crazybobbles

Today was quite an impromptu day, I was contacted by Inn about a spare ticket to see Nine Inch Nails at Brixton Academy. She initially wanted Max to go but he wasn’t free so I was second in line (nice to know eh?). Her condition (well it wasn’t really a condition but I had to do it so I won’t feel too bad about accepting a £30 ticket) was for me to buy her some millies cookies. The hard bit was the fact that there wasn’t many Millies in London (that’s a lie, but most of them require a crazy diversion in terms of getting to Brixton Academy).

So yeah, after successfully smuggling a DSLR into Tilly and Wall I thought I’d give the whole smuggling a camera another shot (the place where I smuggle it is genious and I don’t think even I’d think of it if i was a security guard). I got the feeling I would be caught during the gig taking photos of the band and all so I decided not to take photos in the front row since theres security guards there ready to swipe it away from you. So i decided to bring my 55-200mm lens (well it’s Kazzies but still)  to the gig and take photos from afar. I wasn’t really keen on using the 55-200mm lens to take photos since the quality never compares to small focal ranged shots (or prime lenses etc). So yeah, I brought that as well as my 50mm prime lens (in case situation changes or something).

After a bit of preparation I was ready to head off to buy Inn her cookies and meet her in Brixton.

The tube was a bit chaotic today, it turns out the distrct line between Earls Court and Whitechaple was down so I had to take the Picadilly Line to Green Park and then change to get to Victoria and ultimately Brixton. I was standing around Earls Court for a bit because noone informed me about the lack of district line service, I eventually figured it out with the help of a delayed announcement etc.

Arriving at Victoria I got Inn her cookies, I picked 8 random ones and quickly went back to Victoria line to get to Brixton, this is where Inn phones me up for some shouting haha. “Where are you!?”? YOU’re LATE!”. I accept it with pride, but I blamed it on the cookie buying haha. So yeah, I told her I wont be long since its just a few stops from Victoria and all. As soon as I got out of Brixton I galloped straight to the Academy, Inn kept saying that she was at the “other” door, and it was the right hand side door thingy.

Now here’s where some orientation classes kick in. When you say the RIGHT doors, you instantly look at the venue, turn your head right (well eyes) and bam, thats the right doors, right? Wrong, Inn did it in a weird way haha. It was the right doors for her when she’s INSIDE. So there I was wondering around on the wrong side, looking at a hectic queue and shuddering at the fact of queueing up, even though the queue was going quite rapidly.

Inn finally tells me to go outside and opposite the road where she’ll spot me when I kinda figured it all out that her right was my left. So yeah, I finally meet up with Inn and she was slightly pissed haha. She had her ticket and all and passed it onto me, not sure why she gets to use the other doors to enter (it lacked a painful queue and all) but I managed to pretend I was with her so I got in using the doors she went too so WOOO! for not queueing up with the mofo’s haha.

Inn introduced me to her friend and we got right into the venue to pick a nice spot for photography and gigging. I chose the barriers on the right (left if you’re on the stage looking at the crowd, if that makes sense :P) since the left one was a bit naff and the center looked pretty full already. The idea of a barrier meant that you were safe from hardcore moshing and sweaty people. Not to mention you only get a mild pushing from behind rather then a 360 degrees push fest.

I went to use the toilets, got myself some water (was really thirsty) and showed Inn where I smuggled my camera and lens. She was impressed. I also showed her how good the shots would be by zooming in with the 55-200mm lens. It was enough to get a good glimpse of someone’s crotch on stage. So yeah.

Anyhow, Ladytron were up, the singer had funny hair. I really wanted to see Ladytron and only found out in the gig that they were playing, was quite exciting. They had a screen to project during the gig and all with random footages of..stuff *shrugs*. Right, now for some photo taking.

The gig only started so they were using shitty red lights, I didnt really like the 55-200mm lens, things were really soft in the 200mm region. But some photos were alright I guess.

Here’s the best bit! During the gig, a security guard comes by and speaks to me. We know where this is going now don’t we? Now, how did he know i had a dslr camera? Well, when you’re using a 55-200mm lens and using the 200mm region to take photos, the camera is about half a foot long. So yeah, things are a bit TOO obvious! haha.

He asked me to show him my camera, I showed him the LCD side of it trying my best to hide the lens but he knew what I was doing and asked me to turn it over to see the lens, so I shamefully turn it around to reveal the huge lens haha. He told me how I’m not allowed to bring professional cameras into the gig and all and I had to come with him to hand it over to someone to look after for the gig. I would obviously get it back, Inn thought I was getting kicked out haha but I guess you can’t really kick someone out who’s paid for their gig and “didnt know about taking professional cameras” and all haha. But yeah, I was done, busted, caught red handed, pwnd etc haha.

