Manchester - March 21st 2003 by Skytz - Try To Shut Me Up Tour

[Sharifa]

Try To Shut Me Up Tour Review

Concert: Manchester

Reviewer: Skytz

Date: March 21st 2003


... like any other, ordinary, day.
My right arm stretches out to knock off that incessant, annoying beep of my phone alarm - yawning, bleary eyed, I enjoy those first blessed moments of confusion before the realisation - that today’s not gonna be ordinary, in fact, (with great risk of banging my head against a massively overused cliché) - its gonna be anything but. The journey I took to arrive at Manchester can be summed up in 3 words - mind-numbingly, ball-achingly boring - Do those first two count as one word or two separate ones? Ah, it doesn’t matter, the point is, I’m not gonna put you to sleep with the details. So basically, I arrived. Plans from this point forward were pretty fucked - all bets were off. The person I was meant to meet at the Apollo went and broke his arm the weekend before, the prat, so I was left to pick up the pieces, with a spare ticket and potentially alone in the middle of Manchester for the next 6 hours or so. Luckily for me, I knew someone else there - Sarah - her and her friends had already been in line for a couple of hours (they had like the second place in line) plus there was a ton of them so some could keep place in line while a bunch of us camped outside the back entrance to the theatre and waited for some action. And boy did we get it……
I guess the best place to start this little section is at the beginning - well duh! I had just got off the train about an hour before and was skirting the Apollo looking for its back entrance (I’d never been before so I thought I’d case the joint) and as I came round the corner of the pub next door, I saw about 6 tour buses and a whole bunch of people milling around down the street. Obviously, I headed down that way to check it out, and ‘cos all my attention was directed into trying to scout out Sarah & Co, I didn’t even fucking notice the fact that Evan walked out of a door next to me, straight past me - within about 3 inches - and into the tour bus across the way! Man am I lame, I didn’t even fucking say anything I was so out of it - note to self, next time I have GOT TO FUCKING CONCENTRATE! Anyways, after that great heaving pile of dissapointment, I got talking to Sarah a little and found out that I’d only gone and missed the whole band going into the venue (including Avril) and that they’d stopped to sign all sorts of crap (including lots of body parts for some reason) minutes before I arrived! Yeesh, was I kicking myself now, I ‘d missed so much and it was only 12pm - the doors didn’t open until 7!I decided that from now on the best course of action was to wait this one out - so I got a spot next to the barrier, fixed my eyes on the artists entrance and waited……

