these were my blog entries from some of the shows, reading through them are pretty funny to me, the whole meeting linda for the first time was funny. hahaha, i'm so lame.
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Day 1 – Melbourne
Well I’m on the plane on the way home so I thought this would be a good time to write down my experiences these last few days. Well it all started on Tuesday when I arrived at The Palais Theatre in Melbourne. I got there at about 1.30pm in the afternoon and just hung around there for most of the day. Not long after people who were doing the whole tour as well turned up, we had our first Billy sighting.
He was walking by out the front of the venue with Gooch. I pointed it out to the rest of the guys and they all got excited. I waved to him and he gave us the “peace” sign as he walked by. Then we stood around more in the cold, windy and wet Melbourne weather We then spotted Billy again, this time he had Brian with him, he then walked right past us to get to the stage door of the venue, (don’t worry, we didn’t form a human wall around the stage door so he HAD to go by us).
Well we knew he would be doing a sound-check any time soon so we hang around a big roller door to hear it, and they ended up opening it so the support band, Faker, could get their gear in. So we could hear the sound-check pretty well then and it was awesome hearing Billy play, even though it was just a sound-check.
So a bit after that Billy and Linda Strawberry walked out, Linda was so beautiful in person, her eyes were just so blue and very cool. We said hi to her but she was leaving pretty quickly so she didn’t take notice who it was (hehe). And there were a few crazy people there too; one girl fell to the ground yelling out: “You’re a musical genius. Thank you for everything!!” Which is true, but the way she delivered the message to him was a bit over the top. If I was Billy, I would have freaked a bit.
Well after that we headed out to the Espy which was just up the road from the venue. Talked and hanged with people there. Judith and I had dinner there in what looked like a new done up part of the Espy, it was quite nice.
So next we headed back to The Palais for the show, I didn’t watch the support band then, so we just hung out with people out in the bar area. So when Faker finished we headed to our seats, we were in the upstairs part of the venue called “The Lounge”. It wasn’t a bad view and the sound was great as well.
Here is the set list for the Melbourne show at The Palais:
-Bit 4
-Bit 5
-A100
-I'm Ready
-Mina Loy (MOH)
-To Love Somebody
-Johanna
-DIA
-Now (and Then)
-I'm A King Bee
-It's a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock N Roll)
-Sittin' on Top of the World
-TheCameraEye
-All Things Change
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-Walking Shade
-Strayz
So when the show had finished, Billy came back out to talk to the audience. I think the audience was a bit restless, a few people yelled out pumpkin stuff. Then he tried to tell the people about an extra show he was going to do in Sydney, and then the crowd started slandering Sydney with profanities. Then Billy stopped and said “fine I won’t tell you then”. Then I yelled out “I’m going to be there” and he replied with “what?” then I yelled it out again. And he replied again with “Well I’ll tell you then”. So he tried to tell us about it, but the crowd was still really restless. So he threw the microphone down and left the stage. The next day it was reported that he had “stormed off stage in a fit of rage”. But the next few nights at the other shows he joked about it and said he didn’t “storm” off stage. So as the house lights came on, we rushed outside to the backstage (well it was more of a “side-stage” door). I can’t really recall how long it was before they came out, it was pretty hectic, people trying to get to Billy, Judith got a handshake and the other hand on her face. Then I noticed Linda trying to get through, I saw a few people say hi to her. Then I yelled out “Linda, it’s Josh”, and her face lit up and she squeezed her way through to get to me, gave me a big hug and said hi, we got in a quick picture of us. Then other people were getting stuff signed by Linda, and as she was leaving we said goodbye and I told her I would be in Sydney and Brisbane, and she said she would see me there. She was so sweet. And that was that, the band had left, and it was time to get home to get some sleep before I had to fly out to Sydney the next morning.
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Day 2 – Sydney
Today started at 5.50am for me. As I had a very early flight out of Melbourne at 8am. I had an average flight, read a bit of a magazine, what I really should of done was slept the whole flight. I arrived into Sydney, made myself to the trains which I came to rely on a lot for my 2 days in Sydney. So I trained it to Gosford, which is half way in between Sydney and Newcastle to my friends place, it was roughly about an hour and a half train trip. Arrived at Chris and Amy’s house, and left straight away to the venue in Sydney.
So when I got to the venue, I met a few people and walked around a bit. Then headed to the back of the Enmore Theatre and waited for the band to arrive. Eventually they turned up for the sound-check. There were around 6 other people, all of them went straight to Billy, and I just hung back and spoke to Linda. As she got out, she gave me a hug and asked how I was today. Had a little chit chat with her, then asked her about the extra show that was happening and I mentioned how much I wanted to see this show. She said that she didn’t know much about it and told me to catch up with her after sound-check.
