Bicester, 15th March 2013.

Bicester was in one of the oddest venues I think I’ve ever been to. It was in like a kids youth club centre with pamphlets about saying no to drugs and drink everywhere and there was a tuck shop selling Freddos and Twixes and cans of pop. Basically it was a bit like a gig in a primary school.

The guys were preparing for the release of Exposition and so Beveridge and Kemp had like little nods to the album artwork on their faces which lasted all of about 3 songs, I think before they melted. (It wasn’t their gig, it was a Yashin headline show and Taking Hayley (I think) and FVK were support.) Like all the gigs that were a very long time ago I don’t remember the setlist (other than Diamond Dust and Crimson Reign cos Beveridge grabbed my hand during it), but I do remember it being Becky’s 18^th and them bursting in wasted halfway through FVK’s set with a huge helium balloon and Beveridge wishing them a happy birthday.

It was at this gig that I ended up running back to the car to get my GIANT ASS POSTER wrapped in like six million carrier bags so it didn’t get wet and making Beveridge sit at one of the tiny tables and sign it ‘nicely’. When we got back to Louise’s the night of the convention I’d gotten my poster out to marvel at it and realised there was a flaw with it, in that for some reason (probably being distracted by the card) Beveridge hadn’t in fact signed it. He’d tried to sign it resting on his hand but because it was such a special thing and because the other guys had signed it whilst sat at a table at the convention I didn’t want Beveridge’s signature to look different so I made him sit on the smallest chair in the world and lean on the table. I am a delight.

At one point for some reason I insisted on giving Drew a pretty wild hairdo. I genuinely don’t know why I did that, but I’m glad I did because the results were pretty hilarious.

My only other real memory is that I wanted to buy Beveridge a t-shirt that I’d found that said “WARNING: I say cunt a lot” (relating to the thing that happened in Doncaster shh) and I needed to know what size to buy him, so I asked him what size he’d need if I were to buy him a t-shirt. He thought for a second and then responded “…Large. Lovely and large.” I replied to this with “No-one’s denying that.” and I don’t know why.

EDIT: As I was looking through my photos to decide which ones to drop in this blog I came across this beauty, which I just can't leave out.

Until next time,

Meg Mercury xoxo