Dearest Reader,
Those not in attendance at Cain’s Ballroom this past fortnight have surely missed the social event of the season.
Translation: My review is late because I used my only day off after flying home to binge watch the new season of Bridgerton instead of writing this post. My bad.
Fortunately, there was hardly enough drama, scandal, or match-making at Hanson Day to warrant the continued use of the Lady Whistledown format. (Though it is this author’s humble opinion that many young ladies in pursuit of making the acquaintance of a Hanson brother would be well-matched in tenacity and enthusiasm with the marriage mart mamas of the ton amidst a shortage of eligible suitors.)
But let’s put one nerdy fandom aside and focus on the one that actually brings us here.
As usual, I find myself struggling with how to discuss an event that's always a good time but looks the same as previous years on paper. I could probably write the entire post by copying and pasting excerpts from past reviews. Is it still plagiarism if I'm copying my own work? For now, I’ll spare you the memory lane mashup of quotes that still ring true and start by focusing on what wasn’t the same as past Hanson Days.
Food On The Move
The first difference for me was coming in a day early and attending my first Food On the Move event. To be completely honest, I’ve always supported Taylor’s involvement in FOTM from a distance, and it has never been clear to me if the organization really wanted Hanson fans to get involved in person or if they simply accepted that stamping Taylor’s name on something is going to draw our interest. If anyone has had the same reservations, I have to say that Taylor and Kevin’s speeches at the luncheon showed nothing but gratitude and encouragement for fan involvement. I’m not saying you should book a flight to volunteer at FOTM in hopes of rubbing elbows with Taylor (the same way the walks were never meant to be a mobile M&G), but if you have the ability to give back with your time or make a donation, they clearly want to make FOTM bigger and better and are thankful for any support they can get. Taylor and Kevin both spoke so passionately about what they are doing to help make things sustainable for a long term difference, and I can't wait to see how much progress they make by next Hanson Day. You can visit https://www.foodonthemoveok.com/ to learn more or make a donation.
HTP & Karaoke
The biggest change to the Hanson Day agenda this year was moving both Karaoke and the HTP recording from their usual location at The Vanguard to Cain's Ballroom with a much larger capacity. While I’m all for preserving the intimate vibes of a successful event, it has never made much sense to me to create an event that excludes people when you know so many are traveling extensively to be there and want to participate. It’s one thing to be disappointed that you can’t travel to go to an event; it’s another to make it all the way to the right city and still not be able to get in the door. I was happy they risked moving things to include more fans, and I enjoyed not panicking quite so much while buying tickets!
Whether you loved the Beyond Perennial setlist or not, the stats don't lie: every last song of that set was a fan club release. They played about half of Perennial and filled in the rest with other fan club songs. No singles, setlist staples, or MON songs, and for that I think they deserve a round of applause. My favorite song of the night was "Time Baby Take It," which tbh I kind of forgot existed, but to be fair, I think Hanson did too. It was just really, really good in the moment and I'm so glad they let it out of the vault.
One minor outtake is they introduced "Better Man" by saying it had never been played live before, but my brain was shouting "You played that on the Wintry Mix Tour!" followed immediately by a memory of hearing Zac sing it as "Trash Man" in Jamaica. Hansonstage confirms I've now heard it 7 times and they've played it 14, so I'm not sure how they collectively forgot playing it a whole 13 times.
I was fully prepared to dedicate my first sentence about the Members' Only concert to the fact that they didn't play the entire new EP this year, but then I double checked the set list and proved myself wrong. I'm taking this as another sign that they should just give us the EP sooner so I know what I'm hearing at the show. In addition to the full EP, we got several of the setlists staples missing from the first night, a pretty somber ending ("Young and Dumb" and "Tonight"), and a Taylor solo of WYIYD that I am convinced needs to have time restrictions placed around it because sir, you already made us sob over that one in January and I would like a break.
Dance Party
I am such a sucker for these themed afterparties. I don't care a thing in the world about dancing, but I am here for a good excuse to wear something fun and unpredictable. This year's theme was a little all over the place with Star Wars references and nods to Y2K, but it resulted in a fun range of outfits from inflatable aliens to storm troopers to Zenon cosplays. Everyone looked great!
I'm sure if you saw me in my starry outfit, I blended in with every other basic girl there, but the truth is I stepped out of my comfort zone to put on that dress in public. I originally had another outfit in mind, but while struggling to find the right matching top, I came across this see through bodycon mini dress covered in stars that I felt too old/too conservative/too fill-your-own-insecurity-in-the-blank to wear, but for some reason I couldn't stop eyeing it. I told a friend that I kept going back to this dress every time I tried to finish out my outfit, and instead of talking me out of it, she told me if I felt like I could pull it off that I should wear it now while I can (real talk: girl, you're not getting any younger!). I bought it; I wore it; I had a fabulous time. Get you a friend that will tell you to wear what makes you happy and dance around with you in matching ridiculous boots.
