Ok, this blog is going to be a bit different from the usual trend as it will have nothing to do about Nintendo, the Wii or gaming in general!
This blog is simply about last Saturday night when I saw the Foo Fighters for the 5th time and it was quite simple the best gig I've ever been to.
And now down to business!
One of the great things about being a Foo Fan is that you know that you will get treated to an excellent show. That's why tickets sell so fast when they are first released and it's why they sell for £100+ each on ebay. No ebay for me though as I am well on the Foo Pulse (Most of the time) and I was waiting at 9am to buy my tickets about 3 months ago! And I got them
It would be the first time I would be visiting the 02 arena as I never went to the 'Millennium Dome' as it used to be called. London is about a 2 hour train journey from where I live, so I met up with my Foo buddies and we got the 12.12 train (Sounds like something out of a Harry Potter Book!) and arrived about 2.30pm. Doors were due to open at 6pm so that gave us plenty of time to get to the arena and start queuing to get right to the front! Now last year we saw the Foo's at Earl's court in December and that meant queuing outside... in DECEMBER! Not nice. But worth it
That's the great thing about the 02 arena... You queue inside the dome!
Good times! When we got there, there must've been about 30-40 other people already queuing so we knew we were going to get good spots in the actual arena.
After a 2 1/2 hour wait they finally let us in and sure enough we got right to the front up against the barriers that separate the crowd from the runway in the middle (we knew this was the best spot as at Hyde Park we just ended up there and you get all the band walking along there at some point and Mr.Grohl rocking out on there for a lot of the time).
The 02 arena is beautiful. Everything looks so new and clean and shiny
It's a purpose built arena so we knew the sound would be good.
First support band were 'Brady Cole'. Perfect for an opening slot, simple classic rock style songs with great riffs and ZZ Top style vocals! They played about 7 songs and left to a very good reception.
Up next was the known support act 'Serj Tankian' ...Who? Ah, the lead singer of 'System of a Down' doing his solo stuff
A good showman and if you like SOAD's stuff, then you will almost certainly like his solo efforts!
Serj left and the atmosphere began to build... The arena was now packed and you could literally feel the Buzz of excitement as everyone waited for the lights to go down and those first notes to be played...
And they did go down... at 8.45pm!!
The crowd go absolutely wild as they are covered by the darkness and the first few notes of 'Let it Die' are heard... Then the silhouettes of Dave and the boys can be seen, by this point you can barely hear the music at all! This crowd were up for a good time and they were going to get one!
After storming through the first song they then go straight into 'The Pretender' before rolling out 'Times like these' and then 'Breakout' without stopping for a single beat. What a beginning!! Dave says his hello's, asks if it's loud enough, he thinks not and introduces the new single 'Long Road to Ruin' (Watch the video for this if you haven't already!). The band play through it flawlessly and it's destined to be a regular on the set for years to come. Up next is 'DOA' and then the every present 'Learn to Fly' - the perfect opportunity for me to test out my new camera phone...
Very pleased with the results!
Soon 'Stacked Actors' appeared...and what a moment it was!
The Foos tend to extend their songs by playing long bits in the middle that are not on the original track. With 'Stacked Actors' they took that to the next level! It was amazing. It also meant a lot of runway action, which led to these 2 incredible vids!
YouTube - Foo Fighters 17/11/07 02 arena - Dave Rocking out!
YouTube - Foo Fighters 17/11/07 02 arena - Dave Solo-ing!!
Needless to say I never get tired of watching those back!
Now for the part of the show that the Foo's had never tried before in any other country. Basically a second stage lowers down from the ceiling and lands at the end of the runway, fully set up with all the acoustic stuff so they can do that side of their show!!
So we got the likes of 'Skin and Bones', 'Marigold', 'My hero' and 'Cold day in the sun' all done acoustically
We also got introduced to the band and had a Triangle solo played for us by Drew Hester, the percussionist!
Then these 2 guys show up....
YouTube - Foo Fighters 17/11/07 02 arena - Brian May + Roger Taylor
The place goes mental again, as I'm sure you heard
and we get treated to the queen song ''39'. A nice little acoustic number with Taylor on lead vocals and Brian May backing him up. But alas, One song is all we get and the entire band, minus dave, leave the stage.
Dave, now on his own starts the giant known as 'Everlong'. It's amazing how, as soon as he starts singing, the whole arena just goes dead silent and sings along, almost as a whisper. It's incredible. Dave does the whole song solo until the last chorus where the res of the Foo's return to the stage to blast through the end of 'Everlong' and then straight into 'Monkey Wrench'.
Dave then says thanks to everyone for turning up and how usually the shows in the big cities have the quietest crowds... 'You guys broke that rule tonight!'
Before starting the instantly-recognizable 'All My Life'. They bust through that and then say goodnight, but we all know they won't be gone for long.
A minute passes and the screens get turned on with what looks like a video camera filming the setlist for tonights show. This gets the crowd buzzing again and then the camera pulls back to reveal Dave smiling away next to it with a beer.
YouTube - Foo Fighters encore teasing (17th Nov 2007)
So he runs out and the band begin their 5-song encore...That's right 5 Songs!!!
The first 4 were all off of the first album; 'Watershed', 'For All The Cows', 'Weenie Beenie' and 'This is a Call'. It's rare to even hear one song off that album live!! My only complain is that one of them replaced 'Aurora' which is one of my favourite Foo songs of all time and is absolutely awesome live!
There was only one song left to end on ...'Best of You'. Hearing a whole arena sing that song is a great feeling and it was the perfect way to end what was a superb gig.
As said before, I'd seen the Foo's 4 times before and Hyde Park in particular was a great day. I always felt that would be the gig of my lifetime, I never thought that it would be topped...But it has!
The Foo's were on for 2.15 hours, which is almost unheard of these days. It was an excellent gig that will live long in the memory!
Wow, I have written loads!
I'm not expecting anyone to read the whole of this and as I said, it's not really a blog, just something I wanted to share with you guys.
Roll on June 2008!