Wembleeeeey
So. My first Matchbox Twenty concert, finally. Guess what? It rocked!
To get thing one out of the way, I did indeed pre-order a USB wristband, thereby saving two quid off the still-exorbitant price, and here be a zip of the show: Live @ Wembley Arena, 2 May 08. Grammar mistake on All Your Reasons and mislabelled date (it was the 1st!) courtesy of the sound techs, I suppose. *amused* I'll put the setlist at the bottom of the post for anyone who just wants to peer at it.
Getting to Wembley was an adventure in itself. The bus was running hella slowly - and I say "slowly" as opposed to "behind" because the driver was enough of a newbie that he had a Driver Training fellow standing with him. Personally, I think if you're *that* new that you still need close supervision, you shouldn't be driving anywhere even close to rush hour time. Oy. Anyway, so we got to the train station just in time to miss the intended departure, and thus got tickets for the next one. This was when we first heard that there were service delays at London Waterloo (our intended destination) due to lightning strikes at Wimbledon. Er, okay. We kind of laughed about that, but as the train drew closer to Waterloo, you could see this enormous heavy, dark cloud hanging over that area, with the occasional flicker of lightning. (It was sunny in Southampton, btw.) At which point we referenced Hammond's experiments in a car in an electrical facility on Top Gear to reassure ourselves that yeah, the train would be grounded and thus we would be fine even if it were hit. For a bit you could SEE it raining in the distance, it was that heavy, and then it sheeted over the train and weirdly seemed like it wasn't raining in *all* sections, though obviously it was. The rain had passed by the time we actually arrived at Waterloo, some 20 minutes later than scheduled, and got on the Tube. Which shunted us over to the Overground train as we got further out, because something was stuck on the Underground track. Thus we ended up at Wembley Central, which while in the same area, is actually a mile-long walk to the stadium/arena, with the arena being on the far side of the stadium from our approach direction, naturally.
All that to say that I'm sure Headway was lovely but we completely missed them, lol. I was going to get their CD when I was going to get a T-shirt after the concert - they had a red tee with the dictionary definition of "exile" on the front and "mainstream" on the back, which is something I can get behind and would actually wear - but the merch people were glacial and I didn't want it badly enough to continue being ignored. The coolest part about the merch queue, though, was the guy in front of me in a 2005 AUS/NZ/JPN American Idiot tour shirt. :D Yes, really!
Anyway, so we missed the opener, which I really don't care about as I'd never even heard of them and the music on their MySpace is all right but nothing special, but we got there in enough time to get ourselves all situated and find a decent spot to stand. cookie2697 and by extension piper47, thanks much for confirming that Paul stands stage right. :D We ended up about a dozen or so people back from the barrier, maybe a few more. About four people beyond plectrum-toss range alas. I didn't want to push right up to the front since we'd just waltzed in; I didn't feel comfortable with that, and I could see where I was. Directly in front of us ended up being two teeny tiny punk girls, interestingly enough, and I do mean tiny: I could see over their heads with zero difficulty, and I is short. The other people surrounding me were fairly tall but not couple-y so I had a good window between them (I actually had us move from our initial position when I saw the people in front of us kiss, since I've BTDT and no thanks). Behind us were a few guys with really heavy accents who were (inadvertently) funny as hell. They kept expressing shock and amazement at how good the concert was, with liberal use of the f-word, and then apologising to someone in the vicinity for their language. Hee. I found them highly entertaining.
I chose not to bring my camera. I went back and forth on it mentally and finally decided not to, because if I *had* it, I would feel obligated to try to use it, and with this being the first time I've managed to see the damn band live, I really just wanted to soak it up. Fortunately, looking_spiffy did not suffer from the same issues and kindly brought hers and took some lovely photos and vids! I will share those separately later. We had the best line-of-sight to Paul, so most of the best shots are of him.
It was intensely surreal, standing there in Wembley Arena waiting for Matchbox Twenty to come on stage. Granted, surreal seems to be the mot du jour when it comes to my life right now, but still. I couldn't remember what song they were using as an intro until Johnny Cash's God's Gonna Cut You Down actually started and the light panels lit up. Eeeee. And then the sampled, "Hello, hello, hello..." for How Far We've Come started up and there they were, right in front of me, close enough to look like real-sized people!
The shallow notes: Rob's black shirt was left partly unbuttoned and looked increasingly yummier as he got sweatier and it clung to him. He changed into a plain black tee for the encore. Pookie had a white V-neck T-shirt and jeans on that were rather appealing. Paul had his indie-boy suit and tie on. Kyle must use some serious hairspray because the part in his new-ish emo haircut did not *budge*, lol. He had a vest and tie on. Looked very P!atD, actually. (Exclamation use deliberate.) Jeffrey is their Jason Freese "fill in on all instruments as needed" man, and sadly I've forgotten the drummer's name already; they were both in just tees and jeans. An attractive bunch of fellows, indeed.
