Meet-and-Greet

Greet
/grēt/
verb
verb: greet; 3rd person present: greets; past tense: greeted; past participle: greeted; gerund or present participle: greeting1. give a polite word or sign of welcome or recognition to (someone) on meeting

I have always considered myself a very privileged person. From the time I was born to the present, I have pretty much gotten whatever I have wanted within reason. Some of it is due to the fact that my Mom never wanted me to want for anything, other privileges just kind of fell into place such as marrying who I did. My husband Jake, is a very hard working man. He has gotten everything he has wanted through hard work and dedication. But that's a different story. The reason why I bring this up is because my husband works in radio. He worked hard to get where he is and admittedly I totally reap the benifits. And what that means to me is I pretty mcuh get to meet any famous music artist I want who comes into town. I have met and taken pictures with musicians like: Kelly Clarkson, Hanson, Bruno Mars, FUN.,Macklemore and Ryan Louis,OneRepublic, Sara Barielles, 311, John Mayer, Blink 182, Kat Graham, Rita Ora, Chris Allen, Steven Tyler, Ellie Goulding, Phillip Phillips, Ben Folds Five, Guster, Bare Naked Ladies, Ja rule, Train, Neon Trees, Kate Nash, Grace Potter, Michael Franti, Nicki Minaj, JoJo, Adam Lambert, Orianthi, Taylor Swift, Demi Levato and Vanessa Carlton just to name a few. The reason I bring this up on my blog today is not to brag at this point, but talk about human beings vs. celebrities when it comes to "meet and greets."
For those of you who don't know what a "meet and greet" is, it's basically where winners of a radio, tv, or other promo get to go and supposedly meet the celeb they won the meet and greet with, and take a picture/autograph with them. In your mind you have thought about this moment all through out your life. "If I ever get to meet my favorite singer, this is what I will say and we will become best friends and he or she will call me and maybe take me on tour with them and it will be my dream come true because he or she writes great songs so obviously they are great people who care about everyone". Never turns out as expected and because of this, I have now realized most famous people "musical artists" are full of complete shit. The real definition of a "meet and greet" is this:
1. The beyond grumpy tour manager takes the group of winners and hurdles them into a shitty room like cattle while you sit for AT LEAST a half hour while the artist is doing who knows what the fuck in his or her tour bus. (Who the hell do they think they are wait to meet them? Did Jesus come and visit them in there dressing room?)
2. Finally the artist moseys on out like God's Gift to the World and stands by the back drop with his or her posse, (usually a body guard and a publicist of some sort and sometimes the artist is drunk or high as fuck I might add and you can smell it on them) while the tour manager gets you in a line to take picture in groups of people you don't know so you don't have to waste the artist's precious time with individual shots.
3. You wait in the line of winners and finally you get to where you take a picture with the artist and it's really quick. Usually if the artist is somewhat of a good actor/actress they make you feel like they kind of like that you are there taking a picture of them with a simple nod or hey how's it goin' but most of the time they have this attitude like "Ugh when is this going to be over"? Nice right? So not only did you waste your whole week picking the perfect outfit in hopes they will notice you and want to become best friends because they too like the color blue, but you got your hopes up in thinking they actually gave a shit about their fans. Such a disappointment.
4. After you take a picture or get an autograph (from a celeb who for some reason is too good for a photo) the angry/scary/grumpy tour manager rushes you out of the room like you are a terrorist.
5. At least pretend to care.

So basically after all that work of winning the chance to meet your favorite singer, taking all that time to pick out the perfect outfit and brag to your friends and find a sitter for your children, you feel like shit after. You feel like a needle in a haystack and that you are a worthless peice of garbage. I have been to so many meet and greets now that every time I go I question why I went, (let's be honest I went to get a picture with the artist so I can post it on fb later to brag about it to the world when in actually reality, it kind of sucked).
I tell this to some people and they say "well you have got to look at it from their perspective. Meeting a bunch of people every single day and signing autographs and stuff would get tiring after a while." And I always say this, " I don't give a shit if you are tired of meeting people. It's your job. Act like you give a shit. Act like you are happy to see someone. Most likely this person has looked up to you for years and all you can say is hey with a blank look on your face? How non nostalgic of you. Not to mention you are getting payed a heep load of money to shake twenty people's hands who look up to you."
Meet and Greets have really disheartened me from celebs and musicians. Here you are thinking you are going to meet this really cool person and then come to find out you meet this tired, blank expression, full of themselves artist who couldn't give a flying fuck about you. Oh and by the way, anyone they have on their team such as a grumpy tour manager or publicist gets directly put back on the artist in my mind because they hired the son-of-a-bitch to be mean so they didn't have to do the dirty work. I see right through you! And it makes me not want to listen to the meet and greet artist's music anymore. If I had actually won tickets to meet you, I would be so incredably pissed off if I took the time to win the tickets and an artist treated me that way.
I do have to give props to two artists on my long list for actually acting like they somewhat cared: the band FUN. and surprisingly John Mayer for not showing up totally baked the first half. And there are a few others who were better then most but still, really? I'm still waiting for the "Hey thanks for paying to see me in concert and for appreciating my music" phrase which I don't think I will ever get.