The Backstreet Diaries: One man’s saga of the postponed Backstreet Boys concert at Hersheypark – PennLive

There’s a bar in Hummelstown that has some of the best wings in the area: The Boro. They won the PennLive reader poll for the best wings. And whenever I have a weird assignment in the area – maybe Channing Tatum is releasing a line of his own vodka, or Hersheypark is welcoming a new baby seal – I try to stop there to pick up some wings.

“What’s going on in Hershey today?” the one bartender usually asks. She knows me now, and knows I’ve probably just done something weird if I’m stopping in after a shift at work. I don’t often get recognized by readers, but it’s particularly nice when it’s someone who works at one of my favorite bars. Does this make me A Regular?

But I drove past The Boro on my way to the Backstreet Boys concert in Hershey with resignation. No wing for me tonight, I thought ruefully. By the time the concert lets out, their kitchen will be closed.

I’d just been at the Hersheypark Stadium for the Florida Georgia Line concert the night before – a record-setting attendance, the country stars had said during their show, with at least 30,000 people in attendance. So I was prepared for the crowds, the lines, the waiting. I was no longer some sweet summer child; this was the summer of concert coverage. Carrie Underwood, Breaking Benjamin. Soon, KISS and Jonas Brothers and a number of other shows. I was a Concert Reporter. I knew the drill.

Pride comes before the fall, they say.

My sister had told me a few days before that she and our cousin would be at the Backstreet Boys concert as well. Why not join them? I thought. Concerts are a social event, after all, best enjoyed with friends.

I had a bit of a walk from the Hersheypark Stadium to where they were parked, outside of the main entrance of the Giant Center. A mile, maybe? Two thirds of a mile? I’m not great at estimating distance. But it was pleasant. I even saw a rainbow as I traversed the Hersheypark lot. A good omen, I thought.

Aren’t rainbows caused by light hitting water in the air?

When I was arrived at my cousin’s parking spot, I was greeted with family and chips and drinks and photos – the concert was serving as my cousin’s birthday party. Seeing the Backstreet Boys. A lovely way to spend the day. Let’s take another selfie, make sure you get those dark clouds in this one.

Did they know the opening act? I asked.

“Isn’t it Brian Lettrell’s son?” they said. Baylee Lettrell, a lad of about 16 years of age, opening for his father’s boy-but-now-certainly-man band. The circle of pop music life.

The dark clouds came closer. Lightning was on the horizon. It was about an hour until the concert began.

Maybe we should, uh, get in the car for a minute.

Gathering up the cups and chairs, we made a dash for the SUV as the first salvo of pelting rain began.

I texted my editor: “Soooo if you happen to hear that the concert tonight is canceled, could you let me know?” Send.

Tucked in the back of an SUV, my feet resting on top of a cooler, I texted while my sister, ironically, loudly sang along with a Justin Timberlake song on the radio. One of my cousin’s friends had come all the way from Philly – not for Backstreet Boys, but for the occasion. It was my cousin’s birthday.

“It’s doing nothing here in Etown,” my editor replied. Perhaps the storm had turned away from Elizabethtown, or perhaps it hadn’t gotten there yet. It was moving fast, though … maybe it would all be over soon, I thought, as rain pelted the windows.

“How are you even fitting back there?” they asked. “You must be hating this right now. Sean’s miserable, stuck in here listening to us.”

But I was dry, and seated, and had chips. I assured them that, thus far, this was far from the worst assignment I’d ever had. This, I could handle.

The general consensus of the car was that they’d skip the opening act, if need be. Backstreet wouldn’t likely go on until 9 p.m. Stay dry, wait out the storm, eat some chips, listen to some Lizzo. A sound plan.

But I had to work, I said.

7:40. At least a ten minute walk back to the stadium. Is the rain slowing? It is – this might be my window. Of course, I can’t actually open the back door of the SUV from the inside. Could one of you let me out?

“Clear skies … we want it that way” My editor loves a pun.

Then, an update from Twitter:

No way the show would start at 8. A brief respite, to make sure the rain had truly passed. I texted with friends: the show isn’t canceled, I said, just a bit postponed.

“It’s almost as if… Backstreet’s… Back?” a friend replied.

“I’m glad that storm quit playing games with everyone’s hearts” said another. “It must be larger than life to see them”

My friends are very supportive.

“I don’t get it” Send.

“Is this the line to get back in?” my sister asked over the phone. If I had to pick a word to describe her tone, I’d go with “incredulous.”

I’d gone ahead, hopping on the tram car to get back to the stadium. I’d arrived around 8 p.m., but by then there was quite a line to get back through security. I dutifully took my place at the end of it – I was in no real hurry. If all of these people were trying to get back in, the concert clearly hadn’t started yet.

Spirits were high, then. 8:15. People joked. A large man kept leading the crowd in the chorus of “I Want It That Way,” to an initially spirited response. By 8:35, his efforts found diminishing returns.

“I think so,” I responded. The line had moved a few yards in the 40 minutes I’d stood in it. I took a moment to look back, foregoing the lesson of Lot’s wife. I saw the line, extending from the stadium gates, past the Hersheypark entrance, past Chocolate World. It extended into the parking lot. My sister and company had walked past the end of it at first, refusing to believe that the queue of people could possibly go that far.

When the storm had come through, the audience had been encouraged to seek shelter. Many sought that shelter in their cars.

Usually, audiences filter in over a course of hours. Some arrive early. Some just before the show begins. Some skip the opening acts, some tailgate.

Now, at 8:40, thousands of people were all trying to get into the Hersheypark Stadium at the same time. And now we all stood at a bottleneck.

“This concert is going to go until midnight,” one woman in line observed.

“They can’t,” another responded. “They need to finish by 11.”

