Yesterday saw yours truly forsake the tranquil setting of Rock HQ and head towards the Sonisphere festival to risk further hearing loss as I mingled with thousands of other heavy metal stereotypes who had used a variety of methods of transport to get there. This bike is pretty hard core until you realise that the shotgun is in fact a brolly.
Yes there were some interesting wheels, Gerry served as our troop carrier, his stereo getting our ears used to the battering to follow.
Beth looked a bit more credible than I did as a standard issue heavy mentalist as we wandered around the vast array of essential boutiques selling must have t shirts and weird food stuffs. I had an ostrich burger, bought for me by Ben (a namesake of he who cannot be named who for the first time was not present when Metallica, me and his sister were) and which was interesting (the burger not Ben2) in so far I failed to see how they justified it costing £7 with an extra 50p for onions. Not that I would accuse any one of ripping me off, I mean who would object to paying £25 to park your car? As I wandered around commenting on various aspects of the human parade and their apparel I realised that I had turned into my Dad in a heavy metal shirt. I decided to save my social comments about the 100,000 or so who were all expressing their individuality by dressing the same, and concentrate on enjoying my day.
There were a number of bands on the must see list including my new favourite band who have been around for years but have only just featured in my hearing loss schedule, Dream Theatre. Metallica were the head line act, the clip here is from their One track a bit of how rubbish is war ode, they had heavy metal then but it was called shrapnel.
It has to be said that Metallica did not disappoint, the bass and drums were so loud it moved your clothing and if you got too close rearranged your internal working parts. Suitably deafened, covered in the contents of thrown lager containers (hopefully only lager) and starving hungry (it was a small ostrich) we trudged along with the great unwashed (there were some amazing human casualties, some barely able to stand, others definitely unable to wash for 3 days judging by their aroma) for the two mile walk in total darkness to the car which, unlike I had expected for the price paid, had not been cleaned and valeted. There then followed a bit of a wait as the marhalls tried to work out how to get 50 million cars off a field through one gate. Finally one tattooed stereotype had the amazing idea to open another one and we were off. Eventually.
And so began a pretty uneventful 180 mile road trip back to the sanctuary of the Bonsai Mountain. Uneventful if you if you call Gerry blowing bits of his engine out of his exhaust and somewhat slowly but surely finally get me home. At 5am. Hes now in quarantine awaiting surgery. Again. This time he might have to be put to sleep. A bit of a downer on the day, as is the constant whistling in my left ear. The right ones only bleeding.
Guess who was at his desk bright eyed and bushy tailed at 9 am.
Ok it was 9.15, I had to have breakfast first.
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