Gig Review: Black Gold, 25 April 2009.
[last.fm | setlist | photos | videos]
Black Gold @ Red Bull X-Crawl, Hobgoblin Pub, Camden.
Got up at 5.07am (& subsequently twittered BG telling them)
Showered et al. Fed the fish & was out the door by 6.40 (go me)
Train to Birmingham was at 7.07 and nearly missed to because of there being no sign that it was 2 trains on the platform so to go to the far end.
Train was as trains go really, listened to lots of Black Gold (I've hardly listened to anything else for about a week) and met i_am_tre at Birmingham to go to Ntown to meet my Mum & Sister to give them our overnight stuff. Because it was a 14 to 18 "festival" I had to borrow my sister's ID just in case we got id'd at the door. Get a phone call from my sister about how she was on the way to the station and had forgotten her id. So we get to the station and sit and have coffee with my mum. The coffee dude looked like a brown haired Trace Cyrus, this amused us. Sister gets back and gives me her crappy college id which luckily turned out not to be needed but at the time it was annoying.
Anyhow train to London then tube to Camden. And there's eleventymillion people with varying colour wristbands on, we never did totally figure out what colour went with what. X-Crawl was fluro orange, white was presumably Saturday only Camden Crawl. Gold was for the artists but Black Gold had 3 each as well as a pink "all access" stickers (Eric's was sticking out his back pocket)
We wander Camden and finally find the church to get our tickets swapped into wristbands (after a trip to Starbucks of course). Then it's off to find the venue!
The Hobgoblin Pub (all photos are clickable for the big version)
Having found the venue it's time for food and a wander aka McDonalds and Spending money in the market. I got an awesome new Nightmare Before Christmas wallet; it's even got a space for a photo.
And then we wander back to the venue and I get an ice lolly (blue bubblegum flavour) and who do I see walking down the road but Eric and Than. I spazz and whack Jimmy scaring her half to death and turn round so as to not rouse suspicion from them (luckily they weren't looking our way) and we slow-walk back down the street and I turn round and say hey to them as they come up behind us.
They say hi & then Eric says "I love your t-shirts" (I had the shirt from the Rush pre-order & Jimmy had the shirt from the US tour that jenepherre was lovely enough to ship over) & I of course say "Well we love your album :D"
Subsequent introductions of ourselves go something like:
Us: "Hi! We're Bex & Jimmy, we know Jen"
Them: "Jen! Jen's awesome."
Us: "Yeah we know, she's the best."
Eric: "So you are... oh Bex" *points to my 'Hi, my name is' badge* (we'd both sharpied our names on badges cause we're so cool) Shakes my hand, I have to juggle my ice lolly. Dude has nice hands btw, which yeah obvious he's a pianist.
Me: "Yep"
Than: "So you must be Jimmy"
Jimmy: "Yep :)
Insert conversation about something, including the venue & "You're here really early"
We let them go inside cause they need to see if their gear had turned up yet.
Then we notice them coming out again and Jimmy remembers she wanted to ask them how long their set was going to be so we sidle up to Eric and ask him. Then mention something about if they know when they might be back. And he started saying "Sooner than you think" but I think he realised he'd let something slip cause he turned really quickly to Than and started on about if he'd seen Al& Shiben. So we let them go off and find them.
A quick wander through Sainsbury’s and up the street and who's outside Camden coffee but all 4 of the guys. Of course I wanted to try the coffee in there but Jimmy wouldn't let me cause it would look creepy-fanish if we did while they were there so it was back to Sbux.
Another wander down to the venue and we stood across it for a bit then went inside to get ready to push our way through for Black Gold.
Whoever was on before BG was actually pretty good although IDK who they were. We see Laura (who goes to a lot of shows) and she shows us her kick & on twitter it says " @blackgoldmusic Just met our some Bex and Jimmy. They r so sweet! BG fans r the best!" We had a minor flail at each other and twittered him back about how sweet it was of him.
Lots of pushing to the front and we got as good as front row. The annoying people that had been there since the morning who were waiting to see Saving Aimee last wouldn’t let us in front for BG even though we'd let them straight back but still awesome position.
Enter Eric looking pissed, his rented keyboard never did turn up. He borrowed the one from the next band ditto Than and the drum kit, I believe the kick pedal needed swapping. And as Than said after the slide pedal for the keyboard didn't work so Eric had trouble playing Plans. & enter Al, now if you know anything about me at all (or follow my twitter) then you'll know that I've been smitten with one Alistair Paxton since BG supported Panic last March (see that recap for more). And Jimmy could see how I melted when he came in. I can't help it, he's too adorable and have you seen his eyes? Add that to the lovely Scottish accent and general hot-assery and I'm putty.
