tally hall, no one's better than you. {part IV}

{school is over and i'm back! please forgive my absence. i missed my blog, too.}

{{the big kids' concert}}

the original plan::
location: in the venue
concert time: 6:30pm
our departure time: as soon as jeff got off work (4-ish pm)
driver: jeff
the group: cheryl, blake, me, rocio, jeff, my friend jessie, and jeff's friend brooke

in actuality::
location: in the venue
concert time: 6:30pm
our departure time: 6:10pm
driver: brooke
the group: brooke, me my friend jessie...and later, jeff

explanation:: jeff was going to take me and jessie and rocio. rocio decided to do something else that night instead. okay, cool. still left me and jeff and jessie, all was good. but---[brace yourself for the run-on sentence]-- i couldn't reach jeff and he was supposed to drive us and my mom's van doesn't go past 40 mph cuz it's broken and jessie and i needed to get to the concert and i still couldn't reach jeff and it was getting late and i called cheryl and she'd already left with blake and i started to panic and i made cute hair flowers (irrelevant) and i told jessie i'd just come pick her up in the van so we'd be in one location and i did and we went to jeff's and he wasn't there and it was getting later and i called rocio and she said she wasn't going so she called brooke whom i didn't know and brooke was late coming anyway but she had a car so she met me and jessie at jeff's and the three of us girls got into brooke's car and brooke turned out to be awesome and we went to wendy's cuz we were starving and it was good and i got a jr frosty (irrelevant) and we raced as fast as we could up to salt lake and the three of us girls had compatible horoscopes and decided we'd be good friends and now we are and we drove and drove and finally got to in the venue and brooke was really good at finding it without a google map and we parked in some shady parking lot and brooke put on her new shoes with red laces and then we ran in the freezing cold -- ran-- to the place it was at and almost went in the wrong door so we backtracked and got to the right door and the bouncer let us in.

whew.

[note the shoelaces]

still couldn't reach jeff. until we got there. apparently, his shoot (he was working on a commercial in the middle of absolutely nowhere) went super long and was crazy and he hadn't gotten reception. sad. day. here's his side of the story.

when we got there::
we walked inside, and a really loud band was finishing their last song. i really didn't care for it, and neither did the other two girls. tally hall started to set up as soon as that song was over, and we were ecstatic to realize we got there in perfect time for tally hall.

jeff texted, saying he was still an hour away and wondered if it was still worth it to come. i said that of course it was; jeff was one of the pioneers of tally hall in utah! we had to take THE picture, dangit! so he said he was on his way.

we found allie and her husband. allie was there the very first time we met tally hall in this very venue. that was a happy. cheryl was nowhere to be found, though, and we found that she had a family emergency and had to race to that. that was sad. bless her heart.

the concert part::so, tally hall started their concert, even without jeff or cheryl. they started out with a slower song, which i thought was gutsy. usually bands start out with fast rowdy songs to get the audience into it. props for them for taking a double gamble: the song was slow, and it was a new song. but i loved it. it's called 'never meant to know' and it's the one that i had filmed backstage at the kid concert.

since i already blogged that one, here's another called "turn the lights off":



and here's how they laid the songs down:

Never Meant To Know
Welcome To Tally Hall
A Lady
Sacred Beast
Good Day
Turn The Lights Off
Cannibal
Spring & A Storm
You & Me
The Whole World & You

i sang along enthusiastically to all the songs i knew. maybe more enthusiastically than normal? [nah, probably the same. but i tried, and it was crazy] because a) the audience was pretty lame and didn't dance or anything and b) i had to sing for jeff and cheryl's sake. they deserved to be there.

right after they finished, i turned around and saw jeff. tragically, he'd just barely arrived.

the rest of the concert::
jeff was visibly disappointed he missed the concert, and more so, was shaking all over. he'd had an exhausting day and the mixture of freezing cold + middle of nowhere with no reception + full day's work in previously stated conditions + running to the concert + just barely missing it = one sad jeff. brooke and i felt so bad. we all wandered over to the swag table, where my new friend mike (the tour manager) was manning the merchandise. [check out mike's awesome hat.]

sad has a way of turning to happy, though, in the company of good friends and good music, and...tally hall. and tally hall's guest book.

