use Perl

My 3 favourite bands of the moment, in no particular order, are Nine Inch Nails, Rammstein and KMFDM. After a bit of wheelin' and dealin' on eBay I finally managed to get tickets to the first two for only a little more than face value.

On Friday 8th July, JJ and I walked around the corner to The Academy, to discover the queue all around the other corner up the road towards the law courts. I was told that NIN weren't as popular as they once were ... sorry I beg to differ. The gig was excellent, mixing a bunch of classic and some new songs together. JJ managed to record some of the songs on video with his latest mobile phone. The results are quite stunning. Amazing to see how far the technology has advanced. The atmosphere was great, and the show itself was amazing. I haven't played the latest album enough to recognise all the new songs, but it didn't matter I still enjoyed it. Being a lighting engineer I tend to notice how the lighting effects work with the show. Whoever was on the controls knew his stuff, as they continually manage to compliment the music all the way through. The only disappointment was no encores. The reason for this was the blasted disco that now features on a Friday night at the venue. As such the band played everything they would have played in one continuous set and judging from setlists elsewhere we got the lot. I was happy as they played 'Something I Can Never Have', 'Terrible Lie' and 'Hurt'. JJ was happy as they also played 'The Perfect Drug'.

Friday 15th July. NEC Arena. Having missed Rammstein play earlier in the year, due to Ethne being born, I really wanted to see them this time around. The standing tickets went like wild fire, so was relieved to get one from eBay. I don't go to gigs at the NEC very much any more, mostly because it's a shed. There is a point when gigs do get too big, and unless you're right down the front, the magic gets a bit lost. Rammstein are a band that perform as if they're on the biggest stage in the world anyway, so the NEC wasn't a problem for them. The stage set was impressive, as were all the various props, including a few new ones; the cauldron for Mein Teil and the Segway for Amerika. But even without the props, the band themselves were on form. Playing for a few minutes shy of two hours, they consistently hit the mark with every song. Many of the old favourites are getting dropped these days, which is to be expected now that have quite a repetoire to get through. Personal favs though were 'Asche zu Asche', 'Sehnsucht' and 'Los'.

And so to the last band in my list. I have been a fan of KMFDM for some time, but never thought I'd get the chance to see them in the UK, as they concentrate on the US rather than the European market. However, that changed when I heard a rumour that they were thinking of touring the UK this year. The rumour became fact when they announced some of the dates on their website. They even finally confirmed they were to play Dudley JBs, which is about 15-20 minutes drive for me, although the tickets were due to go on sale while I was in Canada. Thankfully they didn't, and they only got printed last week. At the weekend I managed to book my tickets. I'm really looking forward to October now.