life in the garden of eden.

What an incredible smell you’ve discovered. . .

I have come to expect a certain stink at rock concerts. Cigarette smoke, pot, unwashed bodies, spilled beer, and fried food all mingle to create a unique, pungent pong. However, Cricket Wireless Amphitheater was different. The venue is right next to Knott’s Soak City and within a mile of the Otay Landfill, and the wind carried a terrible stench from either the water park or the landfill. Maybe both. The place looked nice. It just reeked.

Weird smells aside, we’d been directed to meet up with the I Love All Access people at 5:15 pm, so we got there about 4:45 pm. The ILAA confirmation email had noted some last minute changes with regard to parking:

“Please park in the Cricket Amphitheatre parking lots- the attendants will direct you to the closest lot. Please pay for parking and bring your parking ticket with you to the pre-show party and your host will reimburse you. There is ONE parking space per order.”

I toyed with the idea of bluffing my way into the VIP lot, but Lil discouraged me. I considered pointing out all of the times bluffing has gotten us into interesting places, but wisely kept my mouth shut as my twin seemed a little grouchy. There were signs indicating three different parking lots: general, premier, and VIP. I decided I’d rather not traipse back to the car through gravel and dust in the dark, so I headed for the premier lot.

The attendants loitering outside had no idea what was going on and each guy tried to send me to another entrance. When I pointed out to one attendant that the other entrances were closed and his buddies had sent me to this entrance, he muttered at me to pull into the lot and wait then shuffled off to go find his boss. After idling for five minutes, he finally sauntered up and told me to park wherever I wanted.

So, ultimately I didn’t have to pay and deal with the hassle of getting reimbursement from ILAA – which is fortunate. Parking in that lot was apparently $25.00 and people were still trying to get reimbursed from the ILAA hostess shortly before Def Leppard went on stage; even three days after the show, there were people who still hadn’t been reimbursed for parking in that lot.

When we got out of the car, I heard Bad Actress playing, and initially assumed that ILAA had set up with a copy of Songs From The Sparkle Lounge. Lil and I got all giggly and starry-eyed when we figured out that what we were hearing was a sound check. Yes, they sounded that perfect and precise. They also played Let it Go.

In the past, there’d always been an ILAA table set up when we got to the venue.

So, I was a little surprised that there was no check-in table or ILAA sign posted when we got up to the box office, but figured that maybe this statement really meant 5:15 pm sharp - not 4:45, not 5:00, not 5:14:

“Please meet your I Love All Access host, Emilie, at the check-in table at the Main Box Office Entrance (look for the I Love All Access sign) at 5:15pm.”

But 5:15 pm came and went. No I Love All Access sign. No check-in table. No Emilie. Event staff confirmed that yeah, she should be there. While we were waiting around, we met Carol7Lynn and SparkleMeSweet from the forums, who were also looking around for the ILAA check in. Event staff finally coralled people into lines and started signing in the ILAA guests about 5:30 pm, about a half hour before the gates opened to everyone else.

The venue had a NO PHOTOGRAPHIC DEVICES sign posted outside, so I shoved my camera down in my purse, under my glasses case, travel itinerary, cell phone, eyes drops, lip gloss etc. It’s an old trick, but most of the time it works. The security guy checking bags saw the metallic gleam of my cell phone and got suspicious.

“Is that a-”, he began to ask.

“Hmm? Yeah, it’s my cell phone,” I interrupted, sounding bored. It was my cell phone, and yeah, it takes photos, and yeah, there was also a Canon PowerShot hidden underneath it. However, my purse was crowded enough and the line of annoyed ILAA guests behind me was long enough that he didn’t make an issue of it.

I started walking past him before he finished saying, “Go on in.”

Sucker.

Part of the I Love All Access package is supposed to involve crowd-free shopping, before the rest of the masses surge through the gates and park their butts in front of the merchandise kiosk. Running late, our lovely ILAA host swept the group right past that and headed for one of the hospitality patios. I rolled my eyes and asked Lil to keep an eye on where they went, so I could get a couple of t-shirts.

We got the “rhinestone” t-shirts, which I call Sparkle Lounge shirts –since they’re sparkly, yeah? $45 each, they’d better be damned sparkly.

The “pre show party” was absolutely dismal compared to the previous parties. Previous ILAA parties served stir-fry, fresh fruit, various fried foods, sweets, even a decent tray of cheese and crackers, two or three different kinds of wine, and at least two kinds of beer. This one had 1) Fried chicken strips 2) Some Sort of Spinach Dip with Tortilla Chips and 3) Stale Cookies, with 1) Red Wine and 2) White Wine. Due to the keg not working, there were ILAA guests going out and getting their own beer. And not only were the tables and chairs filthy, they didn’t even set out enough of the tables and chairs to accommodate all of the ILAA guests at the party. We were dragging chairs and tables off a stack shoved up against the wall, while our oh-so-gracious hostess took herself off.

Our hostess Emilie stuck the Hysteria CD in then disappeared for a while. She popped back in from time to time and scurried around, passing out gift bags (same goodies as last year), disappearing again, handing out tickets, disappearing again, calling out the raffle. She seemed very disorganized and distracted.

However, the ManRaze street team totally had their act together. They swarmed the tables, enthusiastically passing out phat lewt. Bottled water, flyers, promo cards. Next year, I hope those girls get to plan some parties.

We did win one of the raffle gifts: a black leather Def Leppard wristband and a promo glossy, both autographed. Lil pointed out that the wristband looked suspiciously like some sort of bondage cuff. She cheerfully brought both wrists together and demonstrated.

At all of the other ILAA parties we’ve been to, the hostess escorted the group to their seats and explained to security what was going on, but this one did not, and in fact most people just wandered off on their own while she chatted. We followed their example and wandered out about 10 minutes before REO Speedwagon were scheduled to come on stage.

Finally, our hostess, Emilie, realized that she’d forgotten to take photos of the customers. This didn’t occur to her until after REO and Styx had left the stage, about 15 minutes before Def Leppard went on. She took the time to snap a few photos of herself with the ILAA guests in the audience and then got busy with getting a picture of herself sticking her tongue in the videographer’s ear, which wasn’t really what I expected from an ILAA hostess.

They’ve done a great job in the past, but I was completely unimpressed with ILAA this time around. They stunk. The fourth-row left orchestra tickets we ended up with through the ILAA 5 Star package were nowhere near as good as the second row center orchesta tickets we got a couple hours before the show started. Next time, I’ll use a regular broker, and/or take my chances at the box office on the day of the show. I think the only way I’d blow that much money on ILAA again would be if they offered a meet & greet.

IMAGE CREDITS
Photo of Coors Amphitheater courtesy of Copley Design
Photo of Sparkle Me Sweet & our ILAA hostess & someone else I don’t know courtesy of Sparkle.Me.Sweet
Photo of ManRaze lewt is courtesy of Lilithiel and the rest are mine.

Tags: def leppard, ILAA