Any way, the show!
Song list:
Idols - Jumpy times was had by all, I love this song so much. It gets stuck in your head really easily and is too catchy for words.
Plans & Reveries - Sing along times, both Jimmy and I were singing the parts Brendon Urie does on the CD back at Eric, not sure who noticed but you could definitely hear us over them. Um, oops on that part? We may not be the best singers ever but we are enthusiastic.
Shine - Er I don't know much of the words to this so I spent a lot of the time looking at Al, that was my failsafe for not making a fool of myself singing the wrong words.
Breakdown - This is totally my favourite song, I love that I managed to get the "he said, she said, I said..." part right singing along that fast. I love how animated Eric gets when he's on stage. He gets right into it.
Run - 2nd time I've heard it live (at least this time I knew what he said) and I still prefer the Picture Show EP version to the album/live versions. IDK what it is about it, just do.
The Comedown - Um, it's a song? They were good playing it. It's hard to say much about each individual song because, as with every show, they all sort of blur into an "omg I *love* this" sort of happy clappy dancy time.
Detroit - "This is a song about a place in the US, let's see some dancing. It's called Detroit" And there was actually some dancing to be had.
What You Did - Last song and a lot of love for the way they played it. Eric getting up on his chair, singing his heart out.
Overall they were so so much better than when I saw them with Panic last year (not that they were bad by any means then), I think maybe the fact that they knew there was people there specifically for them brought it out in them. IDK. Than's glasses fell off again, I still reckon they wrote the drum parts around him having to push them up every ten seconds.
See i_am_tre's awesome videos (part of which I helped film) at her recap here
And some photos:
Eric
Than
Al
I would put a photo of Shiben rocking his bass here but I appear to not have gotten one of anywhere near decent quality. Not that many of my photos are because they aren't, it's hard to jump/dance, clap, sing and take photos all at once.
Al again.
More here at my Flickr
After the epic sing-along (and the weird stares we got from aforementioned Saving Aimee fans for knowing all the words) we went out side in dire need of sustenance (AKA a cherry brandy ice lolly [more on that later]) so to the ice cream van it was.
And we turn back down towards the venue and there's Than and he waves and says "hey I saw you guys singing along" which, aww I love that he noticed, although I'm pretty sure any of them could *hear* us in at least Plans and Reveries (we sang Bden's bits back at them louder than the 3 of them doing the backings).
We were having a lovely chat with him about this and that, can’t really remember what, and then up walks Eric too. So we talk to him a bit too. And Jimmy asks him to sign our Rush liners. She tried talking to him but he said she'd have to hold on because he couldn’t concentrate on writing on the liners and talk at the same time because he was bad at that. I've got a cute scribble out where he went wrong on mine. While Eric was doing that Than noticed my Black Gold bracelet (it’s made out of bright coloured beads) and I showed him my other one that Jimmy made. We’ve both got matching ones that say “Black Gold/Burn and Bliss” on and she made Eric & Than ones that say Black Gold and their names. I told him that we had them for both of them and that I’d made ones for Al & Shiben too. He wanted to take a pic of them but never did so me and Jimmy took the initiative.
At some point I left Jimmy talking to Eric about putting her video up on the LJ comm. (blackgoldrush) and wandered over to Al & Shiben who were looking a little lonely, although Shiben was enjoying his ice cream. And I had a nice chat with them, Shiben asked what my ice lolly was and I told him cherry brandy. He said he was deciding about what to get so I naturally offered him some and so he bit the corner off. I offered it to Al too but he was really not interested (I wasn’t being creepy, Jen, honest).
I showed them both their bracelets and they loved them, I think they were a little surprised that I'd gone to the effort to include them. And I gave Shiben his to put on, telling him to be very careful with it because we’d already broken Eric's putting it on him (His now says Ric Ronick cause we only found the E on the train home so we're going to post it to him) so he puts his on and I put Al's on him and tied it up. He said he was going to wear it all week. I knotted Shiben's up too and he said he was going to "Rock it all over LA" so win on all counts with the bracelets. (Eta and we've been told by Laura (who was at the old blue last show) that Eric's still got his on)
We chatted some more and then Jimmy popped up and gave me our bag to find something and I was apparently rambling away while trying to find it, and Jimmy was laughing at me with Al. She told him not to worry cause I'm always like that & I said “I'm a plonker” Al replying: “I’m a plonker too” and Jimmy said, “We can all be plonkers together.” Al was kinda less shy once after that, maybe cause it was a British thing that we all kinda bonded over.