Deary me, the process wasn’t too painful, I didnt feel too guilty about smuggling the camera (in fact it’s made me want to do it again since they’d just confiscate the camera and put it in a safe place for you to redeem later). So yeah, he was pretty polite and all and the process did go smoothly, I met some random old lady who was the keeper of digital cameras and all things deemed dangerous for gigs haha. I got a raffle ticket, wrote my name and mobile number and was escorted back to the gig. Wasn’t a shabby experience I must say hehe.

I managed to catch a few songs I wanted to hear at Ladytron (Seventeen in particular) and enjoy the rest of the gig. It was nice to know I didnt need to take photos and just watch the gig. But this is probably talks from someone who had their photo taking abilities stripped away and is only saying it to comfort themselves haha.

After Ladytron finished we were left to talk about my misfortune haha. Twas shameful going back to inn but meh. She told me I was simply too greedy bringing the 55-200mm lens as well as taking too many photos when support were playing and all. I should be more reserved in future I guess.

There was only one support (which was good) so Nine Inch Nails were up next. The wait was pretty long as they did alot of sound checks and lighting checks, it did look quite elaborate (but not as elaborate as Rammstein haha). There was alot of smoke involved, things got a bit heated up and all. During the wait, alot of people stood in front of Inn blocking her view, I had to tap them on the shoulders and ask them to move because Inn couldnt see hehe (I kept emphasising the fact that Inn was very short haha).

They finally started, they started with “Pinion”. The build up was pretty long I must say but nonetheless the band appeared haha. Trent looked funny with short hair, it was really weird. The guitarist was crazy, he kept going around the stage and flinging his guitar around like a monkey haha. The whole gig was spent camera less (was jealous that Inn got all the camera action haha).

Some songs required some hardcore head banging (March of the Pigs in particular). Inn looked pretty funny at the gig with her hair swinging all over the place, I’m glad she tied her hair back otherwise it would be all over the place. We were standing right behind a bunch of crazy moshers which added to the fun and all. There was this one guy and his girlfriend. He was pretty bad tempered throughout the gig and there was one point where we thought a fight would have started, alot of glaring was involved when he attacked someone who barged into him during the moshing. His girlfriend was constantly telling him to leave it, it was quite a funny scene I must say haha.

There was some annoying girl in front of us with her boyfriend who managed to barge in to their spot which was blocking inn’s view. The girl was really annoying, she talked throughout the gig and constantly had her elbows resting on the bar which meant I couldnt hold onto the bar myself haha. At one point she wanted to sit on the bar, Inn wasn’t too pleased on that and if she did do it, Inn would have done something (girl fight? dunno).

Anyway, the gig and music itself was amazing. The atmosphere was lovely. I liked the obvious songs they played (ie Closer and Into the Void). And in particular pre Into the Void where he played La Mer and threw the keyboard to one side right at the end after some crazy keyboard bashing.

I was sad that they didnt play Sin or We’re In This Together :(. But they did finish with Head Like a Hole which was awesome. Inn was probably super crazy at that time (she did get up on the bar a few times to go nuts haha).

After the gig I managed to get my DSLR camera back, nip to Sainsburys for something to drink (was REAL thirsty, got myself a whole carton of Tropicana Original,  yum yum) and went back home. Inn and her friend left at Pimlico (where their hotel was) and I went back home safetly using the same route.

During the journey a few chavy girls and guys were on my carridge. They were really rude as they barged into the carridge regardless of letting the passengers off the train. Some guy who was exiting the carridge was pissed off and told them off but was soon ridiculed. They were right c**ts. I blissfully ignored them with my shure earphones and played Castlevania. I was listening to the NIN gig all over again, though it blocked out most of the sounds, at some points I could hear them talk about my DS playing. One girl kept going “is he playing Mario?” yes dear, Mario is the only game you know. Have a f**king gold star (and a c**t punch) haha. (Sorry about the language but I really hate chavs, theres the well behaved chavs (which are rare) and the ones that are OOZING with attention seeking boosts to 255 points, constantly trying to impress their ladyfriends so they’d stand a chance to get into their knickers (which they will since they were wearing your typical tracksuit bottoms haha, piss easy to take off for a quickie eh? :p).

Anyway, all I kept on hearing was “is he playing Mario?”. Sounds like they were asking for trouble. One of the boys thought it would be impressive to put his arms around me to impress the girls, when I saw that happening I grinned and gave him a proper elbow. God that was good. He stopped being an arse and left the next stop. The girls kept checking me out but I just ignored them and played my good old Castlevania. I left at my stop and went back home, nice and tired.

I had a bath at 3 in the morning and slept at 6 haha. Far too much buzz for that gig I must say. Quick lesson; never bring a 55-200mm into a gig expecting you won’t get caught and buy some decent earphones, its lovely to drown out the crap from the outside.