Meltdown: Horses
Extracted from Maddie's blog on June 26
I have been informed by my father that he "mentioned [this blog] to some people on a Patti mailing list. You might get some interesting visitors. They'll expect you to review the concerts on Saturday and Sunday too."
Well, hello then if you are one of the said people. I'll have a go. But you might want to go and read Dad's review first, because it is almost certain to be more comprehensive and probably has a lot less of the journey there, and also "I didn't really know what this song was but it was very good."
If you are not, and are used to reading my accounts of not having done a lot, I should probably warn you that this entry is going to be LONG.
I've just read this review through and why I've done it in the present tense I'm not entirely sure. Oh well.
We leave to go to London at about five, arriving at Charing Cross where I bought chocolate raisins from the same shop as before, and was very disappointed to receive them in a plain bag with no quotes, let alone one from Groucho Marx. I get a bit distracted going across the Millennium Bridge thinking "I watched them run across here in Keen Eddie yesterday!" and then, "Hmm, this bridge is really long, how did they run halfway across in five seconds or so?" and finally, "How on earth did they manage to pick a time when no-one was on the bridge except them? If they were actually doing it they'd have to be dodging old ladies and apologising to all the people's photos that they ran through..." So there we see television spinning us lies once again. It was quite a good scene though.
When we get to the Royal Festival Hall we're a bit early so we look around at all the furniture in the relaxation area thing and Mum told us what she wanted us to bid for in today's auction. Dad also buys me a Patti Smith t-shirt! Which is great. We finally go into the auditorium, where we find out seats in the in the 'H' row (i.e. close to the front). Dad takes me to go and find his friend Gordon, who Dad is convinced will have a better seat than him. The search is fruitless so we go back to our seats, where I entertain myself by watching two roadies at the side of the stage pretending to drum along to Jimi Hendrix.
Finally, John Cale and his band come on, and I embarrass myself by not being able to tell which one John Cale is until he starts doing his poem - which, I have just been informed, was called 'The Jeweller' and was (with all due respect) a bit weird. As far as I can tell it is something someone's eye, and involves him playing a slightly creepy tune on the keyboard. I cannot help being reminded of 'Big Shot' by the Bonzos, though I doubt if this is the intention.
We now have a song which also begins with something about eyes. I wonder is this will be the subject of all of his pieces. Looking at Dad's notes, I can see he also does not know the title of this one, and if he did I'm not sure I'd be able to read it. A couple of rows in front and along a bit, someone who appears to be a cross between Gandalf and Bill Bailey is either bobbing his head to the music or has a nervous twitch. The next two songs are called 'Hanky Panky' and 'Ghost Story', during which a lot of people come up to the front and take photos. I wonder why no-one is telling them to stop it, until Dad tells me they are press photographers. The next song is 'Over Her Head', the first one of which I was sure of the title because he says it before he plays it. Near the end, some more musicians suddenly run onto the stage and join in, increasing the volume considerably (including someone with a loudhailer, but I couldn't really tell what he was doing with it). Gandalf is doing his best heron impression.
The next song gets whoops as the intro is played - I wonder if I ought to know it. It turns out to be called 'Fear Is A Man's Best Friend', and I don't, but it's very enjoyable. Cale tells us the next song is 'Letter From Abroad'. I am slightly puzzled by the fact the drummer is hitting his kit with marraccas rather than sticks for the beginning of this one. The man in front of me (possibly with the same hairdresser as Gareth from The Office) starts to twitch along too. The bassist - Flea from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers - does a nice bit on a trumpet.
Cale gets up from the keyboard and proceeds to do his last numbers on the guitar, which is brilliant. 'Gun' segs into 'Pablo Picasso', during which someone in the row in front of me moves a bit and I discover Gandalf has a bald friend who is bobbing along with him. I hope they don't put their necks out. Cale finishes up by singing 'Goodnight, and thank you' repeatedly along with the guitarist, and gets a lot of applause as he leaves the stage.
During the interval, we set off again to find Gordon, who turns out to actually be further back near the sound man (who is eating a banana) and with another friend called Richard (who always has the best t-shirts, apparently). Dad tells them we are sitting under the 'E' of Meltdown. We aren't, we're under the 'M', but I decide it doesn't really matter. After meeting them we go to find Mum, who's gone for a walk somewhere, and Dad tells me again how surprised he is we are closer to the front than Gordon. Back in our seats, I notice Gandalf returning with another beer and Dad points out to me a man on stage who is tuning Lenny Kaye's green Strat. I ask why Lenny can't do it himself. Meanwhile, I am slightly confused by the presence of three men in trilbies, especially as they do not appear to be together and all made this fashion choice independently. One sits down a few rows in front of us. Three video cameras are set up in the auditorium - the Patti section is going to be filmed. I assume this is for a DVD.
The lights go down and Patti enters, receiving a standing ovation before she actually does anything. She opens with 'Gloria', which seems to be a Good Move according to the audience. It really is fantastic, though the shortest performed version Dad has ever heard, he tells me. Trilby man, bless him, punches the air on each 'uh-uh' and on each letter of the name. Everyone sings along.
Next is 'Redondo Beach', complete with Patti's dancing (with which I am familiar from countless recordings I have been shown). People start to go down to the front of the hall, up to the stage, and dance along. The crowd grows all through the song. Next Patti responds to something that someone called out (which I couldn't hear) with a story about a tree in an Indian restaurant in Birmingham, but I get the feeling I don't know what she means. She then performs Birdland, which is one of those songs where I've always known how it goes, and I've always seen the title written down on CD covers, but had never realised that this title was the one that goes with this song. It was very good.