Anyway found whatever it was I was looking for and dumped the bag and my hoody on the floor he was also concerned that my hoody was on the floor & getting dirty. Al asked if I minded it being on the floor and I said something like "well it’s been on the floor in gig venues and we all know how nasty they get" which he nodded to.
Jimmy gave me our liners so that I could get Al & Shiben to sign them. Al’s is really adorable, it says thanks for bracelet Al x with an arrow from his name cause I got him to sign on the song he played on (After the Flood I think it is). And got a cute photo with him.
(Isn't he just adorably lovely?)
Then I left Jimmy chatting to Al about Scotland (have I pointed out how adorable his accent is? And his tiny hint of a lisp?) and bothered Shiben while he was having his sneaky, middle of the road cig. And asked him to sign on his favourite song cause he’s not on the record & he signed on the right side of the middle pages (I forget which song that is) with a bass clef after his name :)
More of a chat with Eric cause Jimmy had gone back over now that she’d fixed his bracelet and Than took a photo of us, so I guess we’ll see that on the Internets eventually ;) and then we got pics with them both.
(I look a little silly in these tbh)
Jimmy told Than that we’d been told that he gives the best hugs so could we have one. He said absolutely and we both go hugs. & offhandedly Jimmy said she loved the stickers on Than’s cymbal case and Than tells Eric to give us some of them. Eric pulls out a huge roll of BG stickers and reels of a load for each of us.
As they're just getting ready to go I remember we'd left our bag dumped somewhere near Al so went to find it. Al was kind enough to save it (and my hoody) from being run over by a truck that was reversing nearby. Dead sweet of him <3
I bothered Shiben for a quick photo; he seemed a little startled that we'd want pics with him
We were finally letting them go then and I think Jimmy asked Eric for a hug so we both got them. And Al saw me looking warily at him and I asked if I could have one off him too and he agreed so yay, Al!hug :D highlight of the day that tbqh.
Then we *finally* let them go off to their meeting (& for a shower, I know that's what Al really wanted, he spent the whole show in 2 shirts and then put his (very, very nice) coat on after, on a ridiculously warm day).
We went for a quick drink with Laura and had a chat about this, that and everything. We were going back to see Saving Aimee but Laura found a friend and we ended up just going home cause we saw them before Go:Audio a few weeks back. Trains were trains, we had fun annoying the people on the train with Rush up loud ;)
We get home and then I decide that right about then is when I'm going to feel really ill because I'd hardly eaten all day and only drunk coffee so I'd managed to epically dehydrate myself. Subsequent spew-age and a nice long sleep and I was better so all is well.
We messed with photos etc in the morning whilst watching the London Marathon on TV.
We started our journey home at 2pm and that was a journey and a half let me tell you. The bus into town was as uneventful as ever but as soon as we get to the station the shit hits the fan. "Train to Birmingham has been cancelled due to a security risk on the Coventry line near Birmingham" which meant a train to Rugby.
Then from there we managed to find a train to Wolverhampton, which consisted of a very roundabout way round Birmingham to avoid the police cordon. Turns out that a dude had gotten kidnapped and tied to a bunch of canisters fashioned to look like a bomb. Just as we got into Wolvo (late) we found out they’d managed to get him out, don't know if it as ever confirmed if they actually were bombs or not. But of course that's not the worst of it. What would normally be 1h10m train ride from Wolvo to Manchester was a 20min wait at Wolvo for a bus :( to Stafford, which took a half hour. Then another 40 mins sitting on the platform at Stafford for a train to Manc. Really I feel sorry for the people who were waiting for that train though, cause the train I got on was the 18.08 that came in at 18.55. It sped up so that it ended up being about a half an hour late into Manc rather than the 50 mins behind it was at Stafford but it was still another hour. A 3hr (inc changes) train journey took me about 5 and a half. Luckily Jimmy was able to get her connecting train from Wolvo home and wasn’t too much later than hoped
In conclusion a very, very, very awesome day trip & we can’t wait for them to get back over here again, hopefully it'll be soon. And of course thank you to Black Gold for having the competition that let Jimmy win the tickets. We love you guys.
