Poster Child

So I saw Sufjan Stevens at the Ryman last month. (See my 9.18.06 review post, Stevens' Show Satisfies.) After the opener's set, my friends and I scoped out the merch table only to find that the concert posters had all been sold. I wanted a poster for three main reasons: 1) I've been following Sufjan's music since our Hope College days -- well before his solo career began. Since we had a small poetry class together, I have a personal tie to him and love to cheer him on from a distance (as I enjoy doing for many other indie artists); 2) the show was a very moving, almost supernatural experience for me and I wanted a memento of the event; and 3) the Ryman posters have a legendary history. You see, from what I'm told, the Ryman Auditorium has long had a partnership with Nashville's Hatch Show Print. In fact, the company has been doing concert posters for the Ryman for decades. Hatch Show Print was founded in 1879 and has done show prints for everyone from Duke Ellington to Elvis Presley to Johnny Cash. From what I understand, Hatch creates posters the old-fashioned way, using blocks to print limited numbers of each design. Determined to look further, my friend Matt decided to contact Hatch Show Print itself, just in case, in an off-chance, the company might have one or two extra posters tucked away in a back room somewhere. To our delight, Hatch had two posters and Matt asked them to hold them for us. We were more than excited! Matt's mother had arranged to pick them up, but was ill on the designated pick-up day. Upon recovery, she stopped at the shop, only to find that the posters had been sold out from under us! Enter eBay. Disappointed, but dealing, I surfed over to eBay and did a quick search for Sufjan items. Would you believe there was ONE copy of the very poster for which I had been pining? My roommate, Taryn, an eBay enthusiast, agreed to help me bid on and keep an eye on the item. Mind you, the poster sold for $10 at the concert. Thirty minutes from the end of the auction, the highest bid was $40. Having told Taryn that my personal spending limit was $52, she rigged an auction snipper bid of $52.51 to be dropped the last five seconds of the sale. I felt like I had a legitimate chance. The next morning, I learned that the winning bid was an outlandish $147.50! I'm bummed that I lost the poster, but, in a small way, I am happy -- that obscenely high bid bodes well of Sufjan. Never underestimate the power of an indie artist...