenable to me.

I've already written about Permanent in the tour thread, but I'll expand a little more here on just how soul-rattlingly blown away I was by Neal. I was really freaking out, and couldn't believe I was seeing and hearing what I was seeing and hearing. I ran down the aisle as far as I could to get a closer look, to see if it was really what I thought it was. After I ran back to my seat I was exclaiming to everyone around me, and no one else had noticed - I thought I was seriously losing my freaking out mind, because playing lead electric guitar with a bow just did not seem like a reasonable or sane thing for a human being to do. Of all the concerts I've been to in my life, and it's probably in the vicinity of 100, I have never, ever been so totally flipped out, amazed, or astonished by something a musician did on stage. I've said before that I think Neal is probably going to be one of the most influential guitarists in rock music, but that I also think he's not really doing anything difficult or challenging to his level of skill. I've been waiting to hear him push his boundaries. I'll shut up about that now. I got to witness it, and discuss it with him afterward. I'm good.

One of the reasons I was freaking out so much was that I didn't expect what he did. Because no one had to my knowledge mentioned it from previous shows. Was this the first time this was happening and I was the only person in a room of 900 people to see it? Is it possible he's been doing this all along and nobody noticed? It didn't seem reasonable or possible to me that someone could do something so mind-blowing and nobody ever noticed. So I was floored when talking with him about it to find out this was the third time he'd done it and I was the first to notice. I'm going to editorialize a little bit here and encourage everyone in the future to drag yourself away from Davetrance and really watch and listen to each of the other members of the band, because they are each individually and as an ensemble incredibly accomplished musicians who, frankly, deserve a lot more attention than they're getting right now. And I don't mean fame-attention, because we are giving them that, I mean they deserve the respect of being listened to and watched with active attention. Because they are equally as good at what they do as Dave is at what he does - they each individually have a deep well of raw talent and a highly developed, accomplished level of skill. As an ensemble, they are so tight so consistently and play with such a driving level of energy. They really listen to each other and play off each other so beautifully, it makes me a little annoyed that they're not getting much attention paid.

I was unfortunately distracted during KOTN by people coming in and out of my row, grr... Next up was Mr. Sensitive, which I will say straight up is a song I just plain didn't get, lyrically or musically, I just never really understood what was going on exactly. But next to the Permanent/Neal freak-out moment, this song was my favorite band moment of the night. In a night of incredible playing, this song was the tightest of the night. The other song so far this tour that I think was at this level was Newburgh Straight Ahead, and I felt really fortunate to experience such a great moment of ensemble playing, and to have my mind completely turned around and opened up to a song I had kind of written off. I rode that feeling through Breathe Tonight, also a song I hadn't been that into.

When Dave started TWIK, I could feel everyone Just. Stop. Breathing. I will admit to full and rapt utter Davetrance for this song. It's one of the few songs from AI that I still listen to regularly, and his vocals were delicate and shimmering, which after how many songs of full on rock voice is an incredible feat of vocal skill, a reminder that as a singer, Dave has heaps of raw talent, skill, and stylistic ability far beyond most singers in the business today, certainly well beyond probably every other singer in his genre. Gorgeous, just stunningly, stunningly beautiful. (Someone else in their blog mentioned that he really took his time with this song, and that the spaces between the notes and between the phrases were equally as beautiful as the singing itself. Yes, exactly.)

I won't say much about Light On, except to reiterate that it is a tough, tough song, that this band and singer has tamed and are now in complete unwavering control of, which again says a lot, especially about Dave as a vocalist. That song is hard, but now, you wouldn't know that to hear him sing it. And again, to switch from such a light, delicate song like TWIK to a song like this, requiring a much bigger, powerful voice speaks volumes about Dave's abilities.

During the break before the encore, most of the crowd was going wild, but there was also a definite stream of people bailing out, so Lisa and I scooted down the aisle, quite a few rows forward from where we had been. They started BBS, and a woman had scooted into the row next to me, snapping pictures and snapping her gum in my ear. In a gravelly, gum smacking voice she leans right up to my ear and says "he's gotta sing the American Idol song" and I said "he's not going to sing it," "whaddaya mean he's not going to sing it?!" "he's not going to sing it," "how do you know he's not going to sing it" " he doesn't sing it any more," "he doesn't sing it anymore?! how do you know he doesn't sing it anymore?!" All this while I'm trying to groove to BBS. Then on my other side a bunch of people start trying to push past to get out and I turned straight at them and said "the show's not over yet" and didn't move. They tried to get around behind me and I said again "It's. Not. Over. Yet". Maybe they got out the other way, but they sure didn't get by me, I'd been disrupted enough already.

One moment I haven't seen mentioned is that getting ready for guitarsex, Dave moved downstage left of his mic (I was in theatre for years, I know my stage directions!) and gestured with his left hand to a spot on the floor next to him for Neal to join him, but instead Neal crossed behind him to downstage right and Dave gave us the funniest smirk behind Neal's back, like "Get a load of that guy! Fine, be that way".

By the time it came to ADAM, I had gone from being in very good voice and ready to sing earlier in the day to a croaking toad after all the cheering and hollering during the show! But for me the thing I really love and was looking forward to in hearing ADAM live, besides the communal group-mind moment, was The Doctor's solo over the top of it all. His solo at the end of ADAM on DCTR is one of my favorite moments on the album, and I just loved hearing him play it live - to me, that is who he really is as a guitarist. It's full of light and air and beauty and my heart was soaring to be able to witness him playing it live.