Black Gold @ Red Bull X-Crawl, Hobgoblin Pub, Camden.
Got up at 5.07am (& subsequently twittered BG telling them)
Showered et al. Fed the fish & was out the door by 6.40 (go me)
Train to Birmingham was at 7.07 and nearly missed to because of there being no sign that it was 2 trains on the platform so to go to the far end.
Train was as trains go really, listened to lots of Black Gold (I've hardly listened to anything else for about a week) and met i_am_tre at Birmingham to go to Ntown to meet my Mum & Sister to give them our overnight stuff. Because it was a 14 to 18 "festival" I had to borrow my sister's ID just in case we got id'd at the door. Get a phone call from my sister about how she was on the way to the station and had forgotten her id. So we get to the station and sit and have coffee with my mum. The coffee dude looked like a brown haired Trace Cyrus, this amused us. Sister gets back and gives me her crappy college id which luckily turned out not to be needed but at the time it was annoying.
Anyhow train to London then tube to Camden. And there's eleventymillion people with varying colour wristbands on, we never did totally figure out what colour went with what. X-Crawl was fluro orange, white was presumably Saturday only Camden Crawl. Gold was for the artists but Black Gold had 3 each as well as a pink "all access" stickers (Eric's was sticking out his back pocket)
We wander Camden and finally find the church to get our tickets swapped into wristbands (after a trip to Starbucks of course). Then it's off to find the venue!
The Hobgoblin Pub (all photos are clickable for the big version)
Having found the venue it's time for food and a wander aka McDonalds and Spending money in the market. I got an awesome new Nightmare Before Christmas wallet; it's even got a space for a photo.
And then we wander back to the venue and I get an ice lolly (blue bubblegum flavour) and who do I see walking down the road but Eric and Than. I spazz and whack Jimmy scaring her half to death and turn round so as to not rouse suspicion from them (luckily they weren't looking our way) and we slow-walk back down the street and I turn round and say hey to them as they come up behind us.
They say hi & then Eric says "I love your t-shirts" (I had the shirt from the Rush pre-order & Jimmy had the shirt from the US tour that jenepherre was lovely enough to ship over) & I of course say "Well we love your album :D"
Subsequent introductions of ourselves go something like:
Us: "Hi! We're Bex & Jimmy, we know Jen"
Them: "Jen! Jen's awesome."
Us: "Yeah we know, she's the best."
Eric: "So you are... oh Bex" *points to my 'Hi, my name is' badge* (we'd both sharpied our names on badges cause we're so cool) Shakes my hand, I have to juggle my ice lolly. Dude has nice hands btw, which yeah obvious he's a pianist.
Me: "Yep"
Than: "So you must be Jimmy"
Jimmy: "Yep :)
Insert conversation about something, including the venue & "You're here really early"
We let them go inside cause they need to see if their gear had turned up yet.
Then we notice them coming out again and Jimmy remembers she wanted to ask them how long their set was going to be so we sidle up to Eric and ask him. Then mention something about if they know when they might be back. And he started saying "Sooner than you think" but I think he realised he'd let something slip cause he turned really quickly to Than and started on about if he'd seen Al& Shiben. So we let them go off and find them.
A quick wander through Sainsbury’s and up the street and who's outside Camden coffee but all 4 of the guys. Of course I wanted to try the coffee in there but Jimmy wouldn't let me cause it would look creepy-fanish if we did while they were there so it was back to Sbux.
Another wander down to the venue and we stood across it for a bit then went inside to get ready to push our way through for Black Gold.
Whoever was on before BG was actually pretty good although IDK who they were. We see Laura (who goes to a lot of shows) and she shows us her kick & on twitter it says " @blackgoldmusic Just met our some Bex and Jimmy. They r so sweet! BG fans r the best!" We had a minor flail at each other and twittered him back about how sweet it was of him.
Lots of pushing to the front and we got as good as front row. The annoying people that had been there since the morning who were waiting to see Saving Aimee last wouldn’t let us in front for BG even though we'd let them straight back but still awesome position.
Enter Eric looking pissed, his rented keyboard never did turn up. He borrowed the one from the next band ditto Than and the drum kit, I believe the kick pedal needed swapping. And as Than said after the slide pedal for the keyboard didn't work so Eric had trouble playing Plans. & enter Al, now if you know anything about me at all (or follow my twitter) then you'll know that I've been smitten with one Alistair Paxton since BG supported Panic last March (see that recap for more). And Jimmy could see how I melted when he came in. I can't help it, he's too adorable and have you seen his eyes? Add that to the lovely Scottish accent and general hot-assery and I'm putty.