There wasn't much setlist deviation, though the cover they played was Better Be Home Soon and it was incredible, acoustic-ish. Speaking of acoustic vs. not, I *have* seen Rob solo twice, and he played both 3AM and Push both times, but they were stripped down versions. This is the first time I've heard either done as full-band rockers and I must say it was far more awesome than I'd been expecting, esp. for 3AM. There are just so damn many versions of that song out that when I listen to it (I tend to skip it for overplay twinge reasons), I usually do go for the acoustic ones so I was wondering what I'd think of it, and I LOVED hearing it all rocked up.
I had not realised that Kyle was singing the majority of Hang and he did a gorgeous job. Paul sang a bunch of She Came in Through the Bathroom Window, too, in the middle of Bright Lights. I was so glad they did go back and do the big finish for BL after deviating into the cover, because it sounds so amazing in the mp3s that I was dying to hear it live. It did not disappoint. :D I squeaked when Rob introduced Could I Be You because that's my favourite song, even though I knew they'd be playing it. But really, with the exceptions of Busted and Leave, neither of which are often played live historically, they hit ALL of my best-loved songs. *wriggles happily*
Paul. Paul is still a wee, spastic, attention-whoring drummer-cum-guitarist. I think he is trying to make up for having been stuck behind a kit for the last ten years because he *attacks* his guitar, man. He also ran offstage and up into the balcony seats right above us and played RIGHT THERE for a few minutes, wandering right through an entire row of people, before returning to the stage to finish off the song. It was hilarious and awesome.
His other moment was shared with Mr. Thomas. Right after Unwell ended and the stage went black, Paul came into the middle of the stage and started gesturing demandingly as he instructed, "Bring the house lights up - more - more." And I was thinking, wtf you imperious little shit, what are you up to? Rob, however, was on the other side of the stage and as soon as he could see, he pointed at some people and asked if they were all right, and got them moved to right by the stage for the last song - inside the barrier, I assume, I couldn't actually see, but he said something along the lines of, "See, now you can *breathe*." I was simultaneously melting and kind of internally giggling that someone actually needed to be pulled out of the pit at an MB20 show, though it's entirely possible that they were kids as there were quite a few. But, Rob and Paul both get major brownie points for noticing and fixing the problem. I like that kind of thing in my bands. :D
As for other shared moments, most of those were Paul and Kyle, actually. Playing to each other, guitars all but touching as they sang together, or Kyle playing to Paul at the keyboard. Rob went by Paul and slung an arm around his neck/shoulder in passing once (in the surprised that it didn't drag him along sort of way). I didn't see Pookie getting any love, awww. Jeffrey stayed out of general awareness as much as possible, by design I expect, and the drummer didn't do anything to call particular attention to himself either.
Leaving was not fraught with the same difficulties as arriving, although it took them a while to get organised with respect to the wristbands, which was not made any simpler by the fact that there was a merch booth upstairs that was just merch, and a bigger one downstairs that was the only place to pick up the wristbands, but there was no signage anywhere to that effect. *eyeroll* But, once they had it set up properly, the queue moved fast. There were people daft enough to be playing in the fountains in the front courtyard area while Jade and I were shivering in spring jackets. Pretty fountains, though, with coloured lights shining up through each spout of water. They are just spouts from the ground, no actual body of water, so in the summer it *would* be a great way to cool off, kind of a running through the sprinklers deal. Just walking outside was enough to do us, though.
I think that I'll enjoy the Exile on Mainstream songs more now that I've seen them played live. Because I'll be honest, apart from HFWC, I'm not really enthused about them. I liked the meandering interlude and new verses in the middle of Downfall where the choir is in the album version, too. Rob's voice was particularly wonderful there, although he was in excellent singing form last night, period.
In conclusion: YAY! And yay for Jade for letting me know about it in the first place, coming with, and having a good time. Thank you *mwah*. And here is the setlist:
Intro: God's Gonna Cut You Down (Johnny Cash recording)
01. How Far We've Come
02. If I Fall
03. Real World
04. Disease
05. Could I Be You
06. The Difference
07. I'll Believe You When
08. Back 2 Good
09. 3AM
10. Bent
11. Hang
12. If You're Gone
13. Hand Me Down
14. So Sad So Lonely
15. All Your Reasons
16. Long Day
17. Downfall
18. Bright Lights (w/She Came in Through the Bathroom Window in the middle)
Encore:
19. Better Be Home Soon
20. Unwell
21. Push
To get thing one out of the way, I did indeed pre-order a USB wristband, thereby saving two quid off the still-exorbitant price, and here be a zip of the show: Live @ Wembley Arena, 2 May 08. Grammar mistake on All Your Reasons and mislabelled date (it was the 1st!) courtesy of the sound techs, I suppose. *amused* I'll put the setlist at the bottom of the post for anyone who just wants to peer at it.
