Back to the Albertane Tour Reviews

Audrey's Virginia Beach Review
August 12, 1998

July 17- My best friend tells me that she just saw a commercial for a Hanson show at the GTE Virginia Beach Amphitheater on August 12.

July 18- It's confirmed. The Daily Press has two articles about Hanson.

July 24- Tickets go onsale online. I buy 3 in sec. 203, row Y.

August 7- I meet Hanson in North Carolina.

August 12- The Big Sha-bam!!! Okay, it's 3:00. My mom and I go to pick up my best friend Sarah at her house. Soon we are on the road to Albertane, I mean, VA Beach Amphitheater. We instantly stick in MON, and are jabbering away, listening to a few people honk at us (we had Hanson stuff in the windows, and a "HONK IF YOU'RE GOING TO HANSON!!!" sign). After a quick stop to get film for our camera, we're back on the road.

We sit in the car for about an hour. By this time, we have listened to MON, IWC2U singles (I have the radio mix one, Sarah has the other), and currently listening to Snowed In (who cares if it's not Christmas!!!). We are getting more honks and other concert goers as we get closer, and make new highway buds.

At around 4:30, we get to the Amphitheater. We park, get out, and head in. Since the gates weren't open yet, we decided to buy some stuff. I got the Albertane Tour shirt with the cities on the back, and Sarah got the lanyard that looks like a backstage pass (if only it was...) and a sticker. We hear screaming, and decide to go to the source to see what is going on. We soon come upon a large group surronding the Z104 van, and they were having a contest for front row and backstage. You had to have a creative tee shirt for Hanson and/or Beach 104. I had asked the radio station about any contests, and they told me they weren't having any, so needless to say, I was mad.

The gates open, and we have to have a bag check. The guy makes us go all the way back to our car. We then just decide to go to the VIP entrance, without cameras, only to find they do NOT do bag checks!!! Grr. Anyway, we go into the bathroom, relieve ourselves (ain't no way I'm letting nature interfere with Hanson!!!), buy drinks (virgin daquaries, yummy), and some Poppa John's pizza. We then go to our seats, to find we had a REALLY good view for being in the second to last row (hey, it's better than what we had at DC, lawn).

Me and Sarah try to go to the stage to drop off my gifts, but we are stopped by security. We are then told we had to go around to a ramp. Thanks for the directions. We ask these other people what to do, and they gave us better directions. The lady at the ramp said she has to ask the manager. We wait, and she says we have to go back. The people that we had asked for directions were a little confused, but they let us past. We go by about three worker people letting us on up, until we reach this crabby old lady who snatches my poster (it was a cartoon drawing of them, roses, and a letter), almost ripping it. Grr. So we see guys coming out to take stuff on stage backstage. Sarah and I look through our binoculars, waiting for the guy to pick it up. He was hesitating, talking to some guy and we were screaming "COME ON!!! PICK UP THE FRIGGIN' POSTER!!!" He finally did, and I watched it make its way back :).

Soon Admiral Twin comes out, and me and Sarah are cheering them on (being some of the few who were, getting nasty looks, but they kick @$$). They played a couple of songs, and we were singing and dancing along (note: Brad Becker e-mailed me back when I e-mailed them! Yeah!). They took the time to introduce themselves, and Sarah and I finally figured out the name of the HOTT guys (Mmmm, Mike and John, aka Fuzzball and Winky).

After they went off stage :(, the crew started to change the set, clean up, blah blah blah. Girls SCREAMED over the vacum guys (OH MY GOD!!! LOOK!!!! IT LOOKS JUST LIKE MATT DAMON!!! NO, LEO!!! WAAAAAH!!! OHMIGODOHMIGOD!!!). And of course, the traditional screaming at the end of every song. The corner of the curtain fell off, so they had to put it back on, and everybody thought the show was gonna start. It didn't.

The radio started to play "My Girl", and EVERYBODY there got up, singing along (except we substituted girl for guys)!!! It was just really awesome!

Finally, the bass line to "Gimme Some Lovin'" starts, the curtain falls, and we are blinded by light!!! IT WAS HHHHAAAAANNNNNSSSSSOOOOON!!!! They played all their songs, blah blah blah. They were so awesome!!! They messed up a few times, but that doesn't matter. It was raw, live, totally awesome!!! My two new fave Hanson songs are More Than Anything (Ike, I give you snaps for it, ::snap snap snap::, man, he is SOOOO goooooood) and Ever Lonely. But I felt soooo sorry for the guys when they sang WYIYD. If you looked hard enough, you could see a few tears from Zac, Ike kept starting to sing, get this MAJOR sad look on his face, look away, and Taylor, well, Taylor did wonderful, and you could tell he was about to burst out in tears. At the end of the song, Zac rubbed his arm over his eyes, Taylor sniffed, and Ike just introduced the next song. It made me want to cry, just seeing how sad they were when they sing that song. I just wanted to go and give them a huge hug. And people shouldn't scream. They should be respectful and SHUT UP!!!

Okay, so if you want to know what they were wearing, Isaac was wearing these grey pants, a black tee shirt, and a grey shirt over that. Later he was wearing khaki jeans. Taylor was wearing black jeans, a white tee shirt, and this really cool blue velvet tee over that (God, he must have been hooooot, wearing that in August here on the East Coast, suicidal tendencies Tay???). Zac's outfit was the coolest!!! He was wearing these satin khakis with a black stripe down the side (they were a little tight in the butt, but oh well, they were cool anyway), and a black and white camo button down shirt that was also kinda tight, I also noticed his black Docs, they were... wow. The bomb!!! I must say, the boy has grown up!!! He looks SO much older, and has lost his little chubbies (yes, he had baby fat too, who doesn't???). He is now SKINEEEEEEEEEE. But it looks goooood. He also had his hair in braids, which looked too cool.

Afterwards, me and Sarah were screaming out songs, dancing, and acting like total retards as we were about to leave (we stuck around for a little bit so the crowd would die down, and we wouldn't be stuck in so much traffic).

We went to BK to get a little something to eat, and it was crowded. But it was cool, because everyone had been at the concert. Then on the highway, listening to Hanson again. We gabbed the whole way home, and soon fell asleep. We woke up, and we were on the road to Sarah's. We dropped her off, headed home, and I fell asleep feeling on top of the world!

-=-*-*_~Audrey~_*-*-=-

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.