A Rare Intimacy

As I mentioned a few days ago, we've got tickets to see Sheryl Crow at the Scala in London, a small, very intimate venue near Kings Cross.

I'm particularly pleased about this because I've wanted to see her live for years but I have an intense dislike of seeing bands and artists in the various aircraft hangers and enormodomes that the most popular artists are compelled to play these days in order to maximise their revenues, and to accomodate the sheer numbers of fans that are clamouring to see them.

It wasn't always this way, though, a fact I was reminded of when I was doing some research for my book on the rock scene in the late 80s / early 90s.

Back then, rather than play a single date at Wembley Stadium, bands like Iron Maiden or Def Leppard would instead book themselves in for multiple nights in the more intimate venues in the capital. For example, on their 1985 World Slavery Tour (so called because of their Powerslave album, as opposed to any apology-inducing references to our bad old English ways) they performed for six consecutive nights at the old Hammersmith Odeon, now called the Labatt's Apollo, not nearly as appealing a name, but that's corporate sponsorship for you.

Similarly Def Leppard played there for three nights on the first leg of their mammoth Hysteria tour, although by the time they returned the following year they were big enough to play multiple nights at Wembley Arena and Birmingham's NEC, but that first time around it was a fantastic opportunity for their fans to see them up close and personal, as it were.

Now, though, and I'm aware that I'm sounding like a curmudgeonly old moaner, it seems that the minute one of my favourite bands gets a sniff of success that they're booked in at some place where unless I'm queuing outside the venue at noon on the day of the performance then there's a good chance that I'll be in a different post code to the stage by the time I've grabbed a beer and made my way to my seat.

C'est la vie, I guess, and with the way the record industry is going more importance is going to be placed on live performance, and the corresponding revenue of course, so I'll just accept that unless I catch a band on the upswing, then I'll be herding myself into the country's cattle sheds to see them, and take comfort in the fact that every now and again someone will 'do a Sheryl' and play somewhere like the Scala.