So as time went by more people I knew started to arrive. Later I headed down to the back of the venue again to wait for Linda; at this point she had left the venue for dinner. And this is where it gets interesting. Security had decided to block off the tiny alley way that ran down the back of the venue. So I as I walked to the end of the street with one of the security guards who was blocking off the road, he asked me if I was part of the crew because of the lanyard I was wearing which had a striking resemblance to an official all access pass. So I jumped on this opportunity to make my way back to the rear door of the Enmore Theatre.
So as I hung around waiting for Linda, I got talking to the security guy on the door, and he was the nicest guy, he certainly made the waiting go by quicker. Eventually Linda came walking down the street by herself in big heels and with a bag of food. So we chatted for a bit. She put my last name in her cool Blackberry Sidekick thing. The reason for this was so that she could put me on the guest list for the extra show they were doing. I then mentioned that I was yet to meet Billy himself after all these clashing moments with him around. So Linda ducked inside the venue and came back with a V.I.P pass for after the show, which made me very very happy indeed. We then parted with a hug and I wished her good luck for the show that night. During this time as well I had met Brian Liesegang and got a photo with him.
So we made our way into the venue for tonight’s show, I had a GA ticket for the night so I got right down the front, not quite on the railing but one back from the railing. So I gave my camera to Bree to take pictures for me, which she did a great job, because a lot of good shots came out of it. The show was awesome, being right down there in the midst of the entire crowd, it was great. We could tell that Billy was in a better mood from Melbourne, he was smiling quite a bit and felt like it was a great night. We were slightly left of Billy and in a prime spot for when he came out to do guitar solo’s and it was amazing having a musician I have so much respect for playing his heart out there RIGHT in front of you.
Here is the set-list for that night:
- Bit 4
- Now + Then
- M.O.H
- A100
- TheCameraEye
- Johanna [Stooges/Iggypop]
- To Love Somebody
- Walking Shade
- Just A Song
- DIA
- Pretty, Pretty Star
- Top Of The World
- All Things Change
- Bit 5
Encore
- It’s A Long Way To The Top [AC/DC]
- I Want You
So after the show I headed out to the bar where the meet and greet was, so I was in and I just found a seat and waited. Eventually Billy came out and it was mentioned that he wasn’t feeling well so there were no photo’s aloud with him and only one item to be signed. So he sat himself on a table and then the rest of the band came out. A couple of people said hi to Linda, then she spotted me, and again!! Greeted me with a hug, she sure loves them. So we took a seat and chatted for a bit, then I saw someone with a set-list, and I asked Linda if she had one. She jumped up, told me to watch her stuff, she then took off out the door and a few minutes came back with some pieces of paper, she got my texta and then went around the whole band and got them to sign it for me, she then came back and sat down and signed it herself with “Strawberry <3’s Josh”, at this point was so happy and excited, what a night it had been. THEN just as the band was leaving she took me to introduce me to Billy as I had not met him yet. So it went like this, Linda: “Billy, this is my friend Josh.” I shook his hand and said “Hi.” I think I was pretty nervous because that’s all I said and that was it, I had the opportunity to say anything I want to BILLY CORGAN, and all I said was, “hi”. Then Linda and I got a quick picture together, it didn’t turn out as well because I didn’t use the flash. And then they were gone. Then I took a train back to Gosford, and was able to have a good night’s sleep, which was good, because I really need it.
