The Big Gig Thread 2017

[Benjm]

The Big Gig Thread 2017

The Pilot is really good, although stopping off there can scupper plans to arrive in the arena before the band do.

I just picked up a couple of well placed returns in the front stalls for Soulwax at the Festival Hall in a fortnight, which I'm looking forward to. Other June shows are new but mature Manchester outfit The G-O-D at the Dublin Castle, the night before their Stone Roses support slot at Wembley, and two visits to the Royal Albert Hall to see Kraftwerk. I was hoping to get along to A Certain Ratio but the entertainment budget looks rather maxed out by that point.

[evilC]

The Big Gig Thread 2017

Well... as previously mentioned, I'm off to this event on Sunday. If you're on the South coast or in the South East corner of England and you like Electropop (Gerontophile?) you might want to pop along. Synth mini-expo-thing starts around 1pm and bands start around 6-ish. I'll be there with a mate from Hove and there'll be other friends journeying from places like Doncaster, Cheshire and the West country, I believe.

Vile Electrodes

Battery Operated Orchestra

[Benjm]

I'm going to see newish (although the members are well seasoned) Manchester combo The G-O-D tomorrow. They're in town to support The Stone Roses so will achieve what has a to be a rare double of playing The Dublin Castle one day and Wembley Stadium the next.

Edit: as I had mentioned two posts, but in fairness also two weeks, ago.

[mr smith]

Brought tickets for Royal Blood supported by At The Drive-in in November. Really looking forward to it.

[beak]

Got tickets for Bohren & Der Club of Gore in Utrecht in September, and Godspeed! You Black Emperor at the Paradiso in November, both of which have got me excited.

[Wouter D]

Still half deaf from this weekend's Best Kept Secret festival in Hilvarenbeek. Will write a somewhat longer post on it once I've recovered.

[Artificial Hipster]

Them* being her favourite band and her being at work I was charged with the task of being logged into Ticket Web or summat at 10am on the dot on Saturday in order to secure Radiohead tickets for Old Trafford.

With mixed emotions I succeeded.

*not Them obviously

[evilC]

Got tickets for Bohren & Der Club of Gore in Utrecht in September, and Godspeed! You Black Emperor at the Paradiso in November, both of which have got me excited.

Bohren are a band I'd like to see. I expect they'd only play really expensive places over here, though.

[beak]

Bohren are a band I'd like to see. I expect they'd only play really expensive places over here, though.

Eighteen euros! Treat yourself to a trip, and see the delights of Utrecht to boot.

Embarrassingly, I've seen them already many years ago and they completely passed me by. First band I saw at the Roadburn festival, having spent the arduous journey tanning joints and Belgian beer and getting excited about all the smelly long-hair big riff action I was going to see. Doesn't help that they played in the day time tbh. Who does that? Going to be weird hearing them in a context that isn't either lying in bed trying to sleep, or taking myself on a midnight bike ride to burn off enough energy so as I can sleep.

[Giggler]

I've got New Order at Granada Studios coming up soon as part of the Manchester International Festival. Stupidly excited for that.

[Snake Plissken]

Been meaning to put some things in here.

Iron Maiden - Manchester Arena. My first ever gig was Maiden at the Apollo in 1990. Finally get to see them again 27 years later and to be honest... tick, off the list. No real desire to see them again. They do their thing really well, but I've kind of moved on. Bruces voice is the wrong side of screech for me. The band is tight as ever. Nicko is a drumming God. I've just seen the show done better - I watch Rammstein so the pyro is a bit meh. Having to sit through another 10 minute song off the new album (which isn't bad) instead of one of the tons of classics - I can understand them not wanting to do the same stuff but... So yeah, enjoyable, worth going to see them again but I think that I'm done with them as a live act.

Penn and Teller - Manchester Apollo. Always loved watching magic tricks but never seen these guys do their thing. Fantastically entertaining show, the expected mix of close-up cards and big stagey stuff, with some shock ones as well. A few WTF moments, including an amazing mind-reading trick that Derren Brown would kill for and "egg in a bag" that had the audience member up on stage looking on in absolute disbelief. I think I figured out a couple of tricks - all part of the fun, really. Also some classic routines, including Shadows, a range of traps and one I can watch forever - coins and fish. Then they invited people to stay behind and get photos and autographs, so despite being knackered, we did and I was a very happy bunny indeed.

