David Archuleta - Archey Report - Atlantic City and Long Island
(Here's the Archey Reports from archuletagem from Atlantic City and Long Island! Thanks!)
ATLANTIC CITY
Here’s my Archey Report for Atlantic City 8/2/08. I travelled from New York to Atlantic City on Friday evening and stayed over with my fiancee in a hotel so that I could get up early and wait by the buses to meet David. I got all my Archie gear ready: Bianca’s Archey Angels shirt (I love it!!), lots of batteries and two cameras, and I made a poster for David that read: “You got me hypnotized, so mesmerized, I know this CRUSH ain’t goin’ away” with a picture of David, a heart that had a Nutter Butters wrapper inside of it, and another heart that read David is my American Idol. I was pretty stoked to hopefully be among the first to communicate to David how much we loved his new song right after it debuted the day before. It was about 12:15pm when I found a small group of people with posters waiting where the buses would drive in and figured that was the place to be. I heard there was also a group of fans waiting on the boardwalk for the Idols and it was confusing for us to know where to be. When I first got there, I was looking around to see if I would recognize anyone from Rickeys. I was keeping an eye out for th118, rightsaidcat, and indomass, but found no one familiar at the time. There were several older Cook fans, some Dreadheads, a Carly fan with Carly’s tatoo on her arm (that was cool!), and younger Archie fans. I was a little lonely at that point, then around 12:30pm we see an Idols bus drive in with a Guitar Hero trailer attached to it. We all got sooo excited!!! But nothing happened after that. But we figured we were in the right place. Shortly after, a girl comes up to me, who looked around my age and was wearing an Archey Angels shirt like mine and asked me “are you archuletagem??” I was soo excited, it was th118 and her husband, and I was incredibly happy to meet an Archie fan from Rickeys at that moment. We bonded over our love of Archie, it was great to put a face to a name at Rickeys, and we had fun waiting together in anticipation for David.
We were waiting for several hours. Finally around 3pm the Idol buses pulled in, we were all hollering, and we saw Kristi Lee Cook smiling and waving through the window of one bus and Archie’s handler at the front of the other bus who didn’t look happy. We heard they were stuck in traffic and were arriving extremely late. They still had to do the official meet and greets inside, had soundchecks to do, and we were told the Idols weren’t going to come out. Well we were all persistent and determined, we waited until 5pm but at that point realized there was no way they were coming out and accepted it and looked forward to enjoying the show and hopefully getting to see David after the concert. The concert was excellent though my seats were pretty bad. I had Floor seats but I was in the second to last row all the way in the back and couldn’t see much of anything. Luckily my camera had zoom. I also had loud screaming girls behind me that were screaming during the performances. Th118 was about ten rows in front of me and it was nice to see her there during the show. She pointed out Brooke’s husband to me who she said hello to earlier and we were looking for Jeff all over to say hello to and praise but didn’t see him. I thought all the Idols did a great job. There were a lot of screams for Jason, Archie, and Cook. I absolutely loved all of Archie’s performances, it was heavenly to see him rise up at the piano for Angels with everyone cheering and I loved the smoke effects, he really looked like an angel in the clouds. Loved Apologize and his body language and hunkerdowns!!! Stand By Me was incredible and after it, everyone was cheering and gave him a standing ovation. It was difficult for him to talk to us after it, we weren’t letting him speak and he kept saying “Thanks so much, thanks so much”. It was adorable. Then came When You Say You Love Me and his beautiful voice filled the room like no other. It seemed like at that point everyone was really listening because there was less shouting and I attempted to record a full video. It