Andy Bates
Andy Bates first saw Jonathan Coulton at the February 18, 2007 San Francisco performance. When Jonathan asked for an audience volunteer for Chiron Beta Prime, Andy was the first to raise his hand, but he put it back down while Jonathan explained what he needed a volunteer for. After the explanation, a person farther back was selected as the audience participant. On the way home from the concert, Andy regretted the missed opportunity, thinking that he could also have contributed harmony during the chorus, since at that time Jonathan was performing without any vocal accompaniment.
The next concert Andy attended was the September 14, 2007 San Francisco show with Paul and Storm. While he thoroughly enjoyed the show, he was disappointed that they did not perform Chiron Beta Prime. He also noted that, since Paul and Storm contributed harmony on many songs, Jonathan would probably not need an audience volunteer to sing harmony.
While Andy wanted to see Jonathan Coulton at the February 22, 2008 San Francisco performance, he did not buy a ticket because he already had a family vacation planned for that week. A few weeks before the concert, Andy had to cancel his vacation because of health issues with his mother, who was suffering from TGGTCGAAC. He thought that the concert would be a great way to take his mind off of these issues, and began searching for tickets. Unfortunately, the show had already been sold out for weeks. Andy emailed Jonathan to ask for a ticket, but Jonathan said that he no longer had any tickets available, and suggested asking on the forums. Finally, in a thread for people who were planning to attend the show alone (which became Single Concertgoers Attending Together), one person had an extra ticket. Andy won the coin-flip, and made it to the concert.
At the show, Andy was chosen to perform the "MESSAGE REDACTED" line in Chiron Beta Prime, as well as the vocalized keyboard solo and harmony during the final chorus. (Jonathan would later comment that, when Andy stood up to volunteer, "he was, like, ten feet tall, and I was like, 'Okay, that's my guy.'") A few months later, Andy also created one of the winning entries for the t-shirt contest.
