Had a good time, but I have nothing to say about the gig :-(
Had a good time at the gig, though as previously mentioned our seats were shocking. I'm not a fan of big gigs like that anyway, but would prefer not to go again than to be stuck at the back like that. Check the block you're being offered before confirming your tickets, if you're up on the top level I seriously recommend passing.
Nice journey to the dome, it's well located for people coming in from Kent. The lobby type area is quite impressive too, it's a lot like being in Bluewater though. I guess this is the modern way of gigs, with he old venues being closed down now, a sit down show in a shopping centre is all that's on offer. Quite a good choice of restaurants, again like an upmarket shopping centre food court. Went for Pizza Express, and though our food seemed a little bit mean (a bit light on the toppings compared to other Pizza Expresses), we had a good dinner. Meant we missed White Lies unfortunately who were first on, but it was a cool novelty to be effectively in the gig, but sat down for dinner.
Found our way to our seats, even worse than we'd imagined, so headed back to the bar. This meant missing act number two Crystal Castles. Met up with some friends who I had not seen for a very long time, good to catch up with them and have a few more drinks, but of course this meant missing number three Franz Ferdinand. Hey I've seen enough support bands in my time, I'm far too old to watch all the bands on the bill now.
By the time The Cure came on, I was pretty squiffy. Couldn't really see the band clearly from where we were, even the huge screens were tiny specs in the distance, and the sound was echoing from the other side of the arena. Sat down and had another plastic beaker of vino collapso, and quite possibly fell asleep at some point during the gig. Clare says she has photographic evidence of this, though I've not seen it. I do have more photos too, and some video, though for some of the gig I was singing into the camera, so I'm a bit afraid to watch it. I think the band started mostly with the new album, so I must have rested my eyes during some of the really good stuff.
All in all, a very good evening, food, company, drink, doing something different, high scores in all of those boxes. Anything actually gig related though, next to zero. Not the bands fault, mostly my fault really, but I'm not sure how I could have got a better gigging experience out of it. Man alive though, what would the people who responded to this review make of me this time though? I think I would react as they did then, if I were someone different telling me this about a gig I wanted to go to.
What about when The Smiths reunite, I hear you ask? What if they don't do the decent thing of a residency at Brixton Academy, and only play the millennium dome, and we can only get sat down seats? I guess I would pay a bit over the odds through getmein.com1 in that case. Probably should have just dawdled and done that this time, prices did not go crazy in the end, we were just very unlucky.
Paul Clarke's weblog - I live in Hythe near Folkestone. Wed + dad to 2, I am a full-stack web developr, + I do js / nodejs, some ruby, python, php ect ect. I like pubs, running, eating, home automation + other diy jiggery-pokery, history, family tree stuff, TV, squirrels, pirates, lego, and TIME TRAVEL.