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Diana's Washington DC Review
July 2, 1998

Well it was may 29th, and I planned to camp out for tickets. Me and my sister, totally not prepared, went to the box office with a blanket. There were about 2 other groups there. We set our blanket up, and the girls (who were like 7) started talking about Hanson. I didn't care how young they were! They loved hanson! Then, about an hour later, these 2 other girls came. One of them was named Angela, and let me tell you, she was a freak! We talked a lot the rest of the night.

That night, we met this guy named Peter Hansen who worked backstage. We kept on asking him questions, and asking for backstage passes. But he couldn't give out any info or backstage passes. He did tell us about the raffle. It turns out that we camped out for nothing. When the gates open at I think 7, each person gets a ticket. Then at 8 or 9, they call out the ticket numbers and that decides the line. I was really mad. My great sister was talking to him and she asked what hotel they were staying at. He said he knew but he couldn't tell her. But she kept on trying. She asked if it was in Manassas, "nope". Is it in Chantily? uhhh.... Is it a sorta Conference Center thing? uhhh... So we figured it was the West Fields Confrence Center in Chantilly. That hotel is a REALLY REALLY nice hotel. So we knew what hotel they were staying at! Later on that night, I decided to call Z104 (the radio station here) and request Hanson. I called them, and I started freaking out about how I was camping out for Hanson tickets. All the other girls started screaming into the phone too. They probably aired our conversation, but we decided not to listen to the station for some reason. Then later these 2 cops came. They got a report that we were there. They gave us special permission to camp out. They were really nice.

It was morning and these girls came running up towards the box office. They saw that we were camping out. It was REALLY early in the morning that they came. So they came in and they were staring at us. We were pissed. Then they started running away towards the gates screaming "have fun getting caught!" cause they assumed that we weren't allowed to camp out on the Pavilion property. So my sister ran up to them, and said "well, unlike other people, we have special priveleges."

The gates opened and each car got a maximum of 4 tickets. So we got our tickets, and at 8 or 9 they started calling out the tickets. The first ticket belonged to this boy and his family. I was so mad, cause I deserved to be the first person in line. I was the 7th person called though! Out of 200 people! I started crying when they called my ticket. When I bought my ticket, I got 17th row, which is really good!

So it's July 2nd and as soon as I woke up, I was majorly hyper. I was so hyped up for the concert! I got dressed in my white tank top and black shorts and started packing my backpack. I called Nicole M., Noelle and Katie and we decided to meet at the mall cuz my sister, Fria, had to develop film. While we were waiting for her film to develop, we got glow sticks for the show. After the film was developed, we had to pick up my sister, Fria and then go straight for planet hollywood cause they were holding a press conference there.

We were about 15 minutes late and I was sorta mad. I got outta the car and ran for the door. This guy stopped me and I screamed "WHERE'S HANSON???" He was like "are you okay??? calm down! they're in there, but you can't take any pictures" I put my camera away and ran inside. It was pretty packed. I walked down the aisle, and this retarded guy was like "you can't get passed this point. please move to the right" That guy was a real jerk. We couldn't see anything cause these displays were in the way. This girl was walking down the aisle and she came up beside me and was like "mom! I can't see anything! I think i'm going to cry!" Then she went across the room and she was like "I see them!" So I ran over there and I could see the back of their heads!!! I was so excited! I started crying. I moved up and this lady was like "they're going to make you move" but we stayed anyways. We were on the side of them. Taylor was the furthest, Isaac was in the middle and Zac was closest. Zac looked over at us and me and 3-5 other girls started screaming, jumping up and down and waving. When he started waving back, everybody else started freaking out. But see, he was originally waving to ME! Everybody was screaming so we couldn't hear a word they said. They would be moving their mouths then all of the sudden the press would start bursting out in laughter. That made me mad. I was like "what'd they say???" Fria took two pictures of their heads. Then they started leaving. Everybody rushed towards them, including me. I couldn't see them so I just raised the camera above my head and took a random picture. It turned out pretty good actually. I got their heads. Anyways, outside was a tour bus and everybody assumed that it was theirs. We made an aisle. I was right there, if they passed by where I was, I definitely would have touched them cause I was right in the aisle. Everybody waited for them to come out. I took a picture of the bus and the driver. I was wearing Taylor earrings and everybody was like "wow! you have Taylor earrings!" My sisters came up behind me and were like "this is a decoy bus. They already left." So we left while everybody else was waiting.

We got in the car and went straight for West Fields Conference Center, the hotel they were going to stay at. We went in there but we didn't see them so we left. We figured they went straight to the Nissan Pavilion. In the car, we were listening to Z104 to see if they would say anything about Hanson. They said that if they (Z104) saw us at the concert and we had Z104 written somewhere on our body, they would give us $104 or escort us to the first row. So we wrote Z104 all over us. We went there and it was really crowded. We went 4 hours before the concert too.