Nashville - Manchester Apollo. Rearranged from the Arena and a treat for my wife. Had no idea what to expect. Stars from the TV show playing songs from the show itself plus some of their own material. Some of the stars are singers turned actors, a couple actors turned singers. Was never quite sure if people were being introduced by their real name or their character name. Anyway, throughly enjoyable. The headliner/main star - Charles Esten - was cheesy as all hell, clearly loving the attention from the (mostly female) audience and playing it up to the max. Couldn't hate him because he was clearly doing it as a bit of a pisstake of himself plus you got the impression that he was throughly dedicated to making sure everyone had a good time. Clare Bowen has one hell of a voice but is way, way way too "stagey". Massively irritated me. Johnathan Jackson is one of the singers turned actors and you could tell as he is ridiculously good. I can't stand "Unchained Melody" but he did an astonishing version of it, incredible voice and range. Despite being not the target audience, I enjoyed myself and there are plenty of catchy tunes to help the evening go along. So despite being massively out of my comfort zone, I had a rather good time. The missus did too - apart from the screaming from the middle aged ladies - as she muttered "Oh for fucks sake, stop it, you're making me ashamed of my gender".

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

Them* being her favourite band and her being at work I was charged with the task of being logged into Ticket Web or summat at 10am on the dot on Saturday in order to secure Radiohead tickets for Old Trafford.

With mixed emotions I succeeded.

*not Them obviously

Me and Thing One had tickets for the second Manchester Arena date, with hotel booked as we were then continuing to a festival next day. We're now going to the replacement date but as it's on the Tuesday that means a cancelled hotel room and a more complicated route to the festival. However I'd still rather that than visit the Arena so soon.

[Artificial Hipster]

Indeed. If you see a slightly bored looking, gangly, greying bloke muttering 'when are they bloody well going to play Creep' to himself standing next to a wildly excited brunette contriving dance moves that even Thom Yorke could never have imagined would accompany one of the twiddlier cuts from In Rainbows then do say hello.

Incidentally on re-reading my post I'm conscious that the absence of the intended 'by Mrs H' after the words 'I was charged' makes it read much more disrespectfully of said brunette than I intended.

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

Continuing SP's Apollo theme, I took both Things there on Sunday to see Paramore. The Apollo isn't the best suited place to be in on the hottest night of the year, it was absolutely boiling. We all enjoyed it thoroughly although the vibe was killed a bit in the encore by allowing the drummer to come forward for the penultimate song and sing a cover from his side project, before the mood was lifted by the long awaited closing banger Hard Times.

The singer made a little mid show speech about recent events in Manchester which was well pitched and knowledgeable about the city. Generally the band knew its audience and the audience was devoted to the band, and the atmosphere, misguided encore aside, was electric.

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

Indeed. If you see a slightly bored looking, gangly, greying bloke muttering 'when are they bloody well going to play Creep' to himself standing next to a wildly excited brunette contriving dance moves that even Thom Yorke could never have imagined would accompany one of the twiddlier cuts from In Rainbows then do say hello.

Incidentally on re-reading my post I'm conscious that the absence of the intended 'by Mrs H' after the words 'I was charged' makes it read much more disrespectfully of said brunette than I intended.

Will do, although there could be a few fitting that description - in turn I'll be in the equally widespread constituency of middle aged dad looking enviously at 18 year old son who gets to down pints and smoke fags while the dad has to drive them both home and can't even have a crafty 'special occasion' menthol as it will set his running fitness back months, all the while muttering that they aren't playing enough from The Bends

[Thierry Ennui]

Indeed. If you see a slightly bored looking, gangly, greying bloke muttering 'when are they bloody well going to play Creep' to himself standing next to a wildly excited brunette contriving dance moves that even Thom Yorke could never have imagined would accompany one of the twiddlier cuts from In Rainbows then do say hello.

They've played Creep a few times recently, so you might be in luck. In fact, their last couple of tours have been very hit-friendly.