It had crossed my mind, too – I wasn’t certain about Hersheypark’s policies, or Derry Township’s, but I imagined a delayed start to the show would likely mean a shorter show, not one that went later.

How much would we miss?

Back inside the stadium, the masses of people were no less dense. The Hersheypark staff had done yeoman’s work, getting so many people back through security scans and ticket check-ins as quickly as they could. But now those people were all trying to get past each other. To their seats. To the bathrooms. From their seats to the bathrooms. The concert would surely start soon, and the sooner we all got ready, the sooner it could start.

Weaving my way through the throng, I decided to use the men’s room that, once again, several women attempted to invade. Be they brave or foolhardy, I couldn’t help but admire their temerity, their chutzpah. They were here to see the Backstreet Boys, after all. Any and all opportunities must be claimed. Fortune favors the bold!

Just as the night before, they were foiled by Hersheypark security. If they’d put the question to me, I’d have rather the ladies avail themselves to the stalls than I be forced to listen to one gentleman’s exceedingly loud rendition of the chorus to “Say My Name” by Destiny’s Child.

This is a Backstreet Boys concert, sir. I thought. Don’t cross the streams.

The stadium grandstand seating seemed to be full as I made my trek toward my seat.

The lights dimmed.

The crowd screamed.

And there was a boom of intro music, far louder than any thunderclap yet heard tonight.

The show was starting.

It was a few minutes after 9 p.m. Had the massive lines of people all made their way inside by now? I reeled from the sound, the intensity, the anticipation. It was palpable. How many people still surged through the stadium’s walkways, trying to make it to their seats, or at least see the stage?

Would Baylee Lettrell go on, for a few songs perhaps? The video graphics popping up on the screens, were they just to build excitement? Was this really the Backstreet Boys taking the stage?

Of course, it was. Of course it was.

And then, the next bottleneck. The grandstands were full, but the stadium floor seating was half-full: tickets needed to be checked, hands marked. The crowd was almost vibrating around me now, pressing in closer as if the few inches between one another was no longer a tolerable distance if it means getting to where they could sit, where they could see.

I could make out the figures of the Backstreet Boys on the stage. It was happening. Even in normal circumstances, the energy would have been electric in the stadium. In these circumstances, it was overwhelming. I could hear the music, but couldn’t process the sound: people were closing in, with some now forcing their way through the crowd-line, traveling parallel to the queue, like salmon swimming upstream. They were past “I beg your pardon”s now, and I had no choice but to admire them – just as I had no choice but to let them push past me. Godspeed. Get to your seats. It’s the Backstreet Boys. We’ve made it.

“Gotta go!” I heard the Backstreet Boys sing.

We do indeed. The concert is happening. Here we go.

I was next. I handed my ticket to a gate attendant, got a blue X on my hand with a Sharpie, and walked past the partition towards my seat.

“And speaking of ‘gotta go,’” I heard one of them booming through the stadium’s sound system. “The officials are stopping the show momentarily. This is for your safety, and for ours.”

The band was assuring us they’d be back. The storm was coming through once more, they said. But they’d wait it out. They were going to perform for us. They were not going anywhere.

“We’ll be back … Backstreet’s back!” one of them said.

A heartbeat later, a Hersheypark Stadium official was speaking:

“The concert tonight has been postponed. We ask that everyone now fully evacuate the stadium. Thank you and please exit safely.”

I had taken a single step into the floor seating area when they had stopped.

What had I done wrong?

I didn’t really remember turning around, but I was walking fast now, towards the gate. And I could see the grandstands, still filled with people.

“Postponed” is a tricky word, I thought. Maybe they think the show might still happen tonight.

But we were past that, now. The storm was coming back. The band was leaving. There would be no show. There was only rain and lightning waiting for us here.

Even I felt the need to stop, to confirm with one of the gate staff members that yes, the show was 100% not happening tonight. But a heartbeat later, I was in my car. It was 9:19 p.m. Already, Hersheypark Drive was clogged with foot traffic, people being guided across the street to return to their cars. No way to get back through there any time soon. Instead, I took a right from the lot, and another right onto Park Avenue. I would go behind the park.

Others weren’t so lucky. Our photographer called, saying she was stuck in traffic, at a complete standstill. The photos might be a while, she said. The photos of the Backstreet Boys performing two songs. It had been two songs, hadn’t it? Yes, they had done at least two.

But I had made it out quickly. I managed to beat the thousands of people exiting the stadium, by avoiding the main road out of Hershey.

I had been saved … by taking the back streets.

One hour later, my sister called. She and her group had not moved from their parking space.

Just as I filed my initial story about the concert’s postponement, my wings arrived at my table.

The Boro is only a few minutes from Hersheypark. And they have free wifi.

I spent the rest of the night writing this story, texting with editors, and listening to the tales of the handful of fellow concert escapees that had managed to trickle into the bar. I had been lucky – even these, who had been fairly quick to out of the stadium, had been caught in the rain, dodging cars to make it here. In a last defiant gesture, they put “Backstreet’s Back” on the jukebox and sang along loudly.

My editor sent me links to tweets from Hershey and from the band.

“So do you get your money back?” a bar patron asked one of the stadium refugees.

“They’ll come back,” was the response. “They just postponed it.”

Finally, I started to feel a release to a tension I hadn’t realized I’d been carrying. After all, it wasn’t really my fault that the concert stopped. It was survivor’s guilt: I’d just been lucky to dodge the rain and the traffic. It was the right call, to postpone. A massive inconvenience and disappointment for the thousands in the audience, to be sure, but far better to be safe. The concert would still happen.

Backstreet would be back.

All right.

“We just got out,” my sister messaged me, at 11:22 p.m. – two hours after I’d made my way out of the parking lot. “Enjoy your wings, you [expletive,]”