they had a book on the table, open for anyone to sign it, so jeff and i took on the responsibility of pasting in each "the picture" from the previous concerts, along with a memory from each one. we wrote 3 entries, one on the inside of the front cover, one on the back, and one in the middle, with a dotted outline of the picture we were sure to get later that night.

we also took another cool picture:
and i liked rooney, too, so here's a well-known song of theirs. forgive the shaking; i was aware of it...i just couldn't help but dance to this one:




i really enjoyed just hanging out with my friends and the tally hall guys in the back by the table, though. andrew came out in normal clothes and smiled when he saw me. it was fun to see him since we'd been interacting all day, then almost as old friends after an 'official' concert (note that i'm not a psycho fan who imposes herself on strangers and celebrities. i know we aren't old friends. it was just sort of a cool feeling :D)

we all talked. words. i honestly can't remember what we talked about (this is the part that i didn't finish in december when i wrote this...it's now april)...which is tragic. i remember some stuff. contacts and dry eyes (as shown in picture above). mittens and their awesomeness (his were homemade). his impressions on the school concert. oh! he said that was one of the most interesting performances they'd given, and we asked what was the weirdest. i think he said it was earlier in their career and there was some sort of snow storm, so only a few (like, 3) people showed up to the concert and they performed for just them? something like that. all i can say is i wish we had a snowstorm concert.
the next and final installment of this tally hall series will come soon (no, really. i promise it'll be soon this time).

explanation + conference (!)

i know. i have abandoned my blog without prior warning. for this, i feel terrible. BUT--it's not permanent. just until finals are done---uggg. so much to do. but then i'll share all my fun projects with you and that'll just be dandy!

to show my apologies for my lack of blog, i'm gonna share with you the best thing that's happening on this wonderful easter weekend--lds general conference! it's the conference where we get council and guidance from our leaders and it's wonderful that anyone can watch it. in fact, here is the link to watch it online. i love love love it.

{conference is held in salt lake city, UT from 10am-noon and 2pm-4pm on both today (saturday) and tomorrow (sunday). every session is different, with different speakers.}

i hope that whatever you do, you have a wonderful weekend as well! and i'll be in touch soooooon! probably about 2 weeks. :)

updates

hi. i'd like to interrupt these tally hall posts with a few updates. three, to be exact.

1) i'm aware that not everyone is a tally hall fanatic...that's perfectly fine. i'm also aware these posts are ginormous. however, i'm trying to make them as entertaining as possible, and will still post the last two for those who are fans (and also for those interested in hearing new music) because i owe it to them, and like documenting things for myself. i hope it feels like you were there. and if you do stop by those posts, please leave a comment if you feel so inclined. i'd like to hear reactions, especially on those posts. :]

2) i added a "page" -- see it? right above this post? for short updates like these. kind of like tweets, but for my blog only. you guys are VIP. and that's pretty great.

...

2) this is what i looked like last night


and this is what i look like today. hope that's okay.


i'm getting closer everyday to chopping my waist-length hair short (as danielle would say, eep!). this particular cut i blame fully on the lovely chantel, because she reminded me how i used to cut my own bangs all the time.

ps, no-- i didn't dye it. i never have. i just cut the bangs.

cheers!

tally hall, no one's better than you. {part III}

{{the kiddie concert}}

keyboard, guitars, bass, drums...all on stage. a small one. behind a blue heavy curtain.
half curious, half amused adults lining the venue. teachers.
the venue: a school cafeteria.
one huge audience.
all under 5 feet tall.
oh boy. (!)

the concert was about to start. kids filed in, carrying their own chairs (i forgot we used to do that) and, of course, their tally hall signs. they were beyond excited. i was just as excited.


an entrance::
while the principle introduced cheryl, who introduced the band, the band snuck up on stage with fabulous fake mustaches on their faces and disappeared behind the curtain. what a fantastic sight. a few moments later, the curtain opened. the kids. went. nuts.

the concert::
i'll let pictures and movies tell this part. it was, after all, a concert.

fyi, the videos are super loud and noisy because my, can those young'ns wail....

rob [yellow tie] kind of headed up the group in interaction with the students, though the rest of the guys chimed in as well. i could tell that there was a mutual wonder between band and audience alike; neither had experienced this before. at the end of the first song [good day], there was a bit of silence, and i started clapping, [i'm sure some of the teachers did, too] then it was a ripple effect and the place was soon filled with tons of applause and yells.



at one point, they tried to get all the students to sing on one note....




other concert highlights::

-rob asked the most random and obscure questions to the audience, and it was perfect. questions like, "do you guys like sports?" and so on. it kept the kids amused and involved.