I bought a program, lanyard and t-shirt. The t-shirt was SO awesome. I got the navy one. Then Noelle was nice enough to buy me a HUGE poster. She's such a sweetheart. Everybody kept on asking us why we had Z104 on us. It was really annoying. Anyways, we were waiting in line to get in, when I saw this lady with an admiral twin shirt. Admiral Twin is their opening band. I was like "wow, you have an admiral twin shirt" and the lady beside her was like "yup. they're really cool" and she started talking to us about them. We got in and we sat down. We were REALLY close to the stage. There were 3 girls behind us who were really nice, we talked for a while. While we were waiting for the concert to begin, the roadies threw in about 5 or 6 beachballs. We caught about 4 or 5 of them and signed them. There were these REALLY annoying girls and they were doing the can-can while singing Mmmbop. Everybody wanted to slap them. They were playing Aerosmith before the concert. Probably cause Aerosmith's Hanson's favorite band. It was really annoying cause the dj would stop in the middle of the song, so everybody would think that the concert was beginning, but then it would start again. What was also annoying is that the back of the audience would all of the sudden start screaming so everybody would think that hanson's there or something and run up there. But there was this one time when everybody started screaming and running towards the wooden fence. I grabbed my camera and ran up there. I pushed everybody out of my way and pressed myself up against the fence. Hanson WAS in there, but I couldn't see them. I saw Peter Hansen though, this guy I met while camping out. He's the computer geek there. I tried to call his name cause he could've gotton us backstage, but he didn't hear me. The security people made us go. Katie and Nicole saw Isaac and Taylor. We went back to our seats and waited some more. Then the lights went down and the concert finally started. Admiral Twin cameout and they were SO awesome. Nobody was really paying attention to them. I thought they were really good though. I got up, jumped up and down, clapped, screamed and danced while everybody else was just sitting down talking. But I didn't care. After they played their third or fourth song, they said "we don't usually play this next song, but it's our friend, Barbara's birthday" then they pointed to the lady who I was talking to about Admiral Twin. She started dancing, and I was like "whoa, dude. She's that lady." Then they had extra time so they played another song. so they played 2 extra songs. Then they went off stage. (On Admiral Twins site, they said that the DC concert was the best one!) The roadies pulled this curtain down, and they started setting up the instruments. You could hear zac testing out the drums. When he did, everybody started screaming.

The lights went down again, and Taylor started saying stuff like "are you guys ready?" and stuff like that. They started, and the curtain went down. I was SO excited!!! I was clapping, jumping up and down, dancing, singing and screaming all at the same time. They played a few songs, then they had to change the scenery again. Isaac was sitting in a green, velet chair, while Zac was behind the drums with egg shakers, and Taylor behind the keyboards with a tamborine. They played some acoustic songs. When Taylor started singing "with you in your dreams" I was about the cry. He looked so sad, yet so sincere. He dedicated it to their grandmother. They are so sweet. Whenever they played a slow song, all four of us would wave our glow sticks in unison to make sure they would notice us. And so we could also notice ourselves in their upcoming video of the tour.

Then taylor was like "would any of you happen to be from Virginia?" I was like "ahhhh!!! mememememe!!!" Then he was like "cause we used to live in Arlington and Zac was born there." I started screaming "I was born there too!!! I was born in the same hospital!!!"

They went back to their regular setting and played some more songs. Then they played this segment where they would show off each person. Taylor played the drums for a few minutes. He looked SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO HOT BEHIND THE DRUMS. I was melting. I mean, Taylor looked REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY FINE PLAYING THE DRUMS. Then Isaac played the keyboards a little. Taylor and Zac sprayed water with water guns at the audience. The water went as far as about 10th row. I was in 17th. :( They played some more songs, and then they went off stage. You could hear them backstage like "do you guys want us back???" And of course we would scream "YES!!!" They came back out and played some more. Their last song was "summertime blues." That song was so awesome. Taylor went up to the first row and tried to get some of the people to sing a line or two. I was so jealous! Isaac did some really cool moves. He also made a weird voice on certain lines. It was so cute and funny! On the last note of the song, Isaac slid on his knees across the stage with his guitar. They said their good-byes, and bowed. They looked so hot when they bowed. I was like *sigh*. The concert was over, and we ran up the the front to see if we could grab anything, like sweat towels, water bottles, etc. But we couldn't. There was some water left on the front seats from the water guns so I wiped the seats with my tank top.

We were walking away and everybody was crowded around the fence that led to backstage. There were LOTS of people going in. We tried walking in, but the security people were like "where's your pass?" we were like "oh, this is backstage?" I hadn't figured it was backstage cause so many people were going in! I asked this girl where she got hers and she was like "I know people who know them" so we walked away mad. Then I saw this family with them and I was like "how'd you get those?" and they said from their radio station. I was like "are you guys leaving?" and they were like "yeah..." then I said "would you mind if we borrowed them???" then they gave me some retarded excuse and walked away. We got in the car, and we were listening to Z104 cause they were talking about the concert. They played all of hanson's songs, and we were dancing to them in the car. We were at this stop light when we saw that the guy in the car next to us was sorta laughing and smiling at us. Well, he wasn't like laughing AT us, but ya know. Then we rolled down the window and started shouting "hanson rules!" It was so awesome! I'm keeping everything that has to do with the concert. The phone number and address to planet hollywood, my water bottle, the glow stick...everything.

:)-diana

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