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Day 3 – Sydney
Well today hadn’t started out as early as some of my other days, I would say about 10am, which was great, gave me enough rest to get on with the tour. So today I headed out to Sydney at about 1pm and I ended up getting to the venue at about 3pm, met up with Simon, Bree, Vic and Jesse. Since Linda said I was going to be on the guest list, I went to the front and asked about a guest list and then they told me that there was no guest list. That freaked me out a bit, but the gang (Simon, Bree, Vic and Jesse) were about 30 people back, so I just jumped inline with them and sat with them for the rest of the day. At one point I decided to go for a walk and get some food, on Paramatta Road in Sydney I walked by a tattoo place, I was so tempted to go in and get a tattoo, I was undecided on what I was going to get, something to do with the tour of course, I thought maybe something to do with strawberries, hehe. But I didn’t. I saw some interesting stores AND people on Paramatta Road, a lot of cool guitar shops and a Maori transvestite…
Well I got back to the venue and sat down again, most of the afternoon was spent sitting and waiting, since they weren’t opening the doors until 8pm. About an hour and half before they were opening the doors, people decided to stand up, why? Why did you all decide to stand up way before they were opening the doors? Well I was up and down for the rest of that time, about 10 or so minutes before they planned on opening the doors, I was sitting on the ground because my feet were killing me. Linda had come out to the middle of where the line was and was calling out my name. Bree had pulled me up and told me that she was looking for me, so I went up to her said hi, she gave me a hug right there in front of everyone,
I then told her how they said there was no guest list, she then said she would take me in early, she asked if I was here with friends and I said yes, I asked if they could come in and she said that was cool, so went and grabbed Simon, Bree, Vic and Jesse, and told them to come with me. I think they were like, “what the hell is going on?” hehe, and so Linda took us in, we got stamped, we didn’t have to pay either. So once we were in I went and talked with Linda, we mainly just talked about what was happening, she said that she was going to play one of her songs, which was titled “Dig”. Linda then asked me what song I would like her to play, I said Spark of Lightning, she said she wouldn’t mind doing that one, but she wasn’t using a guitar and couldn’t work it out for piano properly. We talked a little bit more then she was off to get ready for the show. So the gang and I took up a good position in-front of the stage before everyone else was let in. I ended up getting some smelly drunk with a fake American accent next to me; he didn’t last the whole night, thankfully. So it took a while for Billy to come out, and once he did it was so good, I was literally 2 meter’s away from him, he was right there with his guitar in hand.
Some of the show highlights for me were as follows:
- Billy’s stories throughout the night were good; the one about a “sweater” was funny.
- Billy screwing up Pretty, Pretty Star, 2 times!!! I know, I know, it sounds mean, but it was funny, because he ended up getting TheFutureEmbrace booklet off someone behind me and reading in it, because he forgot the lyrics.
- After that, Linda performed “Dig”, and it was absolutely amazing seeing her perform, and I could tell how emotional she was during the song as well. It was powerful stuff, I was so blessed to be there that night to here her play, just wait for the album kids, and it is going to be awesome.
- And then he played some Chicago songs which were awesome. “Friends as Lovers, Lovers as Friends”, “For Your Love” and “Riverview” were my favourites out of that set.
- And last but not least, in the encore, “Of a Broken Heart”, that was truly amazing being there for that song, and having the crowd sing along to it as well was awesome.
Here is the full set-list:
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Set 1
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To Love Somebody (Billy)
DIA (Billy)
'Unknown Tease' (Billy) (Played 2 verses of song that was going to be on TFE, but Courtney Love told him to go with DIA instead)
Now (and Then) (Billy)
TheCameraEye (Full Band)
I’m A King Bee (Full Band)
A100 (Billy)
Walking Shade (Billy)
Pretty, Pretty STAR (Full Band) (2 False Starts) (Forgot lyrics at "flowers jake the sun afraid I'm blinkin' softly", he then asked for a lyric book from the crowd)
Pretty, Pretty STAR (Full Band) (Played Full Song)
Dig (Linda Solo) (Billy refers to song as 'Dick', after much confusion in the crowd if Linda said 'Dig' or 'Dick')
Bit 5 (Billy, Matt)
Mina Loy (MOH) (Billy, Matt, Linda)
I'm Ready (Billy)
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Set 2
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Prairie Song (Billy)
White Lights (Billy)
Friends As Lovers, Lovers as Friends (Billy)
For Your Love (Billy)
Riverview (Billy)
I Got You (Tease - Split Endz) (Full Band)
Sittin' on Top of the World (Full Band)
Johanna (False Start)
Johanna (Full Song > Riders in the Storm (Tease)) (Full Band)
It's A Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock N Roll) (Full Band)
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Encore
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And So I Died of a Broken Heart (Billy, Matt, Linda)
You Are Mine, All This Time (Billy)
So as the show ended the crowd was going nuts, he shook some hands, mine included, although I got crushed from everyone trying to get a handshake. And so after the show had ended, people started to leave, the gang and I were just sitting around at the front of the stage just taking in what we had just seen. Then someone had come up to us and asked to interview us, we asked her where she was from, she was a bit hesitant at first to tell us where she was from, so then we discovered she was from NME, hehe. She did the interview; I don’t think it got used though, because we haven’t seen anything pop up about it.
So that was it. I had left; I caught a taxi to the train station and found out that I had to wait an hour and a half for the next train, and that train left at 2am, and the trip was an hour and a half, so that was exciting, NOT!!
