2008年 Feb 9日 Saturday, 20:05

Sat 9 Feb – Somewhere Back In Time
Iron Maiden

WOW. Maybe if there is a God, He sure as hell delivered me one of the most memorable nights I'll ever have. I woke up at 9AM on the day, and anticipated that heaps of Iron Maiden diehards would have already made it to the GA line by 11AM, so I'd better get moving. Arrived at 11AM, only 3 guys are lining up for Gold GA's and this German guy tells me "This is so strange. In Essen, where I live, people began lining up for the Maiden show at 9AM in the morning!". Well, obviously I WAYYY overestimated people in Australia, especially when it comes to Silver GA's (which I hand)!!! THE BLOODY ENGLAND-TYPE WEATHER (rainy and windy) was definitely art of the problem (thanks Bruce and co. for bringing the weather with you!!!). Only a handful of people arrived for the next two hours - in the traditional Aussie spirit, even the most diehard Aussie fans who arrived early stuck around in the bar rather than lining up. Except for a few, including yours truly. Met a metalhead from Canberra named Nathan, talked everything about metal to pass away the time, as one does. Eventually it gets to 5PM and FINALLY we have a decent GA line going on (vast majority so far were Gold GAs, lucky bastards!!!).

When the doors opened, and going through the security bits, the FIRST defining moment of the night happened: Me and Nathan were both SILVER GAS, but the security dude gave us THE FUCKIN GOLD GA WRISTBANDS!!!!!! And combined with us being in the front of the line, we knew we would be in the best spot in the house. AND WE BLOODY WERE! (nearly, the First to the Barrier folks occupied the first row, we were in the second row). We fought onto our middle position on the second row the entire night.

OK, on to the night's proceedings. First opening act, of course, was Lauren Harris. The bassist looked totally hair metal, the guitarist looked power metal and the drummer, well I don't know really what to make of him. I must say, it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. She gave it her best, it was alright, and her tight leather pants gained the appreciation of the crowd and me, let me tell you! Next was the bummer of the night, Behind Crimson Eyes, some crappy Aussie screamo band. All I want to say about it was that the Gold GA crowd was in chanting "FUCK OFF", "MAIDEN, MAIDEN", various other slurs, and of course, giving ' em the Finger and chucking stuff at them. The drummer was half-laughing most of the time, and the singer upped his douchebag-ness by giving the finger back to the crowd, and showing he is SEWWWW METAL by swilling from a Jack Daniels. Fuck off, man.

After an excruciating wait, finally the curtain fell and IRON MAIDEN was away! Immediately, I was squashed into a pulp, but fought for my spot, as Aces High fired away. I won't bother going into song by song detail, but I can sure as hell tell you they was simply UNFORGETTABLE. The stage and pyros were amazing, and during Iron Maiden, the huge robotic Eddie walked in. Good times! Oh yeah, and there was a guy in an Eddie costume in the front row too - Props to you buddy! I don't know what else to say other than I don't think I'll see as epic a show till Maiden comes Down Under again (Bruce promised us!).

Setlist:

Intro - Churchills Speech
1. Aces High
2. 2 minutes to midnight
3. Revelations
4. The Trooper
5. Wasted Years
6. Number of the Beast
7. Can I Play with madness
8. Rime of the ancient mariner
9. Powerslave
10. Heaven can wait
11. Run to the hills
12. Fear of the Dark
13. Iron Maiden
Encore
14. Moonchild
15. Clairvoyant
16. Hallowed be thy name