Then suddenly, from the other direction, comes some dude looking kinda miffed, with a baseball cap on, eyes to the ground and heading for the tour bus. I didn’t even notice him at first - seen as my head was pointed the opposite way - and there was no reaction from the line for quite a while, until someone next to me mumbled something I could hardly hear. I turned around to look and at the same time someone else shouted “Jesse - Hey Jesse”. He looked and up, and sure enough, it was Jesse (if you ask me, he looked pleased that someone has recognised him) and he said something like “5 minutes guys, I just gotta do something” before getting on the bus.That got me to thinking - sometimes it must be kind of depressing for those guys, always being just one of Avril’s band, never really being noticed as a performer in their own right. I mean sure, people DO recognise them and everything but its always got at least something to do with Avril - I guess they enjoy it though, but I bet its still hard at times.By the time I’d stopped thinking, Jesse - true to his word - was coming back off the bus and heading straight to us.
And Jesse, hes so cool, he was just doing what everyone asked - having photos taken, signing shit, showing us his cool lego watch (haha, that was so dumb, but he said he liked it). Still, amongst the fun, he looked really burned out, and he said that all the band was suffering pretty bad from flu or something (He was so messed up that he didn’t even know what shoes he was wearing when someone asked, lol). He stood talking to us for the longest time, but then he had to go in for a souncheck, so him, Charlie and Evan where all rushed into the building (Avril and Matt had stayed inside from before). Safe in the knowledge that noone was gonna be coming out for at least the next 20 minutes, me and Sarah went over to the nearest shop - I needed to get some water for the actual gig and some pick me-ups (Red Bull, if you must know) ‘cos I was starting to feel a little burned myself. Sarah got a box of choccies (for the band - they were feeling bad like I already said) - she said she was gonna throw them on stage - I said that might be a bit difficult but what the hey, she bought them anyway.
We slid back into the crowd by the back entrance and waited some more - I was starting to get good at this waiting malarky :-P - every so often we’d go to the front of the queue to make sure we still had a place (we did) but we always returned pretty quick so that we didn’t miss anything.After the sound check was over Charile and Jesse came out and hung around for a bit. More people has arrived by now so all their attention wasn’t on us anymore, but that was OK because we still got to see them both, I didn’t get anything signed because I’m thick, but Jesse stood with me, Sarah and the others and made up some song about Bush, Blair and the war (it was basically made up of fuck the war, fuck Bush, fuck Blair too they’re all fucks) something like that . Sarah gave Jesse the chocolates to take into the dressing room, and after he tried to make this really moody security guard laugh by telling him a dumb joke about Superman, both him and Charlie went back inside again.Jesse was to come back out just once more - he went straight onto the bus to play some Vice City on the PS2 and when he left the bus for the final time he promised Sarah he’d try to get her a backstage pass (she wouldn’t stop nagging him :-P) but, as we eventually discovered, she was to have no such luck.
So this was it - the part we’d all been waiting for. And for a review of her gig, I know I’ve spent a lot of time telling you what happened before the actual show - but that’s simply because there isn’t a hell of a lot I remember about being in there. I know that when we were let in, my first thought was ‘I gotta get to the front’ - I didn’t tho, ‘cos those fucking dumb guards would grab anyone who went to run, I was either 2nd row or 3rd row for the entire night, and was I pissed? Hell yes, next time - fucking next time I WILL be front row! After about ½ an hour, or was it closer to ¾? I dunno, but OLP came on, and they were real good - 2 songs into their set the lead singer hit the deck and stayed splayed out on the floor nearly until they left the stage, that was cool - plus they had the audience shout if they were for or against the war in Iraq - and they said they were against it, but it doesn’t matter how people feel either way.
When they had left we had to wait about another ½ for Av to come on, fuck it took a long time for them to make sure the floor pedals (what are they called) were working for the guitars. The best thing about this wait was, the curtain on the stage (that now had ‘Try To Shut Me Up Tour’ projected onto it) kept blowing up just enough to see feet scurrying about, and everyone waved ‘cos they thought they saw Avril - that was kinda funny.The crush was pretty bad, but it always is, I was used to it - hate to compare with past experiences, but it wasn’t anything on the havoc at the Astoria - that shit was mad. Back to this show tho - by the time Av came on, people were already being pulled out of the crowd from fainting and exhaustion, and I was just there - in a world of my fucking own, trying to keep my place and not trip.
Finally, after getting more than enough of the chick in front of me flicking her hair into my face - the first few notes of Sk8er Boi rang out, the world exploded and, in my head at least, the fucking lights went out. I stayed standing, I got sprayed from the guards throwing water over the place as much as anyone else but as for being able to recount the whole experience blow for blow, well, I’d have an easier time telling you what I’d eaten for breakfast 4 years ago - It was a full-fried if I recall correctly. One thing I can do, however, is be general. Av’s voice was good, I’m not gonna say it was the best its ever been (hell, you’d find out I was lying as soon as I got the audio from the show up) but it was real good. As he has been in the past, Evan was the voice of reason - reminding us not to get too hectic, and to be careful, because people are getting crushed - and the classic ‘if you get too crazy these guys in orange will have to stand up there and you won’t be able to see’ - hes a worrier that one, lol. Av was all over the stage, if she wasn’t rockin with Evan or Jesse she was at the back with Charlie or up around the drums with Matt - who was semi-naked btw, in case any of you Matt lovers out there were wondering. Jesse still had ‘No War’ written on his hand (he’d done that too earlier, with a pen Sarah had lent him I think). Basketcase had the whole crowd singing along, and more people knew ‘I don’t give’ than it seemed Avril had reckoned for. Complicated didn’t go brilliantly - the choice of crowd wasn’t great and the guy she called up (I don’t remember his name, and I don’t want to - he was a freak) was all over Av.
After the great clomping fool and his female equivalent got off the stage Av thanked everybody for supporting her and coming out before Unwanted started. After that she left the stage - only to come back (she had to, the fucking noise was literally awesome after she left) to do her stool and acoustics encore like at other dates on the tour. The set was ended, the band left the stage with a thank you and goodnight and from then on I just knew it’d take me a while to forget…Leaving the venue, I tried to recollect on what had just been, and could only hope that it’d happen again soon. I purchased myself a tour t-shirt with all the names of the gig Av had and will be playing and saying my goodbyes, stumbled back to the train station. 2:00AM isn’t such a bad time to fall into bed - and after the day I’d had, I was out like a light.
Skytz