And everyone at the Pollstar.com compound is preparing for our annual New Year’s Eve party. We’ve stocked the wine cellar, tapped the kegs and dirtied up the gin while shipments from Jack Daniels, Jose Cuervo and Smirnoff are being unloaded on our loading docks as you read these words. In exchange for these non-commercial endorsements, of course.

Yes, the Pollstar.com New Year’s Eve celebration is like none other, for whenever you combine high-octane spirits with the people who diligently spend 365 days a year plugging in dates for Further Seems Forever and Marty Stuart, or updating schedules for Little River Band, Pat Boone and James Gregory, you are looking at one, Hindenburg-style blow-out. It’s our chance to let it all hang out and welcome in the brand spanking new year of 2003. And when it comes to spanking, no one does it better than a Pollstar.com employee.

Hard to believe, isn’t it? That these halls filled with crates of Rebel Yell, Glenfiddich and MD 20-20 will soon be transformed into glittery passageways of delight. And if you’re the typical tour date fan, there are probably two questions on your mind.

Number One; you want to know if the tour database will suffer any harm once the good times start a rollin’. Number Two; you want to know how to finagle an invite to this party of all parties.

Being the anal-retentive, chronologically oriented souls we are, we’ll answer the first question first. Those of you seeking new dates for Julio Iglesias or Puppetry Of The Penis have nothing to worry about, for we have designated tour-data entry people who will be spending New Year’s Eve safeguarding the concert database from any harm that might erupt while the Pollstar.com staff guzzles its way through vats of Night Train, slurps its way through barrels of schnapps and gulps its way through bathtubs of Budweiser. So relax. It will be business as usual during the last few hours of 2002.

Now, on to the second question – how does one manage an invitation to this supreme shindig? Well, please understand, we’d love to invite each and every one of you, for we can think of nothing better than rocking in the new year with all the concert fans that make Pollstar.com possible. But our lawyers have advised us against it. Liability, insurance rates and all that crap, you know, and we want you to have a safe and sane New Year’s Eve.

Besides, if we started inviting non-employees, there wouldn’t be enough hooch for the rest of us.