His name is Andy Hartpence, and he normally raps about video games, computer science and robots. But this week the Seattle nerdcore hip hop artist’s sly and silly rhymes about his favorite soccer club — Sounders FC — earned him prime tickets to Sunday’s sold out MLS Cup at CenturyLink Field.
Hartpence is the winner of the #GeekiestSoundersFan contest, a fun competition in which geeks from across the Seattle area competed for two pitchside tickets in the Slalom Experience seats. You can watch Hartpence’s winning performance below, giving shout outs to contest co-hosts GeekWire and Slalom Consulting, as well as the official judge of the competition: Mr. Sounder Zach Scott.
Scott said he was impressed with Hartpence’s geek references, including Rubik’s Cube and Dungeons & Dragons.
Hartpence — who jumped on the Sounders FC bandwagon in 2016 and calls Sounders fans some of the best — entered the contest after complaining at work about the challenges in securing tickets to Sunday’s MLS Cup.
“I have extremely limited skills in life, but this luckily tapped into an area of mediocre competence,” said Hartpence, who is predicting a Sounders 3-0 victory on Sunday.
Built For This! #GeekiestSoundersFan @SlalomSeattle @geekwire pic.twitter.com/Xq9kARSQvI
— Wheelie Cyberman (@WheelieCyberman) November 7, 2019
In case you are wondering, Hartpence says the beat in the song is by Stenobot, who writes music for the group Supercommuter on a classic 8-bit Game Boy.
Editor’s note: GeekWire’s Kevin Lisota contributed to this piece.