Fast forward to a week later. Its a Tuesday night, and while I'm sitting in my apartment around 4pm, I realize it's the night of the merl show at higher ground. A bunch of my friends already had tickets, so they were heading up there. I decided to go... it was  too late to go with them, so I went by myself up to Burlington, about an hour and a half. I figured there would be plenty of tickets as it was a Tuesday night. Well, I get up there, and there's like a mob scene out front. 

Word was out that Mike was there and likely going to play. Damn, I think. So I look for an extra for about 10 minutes in the bitter cold to no avail, and finally decide to just sit on the railing on the side of the club for a few minutes before cruising back home. Well, right before I was about to leave, a big van pulls up right in front of me, and Merl and his band get out. Holy shit. 

So I just kind of blurt out, "hey, is there any way you guys could get me into the show tonight? It's sold out and I don't have a ticket," as they were unpacking the van. Totally out of nowhere, the bass player comes up to me, hands me his bass, and says, "Here, why don't you carry this in with us and we'll tell them you're our bass technician."  Holy shit! So I carry his bass around my shoulder and walk in to the club with the band. 

We walked in and went right backstage, where I proceeded to meet and chill out with the band for a little while. The nicest guys, by the way, if you couldn't already tell from the story. I then walked into the main area of the club to meet my friends and watch keller williams, and my friend tells me he was just talking to Gordo for like 10 minutes and that he was going to get up and play. 

Fast forward to the second set - gordo goes up with the band, and b.c he doesn't have his bass, ends up playing Merl's bass player's bass - the one I carried in. It was awesome So, to sum up, on a law-school night (830 classes the next morning), I got into a sold out show for free with the band, carried the bass that mike ended up playing there, and got a few free drinks cause I randomly knew the bartender through a college friend. Mentos...the freshmaker.

 - Lenwood Johnson