An Ashes show, London, 14th January 2013.

On the 10^th of January 2013, I went to see Ashestoangels in Birmingham. It had taken a lot of soul searching for me to decide to go to the show, because the 10^th of January is the anniversary of my Dad’s death, and although it has now been 16 years, the actual date still hits me hard. Davey eventually convinced me to go (for he was still in the band then) by telling me he’d look after me, and I decided I’d rather be doing something than sitting at home being sad. I remember Wintervention but not much else, which is quite often the case with Ashes sets cos Wintervention is my fave and I always try and be at the front for that song. The only reason I’m even mentioning this gig is because of what happened after the show when we were all sitting around whilst the band packed up and loaded out. I don’t know how it came about but I happened to overhear Crilly say “I’m going to rugby tackle Kier on Sunday” at which point I spun my head around so fast I almost snapped my own neck. It turned out that FVK were going to be at the London Ashes show, which fell on a Sunday I was due to be working. I immediately texted my friend Vicki, who was the only other person at my work who was doing Sundays at that point and asked if she’d shift swap with me to allow me to go to London. She replied saying she couldn’t swap and I stood up and ran out of the room to go and stand in the fresh air for a minute in the hopes that it’d stop me crying. It didn’t. About ten seconds later Falkor appeared and pulled me into a hug. It turned out that Louise had told them about Dad and apparently both Falkor and Jim were both so concerned about me they both went to follow me but Falkor got there first. I don’t remember much of what was said between us but I remember him telling me that he missed the guys too and he totally understood that I wanted to see them. 

Anyway, there was no way in hell that I was going to miss seeing the guys after so long, so I ended up buying a train ticket to London for something like about ten to five and locked up the shop ten minutes early to go to the show. (Don’t tell my boss about the locking up early bit.)

Louise and Annabel met me at the train station and we walked to the venue. Actually we didn't, we walked to King's Cross and had photos taken at Platform 9 3/4 because it was on the way to the venue. When we got there a band that turned out to be Ugly Love (but I didn't actually make this realisation until much much later) were playing. FVK had arrived about five minutes before us, and when we headed down to watch what turned out to be Ugly Love we bumped into Pill on the stairs. I squished him so hard I thought my arms were going to come off. After pestering Pill for an undetermined amount of time we carried on down the stairs to watch Ugly Love and I stood behind Beveridge pretending not to know it was Beveridge, because I didn't know how to say hello or draw attention to myself without going "HI I CAME TO SEE YOU BECAUSE I MISSED YOUR FACE SO MUCH". In the end Falkor appeared and gave me a hug and started swaying me from side to side and he managed to sway me into Beveridge, who turned around, allowing me to finally say hello without having to fully explain myself. I didn't really talk to any of the guys much until after the show, and the main things I remember are giving Beveridge a bunch of presents I'd bought him for Christmas but hadn't given him cos I hadn't seen him (obviously) and just...not letting go of Pill. Seriously, there are so many photos of me from that night where I'm just wrapped around Pill's middle because I just didn't want to let go.

He didn't know at this point about the whole almost ending myself thing so he probably thought I was just particularly insane that night, but he took it well bless him. In fact, it was this night that he told me that they were playing Download again, but as soon as he'd said it he looked at me with an expression of pure fear on his face and said "Actually... don’t tell anyone that. Don't say I told you. Don't even tell the rest of the band you know. They'd kill me." This was also the night he told me he ate ice cos he caught me doing it. He didn't tell me I couldn't tell anyone about that though.

My absolute favourite memory of this night is Could We Burn, Darling? coming on the music channel that was playing on the screens in the venue. I happened to turn around and notice and I just grabbed Beveridge’s arm and pointed. He muttered something like “Oh no” and looked like he wanted to curl into a ball and hide. Pill, who noticed what was happening a split second later, stood on a stool and shouted “LOOK, THAT’S ME!!”

Until next time,

Meg Mercury xoxo