Massive Attack
Posted: Wed 7 October, 2015 Filed under: Domestic, Getting Organised, Gigs Leave a comment »As regular readers will recall, I’m a bit of a fan of Massive Attack, and have been for a long, long time. I’ve seen them live a good few times, and really love a lot of their stuff.
So I was thoroughly happy to see the news that they’re releasing new music this year, and doing a tour in Jan/Feb 2016.
Pre-sale tickets became available for the tour this morning, and I’m now seeing them twice – once in Manchester, once in London.
Needless to say, I’m already looking forward to it!
Peter Gabriel – Wembley SSE Arena – The Downside
Posted: Fri 5 December, 2014 Filed under: Cynicism, Gigs, London, People, Reviews(ish), Sweary Leave a comment »While I loved the Peter Gabriel gig on Wednesday, it has to be said that the audience consisted of some of the biggest vagtrumpets known to Man.
I really don’t understand people – as has been said many times before – but I truly don’t get why on earth you would pay £50 or more per ticket and then spend the entire concert walking to and from the bar, or chatting to your friends instead of, you know, listening to the music and enjoying the concert.
It’s even worse when – as with the concert last night – it’s an all-seated gig, so these jizzmopping fuckflannels keep on disturbing the entire row in order to go and get drinks, come back with drinks, go to the bog, and whatever else they’re doing. It makes me want to punch them in the kidneys as they go past, just so they’ll stay in one place for a while.
Maybe I’m getting old, but I just can’t see the enjoyment in going to a gig and not really listening to the music at all.
(The one that really pissed me off though was the so-called fan, when they played one of the key tracks from that ‘So’ album said that he ‘had never heard that one before’, for fuck’s sake)
Peter Gabriel – Wembley SSE Arena
Posted: Thu 4 December, 2014 Filed under: Domestic, Gigs, London, Reviews(ish), Wembley Stadium Parking Leave a comment »Last night, I went to see Peter Gabriel at the SSE Arena in Wembley – not a venue I’d been to before.
In fact, having seen the changes around Wembley, I realised that it must be a good four years (and yes, it turns out it was September 2010 to see Muse) and there’s a lot of new stuff gone up in that time. Not least a whole set of shops – sorry, a ‘retail village’ – and eating places etc., which is pretty welcome when you consider how poor the facilities of the area were for that kind of thing when I was there last.
Anyway, rather than use the godawful parking this time, I opted for parking further out (Watford, to be precise) and taking the tube in to Wembley. It actually worked out really well, despite me ending up using Watford station itself, rather than the intended Watford Junction. I blame a) stupidity and b) having one of those wavering decision processes of mine, of not being sure which station I’d use. So I ended up going to a station I hadn’t intended to use, but it working out as being for the best. Such is life sometimes.
I didn’t write beforehand about seeing this gig, because well, my attendance record with Peter Gabriel gigs isn’t really that good. I was determined to go to this one, but that doesn’t always equate with it actually happening, sad to say.
Anyway, for this one I did get there- and in tons of time, too. Watford’s a shithole for getting round (although some of that’s due to my own stupidity and crap timing, getting there just as most people were leaving) but once I got there all was easy.
And the gig itself was brilliant – thoroughly enjoyed all of it. It was billed as a gig in three sections – starting with an acoustic, going on to the electric (and super-loud) section, finished up by a complete play-through of the “So” album in it’s entirety, and in the order it was originally supposed to be. And it did all it was billed to, and more besides.
As always, the lighting and staging was innovative, in the same way that Nine Inch Nails gigs tend to be – in this case, making a lot of use of small video cameras on all the players, and five lighting rigs on counterbalanced dollies that could move around the stage, controlled by stagehands. Very very impressive – and reminiscent of the Martians in War of the Worlds (which I’m seeing at the O2 in ten days time) in how they loomed over the stage and seemed almost animated.
Getting home afterwards was pretty much a doddle too – out of the Arena, up to the nearest tube station, wait for the correct train back to Watford, and then drive home, straight up the M1. Ninety minutes door-to-door. On evidence of the last time I went to Wembley, in that time I wouldn’t have even got out of the car-park in that time, so all good.
Gabriel Again
Posted: Wed 23 April, 2014 Filed under: 1BEM, Domestic, Getting Organised, Gigs, Music Leave a comment »Back in October, I was supposed to go and see Peter Gabriel at the O2. Tickets paid for, car-parking paid for, all prepared. And then my body rebelled, so I didn’t get to see the concert. Which was seriously bloody annoying.
Today, tickets went on sale for another concert, this time in December at Wembley Arena.
I’ve got a ticket.
I’m going to go. I am, I am.
Londinium
Posted: Mon 24 March, 2014 Filed under: Domestic, Driving, Food, Gigs, London, M1, Reviews(ish), Travel Leave a comment »Friday turned out to be a really good evening – despite the trials and tribulations of driving in London.
I knew the drive was going to be a pig – after all, 6.30-7.30pm on a Friday night is always going to be a pig. I’m not the greatest fan of London driving at the best of times, but this one certainly wasn’t the best of times.
Still, I got the job done, and only wished death and fiery rain on about fifty drivers – mainly those ‘in control’ of buses and taxis. The parking I’d found turned out to be perfectly located (in Chinatown) for where I wanted to be (Leicester Square), despite the number of suicidal orientals assuming that they had priority over big lumps of steel indicating that they were turning into the same street.
I’d picked a place called QPark – not the cheapest (although there’s no such thing as cheap parking in London, it appears) but cheaper than most of the other ones in the area that looked far dodgier. I do have to say thought that bloody hell, the parking spaces are tight – particularly when driving a sodding great boat like my Saab. Not too much of a problem going in, but reliant on others not parking like cunts when it comes to making one’s escape.
After that, meeting up with friends at Scoff and Banter in Leicester Square was easy – and that Apple Martini was a worthy reward. (I’d got four hours minimum before driving, so a drink wasn’t going to cause any issues)
Having put the world to alcoholic rights, and grabbed some food as well – which was also excellent – it was on to the Leicester Square Theatre to see Mr Bill Bailey.
I’ve seen Bill Bailey before – as it turns out, ten years ago – although this show was much smaller. I believe this one was a testing run for his new ‘Qualm Peddler’ tour – and if that’s the case, go and see it if you get a chance. Some of the stuff was just surreal (and usually caused by some very strange members of the audience) and he seemed close to corpsing with laughter himself at some points. It was that sort of gig, really.
Highlights included the reggae version of Downton Abbey, and Zombie Country and Western, but the entire 90 minutes was excellent. Thoroughly enjoyed it all, and would love to have seen more.
After that, it was just the drive home – with London still solid traffic, even at 11pm – and then a clean run up the M1.
Oh yeah – and with those timescales, why did I drive? Mainly because a) I don’t mind driving, and it’s always good to be able to say “Yep, done that, it holds no real fears” and b) because I’d thought it was going to start far later, and end after trains had finished. Not that I mind at all – it was a good evening, and the driving was just one part of it.
But I couldn’t drive in London on a daily basis – there’d be far too much temptation to kill people…