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Andrea's Milwaukee Review
October 9, 2000

Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Riverside Theatre
October 9, 2000
By: Andrea (OshHanFan@yahoo.com)

WOW. The concert last night in Milwaukee was the best concert I have ever been to in my entire life. Hanson was so hyped and the crowd was incredible. I'll try to put my 11 hour day into a short story here. :)

OK, left at 10 to pick my friend Glenda up (she's 20 and I'm 18, just for the record). We were going to the concert really early hoping to get to meet Hanson. We got to Milwaukee around noon and walked around the Riverside Theatre to see what was going on.

We found the back door and there were only about 10 people there. They were the nicest people and we made friends with all of them (hi Dana, Tayanna, and Maria "Kim Smith" LOL). Tayanna had a stamp of the Hanson symbol and we all got it on our hands and that was how would could tell who was in our little "group". It was so much fun. There's this one guy in Wisconsin who is a really huge Hanson fan and he's met them a lot before and stuff and he brings his guitar everywhere Hanson is. I think his name is Mario. Well, he got out his guitar and his little shaker and one girl happened to have a tambourine so we sang Hanson songs for a while and it was a blast!

We waited there all day and at about 3:00, we saw Hanson's bus drive up. Zac came out first but he went into the door at the opposite end of the "alley" we were waiting at. Then Tay and Ike came out and they started walking towards us! We were all really excited but made a little pact not to scream or take pictures of their family. So we were all really calm and they shook our hands and stuff before going inside.

We waited around a little more and saw a lot of cool people. We met a girl named Natalie who drives Hanson around from their hotel to the venue but she was really snobby. The first time we asked her what she did for Hanson she said (pardon my French), "I'm Hanson's bitch." Mr. Hanson walked by a few times and said hi. The fans by me were really respectful, I was so glad. They didn't even call him Walker-they said Mr. Hanson and I thought that was cool. He was really nice to us. We also met their promotion guy but I forgot his name.

It was kinda boring (and freezing!) for the next few hours. We got to hear 'Runaway Run', 'You Never Know', and 'Sure About It' during sound-check. A really cool thing is that one girl was crying because she wanted to meet Zac and he went in the door that wasn't near us so after sound-check, this one guy brought out a drumstick that Zac broke and he signed it for her. I thought that was really sweet of him and she was really happy.

Ashley (not Greyson, but the baby-siter) came by us with Jessica. Jessica walked right in but Ashley talked to us. She is so incredibly nice. She wasn't fake-nice, either. You could tell she was really interested in what we were saying. She took a letter from one girl (it took her 3 hours to write) and a scrapbook from Maria and she said she'd give them to Hanson. She was listening to us and asking us questions and everything and she was really really cool.

M2M also came out. Marion's sisters and mom were with her. They were really cute and they were on scooters. :) Marit was there with her mom, too. They are really nice girls. I told Marion that they were really good in Chicago and she thanked me and that was cool. Marit talked to us for a little while. After they went inside, they sent a guy out with autographed pictures for us, so I thought that was really cool.

Scott Hogan kept coming back by us to smoke, too. We also saw Jason Taylor and Matt Rhode a couple of times and they were nice. We kept telling Scott that if he doesn't stop smoking he would die at an early age and he kept laughing at us.

At around 5:15 we decided to go get something to eat so we went to Hooters. LOL. It was kinda weird to walk in there and see all these Hanson groupies. We got the food and found our friends Kyra and Joelle and told them to come with us back to our little spot but there were all these new people there. I guess that, while we were gone, Mrs. Hanson came out and was really sweet to the fans. And Tay popped his head out the door and took a picture of everyone but they all screamed so he went back in.

Then we decided to go inside for the concert. The only thing that happened while we were gone is Mackenzie came out. Some friends we met there sat right behind us and they told us all about it. I guess he was really cute at first but then he started telling everyone he was going to shoot them and smash their heads with a bat. OK...

Here's the set list:

*YOU NEVER KNOW
*CROSSTOWN TRAFFIC
*RUNAWAY RUN
*WHERE'S THE LOVE
*LONELY AGAIN (YAY! That song was so cool live.)
*THINKING OF YOU
*JOHNNY B. GOODE (Very cool live!)

**Switch to acoustic set**
*LUCY
*A SONG TO SING (They left out the glassy surface verse, though.)
*MONEY
*MORE THAN ANYTHING

**SWITCH BACK TO ELECTRIC SET**

*A MINUTE WITHOUT YOU
*DYING TO BE ALIVE
*BRIDGES OF STONE (It was the second time they ever did it live. That song should really Have been on TTA it is so good...)
*SUNSHINE OF YOUR LOVE
*IF ONLY
*SPEECHLESS
*THIS TIME AROUND
*MMMBOP
*IN THE CITY

**ENCORE**

*GIMME SOME LOVIN'
*MAN FROM MILWAUKEE (Tay said something like, "You really think we'd come to Milwaukee without singing this?" You need to be in Milwaukee when they sing this. It's so cool! :)

And that's the concert! No a capella, though. :( It was such a cool concert. The crowd was amazing and so hyper. During the chorus of each song everyone would jump and clap. And Hanson was so cool, too, they didn't sit still. It was a much better concert than Chicago last week. They were jumping on the speakers and reaching for the people in balcony. The didn't stand still the whole time-they were running around and Ike was going up on Zac's little platform and jamming by him and then he'd run to Tay's mic and sing and run around and Tay was going all over, too. I've never seen them have so much fun before. They kept saying what a cool crowd we were (I know, they always say that) and the concert seemed to last so long. After 'If Only' Tay said, "We're just warming you guys up!" It was a blast but one of the best moments came after the concert.

We went back to our spot by the back door. There were about 18 people there and it was kinda packed because the opening was really small. Then our security friend Jo-Jo said that Hanson was coming out the other door so a lot of people left and there were about 10 of us there. A few minutes later Ike came out and walked around kinda confused and walked bak in. But when he came out, all the people were screaming so I told them to calm down and don't scream or they won't talk to us.

A little while later a lady came by and told us to keep calm, stay on the other side of this one post, and don't scream. So we agreed with her and everything and before we knew it, Zac walked right out in front of us. He was about 2 feet away from everyone. We just waved and said hi. No one screamed it was so cool. Then Ike came out and was shaking people's hands and Tay was right after him. He had a camcorder and was taping us and shaking hands and everything. I said, "Great show, Ike!" And he said, "Thanks!" YAY I talked to Ike! :) They were so cool and nice to us. You could tell when they reached the other end of alley because there was so much screaming. People were freaking out-we could hear them. If they would have been calm Hanson would have talked to them, too. Screaming is bad, people, Hanson doesn't like screaming.

We left after that and tried to follow the tour bus but we didn't get too far. It was such a great day and Wisconsin fans are so cool! WOO HOO!

This page is in no way associated with Hanson or Island Records. All thoughts and writings are the sole property of me. Please email me with any comments or questions. Thank You.