Switchfoot: Hello Hurricane Tour - Austin 11/18

Okay, so almost a week ago, I left work an hour and a half early and set off for Austin, where an evening of pure awesomosity and win awaited me.

I arrived in Austin about 45 minutes before soundcheck was set to start. The parking lot I found was just around the corner from the alley where the tour bus was parked – basically behind and then a short block over from the venue. It was a tad pricey since I had to pay both the day rate and the night rate added together, but it was close and that was important to me since I was alone. I think this will be my new rule of thumb for shows at small venues in the middle of a city – if at all possible, park within sight of the tour bus. Heh.

Anyway, as soon as I got to the front of the venue (The Parish), I saw someone I recognized from the show I went to in Dallas in August. It’s a husband and wife that go to a gabillion Switchfoot shows any time they swing through Texas/Oklahoma/Louisiana/etc (they live in Houston), and they’re in Friends of the Foot. So Kathy and I had spent a lot of time talking with them before the show in Dallas and then had ended up standing with them during the show. Anyway, Kevin recognized me as well and said “hey, what are you doing here?” to which I responded “what do you think?” Heee. And he of course said “oh, probably the same thing I am.” So at that point I just got in line with them and stuck with them for the most part whenever there was waiting in line involved.



There were a surprising number of people there at 5:30 or so who weren’t FotF members, so I was definitely glad we were getting in first.

Just after six, they let us in for soundcheck, which I found really cool in my dorky way. They did a couple full songs and a number of partial ones while they tested everything out, talking back and forth with Taylor, their sound guy. Or Ryan? Taylor might be their lights guy. IDK. Anyway. They also occasionally paused to discuss a performance-related thing like where to come in or how etc. Then Jon said they were gonna “learn a song for tonight” (to play during the second set of songs which were from their non-Hello Hurricane records, lol) and that we could pick. After some slightly-shouty discussion, we settled on “Your Love Is Strong” off of one of Jon’s EPs and the boys proceeded to run through that a couple times, starting and stopping to adjust or repeat a section as needed.

Once they were done with soundcheck, Jon basically just said “all right, we’re gonna hang out now” and just jumped right down from the stage without even going around through the back. I spoke to Jon first and then made my way around the room to the other guys, ending with Tim – who remains one of the cutest and hottest people I’ve ever met in person, lol. BOTH. AT THE SAME TIME. DESPITE BEING SHORT. IDEK. I basically told them (specifically Jon and Tim since they seem to have had the most to do with the actual songwriting) that Hello Hurricane is precisely the album I needed in my life right now – I even specified to Jon how much “Red Eyes” in particular feels like exactly what I needed to hear and I don’t know how he does it. I also told them about how I feel terrible because I am stealing my best friend Nikki away from Seattle just as they’re rolling in, and they all said to tell her that they’re sorry they’ll miss her, lol.

Eventually, Ike (the tour manager) herded us all out of the room and back down to the street, where we lined up in the opposite direction as the regular line. Kevin and Jackie, myself, and a couple of their friends ended up right by the door… technically we should have been behind this group of teens with a dad, but Kevin wanted to lean into this recessed part of the wall ’cause his back was hurting. We fully intended to let them go in front of us, but omg the dad was OBSESSIVE about how we had CUT IN FRONT OF THEM and was heckling us about it and casting aspersions on our characters and our integrity right up until the moment we frostily let him pass us to go in first. He had been saying how mad everyone supposedly was, but everyone behind him who saw us APOLOGIZED that we had to listen to it. Anyway, his precious teenage daughter and her precious friends got the front row position they so desperately coveted, and whenever he caught my eye during the concert, he beamed at me in shared amazement at Switchfoot’s awesome as if he’d never accused me of lacking all integrity. WHATEVER, CRAZY PAPA BEAR.

When I got in, I managed to get a spot behind this INCREDIBLY HOT guy in a white shirt who was right against the stage. I didn’t realise it at first, but he had this fancy video camera and was apparently part of the road crew. I leaned forward at one point while we were waiting because even if it was something stupid I just HAD to talk to him so I could get a decent look at his face (srsly, so hot) and I said “I’m just gonna apologize in advance for the inevitable moment when I am shoved against you” and he just smiled and said “it’s okay, I’m only gonna be here for the first four songs.” SCORE. I mean, too bad the incredible hottness was leaving, but SCORE FRONT SPOT FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER. As you’re facing the stage, along the back they had the drums set up in the back left and the keyboards in the back right. Then Tim was standing to your left, Jon in the center, and Drew on the right. It was a really small stage, which was cool. Anyway, I was just to Tim’s side of Jon (because I loves me my Timmy oh yes I do but I didn’t want to be too far from center and therefore miss out on photo opportunities for Drew or Jerome).

