BERLIN

Let's start the trip in style :D

Relief and relax after a terrible Easyjet flight...

Off to the tradeshow! We are going to Bread&Butter not Bright...

Flughafen Berlin-Tempelhof, part of Albert Speer's project, the mother of all airports, taken by the Russians on 24th April 1945... now the home of Bread&Butter... weird.

At the Alife stand...

Food, refreshments and entertainment on the old runway... not an inch of shade...

It was boiling... It felt like a desert... like a scene from Mad Max...




The New Era stand...


Night off. I'm meeting Xesus. I haven't seen him since he moved to Berlin last year...
We went to Babel, a Lebanese restaurant. With El Che looking down on us, the food must be good ;)

Xesus is a regular...

A sudden downpour caught us unprepared, so we went back to his flat...

The underground...
Serious reflections...
A woman with brain... and balls.

Joerg, looking very professional in his office ;)

Wandering...







Klaus...
Nisi, Klaus and Manni.

Alice, looking innocent before the schnaps...

Dinner in the Biergarten...

Manni's artichoke?!

My schnitzel... or is it a ray?!

The schnaps!!!

Klaus being cool...
Dennis, Manni, Budi and Klaus...

Klaus, David, Dennis, me, Manni and MJ. Now I don't how I managed to put Manni's face onto MJ's... I was just trying to blur her out, because she doesn't like appearing on blogs, and I've created a monster!
Klaus deserves the red eyes after what he said... I cannot repeat it here otherwise he would be arrested.

MILTON KEYNES BOWL 03/07/11

Finally the time has come to redeem my Christmas present. My sister got me a ticket to see Biffy Clyro supporting the Foo Fighters. The only thing is that I didn't know that she had a VIP pass for me, too.
I've been to a lot of gigs since the start of my "career" back in 1989 (my god!), but I've never really cared about going backstage. I go to gigs to enjoy the music and the atmosphere not to stalk people. I must admit that at the beginning I felt a bit uncomfortable, but the set up was so amazing that it wasn't too hard to get adjusted.
The Foos had recreated a British pub called "Ye Olde Fighters Arms", with free drinks and food for everyone.

There was a pizza oven and a BBQ.

All the glasses and coasters had the pub's name on it! People were knicking them, but I didn't because I'm honest... stupid more like it.


In the beergarden there was a double decker where you could see the crowd from.


The Foos were mingling. Here is Mr Grohl having a chat. The last time I saw him live he was still a drummer. That was back in 1994.

I went to one of the viewing platforms to watch Jimmy Eat World and I bumped into Ben!!! He was really friendly and it seemed that he didn't mind having his picture taken with me :)

From the stage platform I could see the whole bowl. Pretty overwhelming. As I walked up the stage stairs I felt a mixture of fear and elation... I'm not sure I could perform in front of so many people. Karaoke does the trick for me ;)

I secured myself a good spot to watch Biffy. I watch as they prepared to play. Here is the set list.

Simon's guitar!

MON THE BIFF!!! Here are my pics of the gig. If you click on them you can see them larger :)


Simon rocking... there is some honey by his drinks... good for your throat!



Changing guitar...



Everyone was singing along. The sound of so many people singing at once is unbelievable from the stage. It must be immensly gratifing. I found it almsot moving...

Happy fans :)




The gig was fantastic and the Foo Fighters were amazing as well.
After the show we went back to the pub backstage for more drinks. I had a really amazing day, but the surprises weren't finished. One of the Foo's security guys (K) kindly offered us a ride back into London, but we had to wait until Dave Grohl had decided to go. We didn't mind waiting. To be honest, I couldn't really face the trip back by train. My foot was still hurting from my recent injury and chilling in the VIP area was absolutely fine. It was a very fine summer night and it felt really good to be out.
K asked us to go with him to the "Inner Sanctum" so that he could find us easily when it was time to go. The meaning of that word didn't really register with me at first. I just followed numbly.
I started realising were I was heading to when I had to squeeze pass Taylor Hawkins... I could only mumble something pathetic like "Thank you for a great gig" and he gave me one of his big, sunny smiles.
The narrow passage opened onto a secluded area for the band's dressing rooms and families. They were all there. The first person I saw as soon as I entered was Simon. He was just standing one step away from me... argh! I really wasn't expecting that, I wasn't psychologically prepared for something like that ;)
The only words that escaped from my mouth were "I need the toilet" and walked away. My sister made me notice that the toilet was actually were Simon was standing. I brushed pass him and locked myself in. I could hear him talking while I was doing a wee-wee. Thankfully my body didn't betray me... it would have been mortifying, but typical. Jesus, can you imagine? Haha!
My boyfriend and my sister are still taking the piss out of me. They say my face was "brilliant", one of shock, as if I had seen a ghost. They kept on telling me to go over and ask Simon for a picture, but I couldn't. He was laughing a lot with his friends and I didn't want to interrupt or disturb him. Furthermore I felt rather strange and I just sat down quietly.
I have rationally analysed my weird reaction. The experience felt extremely surreal. I had been listening to Simon's voice a thousand times and I've seen him performing before. However, I think that somehow in my head he wasn't real, almost not human. I think that my brain didn't know how to react when I saw him standing in front of me and sent me into trauma mode :D
How stupid! There goes my only chance... In my defence, I must say that at least I didn't behave like an hysteric teenager. In addition, I'm not very good at bullshitting and I wouldn't have known what to talk about... Sigh!
[For the record, he is so good looking in real life, much better than in pictures. There is something about him, like an aura, a bright energy... it is so difficult to explain... and no, I don't fancy him (maybe a bit, in a silly way!). Well, never mind...]