was a great performance, he really showed his heart, and I was so proud of him and in awe to be there lucky enough to hear him. He introduced Cook and everyone went crazy. There was a lot of love for Cook, the screams were so loud!! It seemed like it was a big Cook crowd. Since this was the first concert for me and the only one for my fiancee, we wanted to hear all the Idols sets and we decided not to leave early at that point to wait for autographs. Please Don’t Stop The Music was so funny, Michael Johns was acting goofy and he was teasing Archie and it looked like Archie tried to run away from him. So funny!!! At the end Cook bows down to Archie and Archie jumps up and down smiling and pointing to Cook. It was so cute!!! Thank goodness he wasn’t wearing that sweater to cover up his cuteness. It was a terrific show. My fiancee and I were tired so we walked the boardwalk for about an hour and then we returned to the Boardwalk Hall entrance to check out if the Idols were coming out. At that point we saw Kristi Lee Cook come out to sign and it was fate that we arrived at that moment. We stood as close as we could to the barricades and were able to get everyone’s autograph but Chikezie, Michael Johns, Ramiele, and Cook who didn’t come out. I was too far away to talk to David and Jeff and get a picture but was able to pass up my tour program and poster to have Archie sign. His handler was terrific in gathering everything for him. It was a crazy crowd with a lot of demands and pushing. When Archie read my poster he smiled and laughed, that made my night. I took a picture of him from a distance. Then a girl next to me lifted up a small radio and was blasting Crush on it as David was passing!!! It seemed like he was smiling a lot when he heard it and even teary eyed but it all happened so fast to exactly say what happened. I know I was teary at that moment. Before I knew it the whole experience was over. But then I had Long Island NY’s concert to look forward to in two days. It was a great feeling to know I would have another opportunity to see him. It’s crazy how the ODD gets you, David is so infectious, that no amount of him is ever enough! ? I tried recording some video as best as I could. I was still learning how to use the video feature so some videos are cut off. WYSYLM is my best video from AC. OK, off to write my Archey report for Nassau Coliseum 8/4/08!
LONG ISLAND
Here is my Archey Report for Nassau Coliseum Long Island NY 8/4/08. I think I wrote a novel here because so much happened so bear with me! I returned from Atlantic City extremely late on Sunday evening because we left late from there and thought we could avoid traffic but were mistaken. I want to apologize again to MC and Xeno if they are reading this because I wasn’t able to get in touch with them in time to arrange a ride since we hadn’t exchanged phone numbers earlier. I drove early to Nassau Coliseum to wait by the buses, this time I went alone and was hoping to meet up with a lot of NY angels from Rickeys. I spoke to Xeno beforehand that morning and I was so excited! When I arrived there, it wasn’t hard to find the crowd waiting. This time I wore an archie-ologist tank top and not my Bianca Archey Angels shirt which was in the laundry so I was hoping to be able to identify Rickey angels without wearing a Rickeys shirt that others would recognize. Anyway it was pretty easy to find MC and Xeno since I recognized them from their pics online and it was great to meet them in person! I also met stina, mcluvin, coca, wickedboi, Noelle, Nikki (Nicolelovesarchie I think), hope I didn’t leave anyone out, and we had so much fun together. What a fabulous bunch of people I will never forget!!! The best part was when before Archie came out, to pass the time we were gushing over Crush and the Teen Choice Awards and we were singing Crush a lot just for fun. Then Nikki came up with an idea to have an interpretive dance to it and it was so funny!!! I’m kinda shy so I wasn’t really dancing but I did join in for the last part. Hope no one posts that video lol!! They all wanted to do this in front of David which I thought was so funny and I thought we were all just joking in our giddiness.
