Hi guys, Jaiden here!
Well, I thought I'd put in an update, and today is the perfect opportunity, as I can brag about how great Manchester was last night, and how gutted you should be if you missed it (except for Queen Mab, who has a valid excuse).
I set my alarm for 6.30. Yes... 6.30! Which equals STUPID OCLOCK! I prepare to jump on the 7.15 train to Sidcup from the lovely Staines, my residence. I jump on the train, all is well, the iPod is fully charged, I have my camera, my dreadfalls, my money and warm clothes. What I didnt have was the bracelets, and those are good for making petrol money, so that was a bit of a downer. Never the less, a smooth journey on a busy train, with a seat non the less!, and a bit of McFly (don't judge) to keep me company.
All right, I'll skip the train journey, thats boring!
Arrive at Sidcup for bout 9, get picked up by Jaz, race to his, pack the car with video camera (even though it doesn't work), confetti bombs, glowsticks, bicycle horns, jam sandwiches and tea bags. I meet the hamster, the hamster meets Ash's pocket, we eat Jam tarts for breakfast with our tea and then off we go.
Make a dash for George's, Lady T is on the phone trying her damndest to get there for half ten. We arrive, press the button for George's apartment, say the magic words ''Miranda, that ghost just isn't holy any more'' [nb. magic words change sporadically], and hey presto we are in.
Up in the lift, into the bedroom, and stunned to find Lady T there before us! I still don't quite know how.
Right, so wait for Chris, Mason wees with the door wide open, incase we want to watch, eat custard creams and head for the new van and the car. Poor Christine is unwell, so 'Fat Alice' will do the job.
Now, it's about half ten, and we get out of London in good time, stop at a service station and claim the journey so far had been good. Leave with tummys full, back onto the motorway, where slowly, bit by bit, traffic surrounds us and we are almost at a stand-still. So much for making good time, who ever said that is jinxed.
Well, I call the traffic line, I am so impatient, and find that the next three juntions ahead have 11 miles of stand still traffic. Oh dear it's already taken us five hours to get that far, takes about another one to get off the motorway and find an alternate route. So much for getting as much time in Manchester as possible before the show.
Go down some A road, buy a map, still 80 miles from where we need to be, and as Muse would say, 'time is running out' boom boom cha. Haha ok if you were there, you'd get the music joke after a pun, if not...hard lines.
Right, so we get back on the motorway, and head for city centre. Now it would have been easy, had we known where the venue was. Alas, as always we come without a plan, and get stuck on a one way system. The same system that was just as unhelpful on the July tour.
We find the venue, it's about half six or something, so thats like EIGHT hours from London to Manchester. And the whole time it was pouring it down, so journey was even more dull, thank god for iPods and a 'This is Spinal Tap' book.
Set up, Lady T and I get thrown out and made to pay! Grr! We had to run to the highstreet, get out cash, and then go to Primark before it closed for a coat to keep Tort warm. And what a bargain at £2 that was!
So, anyway back to the Dry Bar, band come on about an hour late because of the motorway fiasco. So Tankus are first on, and so far there are 6 people in the crowd. Time to pull out the confetti bombs and dash upstairs to the bar and scare the whole pub into coming to watch the show. And it atually worked, the room was full!
Out of my right ear, I hear someone murmer ' they are going to be shit' and so I chuckled, of course.
WHAM!!! The band throw themselves into the set (quite literally if your name is Jaz) and put on a smashing performance, both on and off the stage. Much sweat, a few minor mistakes later, and the set is already over! I look to my right, and hear 'they were actually reeeeaaalllly good'. Ha, never judge a book and all that jazz.
8 hours we were stuffed in a car, all for a half hour set, but it was worth it.. the crowd really liked it, and that's saying a lot when you're faced with a hard crowd of Mancunians.
The band who play after Tankus tell Jaz that they are scared to go on after a performance like that, and in true frontman style, he replies bluntly 'Good'.
Tired bodies drag equipment back up the spiral staircase to the van, while the girls go get the most awful food from the kebab shop.
It's about half 11, and we decided to drive back to London the same night.
Now, this took about two and a half hours in total, with Jaz's car hitting a speed of 100mph for much of the ride. (It's only little, but very nippy!).
Get to George's, drop him off, arrive back in Staines before 4am, all iPod's have run out of battery and we are running out of energy. Leave Jaz, get in bed, fall asleep and whilst dreaming, actually think I am still in Manchester and wake up very confused.
So kids, the moral of the story is, if you go to Manchester, don't be cheap and bypass the Toll road, it will land you in 11 miles of traffic. If you have a hard crowd to please, just go crazy, throw glowsticks at them, scream in their faces and climb all over the bar. Oh..and don't eat dodgy kebabs from a shop that has tuna sandwhichs on show, which are yellow.
Oh yeah, and lastly, get your arses to a Tankus the Henge show. You have no excuse.
