After nearly four hours waiting (and listening to ignorant foos fans taking the piss out of me wearing a Serj T-Shirt), the queue started to move. I couldn't quite grasp what I was just about to experience- seeing Serj?! Fuck.

My heart actually started to race as I sprinted to the front right of the standing area. Third row is good enough to me. This was followed by a nice conversation with the guy in front of me who was there for the Foo Fighters. I explained politely that whilst I like the Foos, I'm there for Serj. I added, watch what he does, you'll understand my hype.

The first band on where greeted by "hoo-rahs" from the tiered section, and the people in front of me. They were a classic rock band by the name of Brady Cole. They were surprisingly good, and even more surprisingly, were joined by Dave Grohl (moderate cheers around me, meh from me) to sing ther cover of Teenage Kicks. By then I wanted them to get on with it.

They did.

Next came Serj's setup crew, his "golden eye" backdrop was lowered, accompanied by a roar of the crowd (from myself). Instruments were tested, and I really recognized everything they did (e.g The Empty Walls Synths). They even played the "Falling Stars" riff at one point.

In the words of the head roadie- "Beautiful". Now Get the fuck on with it.

This is it

Lights Lower, 'Reverend King' starts to play, 3 Black Figures march along the stage like a funeral... Followed by a man in a White Top Hat and overalls. I go crazy.

Then comes the opening guitar to Unthinking Majority, and the lights go up, Serj screams into the mic. I was in heaven.

I sung a long and headbanged to every word during the song, I think Serj noticed this, as I swear to God, he was looking me right in the eye and singing at me, as I sung back. That was like a dream. It was unreal (My Girlfriend videoed part of this, she is shorter than me, and you can see him look just over her... I'm pretty adamant it was me as I was the only one singing in my area).

I Have Uploaded this video to Youtube, it is available here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6L3rptm_kzM

He introduced himself and The FCC, and we were onto Empty Walls. This got quite a reaction as it was the only song that people really know that Serj has done. Again I sung to every word, but this time he was more all over the stage. Although, at times it felt a little too well rehearsed, he often managed to keep up some king of intimacy with the audience (which in such a big venue, I appreciate is difficult to do).

He then moved onto Feed Us, which i think was followed by a nice little speech about how Empires are good and bad (which was followed by a Hoo-Rah and a snigger from Serj)- they can dictate and force us, but they all fall. He has obviously learned from bad reactions in Sheffield and kept his speeches short and very "to the point". I totally agreed with every word he said. This was done well.

He also played Lie Lie Lie really well, I loved it. Funnily, a called for it to be played and almost immediately the piano started playing and I went crazy. I called for "Beethoven", to which he said "Later" (I think he was acknowledging me, I hope anyway), before introducing "Saving Us" as a "Romantic Song" Again, this was a good effort to make the arena intimate (another example was when he said you are all here to see Foos' and they are a class act, I said I was there to see him. I hope he heard).

He played every other song off Elect The Dead (estimated playlist is below), but I feel the best song he played was Beethovens C***. It was really well done and he interacted well with the crowd before with a humorous introduction. A love song followed by him shouting the second word of the title of the song. The song itself was brilliant and had a good finish when the drums disintegrated.

The good thing was Serj looked happy and was being a great showman, he looked like the stereotypical move villain at times. He interacted well.

It was sad to see him go, and he, along with his band, threw stuff into the crowd. I was gutted to see picks and sticks go to Foo Fighters fans, but then then in a fantastic gesture, the very king guy in fron of me said- "You're here for Serj, right", I responded "Yeah, it was great". He responded "Here" with a pick in his palm that branded the trademark Serj "eye". He gave me the pick from the singer of my favourite band.


(Serj's pick a day after the show... Still like a Dream to me)

This is the sort to gesture Serj wants to preach about, gestures of piece and love. We could save the world if we cared for each other.

Playlist:

** Intro/Reverand King **
1. Unthinking Majority
2. Empty Walls
3. Feed Us
4. Lie Lie Lie
5. Saving Us
6. Baby
7. Praise The Lord And Pass The Ammunition
8. Honking Antelope
9. Money
10. Beethoven's Cunt

 

-AVM

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