Attention! Attention!

So being addicted to Twitter and being knowledgeable in popular culture has finally paid off!

Tonight The Academy Is... played a small acoustic show at this little venue here at U of I called "The Red Herring". Unfortunately I didn't even hear about this show until last night, and I was super bummed to find out that tickets were completely sold out. I was beating myself up about it all day. However, about an hour before The Academy Is... was scheduled to go on, I stumbled across a recent update from William Beckett's (lead singer of TAI) Twitter page:

The show in Urbana, IL is sold out. If you can't get in, knock on the bus across the street, answer 3 trivia questions and get on guest list.

Right after reading this, my friend Nikki and her friend Aileen (both already had tickets to the show) also read this message and convinced me to go try it out. Not really knowing what to expect, the three of us hesitantly approached the big tour bus. After asking a guy in the band's crew about William's Twitter offer, the guy informed us that he was recording something on the bus. Moments later, the guy let us in the bus and William was just sitting on a nice leather couch playing his guitar.

After exchanging a few words about the White Sox (I was wearing a Sox hat), William tells me he is also a Sox fan and that I already had some bonus points. So next he tells me the three categories of questions he will be asking: film, popular culture, and mathematics. NICE.

Question #1: "What movie am I watching?" (There was a super nice plasma screen TV on their bus). I see John Travolta and Uma Thurman at an old-school diner, and quickly identify it as Pulp Fiction. CORRECT.

Question #2: "Christian Bale recently had an outburst that was publicized all over the Internet. What movie was he on the set of?" I had heard the Christian Bale freak-out several times, and instantly remembered that it was on the set of Terminator: Salvation. CORRECT.

Question #3: William asks me to solve a Rubik's Cube. Shit. I have never ever been able to solve one! Luckily William reveals he was joking, but tells us that he can solve on is less than 2 minutes. Impressive. Anyway, the real question was "What is the Pythagorean Theorem?" I didn't even have to be a former Math major to know this one. A^2 + B^2 = C^2. CORRECT.

William tells me I was the only one to answer all 3 questions correctly (Hell yeah!). One of the band's crew members takes my name and adds me to the guest list. I take a picture with him and the two girls and then William and I take a picture together (with the Rubik's Cube):


Despite getting into the sold out show for free, I felt the need to show my support of the band so I bought myself a sweet "Fast Times at Ridgemont High"-themed The Academy Is... t-shirt. Due to Adam's recent injury, William played the entire set with just him and an acoustic guitar. The Academy Is... songs actually sounded great stripped down and acoustic. He played a great mixture of old and new material (and even threw in covers by The Shins and Death Cab for Cutie). William is such an awesome guy. Even without the band to back him up his connection on stage was amazing. He also shared a lot about his interests in popular culture and Chicago sports. Overall, the whole experience was probably one of the coolest moments I've ever had, and I am so glad I got the opportunity to do that.

My love for Twitter has grown tremendously and I am so glad that my knowledge of random pop culture finally came in handy!