Kerrang! 1k Review of Forum show

[Jason_scorching_past]

I think he said they didn't soundcheck cos they didn't want to jinx it.

[Arabiandisco]

see, the sound was so "good" I couldn't work out what he was saying...

Or perhaps it was the unintelligible geordie accent?

Not that any of that is of the slightest importance now.

[Mick G]

People are of course forgetting that the man is a self-confessed manic-depressive,

not that it's an excuse,

but it should be taken into consideration before delivering your damning verdict.

At least he's honest, sometimes painfully, brutally so,

but surely that's better than some huge band you'll likely never meet or look in the eye saying how much they love everyone in attendance, so the crowd can respond on cue, just like every other city in the world.

Ginger is a complicated man, and his own worst enemy. I'm glad he polarises opinion.
That's rock n roll people.

[sonicshake]

People are of course forgetting that the man is a self-confessed manic-depressive,

not that it's an excuse,

but it should be taken into consideration before delivering your damning verdict.

At least he's honest, sometimes painfully, brutally so,

but surely that's better than some huge band you'll likely never meet or look in the eye saying how much they love everyone in attendance, so the crowd can respond on cue, just like every other city in the world.

Ginger is a complicated man, and his own worst enemy. I'm glad he polarises opinion.
That's rock n roll people.

Agreed.

[kgriff]

was there, been to worse!!
time to move on i think.
they will play better gigs in the future, lets just hope we are all there to see it!!

[Ritch]

I followed the wholetour (with the exception of Oxford & HRH2 and I have to say I think the London show got the brunt of what had been building up since the Manchester show. Ginger was having some real problems with his throat and was suffering quite badly from what could be heard but he still sung on and played on - I think generally it was a damned if you do and damned if you don't situation, London was not the best show on the tour but given said throat issues I think it was a blinder - any band that can give over 50% when ill are amazing, and I would say London got an 80% show - as when they were playing and at speed they were still fucking great and when they slipped, well..... it just made the on form bits lsound even better

From the tour though I would have to say Glasgow for crowd feeling and Manchester for overall show atmosphere were the winners, Wolves was surprising and didnt seem to kick in like it always seems to, But all i would say is anyone that was at the london show - look at the wider picture of events before damming the man - would you have preferred he had cancelled the show due to ill health? I feel that would have recieved the smaelevel of grief and criticism that playing off form attracted....

[markE]

while i appreciate those comments ritch, it doesn't help the fan who is in the crowd, bursting wuth excitemnet to see their favourite band and they don't deliver the goods in the way that you know they can. expecially when you read about other gigs on the tour where ginger is described as "never being happier" and telling loads of jokes etc. after great warmups from tragedy and A i was expecting gig of the year. it didn't happen and i was gutted.

[Ritch]

But would you have been happy had the show been cancelled instead? I am not saying for one moment that some fans may have been disappointed but on the parts of the set in London when they did get up to speed they were pretty damned good, and you did get to see Ginger & CJ with Tragedy which had not happened elsewhere on the tour..... don't get me wrong I accept you cannot please all the people all the time, and one thing you, I and everybody else has to accept as wildhearts / ginger fan is that it is one hell of a rollercoaster and sometime you get the slightly un nerving rises up but you can be pretty much guaranteed there will be at some point a breathtaking amazing hurtle down the other side, I for one minute would not wanted to have been a wildhearts member before the show, as I would put money on they were debating if it should go ahead or not.

the one thing you can take for granted with the wildhearts is the fact that there is nothing you can take for granted!

Its a shame you didnt enjoy the show but theres always the next tour

[maz]

Unbelievable stuff. - 1 out of 5 is so inaccurate.
I thought the gig was good, however it all went wrong for me. I was soooooo up for it beforehand and then it all went wrong. I caught a bug a couple of days before, anyway, I realised something was wrong when I met up with my mates beforehand and turned down a drink. Anyway I realised I was ill when the show started, having said that I thought it was a fantastic start to a gig (nita nitro.) I had entered the arena before just when "A" had started and thought they were decent. I was already familiar with them, and it was my job to get my mates (who weren't familiar) interested in them. Fair play to "A", but back to the wildhearts, fantastic start, brilliant sound, you could hear battersby's snare clear as f*ck, the sound was very loud, far better than the earth vs wildhearts gig at shephards bush which was from a personal level poor (in terms of sound.) However at the forum I was struggling, every 15 minutes I was in the toilet puking, I had a really bad bug. My mates meanwhile enjoyed the gig, at about the 5th attempt of puking my guts out, i heard the commotion with regards to ginger after just in lust, By then i couldn't care less. i felt so ill that I left 3 songs from the end (Missing "Getting it" which I love) The journey home back to surrey consisted of me trying to hold my guts in and my arse. It was coming out both way. 4 Days later I recovered. So what's my point. Unbelievably, if I was fit I would have thought the Forum gig was far better than the earth vs wildhearts gig in terms of sound quality, but obviously my personal battles tarnished the night. 1 out of 5 is a terrible review, maybe a 3.5 or a 4 is more suitable. The Wildhearts are a quality band, an unbelievable band!!! However please play more "endless nameless" material!!

[Damian]

This has been done to death now but I haven't really given my view so I'll do it just the once. I (like many on here) have been to loads of Wildhearts gigs and no - this wasn't one of the best. I was ill too but nowhere near as bad as the person above.

But instead of some of the drama of old, Ginger had the decency to apologise. which I thought was big of him, and even ended up extending the set by a few songs. It wasn't a 1K show, nor was it a 5K (which last year's Astoria gig certainly was). I don't want to come across as a sycophant - they should have soundchecked - but I still enjoyed myself and there's nothing that happened on the night that will stop me returning for the next tour.