Themes I'd like to see in the future: Slumber Party, Masquerade, Crayon Box (is this a thing? It should be a thing. Everyone just picks whatever color they want and dress in it head to toe).
Bonus Content
In addition to all of the usual Hday things, this year:
-I was coerced into daily STG gelato, which is delicious if you've never tried it.
-I accidentally gave a stranger terrible directions to the baseball stadium, only to then accidentally wind up at the stadium at the same time as him and be heckled mercilessly for it. Sorry to uphold the stereotype that women don't know directions. At least I know he's not still out there looking for it.
-I got to celebrate a dear friend's wedding, and I'm so happy we were able to take all the cheesy wedding photos and see her looking so beautiful. It's fitting that we met on a sidewalk when she was 14 and now we're taking sidewalk wedding photos. Congratulations, Morgen & Jacob <3
In summary, Hanson stepped up their setlist game by playing fan club songs at a fan club event, the semi-unclear dance party theme ended up being a hit, and the new EP is my favorite of the last several years. I'll leave you with this: Support the cause, wear the dress, buy the ticket, get on the plane, and while you're doing it all, don't forget to be the person that encourages others to do the same. Also probably don't ask me for directions.
If you are a fan club member, you can log in and click here to watch the Listening Party, Hanson Time Podcast Live, and Hanson Day Concert & Nightcap.
9 comments:
For Better Man I think they meant they've never played it before (... as a full band...) but I'm pretty sure that's still not true. Isaac's said something similar about Grace Unknown and meant full band.
And Taylor's solo on the setlist was Be My Own so something triggered him to do WYIYD at the last second.
They also said they've never played I'm Ready. Their memory is very short!
I loved your summary Holly! Always great to read and you always know the exact way to capture your audiences attention. I love Nothing Like a Love Song! So happy!
Even thou I always done karaoke with isaac and didn't get to this year but no hard feelings as still had a great time and I won a speaker in the raffle tops it all. Only issue had was Yoda was taken away rudely and almost had a anxiety attack. So yeah I'm no longer will catch flying objects.
Flying objects can knock me out instead. Lol
Only issue had was Yoda was taken away rudely and almost had a anxiety attack.
I'm so sorry that happened, and congrats on winning the speaker! I never saw the baby Yoda after Taylor mentioned it and forgot I was supposed to be keeping an eye out for it until I saw other people posting photos.
I love the slumber party theme idea! This article is great! Last year I had fun but this year outdid last year!
I'm so excited to see your post as I always look forward to reading them! I loved this years Hanson day - even if I only participated at home via the streams! I LOVE the new EP and hope you will do an EP review soon?
A highlight for me was Isaac's solo during the HDay concert. I could see/feel his genuine gratitude for us the fans and it brought tears to my eyes! A class act. All three of them! I hope he records Hallelujah/Amazing Grace as a mash up and releases it, maybe at Christmas time as a little holiday single? Or if Hanson ever puts out another holiday album or EP or something.
I guess I'm in the minority as I really love that we get the new music during Hanson Day weekend! I've been to only one Hanson Day so far and I loved hearing the new music for the very first time live! It definitely adds to the excitement of the event imo. But I could get behind what you said about having the EP released in the media player on the 6th and then still having the listening party later with the Hanson Day festivities. I have really enjoyed the listening parties with the BTS "making of" documentary the last few years. I love getting to chat with other fans about our first impressions hearing the new music.
I have to admit, I'm a bit envious about how much you get to travel to see Hanson, going to all of their events, multiple shows during tour, etc. Please don't take that the wrong way, I guess "envious" isn't quite the correct word, haha. Maybe more, impressed? I wish I could do that! Reading your blog and living vicariously through you inspires me to be brave and try going to some of these things by myself as that is one of my biggest hold ups. I love that you have made so many friends over the years just by attending these events! It's hard to make friends as an adult sometimes so I find this really cool! I really, really hope I get to go see them this fall when they go on tour! I've been going through a lot of crappy stuff lately and this would make all of hard stuff worth it! I'm going to try to channel my inner Holly and go for it! :) Make it happen somehow! Since I really don't think they will be coming to my state this time...
Sorry for such a long comment, lol. I love getting to geek out over Hanson and don't have many people in my real life I can do that with :) And I'm feeling especially grateful to be a fan rn so I guess I have a lot to say right now :)
@Jess
Long comments are always welcome (as I'm sure you can tell I have a habit of long writing as well). I have always loved Isaac's version of Hallelujah/Amazing Grace too and it really blew me away the first time I heard it. I don't think he's ever played it outside of Jamaica until now, so it was nice to see him bring it to Hanson Day where more people can enjoy it.
I'm sorry it sounds like you've been going through some tough things lately. Hopefully getting some new music will be a nice distraction for a moment, and I will cross my fingers for you that you'll get to see them on this upcoming tour! They haven't been to my state in...15 years? So that might be partly to blame for how I started traveling so much :-p Thank you so much for commenting. I do hope to get a review of the new EP up in the next couple of weeks.
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