@ZackTeibloom “Have you ever crashed Cactus Cafe?” Bryn texted me at 3:20 p.m. Thursday. “Nope. Don’t know anything about it.” I texted back. “It may be dicey. Really tiny venue. Show’s sold out” he wrote. I sighed and put it in a way I knew this Hoosier would understand. “I’m Reggie Miller. You’re Rik Smits. Security is Spike Lee. Cactus Cafe is MSG. No worries.” Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom Going to a Neiliyo show on my day off at the venue I’ve crashed the most was a given. I’ve crashed The Mohawk twice using the backdoor slider method and once when I pretended I was Neiliyo. The idea there is to go in the side door which is rarely guarded. This would have been a perfect technique during that all-girl cover band when the indoor stage was packed, but in between the LCD Soundsystem cover band and Octopus Project’s sets, the room was empty and it would have been painfully obvious if I tried to walk in. I got in line w/ $10 in my hand. Yeah, I was that close to paying. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom Finding parking has been more of an issue than actually crashing a show in Austin lately, but I had a pit in my stomach all afternoon. I couldn’t tell if it was from the upcoming crash of a sold out Phoenix show or from having to face Manning/Addai in fantasy playoffs. I’ll have a harder time coming back from the 34 points Manning put up than I did on this crash.* I worked 11-8 instead of 3-midnight so I could get there in time for the opening bands, White Denim and Hockey.

I drove around for ten minutes looking for a spot and settled on one where I was half parked illegally with the ass of my car in a tow zone. I decided it was safe enough and packed a sandwich. Just as I finished packing it, a car two spots ahead of me pulled out of a legal spot, I ate the sandwich and headed to the venue. This felt like a good sign. As I walked up, a clearly cold gentleman asked if I had a ticket and that he’d offer me $60 for it. I want to make it clear that usually a scalper is out there offering you a ticket for $60, which he won’t get, but this guy wanted to pay $60. I told him I didn’t have a ticket and he said, “Good luck, I’ve been out here for over an hour and there’s nothing.” “Don’t worry about it. I do this all the time. I’m the Festival Crasher.” Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom No, I didn’t chalk up crash #25 or #26 this weekend. I didn’t need to. I had a media pass and even won two extra tickets in that supergroup contest to give out to Bryn and @doctorcollins. These are tales of other brave crashers. You know. “Renegades of their time and age. Everyday people like you and me. Renegades of funk.” New crashing anthem. “No matter how hard you try, you can’t stop us now.” Ok, let’s get the the crashes: Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom I wasn’t even planning on crashing this one. I wanted to support Neiliyo. I try to pay for artists I know personally* and I desperately want Neiliyo to be successful. That said, natural instincts kicked in. First, I went for the move I made up on my first Austin crash, the backdoor slider.

The backdoor to Mohawk opens up when someone exits for a cig or to make a phone call and it’s rarely guarded. I waited around for a couple minutes, seeing if anyone would exit, but I sensed the guy by the door worked there and decided to just pay the $10. I wanted to support Neiliyo. I really did. But you know me… Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom There are four faces a first-time crasher makes on their crash. It reminds me of the faces I’d make when my dad would take me to Cubs games and we’d get closer and closer to game time and still not have scalped cheap enough tickets for my dad to buy them. @RayRay849 made them all as I took her on her first crash last night at Antone’s for a sold out show by the Dirty Projectors.

Face #1 is eager, cautious optimism. The opening band isn’t on yet. No obstacles have given you a reason to worry. It’s all potential. Thankfully, we had a woman on the inside last night. @Den_mom proved herself to be the best at giving her location at ACL. No matter how deep she was in the crowd, she’d give a spot-on description of her location (next to the pirate flag, 5th row, even with the right speaker) that made her impossible to miss. You want her on the inside. Read the rest of this entry »

Even though Andy and I crashed JazzFest seven times between us, ACL will go down as the best crashed festival of the season. My roommate crashed, I snuck @chrisinaustin in even though he broke my wristband forcing me to crash two days and, most impressively, @candabus and @doctorcollins created media passes. A whole new level of crashing we hadn’t attempted yet. We needed @candabus to tell us how the big crash went down.

@Candabus As the weeks to ACL approached, I felt like a college freshman at Christmas. I knew I should be excited, and I am a little, but something just didn’t feel right this year. My friends told me it was because I didn’t have the media pass I was wishing for, but I also sensed that the lineup just couldn’t compare to 2008. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom The last* thing you want to lose the first day of a festival is your wristband**. Unless you’re me. I had a 3-day media wristband that I put on extra loose so I could pass it back to friends.

Yeah, I’m Robin Hooding my crashes now. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom Doors at 9, opening band at 10, I get off at 12. You can count on two sets and an encore from Umphrey’s like you can count on death and taxes, so even with a torrential downpour and a 15 minute drive, I figured I could at least catch an hour of Umph. I figured right.

The crashing gods smiled upon me once again as the rain slowed as I got closer to the venue and I had @halleyclaire as my girl on the inside feeding me info. What I knew going in was that there was a stamp, an outdoor smokers patio for easy access. If you’ll recall from Successful Crash #5, I have a stamp in my car at all times for such an occasion. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom I was starting to think my Stubbs wristband collection was as useless as that time I collected Ploids* when I was 16. Every time I’d tried to get into a Stubbs show with my pocket full of different color wristbands, they’d roll out a new one on me. I even have multiple shades of green.

The third night of Spoon’s Austin home stand was a light green wristband. Guess who already has a light green wrist band and had his easiest crash in months. Read the rest of this entry »