AP Tour Fall Ball October 15th, 2009 marked the first AP Tour Fall Ball to ever grace Pomona, California. The AP Tour, hosted by Alternative Press Magazine happens once a year in the spring since 2007 and has featured headliners such as All Time Low, Cute Is What We Aim For, and 3Oh!3. With the success of the tour this spring, they decided that concert-goers would not be able to wait for their next chance at AP tour tickets, and they were right. AP decided that having the tour once a year just wasn’t going to cut it, and so Fall Ball was born. This years line-up included The Secret Handshake, Set Your Goals, You Me at Six (who was unable to make it due to a bad case of bronchitis), Mayday Parade and The Academy Is… An evening of cocktail dresses, the opportunity to meet some of your favorite sweaty band members decked out in their nicest duds, and the chance to walk away with some cool stuff.

AP decided to hold a contest that went along with the “Fall Ball” theme of the tour. The best dressed fans at each of the tour dates would get to cut the line to get into the venue early, get their photos taken for altpress.com and to be onstage while their favorite band was performing. With a lot of hard work and hairspray, my friend and I were able to beat out the rest of the competition and walk away with the title of “Best Dressed” and what could be a once in a lifetime experience. As we sprinted to the front of the pit for the opening band, we were excited to see how fall’s AP tour would fare compared to the one that we had attended this spring.

The first group to take the stage was The Secret Handshake, a band that is sure to make you dance, or else (no really, their motto is: “if you don’t dance you hate your parents”). Their energetic front man Luis Dubuc took to the stage and immediately attracted all of the attention in the room. If happy-go-lucky songs like “Saturday” or “TGIF (Thank God It’s Friday)” don’t get your feet tapping then maybe a cover of a well-known classic like Skee-Lo’s “I Wish”, or a chart topper like Miley Cyrus’s “Party in the USA” will get you swaying. At the end of their lively set, the next band to take to the stage took the show in a completely different direction from The Secret Handshake’s head-bobbing beats and sing-a-longs.

Set Your Goals got creative with their entrance and came out to a sound clip of an episode from Saved by the Bell where Kelly Kapowski gets asked to the prom, and one of their singers came out with a blow up doll, which, by the way, didn’t resemble Kelly at all. The rest of the band filed in after a little entertaining performance and proceeded with their first songs, throwing most of the girls in the crowd into an angry frenzy as they were jumped on by over-zealous stage-divers and crowd surfers. The Secret Handshake fans were not pleased by the sudden rush of testosterone pumping through the pit and by the time Set Your Goals finished up their amazing set (I am now a fan), they receded backstage missing a microphone and buckets of sweat that had been lost while they were running around stage.

Set Your Goals was certainly a tough act to follow, but Mayday Parade, a big crowd favorite, pulled off their set quite well. Nearly everyone in the crowd was belting out their opener “Jamie All Over” and nobody was standing still. It seemed like the entire pit was jumping in unison. They played mostly old crowd favorites such as “3 Cheers for 5 Years” and “Jersey”, and included only one or two songs from their new CD Anywhere But Here, released on October 6th. In the middle of their set, Derek Sanders took his place behind the piano and played “Miserable At Best”, a beautiful ballad that I’m sure left no dry eyes in the venue. As Mayday Parade closed up their set, we got our VIP passes out and headed backstage for The Academy Is...

So that there was no confusion or problems, we followed The Academy Is… up the ramp after their first song had already started, and we mostly stayed off to the side of the stage, but the feeling was surreal. Imagine one of your favorite bands, singing some of your favorite songs, mere feet away from you. At first there was a worry that we’d be a distraction standing on the stage, but the band was completely in the zone Thursday night as they trekked through most of the crowds old favorites and playing only one song from their new EP, which has yet to be released. Their lead singer, William Beckett threw himself (and his microphone stand) around with reckless abandon pouring his soul out into the words that he was singing. We left the stage halfway through their last song, “Slow Down” and made our way back into the crowd, our hearts still beating with the thrill of being on stage in front of so many people, dancing like fools and thought it was their last song, there was no lack of energy from the band as the concert slowly winded down.

The best thing about the tour coming through Pomona’s Glasshouse is that the venue is so small, that it seems like no matter where you’re standing you’re right there in the middle of the action and you can always see the stage. Also, since the venue cannot hold as many people as some of the bigger venues that the bands tour, it’s easier to meet your favorite band members outside or by the merch tables afterwards. Use the calm after-show atmosphere to scout around for that last member of Set Your Goals who’s autograph you’re missing or talk to some of the local talent of the area who are always around selling CD’s (bands and musicians of Thursday night included Close But Not Quite, Uh Oh! Explosion and Justin Tyler). No one could argue that bringing AP Tour around twice a year was a bad idea. In fact, if they started coming around three or four times a year I’d still be buying tickets as soon as they are released at presale. The AP Tour never disappoints, so buy your ticket early for the Spring or they might be gone faster than you can say “William Beckett wore what?!”.

Everyone has a Twitter right?
Well, get a tumblr.
Start the new trend.

If you don't know what tumblr is, it's basically a blogging site,
But it's really simple.
I absolutely love it.
So get one from tumblr.com
And add me!
robotlust13.tumblr.com

I'm not even half way through,
but it started out lovely.
Here's the back cover:

"Within this house is a monster, a freak, a slave to the calendar and my own lunatic hormones. Before ever mestrual cycle - every phase of the moon, if you want to be romantic about it - I am savagely transformed from girl to boy for four full days, then wickedly reshaped into girlflesh again. Most of the time I sleep right through it. Most of the time..."

It's pretty amazing.
I don't know if it's on the shelves yet,
I'm not really sure how old this Advance Reader's Copy is,
But I think you should pick it up.
Read more kids!

It's good for your soul.