Time went by quickly and hanging with everyone was such a joy. Before I knew it the buses arrived around 2:30pm I think. We were nervous that they were late and wouldn’t come out. I was so frantic because I didn’t want to miss them twice in a row!! It was too much for me to handle. Luckily Kristi Lee Cook came out and were all sooo excited. She was so nice and beautiful, wow. She took pics with us and was so accommodating. When Cook came out, I was so glad for the Cook fans who weren’t able to see him at all at Atlantic City since he couldn’t come out before or after that show. He was great to meet. Jason was friendly, gorgeous!, and also really accommodating. When Archie came out we all went nuts!!! It was great that he started at our side where we were standing and we like to think the security guard #60 helped us out with that one. He was a nice guy. Don’t believe them when others say the Idols are not coming out because we were told that by a “security supervisor” and they did come out! #60 was straightforward with us though. Anyway, seeing and meeting Archie was such a thrill for me. This time I was right in front at the barricade and got to take pics of him, get autographs, and talk to him. I wasn’t able to get a pic with him because he had so many people to get to and said he couldn’t so I didn’t want to pester him. He is so cute and flawless, wow, and he looked so happy. His great smile and laugh are contagious. So when he got close to us, our group started singing Crush to him. I was way too shy for him to hear my off singing but I sang the last part, my favorite part “away, eeaaay, eeaaay, eeeaaayyyeaaah”. ? I don’t believe we were doing the rehearsed dance, lol. He enjoyed us singing his song to him so much, that through all of the distractions of accommodating others, he looked up at us several times and gave us the cutest laugh ever! It was AWESOME!!! I told him that we love his new single and I also blurted out how much I loved Love Me Tender. I had to tell him how much that performance of his affected me. How it gave me chills and that it was a special wedding song for me and just beautiful! I swear I am having his version played at my wedding, I don’t care what others have to say about it. Anyway, he said to me that people tell him this a lot about this song of his and thanked me so much. When he made eye contact with me and spoke to me, I think I went numb. It was so surreal. It was an amazing moment for me. The crazy part is I had been thinking for sooo long what I would tell him if I were to meet him, had rehearsed different things to say each time lol, and in that moment I forgot it all, I was soo nervous! and just said what was in my heart at the time.
I wish I could’ve gotten all of this on video but I’m so happy that someone else there did! And MC took amazing video as well. After the Idols went inside, our group went to Starbucks for lunch and air conditioning, it was really hot that day. Thanks to coca for handing out cold water bottles to us!! We were having a blast at Starbucks looking at all our pics and video we got and swooning over David. There were many thuds! Looks like we were really excited and loud because we got yelled at by one of the Starbucks workers there that if we didn’t keep it down, we’d get thrown out! Anyway, she seemed to be having a bad day working there so many of us felt she should listen to some of Archie’s music to feel better, lol. Time went by quickly and it was already time to go to the concert. At the concert, there were a lot of cheers for David when his Guitar Hero commercial came up first before the show. Cookie also got cheers when his appeared. This time I had really great seats, even though I was up two levels I was at the very side of the stage and got to see everything! And was so excited for Archie to come up to us for SBM! I think Side Stage Seating is better than Floor Seating unless your Floor seats are at the very front because I couldn’t see a thing at Atlantic City in my floor seats that were in the back and I’m pretty tall. The whole concert was spectacular for me since I had better seats and I was sharing the night with so many angels from Rickeys. Luckily MC and Xeno were able to join me in two empty seats in front of me for the second half of the show. I really enjoyed Chikezie, Michael Johns (amazing, crowd went wild), Kristi Lee’s God Bless The USA, Carly (incredible doing Bring Me To Life with the breeze behind her blowing her hair as she was rocking to the music), and Brooke’s Let It Be drew cheers and was purely Brooke. At intermission, MC, Xeno and I met up with Carly’s husband who was really nice and we took pics with him. I went crazy looking for Jeff but I didn’t see him and looks like I missed him when I caught up with the other angels. Jason had a lot of cheers when he came out and he was great and so relaxed, Syesha was also very good and she really gave it her all for Listen. Finally Archie came out and I felt like I was seeing him for the first time even though I just went to Atlantic City’s concert two nights ago. The screams for him were awesome! I lost some of my voice screaming along with everyone. I thought his introduction being lifted up seated at the piano in the clouds was so beautiful and so fitting for such an angel. I thought his Angels was perfect, I could hear everything this time around because I didn’t have people screaming in my ears directly behind me like I did at Atlantic City. So I tried to take more video while also trying to soak in everything. Hope I did okay with it. The ending of Angels was soaring and so uplifting for me when he raised both his arms. Then he went into Apologize and I loved how he walked up those steps with such confidence. I loved the performance and can’t get enough of it. His hunkerdown in Tacoma I think was the best but this was still pretty good. Afterwards, he thanked us for our support, was so cute talking to us with his little giggles here and there, and then went into Stand By Me. MC, Xeno, and I were getting ready to run up to the side of the stage to touch his hand. We were soooo excited!!!! When he came our way, we ran down the stairs so quickly, and extended our hands, it was pretty crazy, they were in front of me and I almost fell on them as they almost fell on other fangirls. We were all going nuts!! I was afraid I was going to drop the camera over the railing lol. I got the craziest video of all this LOL!!! Anyway I didn’t get to touch David’s hand but I know MC did! That was a fabulous moment!!!!! I really enjoyed his dancing and the crowd went wild. After his SBM, the crowd gave him the loudest applause. Then came When You Say You Love Me which was my favorite of the night. I found it to be so heartwarming.