After this, someone in the crowd shouts out for the sound to be turned up. "Just a minute," says Patti, and mimes turning a volume control. She then proceeds to play 'Free Money', and I am very proud of myself for recognising what it was before she starts singing. Patti takes off her jacket for this one, then crouches by the edge of the stage and sings to the crowd dancing beneath her. Gandalf and his friend, who have remained in their seats, begin to remind me of Tim (in the episode of Spaced where they go to Camden and he nods very fast and non-stop for a long period of time).
"Thank you. Side two." Patti announces, as Lenny swaps his Strat for a red guitar. I wonder if his tuning monkey did this one for him as well. They begin 'Kimberly' - again I am just as proud for recognising this from the intro only - and I am reminded of the night where I woke up at four am and couldn't get back to sleep due to the fact that this was playing incessantly through my head. (At the time, I did think to myself that there could be worse things I could be being forced to listen to.) This performance is wonderful, and after a while I have to stop tapping my right foot because it's starting to hurt. Patti goes to our side of the stage and waves to the audience, who wave enthusiastically back. Lenny gets his first guitar back and they play 'Break It Up', getting the audience to join in.
Patti has a short break from singing to tell us an anecdote about her boots, during which she informs us "If I can't teach you anything else, impart any other wisdom, take care of your teeth," because she had to go to the dentist and it was not very nice. She recommends we get our teeth professionally cleaned if we ever get the chance. I bear it in mind. She then remembers that she hasn't said "Welcome to Meltdown 2005," and does so. The audience continue to shout out. I wonder if Patti is getting irritated. At one point someone asks if she will do the Watusi, to which she replies, "No matter what you say... it's not going to impress me."
She finally manages to get everyone to shut up and does the first few words of 'Land' before someone decides that they ought to shout something else. Patti and friends stop playing. She says, "All these people have been waiting with bated breath for this moment, and you have to shout something right now?" Appreciative whoops and applause from rest of audience. "Well, I don't know," she says, "it could be the seventh son of the seventh son or something..." More laughter. "Then take the floor my good man!" The person does not say anything else.
At last, we get to hear 'Land', and I remember how much I like this song. There is a segment in it about the lack of communication with children, which includes something about Blackberrys. After the dances section of Land, though, it begins to turn into 'Gloria' (I didn't know this was a thing she did but Dad tells me afterwards it's standard concert procedure). Everyone enjoys it just as much this time round. "London!" yells Patti as the song draws to a close. "London!" reiterates Lenny. She then drops her microphone (a worried-looking roadie runs in to wind up the cable) and runs off stage to appear somewhere higher up at the side of the auditorium and dance, though I manage to go completely blind and not be able to tell where.
(ME: *looking in the direction everyone else is* Where? Where is she?
MUM: There, look!
ME: Where?
MUM: There!
ME: Where?
etc.)
She comes back, and the band leave the stage to tumultuous applause. Which continues for some minutes. Everyone is standing up and I've dropped my book, so I have no notes on anything after this. I wonder if she's planning to do the encore before or after my hands fall off. Luckily, it turns out to be before, and she returns to tell us that she accidentally forgot to do a song. She then does 'Piss Factory' and 'Pissing In A River' before taking off her new boots and her socks. She tells us that, actually, she has another piece of advice for us - "Don't wear your new shoes to a really important job." I imagine she is going to do 'Dancing Barefoot', as does an audience members who shouts it out, but instead she does 'We Three', which was lovely.
There is a short ad lib section of Patti trying to kill time while they look for John Cale for the finale. "I screwed it up by forgetting to do a song," she says, "so I'm very sorry about this downtime." She talks for a bit about what else is going on in London, saying there was a good Freda Kahlo exhibition, or you could go to Bunhill Cemetery and see Mr Blake, "which is walking distance. Well, not walking distance from here, but from where I am. I'm not going to say where that is though, because otherwise I'll get all of you going *does what I later realised was meant to be a Cockney accent* 'Patti, it's my mate's birthday tomorrow...'" (Mum makes a comment afterwards about her studying under Dick van Dyke; I think she studied under Guy from GW.) Someone tells her they are ready to get on with the rest of the concert now, and she asks that this section is erased from human memory. "If you're recording this and you're going to bootleg it, could you cut that bit out?"
We finally get the the last songs. There is a stunning performance of 'My Generation', which, coincidentally, I'd listened to the original version of the same morning. The concert ends on Elegie (the song she'd forgotten to do earlier), with Flea back on the trumpet. It's a moving end to the gig and everyone applauds wildly when she leaves.
Dad takes a photo of the set list, bless. (He also took some during the concert - I'll upload a few in a bit. Have a look in the 'Meltdown: Horses' folder.)
I have a craving for Diet Coke. We leave the auditorium and walk back to the station (Mum asks in all seriousness whether the Milliennium bridge was built for the Millennium or not). Dad buys me some Coke and we go home. I fall asleep on the sofa, get woken by Dad at three am, forget to get undressed and go to bed in my clothes.
Blimey. I've got to do this again for tonight's concert too.
UPDATE: Pictures added. Please, for the love of any non-specific deity, DON'T view them in the Photo Album thing to the right, there >>> because it shrinks them down and you can't red the writing properly. Click 'Photos' at the top of the page, then select 'Meltdown: Horses' from the drop-down menu. Then click the 'play' icon on the bar at the bottom of the first photo when it comes up and it'll go through them like a slideshow.
Extracted from Maddie's blog
Latest update 11 July 2005