I wasn't really sure how to start this recap. Do I focus on the awesome set list at Nokia? How about how good DC's voice was at both Nokia and GMA? Perhaps focus on the fabulous women of DCO that I got to meet in NY? How about how cool it was to see DC and the boys rock GMA and play the television game so very well?

Or I could say: Yammie rocks, y'all. Rocks, rocks, rocks. Yep. That works.

Going backwards in time: The Nokia concert was announced, and while I hadn't intended to travel out-of-state for any DC concerts---I know, I know, bad fan---but I had planned to make a trip to the Northeast, and this seemed serendipitous, you know? So I PM'd the awesome NYC triumvirate of Sasha, Yammie, and SybilT. We looped in LadyM, traveling to NYC for work, and all five of us managed to score tix at the sold-out Nokia concert. [Yeah, I like saying that. NYC. Times Square. 2100 tix. Sold-out.]

Now, keep in mind: I have always been a Yammie fan. Yammie, as we know, is fabulous, hilarious, and all sorts of great things. Utterly deserving of NFT hearthands. But then I learned: Yammie is even more awesome than I had previously understood. She was looking at photos of Nokia on-line, and pondered, huh, what is that balcony? An inquiry later, and there you go: she'd not only finagled us into the VIP balcony, but had convinced the Nokia to stuff all five of us at a four-top. If ever I decide to start a war, I am so luring Yammie into being my general. That may first require me luring NFT into being, IDK, the official guitar-shredder of my personal war. But it would totally be worth the effort, y'all. Absolutely and completely worth it.

Got to NYC on Thursday afternoon, having missed the great JCP throwdown (although I did get to meet the Magic Rainbow Skecher and was suitably impressed). I located the nearest hot dog vendor for a traditional NYC lunch, met up with the fabulous LadyM, and we were off, resisting the urge to bring a "CJT is in the HOUSE" sign. [I joke, I joke.] We hit Times Square and met up with Sasha, Yammie, and Sybil T. Let me say, yes, I have to applaud Yammie's ingenuity, but Sasha and SybilT are also great, and all three are so damned funny and fabulous. So wonderful to meet all four of these great folks.

We ate, in a vain attempt to prepare for the Nokia balcony drinking [BBS: Drink!], and then, despite my best attempts to get lost, we got to the Nokia. And there was a line. And we passed by the line. And Yammie identified herself to one of the security guys. Who retrieved a lackey, who gave us VIP passes and led us up to the VIP balcony. Now, we would be dead if looks could kill. [Yay, Zombie FolkFan!] But looks can't kill, so we were very happy. And ready to, well, you know. [BBS: Drink!]

In related news, the Nokia margaritas, despite their lack of salt, are tasty and more potent than they may appear on initial tasting. Not that it stopped us. [BBS: Drink!] We settle in, a certain amount of gloating via twitter is done, we note that it seems like a great venue and a really good crowd (if possessed of a few too many evil glares), and then here came GRO, whom I really liked. Funny, good lead singer, good musicians, music that was right up my alley and with good variety, etc. No wonder we saw NFT, Andy, Monty, and DC's brother Andrew watched for most of the set. And this is why I joined the hordes to purchase their CD for a very nice $5. This, of course, involved me getting separated from Sasha and LadyM. [You may have noted that my getting lost is becoming a theme. The fact that I got everywhere in anything approaching a timely fashion is a testament to all of these folks, especially LadyM.]

Oh, yeah. And we figured out partway through GRO's set that Stevie Van Zandt had the table next to us. Yeah, we got a little fangirly. [BBS: Drink!] We managed to recover our manners before he showed up prior to DC's set.

The guys got set up, and there was KotN. Damn, did DC's voice sound good at the Nokia. I have trouble comparing his voice to how he sang in Athens---such an emotionally charged night, and his voice was just so good given how tired and emotionally drained he had to be. But damn, he sounded great. And the guys were all in great moods and having a helluva lot of fun. [The guitar pick battle with GRO---who were standing off stage and watching for most of the show with Andrew---was a highlight.] Normally I would have been happy to see Little Lies---it was the only one of the four covers from the first half of the tour that I hadn't seen. But I really wanted to see either Yo Arms or (less likely, but still...) Shattered Dreams. And I figured that was not likely with a cover already in the show. We got a lovely Lie, with DC completely away from the microphone to sing a capella. Straight Ahead was a great surprise add-in. [The look on Kyle's face when DC started talking about going off list was classic. "Aw, s***." Clearly Monty has gotten up to speed enough for DC to start screwing with the set list partway through.] I had been videoing from kind of between LadyM and Sasha. LadyM said that her knees were getting sore from kneeling on her chair and moved. In a ninja move clearly inspired by the Rainbow, I zipped into the seat and prepared to video the encore. Zenny (natch), which got a huge response and is currently the most popular video of the eight I took and put up on my youtube channel. Then the surprise: Yo Arms. Hell, yeah. And the fourth of the four songs that I'd never heard live: ADAM. So great to see that from our vantagepoint, including the whole venue whoa-whoa-whoa-ing.