Getting to Wembley was an adventure in itself. The bus was running hella slowly - and I say "slowly" as opposed to "behind" because the driver was enough of a newbie that he had a Driver Training fellow standing with him. Personally, I think if you're *that* new that you still need close supervision, you shouldn't be driving anywhere even close to rush hour time. Oy. Anyway, so we got to the train station just in time to miss the intended departure, and thus got tickets for the next one. This was when we first heard that there were service delays at London Waterloo (our intended destination) due to lightning strikes at Wimbledon. Er, okay. We kind of laughed about that, but as the train drew closer to Waterloo, you could see this enormous heavy, dark cloud hanging over that area, with the occasional flicker of lightning. (It was sunny in Southampton, btw.) At which point we referenced Hammond's experiments in a car in an electrical facility on Top Gear to reassure ourselves that yeah, the train would be grounded and thus we would be fine even if it were hit. For a bit you could SEE it raining in the distance, it was that heavy, and then it sheeted over the train and weirdly seemed like it wasn't raining in *all* sections, though obviously it was. The rain had passed by the time we actually arrived at Waterloo, some 20 minutes later than scheduled, and got on the Tube. Which shunted us over to the Overground train as we got further out, because something was stuck on the Underground track. Thus we ended up at Wembley Central, which while in the same area, is actually a mile-long walk to the stadium/arena, with the arena being on the far side of the stadium from our approach direction, naturally.
All that to say that I'm sure Headway was lovely but we completely missed them, lol. I was going to get their CD when I was going to get a T-shirt after the concert - they had a red tee with the dictionary definition of "exile" on the front and "mainstream" on the back, which is something I can get behind and would actually wear - but the merch people were glacial and I didn't want it badly enough to continue being ignored. The coolest part about the merch queue, though, was the guy in front of me in a 2005 AUS/NZ/JPN American Idiot tour shirt. :D Yes, really!
Anyway, so we missed the opener, which I really don't care about as I'd never even heard of them and the music on their MySpace is all right but nothing special, but we got there in enough time to get ourselves all situated and find a decent spot to stand. cookie2697 and by extension piper47, thanks much for confirming that Paul stands stage right. :D We ended up about a dozen or so people back from the barrier, maybe a few more. About four people beyond plectrum-toss range alas. I didn't want to push right up to the front since we'd just waltzed in; I didn't feel comfortable with that, and I could see where I was. Directly in front of us ended up being two teeny tiny punk girls, interestingly enough, and I do mean tiny: I could see over their heads with zero difficulty, and I is short. The other people surrounding me were fairly tall but not couple-y so I had a good window between them (I actually had us move from our initial position when I saw the people in front of us kiss, since I've BTDT and no thanks). Behind us were a few guys with really heavy accents who were (inadvertently) funny as hell. They kept expressing shock and amazement at how good the concert was, with liberal use of the f-word, and then apologising to someone in the vicinity for their language. Hee. I found them highly entertaining.
I chose not to bring my camera. I went back and forth on it mentally and finally decided not to, because if I *had* it, I would feel obligated to try to use it, and with this being the first time I've managed to see the damn band live, I really just wanted to soak it up. Fortunately, looking_spiffy did not suffer from the same issues and kindly brought hers and took some lovely photos and vids! I will share those separately later. We had the best line-of-sight to Paul, so most of the best shots are of him.
It was intensely surreal, standing there in Wembley Arena waiting for Matchbox Twenty to come on stage. Granted, surreal seems to be the mot du jour when it comes to my life right now, but still. I couldn't remember what song they were using as an intro until Johnny Cash's God's Gonna Cut You Down actually started and the light panels lit up. Eeeee. And then the sampled, "Hello, hello, hello..." for How Far We've Come started up and there they were, right in front of me, close enough to look like real-sized people!
The shallow notes: Rob's black shirt was left partly unbuttoned and looked increasingly yummier as he got sweatier and it clung to him. He changed into a plain black tee for the encore. Pookie had a white V-neck T-shirt and jeans on that were rather appealing. Paul had his indie-boy suit and tie on. Kyle must use some serious hairspray because the part in his new-ish emo haircut did not *budge*, lol. He had a vest and tie on. Looked very P!atD, actually. (Exclamation use deliberate.) Jeffrey is their Jason Freese "fill in on all instruments as needed" man, and sadly I've forgotten the drummer's name already; they were both in just tees and jeans. An attractive bunch of fellows, indeed.
