Harris House: Imagine Dragons

Our good friends, Jeff and Debbie Sermon (see HERE and HERE) from American Fork, have 5 children. Their youngest son, Daniel, is a member of a very popular rock band called "Imagine Dragons." Just HOW popular this band is right now is kind of mind-blowing. They have the number one song IN THE WORLD, not just the United States, but THE WORLD. They have sold over 4 million copies of their "Radioactive" single, which is the highest song on the charts, more than double the next two bands, "Fun" and "Mumford & Sons."

In fact, the week we got to go to their concert, they had 3 songs in Billboard's Top Ten - and "Radioactive" had been #1 for 19 weeks and counting. Platinum album, two double platinum songs, and four gold records...in Jeff's words "it is just surreal."

So they came to Nashville July 27th, and Jeff & Deb flew in and stayed with us, and they got us tickets, we all went to the concert! We got to enter from the VIP area, so we didn't have to wait in this ridiculously long line that had been gathering since the early hours of the morning...

Sam and his buddy Nathan Chi, patiently waiting to get through the gate...

Clockwise: Me, Nathalie and Bailey Fuqua (Davis' sister); Davis and Bailey, I GOT TO GO
BACKSTAGE BEFORE THE SHOW AND SAY HI TO DANIEL AND MEET HIS WIFE,
Sam and Nathan, and Davis and Grayson.

The concert was at a venue called The Woods at Fontanel (Barbara Mandrell's old house). It was a beautiful setting, and had a capacity of about 4,500. The concert was SOLD OUT! We were about 15 feet from the stage, front and center...

I got a few good shots before my camera died...

Thank heaven Nathalie and Bailey Fuqua got some good ones! In fact, look at the difference Bailey's really good camera made in the quality of the photos:

LOVE THIS SHOT! (by Bailey) It looks like something out of a magazine!

Their show is heavy on percussion, and at some points ALL FOUR OF THEM are playing some kind of drum. It was awesome!

In fact, at the very end of the show, during the encore performance of "It's Time(?)" or was it "Radioactive(?)" the lead singer Dan Reynolds was lifted up above the stage, and kept singing, and then when he got way up to the top in the rafters, there was a drum there, and he kept DRUMMING! It was AWESOME!! The crowd went wild...

Sometime during all this activity, someone in front of us THREW SOMETHING way up in the air, and out of nowhere it came down and hit Nathalie in the face. It gave her a huge goose egg on her left eyebrow, and broke her lips open! We looked down on the ground to see what it was, and never could tell. We think it must have been a bottle of beer or something...

This was taken after she had ice on it for quite a while!

It rained lightly through the last 1/3 of the show or so...we all got MISTED pretty nicely, and had wet clothes and hair. But it never poured, so I guess we were lucky. Because we couldn't bring in umbrellas, and would have just been SOAKED!

AFTER THE SHOW...

Jeff came and got us and took us backstage to meet the band. They were all very gracious and posed for photos with everyone.

We were lucky to get Dan Reynolds, lead singer, as he was on his way to DJ at a local radio station, which he
does from time to time in different towns. I thought that was pretty cool...

AND...(this is awesome)...after the show Jeff gave us THREE of the drum heads they used on stage. They have to replace them about every show, and he got them autographed and gave us one, gave one to Davis & Bailey, and one to Nathalie. VERY COOL! He also gave us some guitar picks, a copy of the playlist, etc. Some fun mementos of the evening!

After the show, Daniel's wife (I feel terrible, I can't remember her name!) came home with us because she had a plane to catch the next morning, and Daniel's bus was leaving at 2am. So she spent the night at our house and Steve & Jeff took her to the airport the next morning...