Eeee! Yesterday was a-fucking-mazing!
Iamx entry. Insanely long, as these things are wont to be, especially when a gig’s involved and including a fair few pictures and stuff.
I only had second lesson and Rhys ‘accidentally forgot’ to go to physics, so we left after second lesson.
After a lot of fussing around whilst I got ready, my grandfather drove us to Cardiff and dropped us in the city center. We wandered around there to kill some time. I found this amazing make-up set by Riggermortis in Forbidden Planet. There were two eyeshadow compacts with four colours in each and a lipstick. It was supposed to be £12, but one of the compartments of the red eyeshadow compact had broken, so I got the whole thing for £3! I also found the little punk shop in one of the arcades Yaz had been telling me about. It had manic panic stuff! So I get a red eyeliner and more Virgin White. Then Rhys and I arsed around in The Disney Store and Hawkins Bizarre for a while I got this thing called a paper lazer. It’s basically a really long bit of paper coiled around a stick and you can flick it at people!
After that, we got a taxi over to The Point. We were the first people there. To be fair, it was only around 2:30ish. The venue is incredible! It’s a converted church, with high, vaulted roofs and stained glass windows and everything and gargoyles and carvings outside. Anyway, the sound crew were setting up and were mystified as to what we were doing there so early. So we had a look around inside the venue itself and stole a bunch of IAMX postcards and posters that they were changing for newer ones. Then, just as the sound crew were leaving they were like ‘Oh, look the bands here!’ Which was a bit of a shock. We sort of smiled and watched as they all walked past us into the venue. Rhys was running around like a headless chicken and I was still frantically applying make-up. We watched while they were all setting up.
Another girl called Alanah arrived. She was nice enough but a bit… ‘I’m so much better than you because I’ve followed them around the entire tour.’… which I thought was impressive, if scarily obsessive. I’m sorry, but I care about my education and can’t afford to go following bands all over Britain, anyway, no matter how much I adore them! Then another girl came. They seemed to know each other, but I really liked this one. Her name was Christina and she was Italian and in her 30s. She talked to me about M’era Luna and Warren Suicide and stuff. Alanah drew moustaches on the plastic covering the posters. They looked amazing!
Me and Rhys, both looking rather special:
Alanah hiding by grafittied posters:
Chris Corner’s secret identity? Adolf Hitler - of course!:
I figured I had way too much stuff in my bags, and they’d probably do a check anyway and I wanted to remember and feel the gig, so I decided to drink all the stuff I had pretty early on. I finished a bottle of Caribbean Twist and some cheap, knock-off stuff in record time. It was actually a pretty good idea, it made the queuing time (well, I say queuing, there were only the four of us!) go more quickly and meant I felt less cold!
Half of the band kept coming in and out. Tom, in particular kept coming out to smoke! We ended up going to the Spa to buy people matches and pointing them in the right direction several times. Tom saw my empty bottles, which I’d put around the corner and asked ‘Have you drank those both already?!’ I felt like such an alcoholic, especially considering I’d been drunk the last time I met them, too >.<
Another two girls turned up. Sarah and Charlotte. They were really lovely and shared minstrels with everyone! There was a sound check and the doors were still open, so we all went into the foyer of the venue and peeped through the doors and I waltzed with Rhys to ‘President’.
Sarah and Charlotte:
Then, after we’d stopped, some seriously moody security woman came along and was like ‘Get out of the foyer. You know the rules. Doors aren’t open until 7:30 Get out now or you won’t be coming in at all. And none of this nonsense, messing about inside. Also, there’s alcohol around there, so there will be a bag check.’ Moody cow! We weren’t doing any harm! >.<
About 30, maybe 40 people joined the queue by about 7... but the turn-out really was really rather pathetic, but, at least that meant it was small and intimate. I ran in once the doors opened, but there really wasn’t any need. I got a place, dead centre, right in front of Chris’s mic and there was no barrier! I could literally sit on the stage and molest the mic, It was amazing. I went over and got merch - a t-shirt with Love You Leave Me and a picture of Chris on it, an IAMX bag, covered in top hats, The Alternative, Spit It Out and some nifty badges.