Doors were at 8pm and the concert didn’t start till 9pm, so we stood there for literally an hour, during which I developed a backache (which would linger for days and still flares up if I sit wrong) to go along with the pain in my feet but OH MY GOD TOTALLY WORTH IT.

Jon started the concert IN THE CROWD. Like, in the MIDDLE OF THE CROWD. He was wearing a hoodie and a jacket over his t-shirt/button-down shirt combo, and he had the hood up. I think he must have been patiently pushing his way through the crowd incognito for at least 5-10 minutes to get to where he was without anyone noticing.

Anyway, they proceeded to play through all the tracks on Hello Hurricane in the order they appear on the CD. As promised, the HOT camera guy in front of me left after “The Sound,” at which point I assumed his place at the edge of the stage (it’s a small enough venue that there was no cordoned off space; we were crunched right against the stage itself). Jon was doing a lot of patter every couple of songs, responding to things he heard people shout/call out from the crowd, etc. In fact, after they did “Free” (one of my faves off the new album), I called up to him (mind you, he’s literally a foot away from me) “Jon, the only problem with this format is that we can’t put you on repeat!” And he laughed, and goes “on repeat? No, no, it’s not that format.” Inside I was squeeing my face off; outside I was very much enjoying Jon’s patter about how Drew has a mike now (YAY DREW) and how he was then going to start off the “ooh ooh ooh’s” of “Hello Hurricane,” since he could. Heh. Before playing “Always,” (for which he sat down at a keyboard!) Jon commented that he wrote it on his parents’ piano, which was the one on which he’d learnt to play. He then dedicated the song to Led Zeppelin (I yelled out “ZEPPELIN RULES!”) because it was their music that pulled him away from the piano and to the guitar in the first place – “I realised they didn’t really have any piano songs.” HEEEEE, OH JON.

After they finished playing the Hello Hurricane songs, they went off stage briefly. Jon instructed the crowd to pick a song and that when they came back on stage we should be singing it and that would be the song they’d kick off the second set with. This produced precisely the cacophany you’d expect. By the time they hit the stage, we launched into not a Switchfoot song, but a rousing rendition of “Row Row Row Your Boat.” Jon laughed, and then made the executive decision of asking the kid standing in front of his mike which song HE wanted to hear. Which resulted in “This Is Home,” which wouldn’t have been my pick but wasn’t something I was upset about, lol. Then they played “Meant to Live,” “Stars,” “Oh! Gravity” (with bonus bits of “The Shadow Proves the Sunshine” worked in), “Your Love Is Strong” (on the setlist it was typed “your love is stronG” lol), “Twenty-Four,” and “Dare You to Move.”

They left the stage and of course everyone was chanting for an encore – the lights never came back on so I joined in, and sure enough the guys came back out. I think they only did two songs – “This Is Your Life” and “Awakening” – but at that point I was just OVER THE MOON because Jon had tossed his guitar pick into the crowd and it had bounced off of me onto the floor so I hit the deck immediately and grabbed it before anyone else had really even realised that he’d done it. I GOT JON FOREMAN’S GUITAR PICK, YOU GUYS. I HAVE NEVER GOTTEN ANYONE’S GUITAR PICK BEFORE. SLKDFJLSKDJFSLDKFJSLKD. There wasn’t even a proper scrum for it, lol. I don’t think most people realised he’d tossed it, which suits me just fine ’cause I think if there had been a scrum I’d have ended up without it. Heh. Anyway, I was on awesome overload so all I know for sure is they played those two songs and it was AWESOME and the whole concert was AWESOME.

Then I went back to the merch area and sat down for a while until it had mostly quieted down and Bobby, the merch guy, had me sort out all the money according to bill denomination. He already had a couple girls who were helping him actually sell, and there wasn’t really room for another, lol.

And after THAT, I went back to my car and got on the highway. Stopped at a Whataburger for some fries and a milkshake (most importantly the milkshake omg my voice was leaving me fast). Talked with Nikki for a while until I decided it was better that I pay 100% attention to the road (lol), and then fell into bed almost as soon as I got home.

Then I spent the last almost-week taking time here and there to go through my pictures and edit them, as well as get the video I took during “Free” uploaded to YouTube.

To see my photos from the concert, go here: {on Flickr}
To see the video I took of “Free,” go here: {on YouTube}