Random Concert Memories Part III (2003 - present day)

Last few rambles:

2003 Big Day Out

Foo Fighters

Got to see the Foo Fighters for a second time. Dave Grohl drumming for Queens of the Stone Age in an earlier act, then fronting the Fighters. One of the hardest working men in show biz.

Murderdolls

The Murderdolls were an American “Horror Punk” band who played on one of the smaller stage in the middle of the day, and I caught a few of their songs while lining up for the ATM. All scary white make up and stage thrashing, whatever effect they were going for went out the window when the lead singer was hit in the head by a dildo (yes, a dildo) thrown by some marksman in the crowd. The song was cut midstream, as the singer stomped around the stage waving the dildo demanding to know which “fucker” had just assaulted him. Surreal.

2004 Big Day Out

This was the last Big Day Out I went to, having moved to London a couple of months after. Aphex Twin was headlining the Boiler Room, but back then I had no idea who he was so gave it a miss. I’d definitely go see him now, though, if the opportunity arose.

Muse

Quite amazing to see the sound these guys produce, considering they are only a three piece band. The Muse seems to have about a million notes per tune, and they have a song on Guitar Hero 3 that gave me permanent arthritis.

Metallica

A schoolmate by the name of “Undies” made a cassette copy of Metallica’s Black Album for me back in 1993, and I must have listened to the tape a thousand times. Of course it was a blast to see another schoolyard favourite up on stage, and Metallica were probably one of the best acts I have seen live. The crowd was enormous when they hit their stage, a sea of flannel shirts, T-shirts with Wolves on them, and mullet hair cuts – if ever there was a city in which Metallica would be extremely well received, this would be it. The fans spat their smuggled in Jack Daniels in awe as fire works shot from the stage during ”Enter Sandman”. Halfway through the act, James Hatfield returned the love as if it was a heavy metal Kids show with a simple third person shout out:

“Metallica loves you Adelaide!”

God bless him.

2004: Lovebox

I went to Lovebox in Clapham Common (a DJ music festival hosted by Groove Armada) in my fourth month of living in London. It was my first, and second to last, Music festival I attended while living there. I went with a group of about half a dozen people, we rocked up to the park hungover as dogs and within hours were smashed again. I don’t remember a single set from the afternoon. All I remember is a colleague telling me how he had taken a photo of his morning erection with his mobile phone, and had shown that picture to a midget at the festival. This somehow resulted in the midget stealing his sunglasses.

You just can’t trust those fuckers.

2005: Live 8

The last concert I’ve ever been too, but a pretty epic one at that. Live 8 was a charity event organised by the world’s grumpiest one hit wonder, Bob Geldof, but I’m sure you already knew that. Tickets were made available through a text message contest. A young lady friend of mine’s workmate had won two of the tickets, but couldn’t make it due to work commitments. The tickets were passed onto my friend (and once again) by proxy, me. This completed my trifecta of “hand me down” concert tickets; though sadly neither Cliff Richard nor Billy Ray Cyrus appeared at Live 8.

I had always enjoyed the Big Day Out’s streamline approach – 45 minute sets meant the bands had to cut the lesser songs, the filler tunes and that experimental shit would just have to wait for another day. Live 8 took that method to the next level; due to the strict scheduling most bands were reduced to two songs, three if they were lucky. This meant they could get out on stage, play their two best songs then GTFO. It made the entire day feel like one long greatest hits compilation CD, which was fine for somebody with as short attention as myself.

It was a crazy day, starting off with a near riot when they were taking too long to filter everybody through the gates, meaning that most of the 200,000 strong crowd were still trying to get in when the opening act started playing. They opened the gates before any trouble erupted, and everybody pretty much just ran in.

What followed was a succession of the world’s most famous bands, with speeches made at intervals by such people as Bradd Pitt and Bill Gates. Full list of acts is here. If I had to choose the stand out act, it was probably Snoop Dogg. I’m not a Snoop fan, I’m not into all that East Coast West Coast rap bullshit; and I think the dude is one ugly motherfucker. He looks like that Rat from the Muppets.

While the other bands were wasting time with awkward shout outs and lame audience interaction on their suffocating schedules though, Snoop dropped into a medley that lasted about 10 minutes, and managed to punch out about half a dozen of his best songs. I enjoyed it.

Bob Geldof said he had no intention of playing his (only) song I Don’t like Mondays, but then on the day decided to get up and sing it as a spur of the moment thing (yeah right), using the rock band Travis’s instruments. This kind of threw the schedule out of whack, and towards the end of the night the concert was running late by about two hours. My friend and I baled with three bands yet to appear, in order to catch the last train home. I wasn’t that fussed, at this late stage of the day it’s only the “classic” bands yet to play, those old timers they drag out of bed to for these special events.

I mean, kudos to the pioneers of Rock for all they’ve done, but sitting through a 20 minute Pink Floyd song at the end of a long day is like having teeth pulled.


Live 8 was the last concert I’ve been to, and so thus concludes our musical trip down memory lane. We return to our regular programming tomorrow.

And to all the mums out there, happy Mother's Day.