*********end of show*********

(after show to come)

After the show, the rest of the night is a huge blur of Trying To Find The Boys, whom never presented themselves for an intentional meet. A lot of us spent a very long time standing out in the street in front of the casino by The Bus. It was very, very cold and getting colder as the night wore on. We had a lot of fun meeting more online friends and taking pictures together. At various points, smaller groups of us would go back to the casino to stalk around in there, and each time some kind of Activity happened at the bus, which was usually just techs and roadies loading things in, those who had left to do reconnaissance were texted to return on the double. And so it goes. It eventually became clear, and was confirmed by the guys who had been running the merch table, that the guys would not be coming to the bus, that they were leaving on the bus at 1:45 am, and that the bus would be moved from it's location on the street to pick them up in front of the casino.

So back to the casino. Some went to hang out in the "bus lobby" a waiting area by the front doors, some went to tour the various bars on a continued hunt, and some of us decided enough was enough, the intentional stalking was getting us no where, and to just hang out together and enjoy each other's company along with a few beverages. becky came through to say goodnight, that she was giving up to go home. After we'd had a few drinks, my group decided to find the bus lobby and hang out with whomever was there. Becky hadn't gone home afterall, and was with that group. We all hung out some more, enjoying conversation and the company OF new friends, while Becky went off to do one last tour of the bars. Then I got The Call.

Becky was in one of the bars and had Found Neal. We were instructed to bring her belongings, which she had left behind. We all knew she had a gift for Neal in her purse and booked it over there as fast as we possibly could on our 1:00am been-in-cute-shoes-since-early-afternoon feet.
We entered the bar, and sure enough, there was Neal. There was a reasonable sized group of young women I recognized from *cough* many pictures, and all I will say is that while we were not greeted warmly by them, Neal very graciously and warmly welcomed all of us into his field of attention and spent much of the rest of his evening talking to us, both as a group and each individually, seamlessly moving from signing autographs and accepting gifts and compliments to talking about music and band topics to talking about literature to talking about his experiences in the Middle East with a soldier (the husband of one of our group). One of the lovliest moments was when he realized Renee's daughter was in the lobby because she wasn't old enough to come into the bar and he said "let's go find her" and followed us out to meet her. He approached her with open arms and a big happy smile and embraced her. He approached her, he said let's go find her, how awesomely cool is that?

I don't know how exactly, maybe we were tired, maybe it was Neal's persona that put us at ease, but we all were able to focus and be in the moment with Neal, and just talk with him. Not all the silly fangirl Beatles-movie crap from earlier in the day, but rather the intelligent, thoughtful adults we all are in real life were the people who enjoyed the pleasure of Neal's company, and I feel reasonably comfortable saying he enjoyed ours. He answered every question in a very forthright but thoughtful way. Some parts of the conversation were one on one while the others listened in, some parts of the conversation were more group oriented, with others of us asking follow-up questions to the answers he gave. I really felt like the Neal we were talking to was the real guy, that we were getting to know him as a person, and am glad I was aware enough to deeply appreciate that in the moment. he is easily one of the coolest, most interesting people I've met in a long time, and I feel so lucky to have had such a real and true experience in meeting him. Neal is definitely one true thing.

After a while, some of us noticed Kyle was there too, and went over to chat with him for the second time that day. We immediately apologized for the earlier meeting, but he was very sweet about it and said he had just woken up and that it was fine. I talked with him a bit about how really good I think both he and Joey are, and he said he definitely felt like the two of them had some great moments when they were really together in the music that night.

At this point the Authoritative Guys came along to hustle Neal and Kyle to the bus, so we said many thank yous and got many hugs and off they went. We went out to where the bus was now parked in front of the casino, and I had my 4th and final near miss with Joey as he threw his bags in under the bus and hurried up inside it. We also saw Andy do the same. at this point it was getting on for 2am and we were frozen solid, but were determined to see them all get on and wave goodbye to the bus. This is the point where I ran down a list in my mind, and then out loud - mature, intelligent, articulate women, standing outside of a tour bus at 2am in 20 degree weather to wave goodbye to 26yo rockstars?! Everyone agreed that I had my facts straight, and I reassured myself that as long as I could still articulate the situation accurately, that I was at least clinging to one last thread of sanity. We finally saw Dave come out amidst a group, I couldn't say who else was in the group because it was the only time all day I had seen him except when he was onstage. He was beautiful, and flashed us a gorgeous smile while apologizing that they really had to go. The last I saw of him was the Union Jacks going up the steps into the bus.

There were a few things that have been mentioned that we saw happening while standing by the bus, and all I want to say is that I was starting to get the feeling we were crossing the line of allowing them zero privacy, which is a situation we all need to work towards staving off for as long as possible, because then access denied becomes the reality. I don't really know anything about what I saw or to whom it was connected, I have no information on which to base an interpretation, and realized whatever it was was none of my business.

Finally seeing Dave closed the circle for Lisa and me, so we said our goodnights and goodbyes and made plans to meet up with whoever would still be around for breakfast and headed back to our hotel. Lisa crashed pretty much immediately, and while I was tired I was still buzzing and needed to connect with the board to unload a little bit of what was overloading my brain. We had a nice breakfast and an opportunity to recap with great new friends, then hit the road for what was a nice drive on a beautiful day. THH was the perfect anodyne for our tired and wrecked minds, as we returned to our reality as suburban moms, with the twitters still tweeting as friends reported safe arrivals home and touched base with each other to assure ourselves that the last 24 hours really happened.

ETA: I mentioned something near the top about Neal referring to Dave as "the guy who was on tv, "and said I'd get to that further down when I talked about the conversation with Neal. I'll actually post about that in DWoP when I have some more time, but it was in the part of the convo Becky mentioned in her blog about the decision for Dave to sing the MWK songs.

I heard someone at DWoP was curious what books Neal talked with me about. He's reading Robbins right now, an author I am not familiar with (I'm more of a Brit Lit and short stories girl), so I'll have to look up the titles of his books to try and jog my memory.