Any way, the show!
Song list:
Idols - Jumpy times was had by all, I love this song so much. It gets stuck in your head really easily and is too catchy for words.
Plans & Reveries - Sing along times, both Jimmy and I were singing the parts Brendon Urie does on the CD back at Eric, not sure who noticed but you could definitely hear us over them. Um, oops on that part? We may not be the best singers ever but we are enthusiastic.
Shine - Er I don't know much of the words to this so I spent a lot of the time looking at Al, that was my failsafe for not making a fool of myself singing the wrong words.
Breakdown - This is totally my favourite song, I love that I managed to get the "he said, she said, I said..." part right singing along that fast. I love how animated Eric gets when he's on stage. He gets right into it.
Run - 2nd time I've heard it live (at least this time I knew what he said) and I still prefer the Picture Show EP version to the album/live versions. IDK what it is about it, just do.
The Comedown - Um, it's a song? They were good playing it. It's hard to say much about each individual song because, as with every show, they all sort of blur into an "omg I *love* this" sort of happy clappy dancy time.
Detroit - "This is a song about a place in the US, let's see some dancing. It's called Detroit" And there was actually some dancing to be had.
What You Did - Last song and a lot of love for the way they played it. Eric getting up on his chair, singing his heart out.
Overall they were so so much better than when I saw them with Panic last year (not that they were bad by any means then), I think maybe the fact that they knew there was people there specifically for them brought it out in them. IDK. Than's glasses fell off again, I still reckon they wrote the drum parts around him having to push them up every ten seconds.
See i_am_tre's awesome videos (part of which I helped film) at her recap here
And some photos:
Eric
Than
Al
I would put a photo of Shiben rocking his bass here but I appear to not have gotten one of anywhere near decent quality. Not that many of my photos are because they aren't, it's hard to jump/dance, clap, sing and take photos all at once.
Al again.
More here at my Flickr
After the epic sing-along (and the weird stares we got from aforementioned Saving Aimee fans for knowing all the words) we went out side in dire need of sustenance (AKA a cherry brandy ice lolly [more on that later]) so to the ice cream van it was.
And we turn back down towards the venue and there's Than and he waves and says "hey I saw you guys singing along" which, aww I love that he noticed, although I'm pretty sure any of them could *hear* us in at least Plans and Reveries (we sang Bden's bits back at them louder than the 3 of them doing the backings).
We were having a lovely chat with him about this and that, can’t really remember what, and then up walks Eric too. So we talk to him a bit too. And Jimmy asks him to sign our Rush liners. She tried talking to him but he said she'd have to hold on because he couldn’t concentrate on writing on the liners and talk at the same time because he was bad at that. I've got a cute scribble out where he went wrong on mine. While Eric was doing that Than noticed my Black Gold bracelet (it’s made out of bright coloured beads) and I showed him my other one that Jimmy made. We’ve both got matching ones that say “Black Gold/Burn and Bliss” on and she made Eric & Than ones that say Black Gold and their names. I told him that we had them for both of them and that I’d made ones for Al & Shiben too. He wanted to take a pic of them but never did so me and Jimmy took the initiative.
At some point I left Jimmy talking to Eric about putting her video up on the LJ comm. (blackgoldrush) and wandered over to Al & Shiben who were looking a little lonely, although Shiben was enjoying his ice cream. And I had a nice chat with them, Shiben asked what my ice lolly was and I told him cherry brandy. He said he was deciding about what to get so I naturally offered him some and so he bit the corner off. I offered it to Al too but he was really not interested (I wasn’t being creepy, Jen, honest).
I showed them both their bracelets and they loved them, I think they were a little surprised that I'd gone to the effort to include them. And I gave Shiben his to put on, telling him to be very careful with it because we’d already broken Eric's putting it on him (His now says Ric Ronick cause we only found the E on the train home so we're going to post it to him) so he puts his on and I put Al's on him and tied it up. He said he was going to wear it all week. I knotted Shiben's up too and he said he was going to "Rock it all over LA" so win on all counts with the bracelets. (Eta and we've been told by Laura (who was at the old blue last show) that Eric's still got his on)
We chatted some more and then Jimmy popped up and gave me our bag to find something and I was apparently rambling away while trying to find it, and Jimmy was laughing at me with Al. She told him not to worry cause I'm always like that & I said “I'm a plonker” Al replying: “I’m a plonker too” and Jimmy said, “We can all be plonkers together.” Al was kinda less shy once after that, maybe cause it was a British thing that we all kinda bonded over.
