"love train 18" all-dayer
other bands playing at this all-dayer included urusei yatsura, bob tilton, ligament, prolapse, hood, eska, spare snare and more...

review, by jason graham

it started with drives to frating, to colchester, to halstead, to witham and finally to chelmsford. when we got to chelmsford trains we found out they were fucked between ilford and romford. br suck. on the train we laughed our tits off at a couple of kids who looked and behaved like radcliffe and lard especially the mini riley. lard teased radcliffe and dad smacked radcliffe as lard banged his head against the railings. we got to london late. when we got there there was a fucking great queue. when we finally got our stamps and badges we run to go upstairs. well four sixths of us. our evening session lookalike companions weren't allowed in.

at 9.45 it was mogwai and their man made temors and human shockwaves. they hit the stage and the garage felt as if it was going to explode. they opened with an amazing version of new paths which pissed all over the single version, but live their songs always do. following was ithica which totally blitzed. by the climax of this song i was gone. while i was picking up the pieces they rolled over with summer, which shockingly never really climaxed or hit home but thats not to say it still wasn't awesome. the remainder of the set shook, smashed and destroyed everything in its way. with time they only better, regardless of venue or crowd. the final song took them to new heights, heights i'm sure the garage has rarely seen before. upstairs i'm sure they must have wondered what was going on. no band should make such impossible sounds. mogwai are the loudest, heaviest , most innovative thing i'm likely to see for a long time. i must recommend you see them while it is still humanly possible. who could ever imagine mere instrumentals would be so emotional and exciting. and plan short sets is just part of the masterplan. at the end people wandered around lost desperate for more. just imagine them playing on the same stage as the prodigy. so deverse but with so much in common. a million converts a waiting to be rescued.

then i saw my friends had collared tommy johnstone. they managed to talk shit about colchester. nice one. fergus was really cool. he said that he is really looking forward to doing the roskilde festival this year. then our next good deed was to rescue dominic mogwai from the skater urusei fans. we showed him our tazos and he was dead impressed ("thats a fucking good tazo"). dominic was wearing a mercury rev shirt and we then got onto the subject of bands and he said that the morning after seeing my bloody valentine he woke up with loads of dried blood in his ears. oh yeah he was also pretty pissed (drunk not angry). then we popped the big question: "is tommy johnstone a drug dealer?". dominic said "it was pretty unlikely but he could be a pimp". i then went to pieces and started gushing how great i think his band is and that they have a real affect on me and he geniunely appreciated it. then we had to rescue ian urusei from the very same skater urusei fans. he was superfucking pissed (drunk) and knackered. i explained we share surnames and that we might be related but he didn't give a fick. i think he wanted his bed. we then finally left the garage.

when we got out it was about 12.15 am and we'd missed the last tube. arse! we fucked about without a clue and i decided to blame it all on groupie boy. we were super stuck and hanging out outside the garage approaching one we were surrounded by bands (mogwai, lunchbox, eska, mark keds) waiting for cabs. it was at this point i told chris mack that i thought he looked like ant or dec (i wasn't sure which). it went really badly. i meant it as a compliment but i think i upset him. i gave up trying to explain myself and i told him that i thought eska were really great by way of an apology. i'm evil scum.

we decided to cram six into a super dodgy cab. luckily i rode shotgun. the driver decided to give us the scenic route to chelmsford. in other words drive us through every dark, suspcious back alley possible where 10 of his mates could possibly be hiding to rob and rip us off. we finally got to chelmsford, unraped and unbeaten, at about 2 am. i went to sleep at 3 and got up for work at 7. happy but.