My EPIC night with 3 Doors Down!
I don’t consider myself lucky, you’ll never see me hit a big jackpot or win a large amount on a scratch off ticket but on February 14th, 2014 I started to think differently. It’s not always about winning money or trips but taking a few steps back and looking at what you have and what you’ve been apart of.
For me I am married to a wonderful man who has a wonderful family, I myself have been blessed with a great family as well. We have a good thing going, we work hard and go on vacations, enjoying life to the best of our ability. It’s not the big things but the hundreds of tiny things that make us rich in life and that’s how I’d like to start this post.
Never in a millions years would I have thought that I would be chilling backstage with a popular music group, eating, drinking, and being merry.
My mom texted my brother, sister, uncle, and myself asking if we ever heard of the band 3 Doors Down. I had responded with yes and asked what was up, she then began to explain to me why her sudden interest.
THE BACK STORY
My mom attends church and has met many nice people, one of them happens to be cousins with Chris Henderson from 3 Doors Down. This lady has been following the band around since the late 90’s and I was lucky to have been asked to tag along on this trip, well.. my mom was and she dragged me with her.
I wanted to go so bad but it was Valentines Day and I wasn’t going to leave my husband high and dry on the most romantic night of the year. I had told him the story and he said it was ok for me to go, that he understood how much I love to do this stuff and that it would be a great entry for my blog. I got a hold of my mother right away and we made plans to leave right after work the next day and be in Pittsburgh by 6:00pm.
Friday morning comes around and I am super stoked because I find out not only are we getting tickets to the show but we get to meet and greet the band as well, an ALL ACCESS PASS kinda day. It was a little after 3 and I hightailed it out of work and headed to my mom’s house where we would get picked up by Donna (Chris’s cousin) and then drive down together. We left shortly after 4, making good time and not running into any scary traffic or weather. The ladies had packed sandwiches, fruit, and snacks for us to munch on during the 2 hour ride to Pennsylvania.
We arrived shortly after 6, missing the actual meet and greet but that was fine. We pulled into the parking garage entrance and asked the gentleman running the gate where the buses were parked, Donna showed him her pass and we were on our way. We had to pull back out and search for the street where the buses were resting but after a few turns we spotted them and maneuvered the vehicle between them and a handful of naked trees.
We grabbed a few of our belongings and trudged trough the snow towards the backstage entrance, running into some of the band mates on the way. Donna said hello to them and I stood there gawking like.. I think I know you. One of the guys ended up being Brad Henderson, the lead singer but it was dark and I was unsure so I walked on by and made my way inside. Donna showed her pass to security and we were pointed up some stairs, which we climbed and then walked down a hall and into a room.
FOR ONE NIGHT I WAS A GROUPIE!
Standing in the doorway I could see Chris (who at the time I didn’t quite know was him) sitting on a couch. We headed in and were introduced to Chris and his mother who was hiding behind the door. Donna started catching up and my mom and I just stood there, she had taken her coat off and started to get comfortable but I was still in awe and remained still in my winter attire.
I was just listening to the conversation when Chris’ mom in her sweet southern accent asked if I wanted to get my Cd’s signed. I was rather embarrassed, of course I wanted them signed but I had JUST walked in the door so the last thing I wanted to do was intrude. I shyly said yes but insisted it could wait, at this time Chris got up and said it was fine and that he should do it now. He asked if that was all I had for him to sign, I thought 2 Cd’s was pushing it but I guess not. He grabbed my stuff and disappeared outside to scrounge up the band and have them sign my stuff. He came back shortly later with 2 signed Cd’s and then continued to chill on the couch but not before we had a photo shoot.
Wait for it…Yes, I know..my hair. I had just had it cut the day before and it was super fresh not to mention it spent 8 hours in a hairnet at work so when I exposed it that’s what I got BUT my mom looks awesome. Also please notice, or don’t.. my torpedo boobs, for whatever reason I can’t seem to take a normal picture.