Oh, and here's my youtube channel, in case you want to see it from our vantagepoint (along with all of those songs, plus Heroes): http://www.youtube.com/user/FolkFan101

Someone spilled my last drink, so I couldn't finish it. [BBS would be so disappointed.] We got gently prodded to leave. We headed out, and through a sad confluence of dead cellphones, missed meeting up with FoolsApril64. [Sigh. Worst part of the evening, by far.] We wandered over to a Scottish pub, in Dublin's honor, and got some food and tried to counteract the tequila with tea and such. LadyM and I stumbled back to the hotel. Around two, we figured that we needed to stop giggling (and chugging water and advil) if we were going to be up for GMA. At 5. AM.

Damn, was that early. But we managed it. First, we impressed the counterguy at the nearest Starbucks by being at the door when it opened at 6 am. Then we wandered over to Central Park and joined the long line of fans waiting to watch the GMA Summer Concert Series. We saw signs. We were skeered. We persisted despite being skeered. We got into the venue, and despite not getting to the park until about 6:30 or so, we still got reasonably good spots. Sadly, we were behind some women wearing bee antennae. [No, I don't understand why, either. They kept them on until the woman next to me berated them into removing them. Heh. There was also some fine screaming down of signs. Heh again. Non-NYC concerts may have been ruined for me forever.]

We were joined by Sybil, who concurred that this experience was a bit like watching sausage be made. Much that was not seen on TV: soundchecks of the band equipment (with Kyle out for quite some time), two initial soundchecks of Windy, an AI8-free soundcheck of Little Lies (which, once I finally saw GMA on TV, was played during the show, in the background of one of the previews), some little clips for the camera, watching DC and NFT consult and arrange the special Idolriffic Little Lies for DC & the guys + Kris + Adam, soundchecks for Adam and Kris, and short clips of audience yelling and holding signs for the cameras (followed by New Yorkers yelling for the signs to be taken down. I especially enjoyed the vehemence of the group behind someone named Petunia, who seemed intent on reminding DC of the fact that they met at the JCP Skechers signing.] Very interesting.

As for the performances themselves: I generally expect top Idol contestants to have strong voices, and all three obviously did. DC's was (unsurprisingly) my favorite of the voices, but I have to say that (despite liking and even voting for him) I think that I had underestimated the strength of Kris's voice. I had thought that bandzilla might overwhelm him, but it clearly did not, in the park or on TV. Adam's voice was as strong as I expected, and I enjoyed the acoustic version of Starlight. Then DC and the guys kicked ass on Windy, I thought, although there was a mike issue with Kyle. And it was awesome seeing DC and the guys demonstrate just what professionals they are. [Also, DC got a monster hug from co-host Robin off-camera. And I thought that Diane Sawyer was DC's big GMA fan....] Afterwards, they announced that the guys (including Adam and Kris) would be performing a song together. The guys did a strong enough version of Little Lies with their guests that I thought that it was the real version. Nope, soundcheck. One little tidbit for those watching at home: during the soundcheck, Adam and Kris just kind of stood in one place to do their singing and otherwise to stand during the guitar soloing and DC lead singing parts. During the actually taped versions, they both came forward to the front to sing their parts of their verse, and then Kris went to rock out with Neal, etc. Nice to see that adaptation as it took place. All in all, a fun show, and we heard some AI8 fans talk about really enjoying DC, which was nice to hear.

P.S. Did anyone else notice that Magic Rainbow managed to shoehorn himself into the televised GMA show? Yup. Throughout the show, as background music, we had a little clip of Little Lies (from the DC/band soundcheck), a clip of Declaration, and then as the intro to the "concert series up next," there was our friendly ninja. You knew that he could not be left out, right? Then on R&K, we got a little clip of Declaration and a clip of BouncyDave, along with clips of ydniW and the full performance of Windy. Nice that so many of the guys came out to play.

LadyM and I left, so that I could get my cab to the airport (after first surprising the Starbucks guy: "Hey! You were here before! You were our first customer of the day!"), and she could, you know, sleep. And so my NY adventure ended. And it was great, with no small thanks to LadyM, Sybil, Sasha, and, of course, Yammie. The end, y'all.

@bbs: Drink!