-the kids...loved dancing.

-comments like this: "of all the elementary schools we've ever visited, you are the most unique...?" can anyone else figure out what he says here? i remember he made some comment about how the kids liked dancing...anyway, brownie points (maybe even a brownie) to the person who can decode this:




-i enjoyed being backstage-ish. mike was cool and let me chill back there. we also talked cameras a bit. it was cool to see sam do his job. so i took a video of one of their new songs from back there. the video doesn't do it justice because i was just on one side of the stage (and it's a cheap camera). i have so many "normal" tally hall videos that i wanted to capture all the stuff you usually don't see. take a gander.


-the swaying of hands (i think one of the teachers promoted that) and the applause. the kids were told by a teacher before the concert that it's not polite to whistle, though. :)

-they ended with this song:



it was an elementary school. how perfect is that? they even had kids come up and give suggestions (that's the part that the camera drops (literally), so i could take photos of it. so beyond awesome.)

have you ever seen miss skinner, eating some dinner?

-and then they topped it off with this:
(rob's epic and very rebellious jump off of school folding chair. there were no smashing of guitars, however.)

...

the after party::

after the concert, the guys came back out and cheryl presented them with school shirts, as they are now honorary elementary schoolers. :)

as such, they took a class photo

or two

and hi-fives were had all around

and posters & clothing got signed (the latter with parental permission...for the most part)

and cheryl and the principle were given awfully cool stuff by the band

and things were happy.

next up: the night concert. there will be a lot less squealing from those videos.

tally hall, no one's better than you. {part II}

{{the classroom}}

after lunch, we headed to the empty classroom and the boys were so amazed at how detailed it was. they said that it was cool because they'd think they saw everything, but then they'd see another tiny detail. from the 'tally hall-passes' to the 'top bananas' to the colored sitting...dots in the reading area (with lyrics "another story to tell" in the sign above). dang, cheryl. good job. it consisted of all this stuff:

note that all the signs are lyrics from their songs. so brilliant.
and of course, the guys all rooted for the individual tables that matched their corresponding tie colors.

the room passed their inspection::
i was a bit shy about snapping pictures of the guys in the classroom, even though i always document everything...wherever i go. i didn't want them to feel all paparazzi'd or annoyed. so i took a few; they weren't my best. but here ya go:

above:: sam, the sound guy (cleverrr)

ironically, after we left the room rob asked if he could get copies of those photos since they didn't have cameras on hand (besides ross' iphone). ka-dang it. i totally should have taken awesome epic ones. oh well, i said i'd get them to him. we then chilled in the hall for a bit (i had fun watching kids take one glance at them wherever they went and squeal or get really excited and run away).

and the kids couldn't believe their eyes::
the kids had really wanted to meet the band, but the teachers told them not to get their hopes up, as the band had a whole lot to do that day. after they checked out cheryl's empty classroom, though, the boys went into the next classroom which consisted of cheryl's class and another class to actually meet the kids. the boys looked a bit out of their element, like they weren't sure what to expect, but excited nonetheless.

it was adorable; the kids had all been feverishly working on 'tally hall' signs for the guys and covered them up as soon as they came in. it was fun to see the kids interact with the band.the kids were all whispering frantically to each other to hide their posters from the band to surprise them in the concert, and zubin imitated exactly what one kid did---excitedly held up the sign for all to see. classic.
and the band clapped for the kids (because the guys felt they deserved a round of applause, too, after their deafening welcome from the students)

after a good lil' conversation with the class, the band bid farewell with hi-fives.

i was privileged; i got to see the signs after the band left the room to get ready. :]

i apologize i don't have much to say about the actual conversation...it was in december. :) but, cheryl, if you have anything to add, by all means, let me know or leave it in the comments! it was a grand ol' time.

next up: the official elementary school concert review.