Moving on…
After this was done the ladies went out for a smoke in the freezing snow storm, I decided to stay behind. They disappeared for a while and in the meantime it was just Chris and I sitting across from each other in awkward silence, well he was playing a game on his Ipad, I was the one being awkward. He broke the silence by asking where I was from and we talked about that for a bit before it got quite again. During this time I was going over in my head how to ask him to give a shout out to the website and the more I thought about it the more nervous I got. My mouth dried up and I started to pant loudly, finally I told myself “Lauren, you want this blog to be successful then you need to grow some balls and ask this man for a shout out” and so I did. CHECK out the video below.
After that was all said and done I slithered over to the couch where he was and watched him play a game called “The Room” which is a serious type of puzzle game that I know I would basically stare at the screen and drool but he was pretty sweet at it. I watched him for at least 10 minutes until the ladies came back, Chris’s mom walked into the room and the others grabbed some food and left to eat it.
Did I forget to mention that the hallway was lined with tables that had tons of food and drinks on it? I didn’t, well.. it did.
After a few minutes I left Chris and his mom and I went into the other room where my mother and Donna were sitting at a table enjoying some food. As I got in there I realized Brad Arnold, the lead singer was in there too. He just got done eating, was cleaning up and getting ready to leave. I motioned for my mom that I was going to ask him for a picture, I wanted to make sure she was ready. As he walked by I asked and he was more than happy too.
I look slightly better in this picture but not much and of course Brad is a cutie which helps take away from my frohawk.
It was almost show time and while the guys were getting ready to go on, I had a little bite to eat since all I had was a couple of car ride snacks. Then Donna came in and delivered our tickets, we finished up and headed down to the theater.
We took our seats and only waited maybe 10 minutes before the boys came out and played for us. Brad talked about how their “Songs from the basement” acoustic tour was pretty much a laid back band practice kind of show. The stage was set up like a basement and around them were couches and in those couches were people and one of those people were Chris’s mom, it was really cool how they did that.
The guys were awesome, laid back, and a lot of fun. The sound was amazing and Brad’s voice was fantastic. I was able to snag a few pictures and some video clips of the night in between security running around and yelling at people with cameras. Check it out below and enjoy!!
The show ended and what a great show it was, I could have watched them all night but unfortunately we had to head back to Cleveland. However our night doesn’t end here, we headed back up after the show because Chris had a few more family members that were stopping by. We had to wait a few minutes and give the band time to get off stage and situated before we ran back up stairs, plus the women had to smoke again.
So while they were outside I stood on the stairs catching my death every time the door would open up. As I was waiting for everyone to come back inside Justin and Brad came from above, they too were going out into the cold. Check out the video I have of the boys walking by me.
I’m such a creeper Mc.Creeperson.
Finally the ladies were done and we could head back upstairs, while everyone was catching up, mom and I hung out in the hallway scouting for more band members. We found Brad and I was going to ask him for a shout out too but he also had company so I didn’t want to interrupt. I saw he went downstairs and decided I’d catch him on the way back up, he never did HOWEVER Justin Biltonen walked by so we jumped him instead.
He was kind enough to take a picture with me and then mom spoke up “Lauren, didn’t you want to ask him a question?” she totally caught me off guard but he was all like “Yeah, shoot” and I was all like (blank stare) but I was able to get out a few words explaining to him about my blog and if he would hook it up. Mom then asked how the band got their name “3 Doors Down” he explains it all, Check out the video below!!
Yes I know, another great picture. :-/
Donna wrapped it up with her family but not before I could get another autograph from Chris, I wanted my ticket stub signed and he was totally down with that. We all bundled up and headed down and out but not before I could snag an autograph from Justin to match the one from Chris on my ticket stub.
So all pictures were taken, all autographs were signed and now it was time to go. We stepped out into the snow and said out goodbyes, as we sat in the car a few of the band members, Justin was one for sure was outside the bus throwing snowballs at each other. It was cute and If it wasn’t cold and dark I would have had footage of that too.
Everyone was very nice, special thanks to 3 Doors Down and everyone behind the scenes.
I had a GREAT time and an awesome experience! I want to thank Donna for letting us tag a long and for Chris who welcomed us into his dressing room and personal space. Definitely something I will never forget and hopefully I can be apart of many more opportunities like this in the near future.
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STALK ya later!!