King and Queen of the Big Weekend

We've just done another one. At least we're playing hard to go with all the hard work we've been doing this year so far - Friday last saw us down the battle cruiser with Rob and Katie who have promised to come kiting with us at some point, the bloody fools. That was a fairly early night though, home and into bed at last orders, as we were both set to be busy the next day

- Mars having a bit of an opera trip to do and me with linux woes, a download of certain things to get watched and an early night need as I was up on Sunday for the breakfast run, and my luck with the weather continues exactly as it has done all the time I've been doing this - beautiful sunrise over the Taff and the bay as I cycle down to Riverside where we collect the goodies, then drizzly crap while we're out, a torrent as we return to base camp which yields to the usual muggy Cardiff winter before I head home. Ain't complaining though, I'm up and exercised and paid and I've done some good before I'd even usually be out of bed. Also, it was the Lunar Eclipse on Saturday night, a fact unrecordable by my meagre camera gear - I'd have been ok with my Konica Z3 were it not for my Jessops' tripod which is sod all use for long exposure work in a light breeze. One might as well tape the camera to a puppy and set it's tail alight for all the steadiness the thing provides when zomed 12X or anything approaching that. Still, it does the camcorder well enough, which is what I bought it for in the first place.

Once home we had to make haste to Birmingham. Back in January when we went to Prague there was one person missing - Ike, who'd been in a position to take a very decent job back in our old haunt of the West Midlands. And that night Nine Inch Nails were playing. An alternative birthday related doodah to Prague soon presented itself. By four o'clock we were in the venue, cameraphones confiscated and watching Mr. Reznor give a playback of the new album to those children middle class enough to be 'premium' members of the NIN fanclub. It's not bad - a definite improvement on 'With Teeth' and a return to the more layered sample-bombs of earlier years, though he's clarly been raiding his hard drive as a good number of the beats and pads were memorable from older recordings. There's none too many catchy numbers on there, from the 'Hand That Feeds' mould but it is a concept album and the tracks released to myspace already seem to be garnering a good chunk of positivity from the fans. Nevertheless when the band came out and ripped through about ten of the classics from the get-go I was reminded why I like the band in the first place - it's the hooks and the vocal stylings as opposed to the lyrics themselves - the catchy-heaviness of Last or Heresy is the high watermark for me, whereas the new record seems to have similar tracks albeit with the choruses replaced with little stretched clips from 'Pinion'. Or something. To be honest album, playbacks have always been a bit of a chore to me, a contrived situation where you can't really give anything a proper listen. Especially with a band like Nine Inch Nails, if you 'get it' on the first listen Reznor isn't doing his job properly. Needless to say I'll be buying a copy when I can, and evangelising it if I need to, later on.

The crowd await their heroes

As always Reznor has got a tight crew of skilled performers including your favourite and mine, Jeordie White on Bass. The show is never a disappointment, and drummer's click-track aside the liveness of the performance is inexplicably tangible, as ever. No idea how they do it. Here's some phone snapshots wot I taked.

Last

Heresey


Wish, as seen from the lighting rig. This made me very happy.


Some guitars from the gantry, post gig.


Ready and waiting for Monday night's show
(which was cancelled because of Trent's voice!)

All of which comprised my first day behind the scenes of a big show for a couple of years, not that I regret doing what I do now instead. I'm well chuffed for Ian to be doing what he's doing and we might see him more than three times a decade now that he's a couple of hours up the road. Alas I was thoroughly tanked up for the whole evening, on a shamefully small amount of grog. 2 pints of Abbot in the incumbent Wetherspoons of the area, the 'Square Peg' had me wobbling slightly after an insubstantial dinner and a very very early start, then a couple in the venue, then the sudden reappearance of Ike (who was supposed to be heading off to That London the same evening but didn't) and subsequent drinking conspired to rattle my senses somewhat. One moment I was in a bar near the venue with Mars and Ike, the next I was sitting up in bed, asking Mars how I got there. Could have been worse though, I might have been sat up in bed asking Ike how I got there! It's been many years since I lost part of an evening to the sauce. Never again, and all that. The hangover kicked in about half two that afternoon.

A day's shopping in Birmingham followed with Mars getting a sexy witch coat and a nice skirt to match her curtains. I tracked down a copy of Jet Set Radio Future for my OxBox which is a little like being able to find a drive-thru Elvis themed wedding chapel in Tehran, so I bought that and very Classic Sega it is too, to my immense pleasure. After much traversing of the town centre we returned to the car and drove out of the NCP into the biggest bloody traffic jam I've ever seen. Just like always, some kid had been stabbed somewhere in Birmingham City Centre and along with a couple of closed roads and diversions the whole place was at a standstill. We should have been back in Cardiff for about half six. Eight was closer to the mark. Still we know what Bromsgrove looks like now, and we'll not be relying on TomTom when a map still has merit ever again. All in all, a huge weekend. I loved it, for the most part. Turns out we picked the right night to see the band as well - Trent's voice has packed up and the Monday Birmingham gig at least has been cancelled with more to perhaps follow.