Bring Me The Horizon at Alexandra Palace (London)

Before I start blabbing about everything else, you should know that the Sheffield (UK) band Bring Me The Horizon (BMTH) is one of my all-time favourites (together with Thirty Seconds To Mars and Yashin, but if you’ve read my bio then you probably already know this), and they mean incredibly much to me as I can identify with a lot of the issues brought up in their songs. I totally dig their unique sound-vocals, drums, guitar, bass, keyboard-everything always syncs perfectly. Granted, I was sceptical of their new album ‘That’s The Spirit’ at first, mainly because their first songs they released hinted at a move towards the less heavy side of the spectrum. But, as soon as I listened to it and put my preconceptions aside, I was hooked. However, I’m still not sure if I could pick a favourite album because I’m in love with all of them.

Having never been to Alexandra Palace before, also lovingly called Ally Pally, I was stoked as it’s known as a ‘must visit’ venue. The arrival went smoothly and I enjoyed the view from the outside already which was a great start.

The website doesn’t lie- Ally Pally really does have a festival atmosphere. The internal venue didn’t fail to impress and lived up to my expectations. Because it is extremely spacious, before the gig, you can actually have a relatively relaxed stroll through the stalls that resemble a cute village. We didn’t quite catch the whole performance of the American band PVRIS and the Welsh band Neck Deep, but from what I did hear I didn’t miss much. Note on the side-I would’ve much preferred the smooth Scottish band CHVRCHES to PVRIS, although they have a similar sound. I would also like to offer a small tip-if you happen to be a person that gets easily exhausted, given the support acts are artists you don’t really have to see (nice to support them but takes more stamina), and you don’t mind not standing at the front, then don’t fret when you don’t get there before the main act. It makes such a big difference if you get to absorb the gig with a fresh mind and body!

I was shocked at the ticket prices-at around £20/£25 pounds they were ridiculously cheap for a band with wider recognition. Unfortunately I was already upset before BMTH got on stage because I was having a hard time dealing with obnoxious fans. Relatively speaking, the crowd was indeed better compared to some others (I.e. Northlane) although there was just a lot of pushing, shoving and flinging but not even close to what I had expected. I’m not really sure what exactly set me off that night but my emotional shield, as I like to call it, was wearing thin. The fact that I was upset and couldn’t enjoy my favourite band playing, upset me even more. Eventually, I thankfully got swept up in the music and got to enjoy the rest of the otherworldly journey.

The lighting and effects were amazing, and you could tell they put effort into their performance (you would think that’s common practice but unfortunately a lot of stage performances are flat out boring). The performance itself wasn’t anything out of the ordinary; however, the strong connection with the audience was certainly felt. I loved the chosen visuals, as they set the tone for the songs perfectly. The only bands’ set ups that come visually close to BMTH’s awesomeness are Queens Of The Stone Age with their 2014 Reading Festival (UK) performance, along with Thirty Seconds To Mars’ gig in Vienna a couple years back.

The sound was alright; however, looking back, I have to agree with my boyfriend and other guests, insofar that it actually wasn’t good at all, but it didn’t really detract from the performance. The sound did seem to improve massively during the last few tracks, and Lee Malia’s (guitarist) solo during "Blessed With A Curse" was literally breath-taking. In sum, the gig was an emotional roller-coaster for me, and I enjoyed every second of it-the good and the bad.

Sadly, I didn’t have enough money to grab a ‘That’s The Spirit’ shirt from the merchandise stand after the gig. I always try to pick something up before or after the gig (buying merch before is definitely advisable to beat the crazy queues), in order to support the respective band, especially if it’s a small one.

I feel like I have to share the story of our departure with you too. After the gig, we made our way to the bus stop: after waiting for a while, a bus drove by and didn’t stop because it was full, so we waited for the next one. Another bus drove by and again, didn’t stop. This must have happened a couple of times and neither me, nor my boyfriend were checking the time (normally at least one of us always has their wits about them). As we finally realised the time, we had to move at the light speed if we were to catch the last train from Liverpool Street.

Annoyed that we hadn’t left earlier, we hurried to the nearest train station. When we were about to change to another tube station, Google Maps told us that the tube was still running, but guess what-when we got there everything was shut down already which meant that we were stranded at King’s Cross. We frantically tried to find a bus to take us to Liverpool Street, but to no avail as we wouldn’t have gotten to the station in time. It was past midnight, there was no other transport that could’ve gotten us home; further, I was out of money and on top of that, both of us were running out of battery on our phones.

After a couple of extraordinarily stressful hours, my boyfriend finally managed to withdraw enough money for a taxi (I don’t want to mention figures here because it was absurdly expensive, seeing as it was roughly a 2h drive back home). We then tackled the final hurdle and called a driver with 1% battery left. This meant that we had to convince him it wasn’t a prank call since we had to tell him that he wouldn’t be able to phone us if our battery died before he could get to us. Luckily he must have taken our word for it, and thanks to a decent description he managed to find us. As you can imagine, it felt like heaven finally walking through my doorstep. Lessons definitely learned:

Always check the exact bus and train times, and plan an alternative route
Always have emergency money on you (but hide it well because pickpockets take advantage of gigs and similar settings)
Always take a portable charger (if you have one, if not you can get decent one’s between £20 and £30-they are really handy) with you when traveling.

These things are common sense, but somehow I still found myself in that situation. I won’t be forgetting that night anytime soon, neither the departure nor the gig itself. To end on a positive note, I have to say, I’m truly grateful for every single experience because that’s how we grow after all.