Paperjam

The Enemy Within... The Ricoh Arena

Gigs // Malc // 14th April 2008

Waking up early on Sunday morning to find about 6 inches of snow outside was very much unexpected and a real concern in view of the fact we were due to see ‘The Enemy’ play at the Ricoh Arena that night.

Luckily most of the snow had melted by the evening, but the night was still bluddy cold and wet. We really weren’t looking forward to standing in the freezing cold for a few hours. Putting ourselves through that on a Saturday afternoon to see yet another defeat courtesy of CCFC was harsh enough. Thankfully we were suitably pleased on arrival to find out the gig was actually indoors in the Jaguar Arena to the side of the ground. Phew! Well done to CCFC on another well advertised event, as we could find fook all information about it on the net. I also previously phoned up to find out about parking arrangements and spoke to three different departments and pond life, including the reception who knew nothing about the parking arrangements. How can you not know about the event parking!

Anyway onto to the gig, we got there about 8ish so missed some of the earlier acts. I did hear rumours that one of them was Neville Staple from The Specials, who I wouldn’t have minded seeing if I knew he was on. The arena was bigger than I thought and the crowd was probably near on 10,000 strong. We proceeded to the bar to buy our overpriced and warm bottle of Carling (just like on match day, well organised CCFC yet again!) The only support act we caught was a band called ‘Boy Kill Boy’. I had heard of them, but not heard any of their music. They were a fairly standard manufactured type band for the masses, including their look. I wasn’t mad keen to be fair, one of their songs sounded very much like an Editors track and the last one they did sounded very much like a Hard-Fi number. Just another rock/indie type band in my opinion.

Then after a quick stage change a guy came out to introduce someone I really did not expect -Mani from Primal Scream on the decks! His mixing was pretty non-existent, but his choice of choons was brilliant, getting people into the groove with old classics like Young MC – Know how. Then building up to rockier numbers like Prodigy – Breathe and Sex Pistols – Anarchy In The UK. Then something hilarious happened. A guy was on top of his mate’s shoulders in the middle of the arena jigging around, a few obligatory pints were being thrown at him. Then he did something incredibly stupid by turning round and goading the crowd for more. To which point he was greeted with a barrage of flying pints and bottles until he decided it was a good time to step down, or fall down more to the point! He was either very pissed or a nutter. The bottles and pints then continued to fly around for about 20 minutes and was hilarious to watch, considering we were no where near it. I don’t think I'd have found it so amusing if I was in the middle of it though. Mani then decided to calm things down and finished off his set with some classic Verve – Bitter Sweet Symphony, to which the whole place started singing along to it.

Then it was time for the main event, the lights went down and the boys walked out to a rapturous applause. The stage looked rather empty though due to the set up, with Tom and Andy almost next to each side of the rig and Liam the drummer too far back really. Nice touch with the Cov City flag though lads!

They commenced the set with a fabulous version of ‘It’s not ok’ to get everyone rocking. Then proceeded to work there way through the set of tracks from the album. They were very tight as a band and had improved a lot since I last saw them at their homecoming gig at The Coliseum in Coventry in summer 2007. I must admit I don’t recall hearing one mistake from them, they definitely have the makings of being a very successful band of the future. Not only with their support from the Coventry masses, but with youth on their side and what seems a very good promotion/management team behind them, they’re getting a lot of good coverage on TV and Radio. For me their best crowd rocking tracks of the night were Had Enough, Aggro, Away From Here and Live And Die In These Towns. Before they chilled things out with Happy Birthday Jane, which was equally as good.

Finally to show theer diversity or maybe lack of songs (which was something Tom joked about before introducing the last track by the way!) they did a very credible cover of the Sex Pistols – God save the queen. This whipped the crowd into a frenzy again in time for the last one of the night ‘You’re not alone’ which finished off a very uplifting set and yet again showed that they truly are the best thing to come out of Coventry since The Specials…

Full set list: It’s not ok, 40 days, Pressure, Technodanceaphobic, Had enough, Fear killed the youth of our nation, Aggro, Live and die in these towns, This song, Away from here, Sing when in love, Happy birthday Jane, God save the queen and You’re not alone.