There wasn't much setlist deviation, though the cover they played was Better Be Home Soon and it was incredible, acoustic-ish. Speaking of acoustic vs. not, I *have* seen Rob solo twice, and he played both 3AM and Push both times, but they were stripped down versions. This is the first time I've heard either done as full-band rockers and I must say it was far more awesome than I'd been expecting, esp. for 3AM. There are just so damn many versions of that song out that when I listen to it (I tend to skip it for overplay twinge reasons), I usually do go for the acoustic ones so I was wondering what I'd think of it, and I LOVED hearing it all rocked up.
I had not realised that Kyle was singing the majority of Hang and he did a gorgeous job. Paul sang a bunch of She Came in Through the Bathroom Window, too, in the middle of Bright Lights. I was so glad they did go back and do the big finish for BL after deviating into the cover, because it sounds so amazing in the mp3s that I was dying to hear it live. It did not disappoint. :D I squeaked when Rob introduced Could I Be You because that's my favourite song, even though I knew they'd be playing it. But really, with the exceptions of Busted and Leave, neither of which are often played live historically, they hit ALL of my best-loved songs. *wriggles happily*
Paul. Paul is still a wee, spastic, attention-whoring drummer-cum-guitarist. I think he is trying to make up for having been stuck behind a kit for the last ten years because he *attacks* his guitar, man. He also ran offstage and up into the balcony seats right above us and played RIGHT THERE for a few minutes, wandering right through an entire row of people, before returning to the stage to finish off the song. It was hilarious and awesome.
His other moment was shared with Mr. Thomas. Right after Unwell ended and the stage went black, Paul came into the middle of the stage and started gesturing demandingly as he instructed, "Bring the house lights up - more - more." And I was thinking, wtf you imperious little shit, what are you up to? Rob, however, was on the other side of the stage and as soon as he could see, he pointed at some people and asked if they were all right, and got them moved to right by the stage for the last song - inside the barrier, I assume, I couldn't actually see, but he said something along the lines of, "See, now you can *breathe*." I was simultaneously melting and kind of internally giggling that someone actually needed to be pulled out of the pit at an MB20 show, though it's entirely possible that they were kids as there were quite a few. But, Rob and Paul both get major brownie points for noticing and fixing the problem. I like that kind of thing in my bands. :D
As for other shared moments, most of those were Paul and Kyle, actually. Playing to each other, guitars all but touching as they sang together, or Kyle playing to Paul at the keyboard. Rob went by Paul and slung an arm around his neck/shoulder in passing once (in the surprised that it didn't drag him along sort of way). I didn't see Pookie getting any love, awww. Jeffrey stayed out of general awareness as much as possible, by design I expect, and the drummer didn't do anything to call particular attention to himself either.
Leaving was not fraught with the same difficulties as arriving, although it took them a while to get organised with respect to the wristbands, which was not made any simpler by the fact that there was a merch booth upstairs that was just merch, and a bigger one downstairs that was the only place to pick up the wristbands, but there was no signage anywhere to that effect. *eyeroll* But, once they had it set up properly, the queue moved fast. There were people daft enough to be playing in the fountains in the front courtyard area while Jade and I were shivering in spring jackets. Pretty fountains, though, with coloured lights shining up through each spout of water. They are just spouts from the ground, no actual body of water, so in the summer it *would* be a great way to cool off, kind of a running through the sprinklers deal. Just walking outside was enough to do us, though.
I think that I'll enjoy the Exile on Mainstream songs more now that I've seen them played live. Because I'll be honest, apart from HFWC, I'm not really enthused about them. I liked the meandering interlude and new verses in the middle of Downfall where the choir is in the album version, too. Rob's voice was particularly wonderful there, although he was in excellent singing form last night, period.
In conclusion: YAY! And yay for Jade for letting me know about it in the first place, coming with, and having a good time. Thank you *mwah*. And here is the setlist:
Intro: God's Gonna Cut You Down (Johnny Cash recording)
01. How Far We've Come
02. If I Fall
03. Real World
04. Disease
05. Could I Be You
06. The Difference
07. I'll Believe You When
08. Back 2 Good
09. 3AM
10. Bent
11. Hang
12. If You're Gone
13. Hand Me Down
14. So Sad So Lonely
15. All Your Reasons
16. Long Day
17. Downfall
18. Bright Lights (w/She Came in Through the Bathroom Window in the middle)
Encore:
19. Better Be Home Soon
20. Unwell
21. Push