I am amazed at how mature this performance is, and how expressive he gets with it. I loved the part towards the end where when he sang the words “when you say you love me” he put much emphasis on “me” and pointed to himself with such conviction that I really believed he understood our love for him and has at last gotten it! Then he went into “I feel like I’m alive” with his arms rising up and I felt this rush through me because the sound of his voice live goes right through you, I can’t explain it, and I became emotional. It was simply perfect. We gave him tons of applause, he didn’t have to do a thing to get us going like the other Idols did, he just stood there in all his cuteness and glory. He thanked us a ton, introduced Cook, the crowd went crazy, and after the last wave goodbye, MC, Xeno and I were getting ready to leave early to wait for autographs since we already heard Cook’s set and PDSTM at other concerts we went to. The best part was that we were able to see Archie leave the stage and take off his glittery jacket and walk out!! We all tried to get pics of this, I really liked the shirt he had on underneath the glitter jacket, still don’t understand this outfit that was picked out for him. Anyway, we waited for about an hour and all of the Idols came out except for Chikezie. I was able to get everyone’s autographs, and pics with Kristi Lee, Syesha and Jason. They were all really accommodating despite the craziness. After Kristi Lee came out, she went up to admire one of the policeman’s horses, that was cute. Jason’s sister and mother came out and they were really nice and his sister remembered Xeno. Ramiele was cute and screamed out “Castro family!! Woohoo!!!” and everyone cheered. Michael Johns’ wife and their puppy came out too! Puppy Johns! Puppy Johns! Jason was so carefree, he looked kind of tired but was so willing to make everyone happy. I see how he and David spend much time together. Meeting Archie again was awesome!!! When he came out of course everyone was going crazy. He and Jeff both walked the line together. Xeno was next to me and she presented to Jeff a plaque that read Best Dad To Look Up To that also said Rickey.org loves you. It was really special and he seemed shocked that he has fans at Rickeys. I told him that he has a wide fanbase just like David does and he laughed. Xeno and I also told him that we could never tire of following David throughout his journey and listening to his music. When Archie approached us, he signed more pics for me, he wasn’t taking pics with people because it was too crazy, and I got to tell him how touching When You Say You Love Me is for me. He said “awwwww thanks” when looking right at me. It was very dark because one of the lights above us had suddenly blown out and security had to hold flashlights for the Idols. It seemed to be hard for the Idols to see what they were signing. It was too bad that the lighting was not great for video. Since it was so dark, Xeno and I noticed that Archie almost fell at one point almost tripping over the curb behind him when he turned around, and security rushed to him but everything was ok. It was good to see that they were doing their job to protect our angel. It was about midnight and David must have been so incredibly tired at this point. I don’t know how he has the stamina for all that he is doing and he is one amazing guy. The whole experience of the day and night from beginning to end was incredible. I will never forget it and will never forget the great people I met! I hope to meet up again soon when David is back in NY on his own tour. ?
Videos: