New York 3rd show….

Headed over to the Local West bar around 5pm, met up with Matt, Wes, Franz and Jane, Couple of others joined us as the night went along and i was already getting De Ja Vu from meeting up here  only 4 weeks previous for the earlier New York show.

I love the Local West bar, unfortunately the bar loves me too and just wont let me go once i get in there! After having memories of been there several years ago and having slightly too much to drink i held back a little and took my time, didn't rush my Long Island Iced Tea’s and made sure i didn't go all out before the show!

Franz, Matt, Wes, Myself and Jane      Rick and i                                           Myself and Robert (such a great guy!)

   

Finally managed to meet up with my friend Rick whom had been a regular on the Roger Waters message board for over ten years and had been in touch by e mail before the show to arrange meeting up. Little did we both know the problems he would have getting into the show!

We hung out at the bar for a couple of hours before finally making our way over to the venue. It was great to be around so many friends at this show and i especially want to thank, Franz and Jane and John and Lesley for being such good friends. It was great to meet Ron's friend Robert and also to meet Kimberley and Valerie both whom had been following my blog and added me as a friend on facebook:)

Lesley and John                               Myself and Lesley                           Kimberley and Valerie

    

I was 12th row centre on the aisle for this show, my favourite place yet again however during In The Flesh i got a text from Rick to say he was downstairs and the tickets he had bought had turned out to be fake and could i help! i made my way down to the box office and after a few words with a few people was able to bring Rick and his friend up to the floor and help them out:) Glad you guys made it and hope you enjoyed the show!

Id missed a couple of things while trying to get Rick and his buddy into the show but when i got back i could see there had been problems with the schoolteacher puppet during Another Brick 2 as the teacher was still down and they were unable to retract it back, there was a roadie with a step ladder trying to sort the problem as the show went on. The venue was packed and totally sold out, the crowd were great they stood for the whole time and the atmosphere was far better than some of the shows the previous week where a lot of people remained seated!

 

The second half started and within minutes i was tapped on the shoulder by a girl and asked if i minded is she could stand next to me where there was a spare seat. Of course i said, she had a union jack T shirt on what else was a going to say:) I could tell she wasn't just a “general” fan as she knew every lyric to every track. We got talking between the tracks and it turned out she had driven down from Connecticut for the show, was a HUGE fan of the Wall album and had been introduced to her Floyd by here father.  After the wall came down (and in spectacular fashion!) we both made our way to the front rail and enjoyed Outside The Wall within feet of the stage and the band. Dave’s now taken to making a pose at me with his banjo after he sees me at the shows but i wasn't quick enough to take a picture,  I laughed and Jamie couldn't believe how close we were to the stage and seeing the smile on her face was just a perfect picture, i love seeing peoples reactions when they stand on the rail and the band come out after the wall comes down. After watching the band onstage under the red and coloured lighting and then seeing them come out after under the bright white lights they appear to be so much closer and look so much different!

Jamie and i after the wall falling

 

We chatted for a while after the show and i invited Jamie over to the Local West bar after to meet back up with Matt, Franz, Wes, Robert and the others. We had a great post show time, in fact tooo good a time and once again the Local West bar had dragged me in and wasn't letting go!

Brad, Wes, Jane, Matt, Franz, Robert and Jamie.               Jamie, your second glass of wine didn't go to waste! lol

     

   

We all had a fantastic time after the show, it was a great end to the NY shows and i know Matt, Wes, Franz and Jane were not be seeing any more shows and it was a great send off to the last show for them Honestly, i cant remember walking home or even getting back to the apartment, thanks to Brad for making sure i got back safe!

Jamie, it was fantastic to meet you and the way we met was made it even better! Its a shame about Philly but looking forward to you coming out to one of the other shows, keep reading the blog and keep in touch:)

 

More pics here:

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Sunday, New York to Philly….

So after a difficult day yesterday, the show at the garden and then a night at the Local West bar i woke feeling VERY hung over! (Will type up the pre show, show and post show details in another post)

Id arranged to pick up the rental car from the parking garage at 10am, i looked at my watch after waking and is said 9:15, ugggghhh i was late! fortunately the clocks had gone back the night before so it was only really 8:15am! nice!

I struggled out of bed, Brad and Julee had ordered breakfast and ordered me French toast with a huge container of syrup, this was exactly what i needed to soak up the remaining alcohol in my stomach! I then showered, packed, said goodbye to Brad, Julee and Milla and walked the couple of blocks to pick up the car.

I was driving down to Philly today, a short 2 hours drive compared to some of the trips id been doing. Getting through the Lincoln tunnel took nearly an hour! it was the New York marathon this morning and although id planned my route to avoid the East side of the city i think everyone else had done the same! once through the tunnel i got on the highway and traffic was great all the way till i hit within a mile of Philly.

Took me a good 45 minutes to drive one mile once i hit downtown Philly!! for some reason all the main highways into the city had been closed by cop cars parked across the freeway entrances. I finally made it to the hotel around 2pm, parked the car and went to check in.

Kami was on the Chinese bus up from Washington DC to Philly and would be getting in around 3pm, i was unable to check in till 3 so sat in the lobby and relaxed for a while. I got in the room around 3, unpacked and headed down the street  to meet up with Kami, her Chinese bus ride was an experience in itself by all accounts as I'll let Kami tell you below:

As an eternally impoverished college student, I’ve had to discover interesting ways to save money over the years—this has led me to reach lots of new lows. The Chinatown bus is one of them. For $14 one way, you can get from D.C. to Philadelphia, New York, or Boston in record times. I remember my first ride on the Chinese bus up to New York several years ago- it was crowded and loud and smelled like… well… China. The drivers barrel up and down 95’ reaching unprecedented speeds and changing lanes like a tiny sports car, stopping to spew people out at the next Chinatown (or anywhere else—if the diver feels like it). The D.C. office/waiting room is a tiny little cave in the basement of a townhouse in the heart of D.C,’s Chinatown about a block away from the Verizon center. I waiting there until the driver came and yelled at us, herding us into two unmarked busses—one for Philly and one for N.Y. I loaded my own luggage into the bottom and had to shuffle and nudge my way onto the bus—they’re first come, first serve. I also wanted to sit in the front of the bus, where it smells less, and it doesn’t bounce me as high when we go over bumps at 90mph. As we pulled out of D.C. the driver kept changing lanes solely to get up next to the other Chinese busses, role down the windows, and yell at them in Chinese. The busses now make pit stops out of Baltimore, and when we got there, the bus driver disappeared for about 5 minutes and just left the bus sitting on the side of the road. From Baltimore to Philly, we seriously made record time—if there had been no traffic, the trip would have been two and a half hours, even with a few random stops—as it was, it still took less than three hours. The last few miles of the journey, we flew into Philly going God-knows-how-fast—definitely faster than all of the cars we cut off—as the Chinese driver was screaming at some in Chinese over his radio. (Now they have Bluetooth pieces, but they used to have hand-held radios which they’d juggle in one hand as they drove.) I got there before Simon could even make the short walk from the hotel to the bus stop.
We celebrated with Chinese dumplings!

 

We ate at a small Chinese dumpling place when Andy arrived which was probably as near to genuine Chinese food as you can get in downtown Philly, Then headed back to the hotel, dropped Kami’s bags off and intended to go out and have a look around Philly. I was actually just coming around by this time, after driving to Philly with a hangover and going through the “I'm never going to drink again” phase. The food had done me good and kinda brought me round a bit but i was totally shattered so the three of us just hung out in the hotel lobby, chatted about stuff for a couple of hours and then headed up for an early night.

New York, Saturday…..

Not the best day since I've been out here in the USA, just a difficult day, probably best left at that to be honest.

New York (again) day 4

Woke around 9am wasn't expecting  today to be like it started.

Had a shower and watched an episode of 90210 on my laptop. I've bought a few T shirts while I've been out here but my case was seriously gull when i came out from the UK so i got a couple of flat rate boxes from the post office with the intention of mailing back some of my old T shirts and clothes i hadn't been wearing, just to make some room in my case! I lacked the stuff up and sealed the box and took it down to the post office on 23rd street. $46 to mail it back!!!! The T shirts and things in the box weren't even worth that amount, i figured id just throw the old  T shirts away at that price and not even ship them home! I dropped the box back into the apartment and then headed out over to Eaterly where i was meeting my friend Paula at2pm for lunch.

I walked past the poster painting guys and took these pics, judging by the amount they have done in the last 2 days id guess it must take then like 3 weeks to complete it!

 

I got to Eaterly early and put my name down for a table at the Pizza and Pasta restaurant, there was an hours wait but that was fine, i wasn't meeting Paula for 15 minutes and we were gonna have a look around inside first anyway.

We had a look round the market inside and then took a standing table just for appetizers at the cheese and ham restaurant. There's lots of smaller restaurant type places in Eatlay and you can order a glass of wince and a drink and just wander round the market with it in your hand and take it from one restaurant to the other. We ordered the plate of Mozzarella and prosciutto ham and i ordered a glass of Chianti, it was all as fresh as it could be and tasted amazing. By the time we had finished this and had a good chat we headed over to the Pasta restaurant and waited inline for 10 minutes before being seated at our table. id been here the last time i was in NY a few weeks ago and remembered the pizza was amazing, just like you get in Italy and nothing like NY pizza.We ordered the salami pizza and the butternut Squash Lasagne. They were both delicious, it was the first time i had tried squash and i loved it! it was strange to eat Lasagne and not have meet or tomato sauce in it however it was really nice. We split the lasagne and the pizza and had another glass of wine each and chatted for a good hour before leaving. Paula headed back to her apartment and i did the same.

Pasted a favourite place of mine on the way back, Shake Shack, its open year round in the middle of  one of the parks in NY and ALWAYS has a long line, said to be the best burgers in NY and the best frozen custard! I've had the burgers before and they are good but never tried the custard, Might call in tomorrow and try it before i leave NY.

   

I got back to the apartment, sat and had a chat with Julee for an hour or so and then caught up on a Gossip Girl on my laptop! didn't do much for the rest of the day/night, my head had been pounding most of the day and my neck was still hurting from pulling the muscle in it last weekend.

Will try get the New Jersey show reviews up today, have to ride the train out to Newark today to pick up the rental car, MSG show tonight and then drive to Philly in the morning. Its the New York marathon tomorrow so I'm hoping the i can still get out fairly early and arrive in Philly around noon. Clocks also go back here tomorrow night so I'll gain an extra hours sleep in Philly on Monday morning!

Its 4:22am now on Saturday morning, been awake for an hour or so and am gonna try get some more sleep

New York (again) day 3

Woke this morning to find it peeing down with rain so had a lay in, did my laundry and didn't go outside till about 1pm. Walked the few blocks down to the movie theatre and saw The Social Networking film about facebook, Loved it! great film and highly recommended.

Made my way back to the apartment and Brad and I drove out to New Jersey for the second show at the Izod centre around 5:30pm.

Couple of little things……….

 

Kansas City show:

So Kami and i are sat at the stage right for the first half, there's 4 seats free on the floor the second row right, i ask if she wants to go sit down there. “no I'm fine here i like seeing the show from here and want to get some pictures from here from the second half” she says, so we stay there for the second half. At the end of Waiting For The Worms every night Roger walks off stage right but before doing so he removes his red hammers armband and throws it into the audience who are sat on the right, you know what I'm gonna say don't you? yup the person that caught it was sat right next to the four seats that were free, in fact he lent over to one of the seats that was empty to catch it!!

 

Mark Fisher website, Wall 2010

There's some fascinating pictures here as to how the whole stage is constructed on this current wall tour, really shows you how much work and effort goes into setting this whole thing up by the crew!

Click on the link below.

Stage construction Wall tour 2010

There's some great pictures from the rehearsals at the Izod centre  at the link below:

Wall 2010 rehearsal pictures

 

 

And there's also some great conceptual drawings here at the link below:

Wall 2010 conceptual drawings

New York (again) day 2….

Didn't sleep in too late today but then i didn't sleep too well either, i pulled a muscle in my neck working out i think in Kansas City and its been hurting a bit at nights, its the pillows i think.

I didn't do much (well any) shopping yesterday so headed down to Union Square to have a look round some stores. Remember last time i was here and i put up a picture of the guys painting a forthcoming movie sign on the side of a building wall ? well here it is again! its just over a month since i was here and they have whitewashed it all again and are starting a new one!! crazy! Also passed a Bud Light box throw out in the trash and thought of Kenny's beer wall!

The farmers market was on in Union Square and whilst the sun was out it was still a little chilly so i warmed myself up with a cut of hot cider and wandered around the market. I looked in a few stores, bought a couple of things and then headed to to Noho and Soho, i spent a good couple of hours down there looking at stores and then wandered up to Washington square Park where i called in a  deli and bought lunch (cottage cheese, Eggs, Coleslaw, grapes, mozzarella and tomato!) i then wandered over to the park and ate lunch while sat in the fountain. It had warmed up by now and the park was full of NYU students and business people making the best of the weather while eating lunch.

Washington Square Park                  My Lunch                                        The view while eating lunch

   

After lunch i headed up the lower end of 5th Ave, i walked past a small restaurant with small bench outside, Sat on the bench was a guy dressed in block jeans, black boots, sunglasses and smoking a cigarette, as soon as i saw him i KNEW i had seen him before. I walked straight past and names started coming into my head, Matt Damon, Matt Dillon, and a few others came into my head but i couldn't place the guys name. I turned around after passing him and walked back, taking another glance as i passed, the guy was no more than 4 feet away from me! as i walked past again it dawned on me, it was Brad Pitt!! just as i turned around to walk past for a 3rd time he stood up and headed into a doorway next to the restaurant, Tracie Martyn, it turns out this is a high end anti aging Clinique/ facial place, oh how i laughed at the though of a priceless picture of brad walking out of that place! Had he not have just gone in as i passed by the 3rd time i would have for sure courteously asked him for a picture!

I carried on up 5th Ave to Macys, had a look around and then headed back down towards the apartment. Saw a great t shirt in a store that I'm gonna buy when I'm in Philly as my friend Wendy can get me 30% off, the second i saw it it reminded me of the animation at the bringing of Good Bye Blue Sky! I got back to the apartment around 4:30pm after spending a few more $ on the way! I spent $10 on the following and whilst it didn’t cure my neck it made ait a lot better.

I passed a guy working out on the sidewalk on the way back, he just stood his bike at the side, turned on his ghetto blaster hit the floor doing push ups! New York never ceases to amaze me! I also passed a cake store with some rather odd looking cakes!

Love this T shirt                    $10  worth every cent!         Open air workout!               Frog cakes!

   

Chilled out in the apartment for an hour before brad got home and we left for the drive over to New jersey for the show.

New York (again) day 1..

So after my delayed flight from Baltimore i arrived into Le Guardia at 8:30pm. Took a can straight into the city and got to my friend Brad and Jules's around 9:15, long day travelling and waiting around and i was shattered. I was in bed for 10:30 and had an ok nights sleep.

I woke early and wondered where the hell i was was for the first 15 seconds! i managed to get back to sleep for a couple of hours till 11ish and then got up and showered. Id heard from my friend Ellie yesterday that she could meet up for lunch today so i arranged to meet her where she was working at 1pm.

I walked the twenty some blocks up to 52nd and Broadway calling in a few stores on the way, i didn't have too much time so decided to save the shopping for later on in the afternoon. Had a real nice lunch with Ellie and was great to see here again, it had only been a few weeks since we saw each other out in Long Island for the Nassau shows and previous to that here in NY again for the MSG shows last month. I feel so lucky to have great friends like Ellie. We talked for an hour and a half before she made her way back to the office and i made my way over to fifth avenue. I always get my watched serviced when I'm in NY, the Cartier 5th Ave store is the only Cartier store where you can walk in, wait 5 to 10 minutes, get your watch looked at there and then and be out of the building within 30 minutes at the most.

I headed down 5th Ave towards the apartment with the intention of doing some shopping however i just wasn't in the mood. I walked straight back to the apartment where i stayed for the rest of the day and night.

Its now 10am Wednesday morning, Brad and i are leaving here in the car about 5:30 tonight for the show out at the Izod centre in New Jersey and i AM in a shopping mood today. I'm first gonna  try find an Chinese massage guy as i pulled a muscle in my neck somehow  a couple of days ago in Kansas City and its been hurting ever since, gonna try get it fixed as its driving me nuts at the moment.

Kansas City show….

WOW what a show!! and what an after party!!

We got to the hotel around 5pm, showered, got changed and then headed out to the show. Neither of us had eaten. The venue was in a fantastic  area full of restaurants and bars  and as we walked the few blocks to the hotel we passed a Chipolte! unfortunately the line in the store was real long and there was no way we would be served and be able to eat by the time we had to be in the venue. We went to another restaurant hoping to get served quickly but after waiting a good five minutes and no one coming to take even our drinks order we decided to eat at the venue and head in.

I wasn't actually too hungry to be honest and didn't bother eating but Kami was. Kansas city is known for its BBQ places and i had a few places listed that i had looked up online but we just never got around to finding them let alone eating at them!

Kamis BBQ beef brisket covered hotdog with deep fried Onions!     Various slushy drinks for a buck each!

                                    

We made our way down to the floor, Kami went off to see Dave K and  headed over to see my friend Mark Strand who had been at the four shows previous with us. We had a chat  about how good the previous few shows were as Mark hadn't seen the shows since Chicago and the band were so much tighter now!

I wanted to see the show from the side again tonight so we headed up to the side level next to the stage on the right and took our seats in the second row from the front, behind the yellow tape which separates where the wall fall used to happen!

View from our seats                         Kami and Brent before the show       Brent preparing Pink for the stage!

     

The whole section where we were was pretty empty and one of the security guys came over and told us to sit wherever we wanted in the section, we were perfectly happy so stayed put! The kids during Another Brick were great tonight and really made the best of their time onstage, a lot of them coming out in front of the others and dancing about and doing step dancing. When they exited the stage they stood at the top of the steps waving to the crowd and encouraging them to applause louder, which they did!

   

Kids in Kansas City

I forgot to mention in the St Louis review that during Comfy Numb most of the front half of the crowd were sitting in their seats and during the lyrics “ can you stand up stand up” Roger pointed at the people sitting and motioned for them to stand up!! he didn't do it tonight even though a few of the crowd were still in their seats!

Few random pictures that i took at tonight show from the random images section

      

it was a great first half with no mistake that i noticed at all. Kami stayed in her seat and i ventured down to the floor to see Mark again.

They have shortened the intermission by ten minutes now so the intermission is only 20 minutes in total.

I walked back up to our seats and took my place for the second half, for some reason the section was packed for the second half! not sure what happened  whether they sold some cheap seats at the box office for a cheap price or what but it was pretty much full for the second half.

Robbie has started singing a bit more melody during The Show Must Go On, personally i dont like it but just pointing it out as an observation, he started doing it at the St Loius show and did it at the KC show after that. Looks like its gonna be staying!

       

Roger came onstage in his usual leather jacket and black biker boots, saluted Robbie, wagged his finger for Roger to follow him and then made his way to the podium in front of the mic stand. he pointed to his mic and Robbie handed it to him, he also pointed to the machine gun on the floor and Robbie picked it up and put it over his shoulder.

Roger took the machine gun from Robbie at the end of In The Flesh and started to shoot into the audience, its changed slightly in that he fires a few shots, moves around then fires a few more and then does it again, i think it works better than doing the whole sweep around in one shoot! After he fired the gun he took his mic and said “so how many did i get?” and then grinned.

Roger again got a little confused between the microphone and the megaphone that he talks though during Waiting For The Worms and sang into the megaphone instead of the mic towards the end but made a quick recovery!

During Nobody Home roger held out the mic for the crowd to sing into but held it out at the wrong time and the crowd singing “on the TV to Choose from” was heard back! he still thanks the crowd though.

Roger during Comfy Numb

     

Shadow Dave playing Comfy Numb         

The wall ell good  and in a couple of large pieces but the sides are still not falling, all the people that saw the shows earlier on in the tour really got to see something that will probably not be seen again!!

More pics of the Kansas City show

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So after the show we headed out to the outdoor plaza that we had walked through earlier, the place was absolutely packed with people dressed in Halloween costumes! Its not really a celebrated holiday in the UK and while a few kids dress up in costumes there's not many adults do and certainly nowhere near as many as here in the US! In fact we had seen people in costumes at the shows for the last 3 nights!! no one blinks an eye its just normal to see witches, sailors, wizards and zombies at a show!

Few Halloween pics

     

This was a costume!

        

This was THE best costume I've ever seen!! this was just one guy as well.

We stayed at the plaza for a good hour just leaning over the balcony and picking out all the different costumes, I'm sure kami will comment and say how much i enjoyed it, i really had seen nothing like it and couldn't believe how many people actually join in!

Halloween dancing

There was a costume competition at midnight but we left around 15 to midnight so missed it, we did hear the next day that a guy dressed as the invisible man won it!!

Halloween pictures:

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