Last Saturday (yes I realise that its taken me all this time to update here.. and yes...I apologise!! LOL) Rich and I managed to pack the kids off to Nana for the evening so we could go out... yes I know!! Look at me leaving the house and all that.. amazing!! Wait until u find out where I went...LOL
But first... Rich managed to traumatise Heather by letting her watch "Clash of the Titans" before she went to Nana's. An old family favourite but maybe a little too old for a child with an imagination as hers, Heather found Medusa a lil difficult to deal with and promptly had a bad dream that night before she'd even closed her eyes!!!! Needless to say Nana Sue and Grandad John were not v impressed as this continued throughout the evening and there wasn't much sleep going on at Nana's that night. Not Richard's finest hour, although I'm sure he'd vehemently disagree and reveal that was his plan all along.. ah yes.. my Father would have been particularly impressed I'm sure.. in fact I KNOW he'd have had a chuckle off that one - a few times over LOL. Anyway... punishment is due and he'll have to put his hand in his pocket for a special surprise for darling boy Jake who came to the rescue and shared his sleeping space and cuddled his frightened baby sister until she went to sleep... altogether now...
aaaaaaaaawwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!!!!!!!!!!!! Bless his special Ben 10 socks!!!! that boy knows how to tug on the old heart strings.. Nana will be impressed forever with that one... thats my boy ;)
So.. whilst all that was happening Rich and I were on t'other side.. (across the Pennines in Manchester for all you non-Yorkshire people..*spits*) having spent an hour on a train and walked the length of the city (I'm not kidding) to the "Academy" and were presently stood outside a cashmachine contemplating if we were in the queue for the venue or if the cash machine was really the slowest cash machine in the world and everyone in Manchester was just wanting to use it or not.. and of course whilst we were contemplating this we began a conversation with 2 guys stood behind us in the queue who were wondering the same thing... guess where they were from?? Go on guess... yeah.. Bradford. Unbelieveable isnt it.. all the way to Manchester to strike up a conversation with 2 blokes from down the road... and they were literally from about 2 minutes down the road from our house too! Sadly we couldnt bag a lift home as they'd come on the train too.. bugger!!!
Anyway.. who were we doing all this for?? well... Sometime in the 90's I saw a video on RawPower/Power Hour or whatever it was called for Alice in Chains.. Man in the Box and I was a lil hooked. Layne Staley was gorgeous what can I say? Then I met Rich who was an AIC fan also and the rest is history... for whatever reason we'd both missed them on the "Dirt" album tour but neither of us were too worried cos they were pretty big and we were sure they'd be back soon.. tragically not.
Layne's 'spiralling' drug addiction meant that AIC rarely performed and when they did it wasnt over here and then in April 2002 Layne died and that was that, we would never see them now..
or would we? Well yes we did.. last Saturday Rich and I finally got our "Evening with Alice in Chains" - Layne Staley being replaced by the fabulous William Duvall.
As such a huge Staley fan I was worried that I might not get past his absence or even that AIC might not live up to the image in my head but I needn't have worried, for infact they were INCREDIBLE. Duvall was amazing and the weird thing was he fits so well that you're enjoying yourself so much you almost forget that Layne isnt there...
Until that is, that they hit you with "Black Gives Way to Blue..". Off the new album and a touching tribute to the man they end it with this picture shown on the big screen behind them..
I'm not sure you can see it properly but its a lovely pic of Layne pre-drugs ravaged and giving the peace sign and I have to admit I teared up at that point, got me a lil bit emotional!!!
So at that point I very much missed his presence and it is very affecting but the mood is lifted by a smashing finish including "What the Hell am I?" followed by "Acid Bubble", "Angry Chair", "Man in the Box", "Would" and "Rooster"
For me it was an unbelieveable night and a very memorable experience which I will hold close for a long time to come and for them? For them it was a warm and excited welcome back to the cold north of England and I for one hope that its not another 15 years until we get to do it again..
