THE STORY BEHIND THE SHOES

I just thought I would help Shannon out and post her experience for her, so she can catch up on some much needed rest. Here it goes:

"I just want to mention, these girls were really really nice. I know I've read a few things saying that Leisha wasn't always nice to fans, but after yesterday, I have a hard time imagining that. When they did the signing, I gave her my shirt to sign, and she was like, "wait, you didn't pay for this did you?" and I said that I didn't, and she said, "are you sure? you promise?" And she was looking over at the merch table like she was going to make sure they gave me my money back if I'd paid for it. Also, when my friends and I first talked to them outside the venue that afternoon, it was Leisha who said hello to us first; we were all playing it cool and not saying anything to them until they approached us first. So I do find it hard to believe that she's rude to fans. She was completely friendly, as was cam. I was happy to find that they were both such down to earth, easy to talk to girls. I almost forgot I was talking to "famous people", haha!Ok anyway, let me go ahead and tell you the whole story So we got to the venue around 2pm after driving 3 hours and having some lunch before standing in line all day. We just sat around for 2 hours, not doing much of anything, when a bus pulls into the parking lot. We were speculating as to what band might be on the bus; there were four bands playing there that night (they have two venues in the same building, so there were two headliners and two opening bands... plus Amy Cook played a few songs before the UHH show, which was great!). so we watched the crew members unload the trailer that the bus was carrying behind it. About half an hour after it got there, they were finally done and the four band members came walking around the side of the bus. The first thing that caught my eye was Leisha's green boots! I was suddenly so nervous, and was afraid I'd be too scared to stop them to give them the shoes. But they made it way easier by saying hi to us first. So I got a sudden jolt of courage and said, "hey i have something for you!". Leisha walked over to us and asked what I had. I was bending down to get them out of my bag and I was telling her that I was the winner of the tagging contest. I asked her if they'd seen the video. At first she didn't seem to know if she'd seen it, but when I pulled the shoes out she was like, "YES! we did see that one, it was so awesome!" (of course I'm paraphrasing there; it was all a big jumble of me being nervous, so I don't remember her exact words, but that was basically it). At that point I stood up and she stuck out her hand and said, "I'm Leisha" and as I shook her hand I think I mumbled something like, "yeah i know!" (haha!) Then Cam did the same. Anyway, so the whole band was looking at the shoes and talking about how much they liked them. I think it was Josh who was saying he liked the skull . Then Leisha made the comment I quoted earlier, "these shoes are f**king awesome!", which sort of gave me a little thrill. Then they asked what size they were, I said they were men's 7, Cam said that was 9 in women's. Leisha said they would be too big for her, and Cam joked about how it was good that she had bigger feet than Leisha. Then Leisha said, "will you paint a pair for me if i pay you?" And of course I said YES! So she asked me for my contact information. I scribbled down my name and email address on a piece of paper that she put in her pocket. Cam suggested that Leisha get me to paint some boots for her. I told her maybe she could send me a pair of boots that I could paint, so we'd know they fit her, and she thought that was a good idea. I asked if I could take a photo with them and they said Sure, so first I just took one of them. Then they said "come get in the picture with us!" So I stood next to cam, who told me I should get in the middle. I was starting to get over being nervous by this time. It stopped feeling like I was talking to my favorite band, and instead like I'd just met two cool girls. if that makes any sense... it's just that they weren't acting like they were being bothered or like they wanted to hurry and get away from the geeky fans. They were just a couple of genuinely nice girls that we happened to be talking to. Then I told them about how I'd been talking to Brian from Nettwerk about the free t-shirt they were going to give me at the show for winning the contest, so she told me to talk to them after the show and they would make sure I got one. Then they said goodbye and went into the venue. We saw them go back and forth several more times, but we didn't want to bother them, so we kinda played it cool and pretended we didn't notice, lol. We listened to soundcheck, and i managed to record a little of mystery lights during that. It's a little muffled though.Then we finally got in, after a bit of confusion at the door about who was getting in first. There were about 5 people who'd waited for hours, so we were trying to make sure that at least the five of us got good spots (and we all did, thankfully). I stood right in front of the stage on Leisha's side. In fact, I even sat my bag on the stage in front of her pedals, haha. When they came out the crowd went CRAZY. And I'm happy to report that i personally didn't hear anyone yelling out "Alice!" although I did hear several people referring to her as that at various points when they weren't playing Apparently some girl yelled "play some murmurs songs!" The crowd was really into the show, lots of screaming and yelling going on. I heard a lot of "I love you CAM!" which made me happy. I'm always a little bummed that Leisha gets all of the attention. Cam is great too! And she's so gorgeous in person. I mean, even when she got off the bus in her street clothes, she was just really stunning. Photos don't do her justice!The band sounded great. They did an awesome version of Mystery Lights that's been reworked, and includes a bit of "Sweet Dreams are Made of This" at the end. They had a lot of funny banter too (i managed to record some of it). At one point, I guess Cam read the wrong thing on the setlist, and Leisha told her she needed reading glasses. Then she said, "you're getting old cam", to which Cam replied, "at least i'm not 30". The whole audience was like "oooooh!!", and Leisha sort of quietly said, "no, i'm not either" Cam said, "it gets better when you're 30, that's what I hear", then Leisha said, "your life is gonna get so good this year, trust me". then after the song, cam put her arm around Leisha and whispered something. Leisha came to the mike and said that cam apologized for calling her old. She said, "I'm not old!" And of course with me being 34, I had to agree with that!I got a copy of the setlist after they played, and here are the songsI've had enoughSo LongRunCoveredMystery LightsExplodeI See RedCommon ReactionEveryoneSay SoWait Another DayAway From HereDance With MeNot a Love Song (encore)Dreamer was on the bottom of the list, but they didn't play it After that they left the stage, and my friends and I lined up for the signing. I already told you how that went Leisha and Cam thanked me again for the shoes, and Leisha said she'd get in touch with me soon. As for the person earlier in this thread who said I should share her contact info, I hope you were joking. There's no way I would betray her trust like that. It would be really uncool of me to do so. I'm looking forward to getting to do some work for her; I was thinking of suggesting a trade instead of her paying me. After seeing her painting on ebay, I know I'd love to have some of her art to hang in my apartment. So I'll ask her if she'd like to trade instead of giving me money. That would be rad.ok! well that's about all I think. whew! what a day" .

Story by Shannon... :)