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It feels a little strange to be writing about traveling for fun during a time when so many people in my home state and neighboring areas are dealing with devastating loss in the wake of Hurricane Helene. Remember my blog post about dancing on stage with Taylor in Asheville, NC a million years ago? That entire city is practically under water right now, completely cut off from roads, electricity, and even cell service. My heart goes out to the countless people who have survived the worst but are still a long way from anything being fixed or normal. I'm not sure how fully this is being covered nationally, but it's all I can see in my local news, and it's heartbreaking. If you would like to consider making a donation or sharing a link, this news article has a great list of places accepting donations, including verified gofundme pages if you want to see your dollars go directly to affected individual families.
Seeing all of this news while on my trip to Tulsa went a long way towards giving me a fresh perspective on my own struggles over the last few days. Sure, I might have had to change my flights literally four times and spent five hours at my home airport before calling it done and trying again the next day (ironically a technical difficulty unrelated to weather), but in the end I made it to Tulsa in time and I'm safely back home, and that's really all I can ask for. P.S. Shoutout to Jocelyn, a random AA chat representative for whom I would like to start a fan club. She listened to me when I asked for a flight change that wasn't strictly necessary by their standards, and she is the reason I am writing this calm post from home right now and not raging in the CLT airport overnight composing an angry letter in my head.
Weather and travel issues aside, I don't have to tell you that being able to go to this show was a privilege, and I'm grateful that I was able to get a ticket and jump through all the right travel hoops. I know for Hanson and for plenty of their fans, being at this show was a special opportunity to celebrate the 20th anniversary of an album, an era, and the Underneath Acoustic recording. Since I showed up on the Hanson scene in 2006/2007, I think it was a little different for me. I don't have the same memories that others have attached to the Church Studio or even to the Underneath era of shows, but sitting there in such an intimate setting definitely brought back memories of my first time seeing Hanson at the Middle of Nowhere Acoustic recording and the general feeling of awe and gratitude at being allowed to be a part of that moment.
I think for special shows like this, I'm always looking for some sort of wow factor. It's usually a rare or unexpected song; sometimes it's a special guest or a Hanson deciding to go swimming in the ocean in the middle of a set. In this case, I think the wow factor was simply the setting and the sound quality. Don't get me wrong, they gave some great song performances, but there was no single "wow" song so much as an overall "wow" quality to listening to good music straight from the source in a recording studio with a rich musical history and excellent sound.
There were two sessions, 1pm and 4:30 pm. I was at the 1pm show, but the setlists were identical. Here is the setlist courtesy of Hansonstage.com:
The first song that got me excited was "Stories," which was always my favorite 3CG song as a kid. We all know there are a few old school songs that might be cringy coming from grown men ("bing bang, you hit me like a boomerang," etc.), but I think "Stories" comes off as a nostalgic folk-y sounding song that if possible sounds even better from grown-up Hanson. It aged well, and I'd be happy to see this one as a tour staple.
"Annalie" felt a little bit like it got lost on its way to a different setlist and wandered into the wrong show at first, because I wasn't expecting to hear anything outside of the Underneath era. But you know, it's kind of like the time I got us lost on the way to Joshua Tree and accidentally drove us to to Lake Tahoe instead. I didn't mean to be there and it wasn't what I expected, but it was still beautiful. I could see "Annalie" fitting in well with the full acoustic set on tour, but I am a little surprised it made the cut for an abbreviated preview. Still, it was probably the best performance of it that I've ever heard, and I loved the drums.
"Runaway Run" was the same amazing slowed down version they played at HDay a few years ago that we feared might go into the vault forever, and I felt like Taylor poured his whole soul into his performance of "Believe."
I also have to give Isaac props for successfully pranking us with "MMMBop" this time. I know I'm always joking about how he will intro a song with "We've never played this live before" and my instant reaction is to wonder which song he's lying about now. But this time when he said it, he followed it with "MMMBop," and okay, he got me. I was fully expecting to hear something semi-rare that he forgot playing approximately 10 times instead of "MMMBop." He's just ensuring that I never trust his song intros again at this point.
At the risk of saying something slightly offensive, I think my favorite part was the "Me and Julio"/"Cecelia" mashup, and the reason that feels offensive is who in their right mind gets to go to a special show like this with rare original songs and comes out loving a cover song the most? I can't help it, though. The vibe was absolutely perfect and everything I've ever wanted out of an acoustic performance--solid vocals and an upbeat rhythm that forces me to tap my feet. Honestly, it was perfection, and "Annalie" felt like a distant cousin with a similar vibe. I'm definitely going to need a tutorial on those claps on tour, though.
I probably need to stop gushing about each and every song before I've gone on for 19 paragraphs, but it's hard not to when so much of it was memorable. It's funny, in person, the overall feeling of the show felt very mellow, maybe even excessively so at times, and there were moments when I was hoping things would speed up and wishing that I could have been standing and dancing around a little more. In retrospect, looking at the setlist, it's kind of hard to find fault with anything. It's so vastly different from your typical "festival" setlist full of singles and setlist staples, and I really can't wait to see what the extended version with two separate nights looks like.
The only thing I would change at all would have been to leave off "With You In Your Dreams." I realize I say this too often, but I stand by the fact that if I'm saying it too often, then they must be playing it too often. When Taylor said "Can I get a 'whoah whoah'?" to the crowd referring to the crowd participation part, I really wanted to sarcastically respond "whoah, whoah" in an entirely different tone, Peter Griffin style. It's a beautiful song and a prime example of the power of music when you have a sobbing mass of fans every single time you play it, and kudos to Hanson for having harnessed that power, but to reference another Peter (Parker), with great power comes great responsibility, and I think the responsible thing to do would be giving us a solid break from this song on occasion. I realize I'm being a total drama queen and all sarcasm aside, I'm not actually mad. I also don't expect them to cater to me when for every person who is tired of crying over it, there's probably another one feeling some epic healing catharsis. Still, can we get a once a year rule or something? I might even settle for a "not at three shows in a row" rule. Or what about a "not at BTTI" clause? Just think about it, guys.
I'm sure I've skipped over several other great moments because this post is starting to get longer than the show itself, but if you're a fan club member, the good news is you can currently still stream it for free directly on hanson.net and get all the fun and none of the flight delays. It will probably be removed shortly, so go ahead and give it a watch if you want to check it out!
Special thanks to Hanson for creating such a cool show opportunity, to their team for facilitating ticket sales and for great organization the day of the event, and shoutout to all my fellow fans that kept all unsolicited "whoah, whoahs" to themselves and made the whole experience fun and enjoyable. See you all soon on the road!
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