Photo Gallery: The Hop Jam 2014
Somebody was about to snap a picture of Taylor Hanson when a brawny security guard stepped in front of the iPhone.
“Excuse me,” he said, turning away from the excited fans to face the middle Hanson brother. “You need one of these if you want to be in here.”
So Hanson obediently put his arm out to get a wristband, mandatory for everybody — and that means everybody — in the over-21 section of this unique event, mixing equal portions of music and craft beer.
Thousands of people came to the Brady District for Sunday’s first-ever Hop Jam, but they didn’t all come for the same reason.
Some, like Jeanie Tanzola from Ontario, Canada, came for the music.
And judging by the Hanson tattoo behind her left ear, for one band in particular.
“There’s a song for every emotion. Everything that you’re feeling, you can listen to a Hanson song,” said Tanzola, who won a Tulsa World contest that included a meet and greet with the band Sunday night. “If you’re happy, it’s ‘MMMBop.’ When you’re sad, you listen to, like, ‘Me, Myself and I.’”
Others came for the beer.
In fact, during the first couple of hours of the festival, the crowd seemed sparse in front of the stage, while beer lovers were crammed shoulder-to-shoulder in the tasting area north of M.B. Brady Street.
Some vendors ran out within a couple of hours, and most of the craft beer was gone long before Hanson took the stage Sunday night.
“I haven’t really had a lot of exposure to Hanson, but you got to love anything from Tulsa,” said Jimmy Moore, from Collinsville, who was sampling a dark ale from Mustang Brewing. “I’ll definitely be a fan after tonight.”
Hanson’s fan appreciation day has been Tulsa tradition for several years, always coinciding with Mayfest weekend because that’s where the band first played in 1992, before becoming international celebrities.
But this was the first time the band added beer to the mix, closing most of the streets in the Brady District to accommodate the huge audience. With Hanson’s own MMMHop Pale Ale recently earning an exceptional 90 points from Tastings.com, their beer might someday be as famous as their music.
But not yet.
“This band has been a really big part of our lives growing up,” explained Abby Young, a fan from Spartanburg, S.C., who came to Tulsa this weekend with more than 20 other women from “The Island of Misfit Fansons,” a fan club with members around the world. One came from England to see HopJam.
“So when we meet for the first time, like a lot of us did this weekend, there’s no awkwardness. It’s like we’ve known each other for ages.”
Chris Easom has been a Hanson fan since the band’s 2000 tour of Britain, when she “was really thirsty for a new kind of music.”
“It was so upbeat and genuine and fresh and enthralling,” said Easom, who came to Tulsa for Hanson Day in 2007 and 2012, and now for Hop Jam 2014.
“I’m 57 years old and when they play, I’m 18. I don’t think I’m happier anywhere else than at a Hanson show.”
source: Tulsa World
source: Tulsa World
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