The support act were called something along the lines of Trifle Sky… they were really rather wank. But at least that meant I could sit on the stage and rest my feet! They were all getting on a bit, the bassist in particular, was balding and looked like a disgruntled maths teacher! I will also swear that they got half of their instruments from the Early Learning Centre. They had this tiny toy guitar…. And a plastic recorder… and a Pringles tin full of rice and a wind-up mice. It really was rather bizarre, but it passed the time.
Even so, by the time IAMX came on, there could have been more than about 80 people in the whole venue. Apparently only 28 people turned up to another gig. I find it such a pity. IAMX really are a truly breathtaking band and immensely talented… but at the same time, it meant the gig was really intimate and stuff.
Anyway, they opened with Spit It Out played on a violin. It was incredible. Like some kind of fantasy crossover between IAMX and Emilie Autumn! I really loved the track, it sounded so achingly beautiful - I’d really like to get hold of an mp3 or something. After they all came on, they played The Alternative to open. It was amazing, so full of energy and I was right at the level of Chris Corner’s crotch… and he was wearing the tightest trousers imaginable and flying low. I could have died on the spot, I was less than about 20 cms away from him half the time! I forget how he makes my insides flip over. He’s so miniscule, yet perfect in every way imaginable and filled with so much life, so much energy, so much creativity… you can practically feel it seeping from him.
Chris in all his glory. You can tell how close we are by the blindingness of his skin from the flash:
There were some brilliant slash moments too, to keep me happy. At one point, Chris grabbed Dean and was thrusting at his arse. Then, in President (for those of you who don’t know is dripping in homosexual connotations and, in my opinion, is about being some kind of icon of androgyny and gayness/bisexuality) he got up on front of the amplifier in front of Rhys, standing there like some kind of god to be worshiped and thrusted in Rhys’s face (which was very close to mine, too) I could have died on the spot. Not only was Chris Corner thrusting in our faces, he was also singing the gayest song imaginable to Rhysie-pie. I literally squeed!
Now and again I would swear he was singing right at me for example during Bring Me Back a Dog, when he was doing the ‘The Trouble is Me/You’ bits, the ‘You’ was directed at me!
At some point, he jumped up on the amp, and jumped on Rhys’s hand and then fell on him and had to grab is head to stop himself from falling face-forward into the audience. He also pushed my camera on the floor.
I got rather frustrated when he held out his pick to me and Alanah took it. She’s probably got loads form other gigs. But I managed to get one of Dean’s… someone else caught it, but then they dropped it - so ha! Rhys managed to get one of Tom’s drumsticks.
Chris again:
Janine:
Chris and Tom:
More Chris:
Dean came over to me and bent down and was playing right in my face and stuff and wouldn’t go away! So I ruffled his hair and touched his legs, then I kissed him on the cheek and he returned the gesture XD
Tom was giving me odd looks whilst I had to readjust my top!
Me and Dean. Both looking impressively ridiculous. Why, pray god, must I pull such weird and horrible faces when I meet my idols? WHY?:
Me and Tom who had just shocked me by pulling me a lot closer than I was expecting:
Afterwards, Tom and Dean came out almost straight away. They were really lovely and chatty. I got stuff signed and photos and suff ^^ Then we waited and waited for Chris and Janine to come out… but they didn’t. Makes me wonder if Chris isn’t a little up himself… but to be fair, he had put on one hell of a show. Anyway, Dean offered and took our stuff back and got them to sign it. So now, both my Alternative and my Kiss And Swallow are signed. I’m more attached to my Kiss And Swallow, though, because it has my name and I got it signed for myself. Then Rhys and I stole amazing German tour posters from the girl on the merch stand before going home.