Anyway found whatever it was I was looking for and dumped the bag and my hoody on the floor he was also concerned that my hoody was on the floor & getting dirty. Al asked if I minded it being on the floor and I said something like "well it’s been on the floor in gig venues and we all know how nasty they get" which he nodded to.
Jimmy gave me our liners so that I could get Al & Shiben to sign them. Al’s is really adorable, it says thanks for bracelet Al x with an arrow from his name cause I got him to sign on the song he played on (After the Flood I think it is). And got a cute photo with him.
(Isn't he just adorably lovely?)
Then I left Jimmy chatting to Al about Scotland (have I pointed out how adorable his accent is? And his tiny hint of a lisp?) and bothered Shiben while he was having his sneaky, middle of the road cig. And asked him to sign on his favourite song cause he’s not on the record & he signed on the right side of the middle pages (I forget which song that is) with a bass clef after his name :)
More of a chat with Eric cause Jimmy had gone back over now that she’d fixed his bracelet and Than took a photo of us, so I guess we’ll see that on the Internets eventually ;) and then we got pics with them both.
(I look a little silly in these tbh)
Jimmy told Than that we’d been told that he gives the best hugs so could we have one. He said absolutely and we both go hugs. & offhandedly Jimmy said she loved the stickers on Than’s cymbal case and Than tells Eric to give us some of them. Eric pulls out a huge roll of BG stickers and reels of a load for each of us.
As they're just getting ready to go I remember we'd left our bag dumped somewhere near Al so went to find it. Al was kind enough to save it (and my hoody) from being run over by a truck that was reversing nearby. Dead sweet of him <3
I bothered Shiben for a quick photo; he seemed a little startled that we'd want pics with him
We were finally letting them go then and I think Jimmy asked Eric for a hug so we both got them. And Al saw me looking warily at him and I asked if I could have one off him too and he agreed so yay, Al!hug :D highlight of the day that tbqh.
Then we *finally* let them go off to their meeting (& for a shower, I know that's what Al really wanted, he spent the whole show in 2 shirts and then put his (very, very nice) coat on after, on a ridiculously warm day).
We went for a quick drink with Laura and had a chat about this, that and everything. We were going back to see Saving Aimee but Laura found a friend and we ended up just going home cause we saw them before Go:Audio a few weeks back. Trains were trains, we had fun annoying the people on the train with Rush up loud ;)
We get home and then I decide that right about then is when I'm going to feel really ill because I'd hardly eaten all day and only drunk coffee so I'd managed to epically dehydrate myself. Subsequent spew-age and a nice long sleep and I was better so all is well.
We messed with photos etc in the morning whilst watching the London Marathon on TV.
We started our journey home at 2pm and that was a journey and a half let me tell you. The bus into town was as uneventful as ever but as soon as we get to the station the shit hits the fan. "Train to Birmingham has been cancelled due to a security risk on the Coventry line near Birmingham" which meant a train to Rugby.
Then from there we managed to find a train to Wolverhampton, which consisted of a very roundabout way round Birmingham to avoid the police cordon. Turns out that a dude had gotten kidnapped and tied to a bunch of canisters fashioned to look like a bomb. Just as we got into Wolvo (late) we found out they’d managed to get him out, don't know if it as ever confirmed if they actually were bombs or not. But of course that's not the worst of it. What would normally be 1h10m train ride from Wolvo to Manchester was a 20min wait at Wolvo for a bus :( to Stafford, which took a half hour. Then another 40 mins sitting on the platform at Stafford for a train to Manc. Really I feel sorry for the people who were waiting for that train though, cause the train I got on was the 18.08 that came in at 18.55. It sped up so that it ended up being about a half an hour late into Manc rather than the 50 mins behind it was at Stafford but it was still another hour. A 3hr (inc changes) train journey took me about 5 and a half. Luckily Jimmy was able to get her connecting train from Wolvo home and wasn’t too much later than hoped
In conclusion a very, very, very awesome day trip & we can’t wait for them to get back over here again, hopefully it'll be soon. And of course thank you to Black Gold for having the competition that let Jimmy win the tickets. We love you guys.