Tears for Fears ~ Surreal & Soul Stirring in Kansas City, Missouri

This is dedicated to Ryan, our newest Travel Fan Team member. Ryan is based out of KCMO and helped us find all of the things we needed to make memories that will last a lifetime!

Writing these show re-caps never gets any easier because each show and each year outshine the previous ones. We go to these concerts more for healing than entertainment. Tears for Fears are a theraputic oasis for the soul. For the past week I’ve been relaying others’ photos and experiences at Tears for Fears extravaganzas. Today I’ll share mine. One of the shows I attended took place in Kansas City, Missouri. Up until I actually landed in KCMO I was referring to it as just Kansas. Weeks and months prior I had conversations via phone with Carolyn, the Travel Fan Team rep in the area, and she corrected me saying “Missouri…Andye, it’s Missouri.” I replied, “Ooops, sorry. I won’t do it again.” Then I said “Kansas…” again. She, again, corrected me and so did every person from the driver that picked me up to Carolyn’s travel pal, Ryan who showed us around the city. Later, Curt called it Kansas with clear intention of meaning “KCMO.” He later made it clear to everyone that he did indeed mean Missouri. So, lesson learned, when referring to Kansas City, you better include the state or risk being corrected (politely mind you – e.g. soft whispers in your ear) by the sweet gentle folks that live here. And gentle is an understatement…the people there are unbelievably kind and caring!

Why Kansas?
Kansas City, Missouri was named as one of the coolest cities in America…and it is! There’s a lot to do there. They have an incredible Plaza downtown that rivals the midtowns of several major cities in North America. The shoppes and prices are more than reasonable. The food is delicious and restaurants stay open pretty late, we even found a few at 4:45am in the morning on a Sunday night/Monday morning…crazy hours and awesome at the same time!

This was the city in which several decided to see a show together. One of our members is a police officer and took it upon himself to escort us to KMO as well as Tulsa, Oklahoma. We spent 4 long days together and bonded like you would never believe. None of us had really spent THAT much time with each other previously unless you count the times we were having cold ones with Captian Julian and a few band members, road crew, etc. post show at Sunset Station in Hendersonville Nevada, Thackerville’s Winstar Casino in Oklahoma, and the list goes on. Despite our limited interactions in person, we actually clicked FAST! Everyone, especially Bobby and his son Roland (yeah, he named him after Mr. Orzabal and was one the highlights of the trip) did whatever was necessary to make the midwest shows ultra fantastic and comfortable for fellow fans around them.

Travel Fan Fun
10am in the morning (yeah, we got about 6 hours of sleep), Carolyn and I are downstairs ready to roll and chat with whomever walked in the door of the hotel. And we did. We met all sorts of people and had numerous conversations. I should mention that the guy at the front desk saw my TFF tshirt when I checked in and just beamed as if he knew something. My goodness, were we staying in the same hotel? Then we all headed out to the Plaza where we got Bobby ready for the shows at one of the neat shoppes. I also grabbed a pair of Hello Kitty socks which had *anchors on them. The whole day we kept finding little signs of TFF that wouldn’t normally be present except during a tour. There were lots of symbolic things that happened or either we were hypervigilant. All of our adventures were broadcast via Persicope. Some have been archived on YouTube for later viewing. Thanks to all who joined in the live broadcast, we had 65+ viewers on some emissions. If you missed it, you can find them on YouTube…should be about 7 of the 12. Enjoy!

The Show
After visiting the venue earlier and making sure we knew where to park (coincidentally chatting with staff etc. wink wink) we went back to the hotel, changed quickly and rushed back to the venue. The parking lot, which had been completely empty 90 minutes prior was now completely filled with only one space open facing the backstage door. We took it! We sat in the car as it drizzled and watched crew working and doing last minute things while fans lined up the sidewalk, shifting around the local radio station’s live broadcast booth. Just like L.A. there was a guy on the corner beating a plastic bucket with a pair of drumsticks. Others were seeking tickets…and we were one of those people as we had just enough for the Travel Fans and not our newest inductee, Roland. A kind man handed over a ticket to him 20 minutes before showtime for free!! Whomever you are, HUGE THANKS!

The Uptown Theatre is a gorgeous venue that looks a little bit like the Fox Theatre in Atlanta with its intricate architecture. It’s hard to tell if you’re in a cathedral or a music hall. I’d happily go to more shows at this place. All of the seats are pretty good. There’s space so you’re not really bumping up against your neighbour and that’s crucial at TFF shows because just about everybody is dancing. As mentioned I was in my little tiara representing TFF’s Rock Royals title that many of us (and a couple of music industry peeps) have placed upon them and unexpectedly received so many compliments. In ATL where I spend most of my time, tiaras are not uncommon. I was shocked people even paid attention. I used that opportunity to make new friends and get email addresses so we can exchange photos, etc. Then I got seated as I was too excited to stand around. I just wanted to get to the front where we were close enough (6 rows back) to the stage that the band could see us and interact with their returned peace signs and such. It was awesome! We also met a few travel fans who had seats on our row. :waving at Lady M:

Carina Round looked and sounded like a powerful angel…there are no other words to describe it. She outdid herself. It was unreal.. we made sure to show her a ton of love, from the time she walked out to the striking solo parts of Woman in Chains and BadMan’s song. She got a lot of love not only from those of us who follow her, but from the new fans in the audience…they adored her and showed it! She deserved it! Amazing job!