[Mr Cogito]

Bohren are a band I'd like to see. I expect they'd only play really expensive places over here, though.

They played at The Union Chapel last year, £16, at the top end of my usual gigging price range but utterly fantastic. It's a perfect and very atmospheric venue for their music. And they have a wicked sense of humour.

We won the cup that day too.

[statto99]

Me and Thing One had tickets for the second Manchester Arena date, with hotel booked as we were then continuing to a festival next day. We're now going to the replacement date but as it's on the Tuesday that means a cancelled hotel room and a more complicated route to the festival. However I'd still rather that than visit the Arena so soon.

I'm in a similar boat. Had a ticket for the second date, now going to the 'combined' one on the Tuesday. Still haven't decided between car or rail for travel. Hadn't booked a hotel, but notice any hotel room nearer than 15 miles away costs approx. £250 for a single...

[statto99]

So far this year I have seen:

Laura Marling
Half Man Half Biscuit
Howard Jones
Philip Glass & Laurie Anderson
KT Tunstall
Kraftwerk
Elbow

I have tickets for:

Radiohead
U2
Regina Spektor
Johnny Flynn
Chris Rea

I am hoping to see:

Everything Everything
Muse
Nothing But Thieves

So, err... now you know.

[evilC]

They played at The Union Chapel last year, £16, at the top end of my usual gigging price range but utterly fantastic. It's a perfect and very atmospheric venue for their music. And they have a wicked sense of humour.

We won the cup that day too.

Gahhhh!!! I'm so out of the loop, these days! :-(

[evilC]

Bought a ticket to Adult. at Moth Club. £14, which is a bit steep for me, but I've only seen them the once before, so thought I'd do so again.

[Benjm]

I went to see Kraftwerk twice at the Albert Hall last week. My principled objections fell away pretty quickly once I found that I could get tickets. One night was in the gallery up top, the second in the front stalls about thirty feet from the stage. The sound was clear and a decent volume in both positions and some of the 3-D even worked better at a distance. The big difference was that the gallery was standing, the stalls seated. In the latter, nobody stood up at all, not even for the encores of The Robots and Music Non Stop. It may be that the 3-D and accompanying specs suggest cinema norms of behaviour are appropriate rather than those of a concert. Although the rude bastards who talked throughout the show on both nights would be insufferable twats under either code.

The 3-D wasn't overpowering and was mostly adapted from their familiar visuals. But if it ain't broke... I preferred the effect when the objects were hanging still in front of the stage as it rather shatters the illusion when the moving ones reach the edge of the screen and just vanish. The spacelab's aerial was pretty cool though. As an audiovisual spectacle it is absolutely gorgeous and would be without the 3-D. Ralf does look a bit like a ninja turtle from some angles. A Tron suit is not the most forgiving of garments for the mature man.

Musically, their set evolves rather than announces that it is time for Jazz Odyssey. The current versions of Radioactivity and Computer Love recapture the melancholy of the originals that has rather been sidelined in the more full on arrangements post-The Mix. Ralf was visibly knocking the keyboard lines out and getting into it to a degree that he might have fired himself for in days gone by. The Tour De France Soundtracks material sounds stronger than it did in 2004, but there was no space for Vitamin or Elektro-Kardiogramm.

I went with an old friend who I go to see Kraftwerk with every thirteen years, it seems; 1991, 2004 and this year. Already looking forward to the 2030 renewal.

Next up is New Order at the Manchester International Festival. Like Giggler, I am very excited about this one.

[statto99]

A very enjoyable overview there, Benjm, with which I pretty much agree. Personally, I was disappointed (though only a bit) that we didn't get Pocket Calculator. Also a drat and double drat that I will miss what sound like an excellent series of New Order gigs. Found out too late / wasn't available when extra tickets went on sale / it's 160 miles away etc etc.

[statto99]

Do Everything Everything tickle your fancy at all, Mr EvilC? Even slightly?

[Benjm]

Shit, just saw a set list for the first night of New Order's Manchester Int. Fest. show.

I'm going to try to block it out as much as possible before seeing the show on 15 July but it looks fucking awesome.