My first visit to London began some months ago. The preliminaries had began the day that we were able to buy two tickets throught Ticketweb to the exclusive show that would take place in one of the London’s rock temples, the small one “The Borderline”, in the heart of Soho. Wolfsbane, Blaze Bayley’s leader band, came back to the activity 17 years after its disappearance. They were going to make a concert at this small club and for their most loyal fans. If that was going to take place, I had to be there.
As soon as I got the tickets, both flights, the first of all was to find a good place to sleep. In the April’s month, due to my job, I could only go for a weekend, so this time, I needed a nearer club place than a cheaper prize to sleep. A place for going on foot to the concert. I found a nearby hotel for £ 100 by night and then I booked the flight with Easyjet.
On Friday we flew to England. The plane left Asturias an hour later than expected, something that did not worry us too much. The main thing was to arrive well and our wallet too. Everything went as we planned. As soon as we arrived and picked up our luggage, we took the train, the Stansted Express, that left us on Liverpool Street station in 45 minutes. Then we caught the Metro Red Line to Tottenham Court Road. The hotel was a hundred feet away from the subway station, in the Soho place and we could even enjoy the view of the London Eye and Big Ben from the window.
Check-in at the hotel and then went back to the street. We located the concert hall, The Borderline, for going the next day without losing time. Then we walked down Oxford Street, we had dinner and had a beer at The Crowbar, a small place just nex to The Borderline, and attended by a good reputation and good reviews that we had read on the Internet. However we saw there a very bad service, too much hot and expensive. Not a cool bar liked the bars I have visited in Hamburg or Berlin cities, for example.
The Crowbar
After the cheering beer, another small tour through the area. We found a bar called The Spanish Bar, with the Spanish flag outside and the San Miguel’s beer logo, but we escaped from there. There are many San Miguel here, we didn’t need it in England of course. I guess that for someone who is living in London will be a nice place, but not for us. We came back to our hotel soon, it had been a hard working week and the trip had left us like shit. The next day would be a long day, we wanted to squeeze out ceiling, so it would be better retire to rest.
The Big Ben from the window
Saturday woke up early and was a nice feeling to look out and enjoy the view of Big Ben through the window. London time was 7, the Spanish 8, so at 7:30 we were as a tourist and down Charing Cross Road. Calmly we marched towards Trafalgar Square where we got the first pictures. From there, in 10 minutes we were crossing the Waterloo Bridge, where we portraied the background London Eye, Big Ben and Parliament. We went around the other side and returned to cross to the north side of Westminster Bridge. Some more pictures on the door of the famous Abbey and after a good breakfast we headed for Buckingham Palace, where we took a bunch of more photos. Once we have seen the famous palace of the Queen (She was not because the flag was not flying on top of the mast) we departed towards Piccadilly, where we took some more photos and we bought some British souveniers. Among those things, the new Whitesnake album Forevermore in a limited edition with a book, posters, pins and bonus tracks. A marvel one more for our own personal music.
Then we got on a Double Decker, the typical London red bus and we were to Camden, where we visites more stores and we had lunch. Before finally returning to the hotel, a visit to the nearby shop Metal Militia, where I tried some patches for my vest. Pantera, Soulfly, Ektomorf, Slayer, Sacred Reich and others are going to decorate it. Definitive return to the hotel. Refreshing siesta, shower and the concert.
We arrived a little before six in the evening to attend the exclusive Meet & Greet. We were among the first ones to enter and even my wife met at the door with a girl-camera in hand who was asking us about Wolfsbane. Maybe someday we’ll see us in a DVD. We were the only Spanish people there and we did not find anyone who did not speak English, although I’m not quite sure we were the only British people there. I took all my official cd’s for signing. The precious vinyls were at home. They are not comfortable for travelling, although I would have loved seeing the faces of the band when they had seen so rare that I have collected over the years. Anyway now I have 13 CD’s, a DVD and a shirt signed by all group.
Since the signature and photos, it was time the concert.
Wolfsbane & Larry Runner
To be continued ...
Clicking on the images can be viewed in a larger size.
I will be forever grateful for this dream come true.
Spanish version/ Versión en español here
Second part here
© Larry Runner 2011.
