You Only Live Once

Friday morning 7.30 am I awoke from my slumber to the noise of my dad, I got my work clothes on and me and him left the house to go to work. Dad drops me off at my place of work every morning just in time for 8 o clock, when I am due to start. Half way through the morning I was lost in a mountain of work when I received a text from my dad, I read it to myself. "Matt and I are going to the Strokes on Wednesday!!” I was happy for them but obviously very jealous as the Strokes rarely play in the UK anymore. A few days later my dad informed me that there may be a chance I would get his mates ticket depending on whether he could go or not. Following on from that I had 3 days of constant mixed feelings, not knowing whether to be excited or nervous. Well finally my dad walked in my room Tuesday night and told me the news, "The ticket is yours!" And that's how our story begins...

Driving up the A1 towards Tufnell Park I was sinking beers quicker than no one’s business. 4 beers down and we arrived. A quick tube journey to Camden Town and a 5 minute walk and we were at the venue, the Roundhouse. A fairly big venue, capacity about 3000 heads, rather small I thought for a band of The Strokes calibre. My dad had attended a Morrissey gig there in the mid-2000s and had had his wallet nicked so we were alert and our hands stayed firmly in our pockets for most of the evening. The time was nearly 8 o clock and the support group the Hinds were entering the stage. An all-female group from Spain which was new to me but none the less very good. All very talented musicians and a perfect support group for the Strokes. I would thoroughly recommend seeing them if the chance arises. Once they had finished at around 8.45pm the audience began to wait eagerly and slightly impatiently for the arrival of the Strokes. It got to about 9.35pm and they finally entered the stage, Julian Casablancas and his band of merry men most notably referred to as the Strokes.

A strong start from the Strokes with 'Someday' which got the entire of the Roundhouse electrified. Caught me and my dad completely off guard as we were expecting a song of that prominence to be played a bit later in the set. But no one including us was complaining as drinks went flying into the air all around the room. No matter where you stood in the room everyone around you was moving and moshing, it was like we the audience were the sea and the Strokes had just exploded from the sea bed creating a relentless wave for the rest of the evening. 'Automatic Stop', 'Heart in a Cage', 'Take it or Leave it' and 'Ize of the World' were the 4 songs following on from that all of which took the roof off the place. I'm personally not a massive fan of 'Ize of the World' but 'Heart in a Cage' is definitely up there as one of my favourites. Midway through the set and the place was in a constant state of euphoria. My dad's favourite song began playing and well it's 'hard to explain' the reaction the audience gave them when it started. Did you like my pun? No? Yeah me nether, had to do it though. The Strokes ended their set with other notable bangers such as 'You Only Live Once', 'Last Nite' and 'Bad Decisions'. I've been listening to the song Last Nite for years as my dad's band perform a cover of it; it was surreal to be listening to a song I have known for so many years, an amazing feeling and not to mention it was fucking lit.

It was the end of their set and as a standard for most bands and artists the Strokes left the stage only to return a few minutes later for a 3 song encore. I was hoping for ‘Undercover of Darkness’ or ‘Machu Pichu’ from their album ‘Angles’ but they didn’t perform ether of them, but that just shows the talent the Strokes have in their catalogue of music. That even though they didn’t play in my opinion their best song, they still took the roof off the place. The first song of the encore was ‘Juicebox’ which was fantastic and according to setlist.fm was supposed to be played early on in the set however Julian Casablancas was so drunk he forgot to play it. Regardless it was a great way to kick off their encore. Following on from that was ‘What Ever Happened’ which has got to be one of their best by far, the song is utterly genius from start to finish, it was around about this point in the gig where I ditched my dad and got stuck in the big moshing towards the front of the stage. It’s fair to say that the physique of the audience at the Strokes was very different to that of the audience at the Amazons. I was launched left right and centre for the rest of the gig and I loved every single minute of it. The gig was coming to an end, with one more song left; everyone knew what it would be. The Strokes played their last song of the night ‘Reptilia’ and it was the song of the entire evening, every single human being in the entire of the Roundhouse abandoned all sanity and went mental, including the bloke in front of me who accidentally (I hope) elbowed 3 times in the face within 10 seconds. The moshing was like nothing I had ever seen before, utterly utterly brilliant.

The lights of the Roundhouse switched back on to signal the end of the gig, 3000 people simultaneously headed for the exit. Unfortunately the system for getting people out wasn’t good at all and it took about 20 minutes to get out and with there being only one exit out of the entire event it was fairly nerve racking for a while. Eventually we got out and made our way back to the car. The gig overall was a very special night, and I still can’t quite believe that I have finally seen the Strokes live. The venue was superb, the support act was amazing and all of this made it for me a very enjoyable night. If you ever get a chance to go to the Roundhouse please do, you won’t regret it! The Strokes were phenomenal as always even if they were all battered. Make sure to drop a like on this blog, and comment below. Until next time. Peace.