LoneWolfLeya

Oh hi.

This afternoon I have another 'life' post for you, one of which is within the same genre as the last post. Music and gigs.

As you have guessed from the very obvious title to this post I will be indeed sharing my night at the Planes gig with y'all!

Now, some of you may not of heard of the band Planes and if you haven't what are you playing at?!

Okay, so a brief low-down.

On my previous post I talked about the Placebo concert I went to, now the drummer Steve Forrest who used to be in Placebo left this year to focus solely on his band 'Planes'. I am SO glad he left Placebo (no offence intended) because now I have another band who I love as much. The band consist of five members, Steve, Charlotte, Ted, Dan and Ed and their new (self-released) album 'Hotfoot' is out to pre-order now. http://weareplanes.bandcamp.com/ (Go on click the link. :)

Their music is frickin awesome, I never really knew about the band until I saw Steve on Twitter talking a lot more about them, so I thought I would listen to their stuff and oh my aren't I glad I did because their sound is very much up my street. It's melodic, energetic, thought provoking and beautiful.

So, when I heard they were going to be doing a mini UK tour and were coming to Birmingham I had to get a ticket.

15.04.15 was the day.

I was working on the day of the gig and I asked if I could have my lunch at the end of the day so I could get there in time.

Dedication right there.

Seriously now, I literally got stuck in every traffic jam going and I was getting so annoyed. Does anyone else get that, when they want to be somewhere quickly all the traffic lights go to red, you end up behind some stupid Sunday driver or you get stuck in queues?

Well all of those happened to me. Now I believe in "everything happens for a reason" and now I know why I was stuck in all of that traffic, because when I arrived at the venue all the band members were outside. :O

That happens to me every time I go to a gig, I seem to pull up right next to the artist(s) and then I freeze and miss my chance to talk to them. I just hate it when I see other people running up to musicians asking for pictures and autographs, because deep down I want to be one of those people but you end up falling into the 'groupie' category and that's not me. I just want to chat, hangout, get to know the person/people and yeah get a picture or autograph so I can do a blog post on them.

Just like I am doing now.

My parents took me the gig and my dad was like "isn't that Steve" as we pulled up to park. Ha, me being me I was like "oh I don't want to go over to them in case I invade their space" my dad literally forced me out of the car because he knows I am too polite ha ha.

I had my massive boots on again ( I should of learnt from the Placebo gig) and strolled across the road to them hoping to god I didn't fall over. And I was SO surprised at how warm and welcoming they all were. I had been talking to Charlotte a lot on Twitter and occasionally Steve and Dan. And Charlotte gave me a lovely hug and I felt a lot more at ease.

I turned to Steve and all I could manage at that point was a "hi" and he was so lovely and chatty I lost control of my limbs and went in for the hug. Now 'the hug' is a risky little game because you either go in for the kill and it's reciprocated or you get shot down and die right there on the spot.

He gave me the nicest hug back and really made an effort to find out about myself and engage with me personally. I have never seen that from a band really before, I mean genuine interest and totally laidbackness. And Charlotte was talking to me like she knew me for like forever. I was really overwhelmed.

It was very surreal and it just made me love them even more.

I am not going to lie, as I didn't want to ask for a picture together as I was too shy, I sneakily took this shot of Steve.

I'm like a stealth ninja ;)

This post is going to be a long one if I don't get down to the 'gig' part.

You ready?

So this venue was a cute little pub in Birmingham which had this very cool walk through.

I went through to the staging area and YEEESSSSSS I was at the very front. I was loving life.

The support band Jeremy & the Harlequins had flew in all the way from New York and they certainly had some character. They were so lively and raring to go. There wasn't loads and loads of people at the gig as Planes are relatively new but I found that better as you got an intimate gig and it felt somewhat personal. I think it was one of the best gigs I have been too! No joke.

One of the members from Jeremy & the Harlequins, Craig, introduced himself to me whilst I was waiting for them to go on and handed me his mobile phone and asked me to take some pictures of their performance for him.

Obviously I said yes, but he was rather trusting with his belongings. Good job I wasn't a chav that would of made way with it. Ha.

Seeing as I took A LOT of pics/video's on his phone I didn't have much time to take my own but I did get an action shot!!!

They were really good and they had an 'Elvis' vibe going on which I thought was pretty cool. The music matched that vibe too. It was nice because I was listening to stuff that wouldn't usually interest me, but I found that I actually really enjoyed it.

A really smooth and friendly band with charisma to boot.

Planes were now on stage and I must say they are all bloody hot. A very good looking band indeed. They have amazing chemistry, highly talented and their songs are effortlessly catchy. Charlotte's violin broke that day so she carried on with the keyboard and you wouldn't of even known that the violin was meant to be in there. Highly skilled people.

I am a singer with, what some people say, a 'unique voice', whether that's good or bad I don't know but when I go to see people that inspire me and who I respect as an artist, it makes me want to be on that stage even more and allows me to hang on to that dream a little longer. Planes showed that night that even with a small crowd that they were still going to give it their all and put on an electrifying performance and there was so much positive energy.

All the songs they played I loved, especially 'Legs', 'My Own Way' 'Grinding Teeth' and 'Wait It Out'. If you want to hear any clips of me singing their stuff you will find it on my Instagram https://instagram.com/anythingbutordinaryleya/ or on my Twitter account https://twitter.com/leluroxxblogger

After the concert, they came and mingled with us at the bar, took photo's with us and signed our 'merch'. I really wanted photo's with each of them for this post and for my own memories but I was far to shy to ask and didn't want to annoy anyone. I wish I had of just asked now.

Maybe next time?

It was a real special night, one of which I will never forget and they are THE nicest band I have met to date I didn't expect them to speak to me let alone come and sit and talk with me after the show.

Their music is very 'now' and I cannot stop listening to it. When I buy into a band I do so generously and it is the same with other bands I love such as 'The Mirror Trap' who supported Placebo.

I will leave you with some photo's I took of the gig. :)