The band just stirred souls left and right. People were crying, people were picking each other up (no matter what their contrasting size) and hugging mid-song. They were having solo moments of their own by adding little supportive lines to the various songs. One guy just lost it and looked around singing at people with great force. Attendees did not mind the aisles, they flooded them where possible and rushed the stage. It was chaotic to a degree but still felt safe. Most notably, people. were. crying. I don’t mean a little tear, but instead that crippling cry where you can’t talk. Wives were holding husbands, husbands were holding wives and friends had their arms around each other. People just “had a moment” at the show. One person was local journalist Holly E. She blogged about her experience as well. She begins with…

“Concert footage in which fans are crying. I never understood it. Sure, the music is great and the band members are (sometimes) good looking, but weeping at a concert?

Last night I wept at the Tears for Fears concert in Kansas City. On and off, from the first strains of “Everybody Wants To Rule The World,” through the encore “Woman in Chains” and “Shout.” Read More Here

*Holly is also a really cool person, one of those people you’ll just enjoy on many levels through her writing. Follow her @HollyEdgell.

And she wasn’t alone, again…Carolyn cried, strangers cried, the guy behind me could barely get the words to the songs out due to his emotion. I turned around and smiled at him, he was all verklempt with his daughter snuggled up beside him. It was a very emotional show and the energy in the theatre was different from past concerts. Kansas City, Missouri got more than a performance, they received a big ol’ Tears for Fears Concert Hug.

Pale Shelter – Curt sounds really good, listen and enjoy…

The Set List was similar to last year’s with a few songs switching places. I’ve abbreviated it as we do… Everybody Wants to Rule the World (Lorde intro then the majestic mesh into the original), SW, STSOL, PS, BIDA, ELAHE, Change, MW, MF, CTTH, AFTYAH, Creep – (Radiohead cover) BMS, HOH – Encore WIC and Shout

Drummer Genius Jamie’s drum solo was excellent and the crowd just lost their minds through the power of his talent. During Shout the crowd sang “the long version” intro loud and clear. Roland was sweet again and dropped the mic down so various individuals could sing into it. You know we all love that. I’ll never forget when he did that to me back in 2011. I’m still in complete awe. There were just all sorts of extras at this show, Skittles included. I think Curt threw a few.

Doc Martens Shout Outs
Another great moment that happened before the show was when Ryan talked about his own pair of Doc Martens of which he was wearing. We snapped a photo of them and then sometime later (not neccessarily related to our tweet) Curt sends his Docs tweet.

Then during the show Curt motioned toward his feet to reveal these saying, “Because I’m not in Kansas anymore.” It was clever and got a lot of laughs Very cute! During an earlier Periscope Travel Fan broadcast I talked about how I asked the gentleman that brought me to the hotel if this was Dorothy’s Kansas. I enjoyed hearing Curt referrencing The Wizard of Oz as well. It was also cool to have Manila Kooks like JW in the mix.

Eventhough I managed to write a bit about the show, so many parts of this particular part of the tour left me speechless and I don’t even know where to begin in detailing them. As always it’s just cool to hear from the band throughout the tour/talk to them via social and see Roland so animated and involved with Twitter (something of which for years we thought he’d never do until he surprised us back in March 2014). It was very important to us. At one point I was messaging with the Good Man Curt Smith as Carolyn was so worried as to why he hadn’t said “Kansas City, Missouri we are in you…” and he mentioned they were just getting in. I think I’m responding to Carolyn, but I was accidentally responding to Curt and told him to “…go on and get dressed everything is going to be fine…” or something. It was rather embarassing but funny in hindsight. Glitches will happen…

The above may seem like “little things” to other people but if you’ve been following this band for at least a year at mininum (though for most of us it’s been 90% of our lives) you “get it.” You know why the Docs tweet is important, you understand and even cherish the tears of your fellow fans. We just mesh…that’s one thing about the fans…most of us just “mix and gel” quickly. In the cases where meshing didn’t take place or is struggling to gel, societal ills are present and have nothing to do with the band. If you come to this fan world with a pure heart, you will meet your soulmates. Not necessarily your future spouse (although that isn’t uncommon) you will, however, make friends that will become family. That’s what happened on this tour. Friends became relatives, souls were stirred and combined. I could go on. But I’ll conclude with this; nothing, not Periscope, not YouTube or any streaming media compares to being PRESENT. This is why, even if it is for one show or all of them, fans travel all over the states, to and from various parts of the world to see this band and experience something so overwhelmingly majestic that it brings a crowd to tears…

Big thanks to the people we met in Kansas City, Missouri! I have never been to a place so friendly…and I thought Toronto had the world beat! All of our loyalty and dedication is to the band and many hugs to the new travel fans that flew in from all over to be there. There’s no way any of this would work if love didn’t show up in the form of attendance!

Cheers!
-AA

*Nautical Anchors are a constant symbol in so much of TFF, CurtSmithOfficial and DelaQ.

More on the Kansas City, Missouri show from Timothy Finn