It’s been a bit dry on the music front lately. No one decent touring (except for Paramore a few weeks ago).
Anyway, I’ve had this one booked for some time. My ticket agent did me the business and got me tickets. Not far from the stage, but seated.
When I ordered them, and after he had got them and told me where they were, I said “but I wanted close to the stage” . He said “but these are good tickets – the floor is standing” . I said “that’s what I wanted” , to which he replied “you wanted standing???”
At the time I was puzzled: he knows that I want floor tickets when I order from him.
Anyway, I set off for Manchester this afternoon at around 3.45pm and finally got there at 7.30pm! Traffic was terrible this end and my attempts to avoid it took me via routes where they appeared to have had several metres of snow over the last week! That, combined with people who can’t drive above 40mph on the A628, meant it took longer than expected.
We caught the end of the second support act (doors opened at 5.30pm). They were bloody rubbish. That croaky voice, foot on the monitor, headbanging whilst “singing”… it was all there. A big turn off was the gratuitous swearing.
As they got the stage ready for the main act, a bit of people watching led us to the conclusion that either we are going to see bands who attract extremely young audiences, or we are just getting old. I’ll stick with that first thing. But they were throwing things around – shoes, t-shirts, a glo-stick (could have had someone’s eye out), the lot.
Bullet For My Valentine played a good set. As a metal band, they are very raw live, but there’s no doubting their skill. They played tracks from their latest album plus the singles everyone is familiar with.
It was during the set that I realised why my agent had sounded surprised when I’d indicated I would have preferred floor tickets. As well as chucking stuff around, they also started chucking each other: crowd surfing. The army of stewards at the front repeatedly pulled people off the top and sent them to the back. Unlike the gentle kind you see on MTV, British crowd surfing appears to involve trying to throw the surfer as hard and far as possible – with the obvious problems associated with the surfer falling, and the damage to whoever he falls on. And then they were doing that thing where they all run around in a circle making themselves dizzy – it’s funny watching pink, portly youths with their shirts off trying to look hard.
But all in all a good night’s entertainment. And it’s off to Sheffield next week to see Status Quo.