"Give us all a song and a reason why"

In the name of 'free' music, once again I found myself stood in the stupid barrier driven queue outside Virgin Megastores, armed with a very cheap looking bright green wristband. I plugged my headphones firmly into my ears, tuned my phone to Radio 1 and settled down for the wait. About forty five minutes later, after removing the barriers to the right of me, security decided to move us all into the store. And then I discovered that Virgin can indeed deal with more than little accoustic gigs - they can deal with drums!


They had constructed a stage by the window. This then means that everyone is positioned in between the rows of CDs, which as a general rule I hate, but I will make the exception here since it was a high stage so I would definitely be able to see. Plus the mike looked scarily close to the lights so you know, if anyone did accidentally bump their head on the lights, I wouldn't miss it. And also because this was the third time I'd tried to see the Fratellis live [the first being Fundee and the second being Boro Music Live] so I was going to make damn sure I could see. After the roadie people had sorted out sound levels, the Fratellis appeared on stage.

"Justin Timberlake doesn't do this type of thing...lazy fucking bastard"

Quote of the day methinks, and much better than the usually 'hello and thanks for coming...' Then they kicked off with Chelsea Dagger, a song I am currently in love with since they did it in Jo Whiley's live lounge and now with the drum beats and Jon's vocals blasting out of the speakers, it sounded fucking awesome. Rock and indeed roll. Of course as it seems with all gigs I attend, there was a mic incident, but only a minor one.

They sang Henrietta and Creeping up the Backstairs as well as a few album tracks.

"This one's called Doginabag...Hope you like it...We do."

And they all made me want to jump up and down like I was in a festival, but I wasn't, I was in Virgin Megastores with about two inches of space all around me thus limiting the jumping around - though the bloke next to me was making a very good attempt at headbanging. Plus you know, anyone who writes Chelsea Dagger on their guitar, has to keep asking his drummer what they are playing next and has hair so curly he could be in Wolfmother, has to be alright in my book.



Virgin Megastores was packed, which was good, however I soon realised that being relatively near the front in the middle of the cd racks meant that I was at the back of the signing queue. And I was supposed to be in Coventry asap so I promptly decided to skip the signing and jumped over the stage to get out. Then the stupid security man tried to tell me that I shouldn't have jumped over the stage, so I informed him that I had asked the hot roadie bloke first; I decided not to bother telling him I never listen to security anyway.