The SECC is predominately awash with children.
I would love to be able to claim altruistically that I’m pleased that so many young people are excited about live music, but the reality is that if the tweenie in front of me makes one more squeaky assertion about one more band that she has gleaned the name of from Kerrang then I might wring her scrawny little neck.
According to the font of all tweenie knowledge Prima Donna are shit, although she glibly admits she hasn’t seen, nor heard them.
I mean c’mon. Aaaaaaaaaaargh.
This sort of inane chatter that’s grounded in bullshit is all around me.
Twenty minutes standing in the line behind her is enough for me to entertain fantasies of the child catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang arriving and decimating the crowd in one fell swoop.
maybe he could lure about 60% of them away with the offer of meeting Billie Joe Armstrong and then lock the little fuckers up in cages for everyone over twenty five to throw bananas at.
Thankfully Prima Donna provide an excellent distraction form the prepubescent throng. .
Neatly sidestepping the glam sleaze cock rock hair metal LA scene of the eighties they prefer to root themselves in the classic stomping glam of the seventies, while giving a cocky wink to the early NY scene of the Dolls and Ramones.
It’s a heady mix that completely by passes the majority of the Green Day acolytes who appear to be mainly unaware that a band are actually playing before their gods arrive.
The lack of appreciation from the majority there doesn’t phase me in the slightest though.
Fuck them.
It’s their loss.
If they can’t hear and see that this band are special, regardless of the fact that they’re not neatly keying into the modern day demographic of what they should be listening to, then I reiterate, fuck them.
This band have actually existed in my head since I was a kid.
They're my dream band.
f I imagined a look, a sound and an attitude and then conjured a band into existence for my own entertainment then this is that band.
They've made my fantasy a reality.
There’s the swagger of the Dolls, there’s some T-Rex, the sax reminds me of Hanoi Rocks and then there's more and more and more.
Live they sound like a melting pot of all the very best albums that I own.
Opening with Soul Stripper they hit the stage with high octane glee and keep the pace up throughout a short, but very urgent, set.
Chinese Rocks is sublimely ripped from the past and transported to the here and now.
When played right this is a tune that still sends shivers up and down my spine, and tonight the fire is there.
Shit. I wish this was in a small sweaty club as this is how Prima Donna should be seen.
A bit of Gary Glitter is thrown in, but I doubt anyone under thirty even notices.
It’s only about three quarters of the way through their show and I had to slip off to the merch stall and grab a t-shirt and CD.
There’s a pile of CDs there and no one seems too interested, but I’ll happily step out of time to the drumbeat everyone else is marching to.
The t-shirt's an impulse buy, but if in some small way the buying of it extends the life of this band to another album, tour, or whatever, then its worth every penny.
When I get back into the auditorium I catch the end of the show, and just in time to hear them promise that they will return to Scotland soon.
I hope that’s not a glib promise as I’m setting aside the cash for a ticket right now.
What a gig.
Time to go home.
Oh wait. There’s still Green Day to go.
What can I say.
Green Day are like tectonic plates now.
They have moved on so slowly from American Idiot that you can barely see the change.
There’s a new stage show and a few new songs but apart from that this is the American Idiot show all over again.
The audience participation angle is starting to wear thin due to over exposure and their lauded two and a half hour set could be whittled down to an hour and a half without it.
Of course they'ree pretty much faultless in the execution of the gig, but personally I’m thinking that the rock behemoth stadium show takes from the performance as much as it gives.
The balance is off.
For every highlight there’s equally a point where it drags.
The splitting of the crowd for some call and response shenanigans can be fun, but by the second and third time its failing to impress and I'm stifling a yawn.
I’ve seen Green Day on virtually every UK tour and the romance seems to be over.
Have they outgrown me, or is it the other way around?
I don’t know, maybe we just want different things now.
No matter. Unless they can re-engage with something less superficial then I can’t see me coming back.
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