Although I haven't kept up with all of their new music, I enjoyed seeing Lady Antebellum when they opened for Keith Urban and, a bit later, for Tim McGraw. So when they began their own tour I kept an eye out for a show I could make it to. When I saw that they would be coming to Moline, IL I decided that was the show for me, even though it was on a not-so-convenient Thursday night.
I bought a ticket early in the year and waited for the April date to arrive.
It was a happy coincidence when, without talking to me, my oldest daughter Jen scheduled a visit home from Rhode Island for Easter and booked the cheapest flight to Iowa that she could find - landing in Moline that very Thursday night!! When she sent me the flight info, she asked if she should rent a car for the 2.5 hours drive to Cedar Falls (since she'd arrive when Mom and Dad would be working). "No way!" I responded. "I can not only pick you up, but I'll take you to a concert before we head home if you like!" She liked and in fact invited one of her best buddies in the Quad City area who has gone to other concerts with us. I checked Ticketmaster and told Jen that it looked like only upper level seats were available at this late date, but we didn't worry too much because the Moline arena isn't that big.
And then another fortuitous bit of luck. When we firmed up our plans and I returned to Ticketmaster to purchase more tickets, suddenly Ticketmaster gave me seats in the 8th row of the lower risers mid-arena! How could this be, just days before the show?? I immediately tried to complete the purchase. But- gosh darn it - got an error message : (.
Tried again, got the same 3 seats, tried to complete the sale and Error! again!! I repeated the process a third time with the same result. Finally I decided to try to change my parameters - switching from "Ticketfast" to Will Call and (to appease the ticketmaster "gods"), added the optional $15 to join the fan club. And YES!! this time it worked, for whatever reason, so we got our 8th row seats!! Since I paid the fan club fee I decided to check the fan club site for a possible meet and greet sign up although I was pretty sure that, since the show was just a couple days away, the meet and greet sign-up had probably already taken place. The fan club site still allowed me to click on the Moline date, so I went ahead and signed up = what the heck.
Well my good luck charm was still working. About a day later I got an email saying I had won a meet and greet with Lady A!!
I couldn't head out to pick up Jen from the Moline airport until I finished teaching that day, so told Jen she would probably be stuck there for a while. She said no problem - she had her computer and was working diligently on a grant application so I could take my time. As it happens, her friend Sarah was available first, so Sarah collected Jen and they had time to catch up for a while before I got to town. Since I no longer had to rush to the airport I made a brief detour on my way to Moline to have a nice lunch with my youngest daughter Annie in Iowa City (which is right on the way). Tried to talk her into joining us in Moline but she was a stressed out grad student and felt she had to decline.
I met up with Jen and Sarah and we had a beer together at the Bent River Brewery, but then I had to head to the arena early for the meet and greet. There was a bit of complication because the box office had no meet and greet envelope for me. But I had brought along my email from the fan club and Lady A's staff member came up from the bowels of the arena to hand deliver the missing M & G wristband. I stood in line with many others for quite a while and then they finally took us back to the meet and greet room. There was no attempt to create a special atmosphere like Keith does at his backstage sessions. Instead there were just 3 stools in front of a GAC backdrop and several rows of chairs forming a semicircle (with a center aisle) in front of the stools. There were about 80 of us in attendance and I scored a seat in the second row.
A Lady A staff member told us the rules (no camera, no autographs) and briefed us on what would happen during the M & G. She then kind of preemptively answered the most frequent 'routine' questions asked at M & Gs to encourage us to come up with more unique questions.
Well that might have discouraged the fans from asking questions - when Lady A came out and opened it up for questions, initially there was silence and no hands were raised. So I raised my hand and asked if they would share a funny story from touring. (No, much as I would have liked to, I did not ask them for a "touring with Keith Urban" story!) Hillary talked about a time that they used a lift to carry them from beneath the stage up to stage level to make their grand entrance at the start of the show and the lift got stuck so that only her head was above stage level and Charles had to drag her out from the lift pit. Funnier than that, however, was the song they performed for us at the meet and greet. At the start of the M & G Lady A had told the couple little kids in the audience that they could come up front and sit on the floor if they wanted to. At least one was a very excited, perhaps 4 year old fan. When it came time for their song Hillary asked that little guy which song he wanted and he chose "Just a Kiss". But then he asked if he could come up and sit with them during the song (they said yes and got him an extra stool!). And he sang along with them and was just as cute as could be!
After the song each of us in the audience got to meet and have our photo taken alone with Lady A!! I was pretty pleased! But lordy I had never thought of myself as being particularly short (5' 7" most of my life, maybe 5' 6" now that I am older) until I met that group up close. Gosh it felt like Charles was 7 feet tall and even Hillary towered over me. In my photo it looks like I must be standing in a hole!!
By the time I got out to the arena I had missed a bit of Thompson Square's opening act, but I was there for all of Darius Rucker's set and thoroughly enjoyed all the hits I was familiar with. I must admit that some of his new songs that I did not know all sounded very much the same to me, but Darius does have an engaging stage presence.
BTW I was happy to see that Lady A's stage set up included a catwalk that extended to mid-arena (right in front of our seats). The stage itself was a bit odd - kind of donut shaped with the rear half of the donut consisting of right and left curved stairways for the artists to descend dramatically, while the front half of the donut was the curved front of the stage. The "hole" in the center of this donut stage was a VIP fan area called The Inner Circle. This Circle probably allowed an up close view when the performers were actually on the stage, but probably had a rather poor view anytime the performers went out on the length of the catwalk.
Usually it seems that the headlining group has the best quality sound at shows, but I was not impressed with the sound Lady A's sound techs created. While the group sounded great on their big songs like Run to You and Need You Now, on more rocking songs where the band has a bigger presence, Hillary's voice did not project well and the lyrics got totally lost. In fact when they opened the show with the lead track of their new album, I didn't even recognize it for several moments (even though that is one of the tracks I play over and over in my car). Here is American Honey and Run to You (sorry about the noisy women sitting behind me who should have stayed out in the concourse since they paid no attention to the performers).
I was happy that Thompson Square and Darius got to come out for a group song towards the end of the show. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Az1mGpGbLsQ
Jen, Sarah and I spentt the night in Moline at the quaint Stoney Creek Inn, had a quick breakfast in the morning, then Sarah went off to her newspaper job and Jen and I headed home to Cedar Falls so I could get to my Friday classes. It was great to have some concert buddies to share a fun evening with and to start off a welcome weekend visit from Jen, who lives way to far away!
