Tales from a Ticket Stub - Give it a Name 2005

I’ve been ridiculously bad at keeping to my resolution since I last posted. I pretty much succumbed to the evils of alcohol on Wednesday through to Sunday and did fuck all that could be considered constructive. I was determined to get back on track this week though and spent last night wiping the sin from my flat and drew a new ticket from my bag to write this week’s Tales from a Ticket Stub – Give It a Name 2005.

If I remember rightly this was my fifth ‘proper’ gig, and my first all-dayer, so it had the potential to go very, very wrong given my penchant for drinking for more than I could handle. Luckily this was kept in check firstly by my good friend Steph, who quite frankly would rarely put up with me being a state, and secondly by excruciatingly long queues for the bar.

It was a sunny Bank Holiday Monday and Alexandra Palace was the venue. As we queued up I was in utter awe of the place, it really is a fantastic venue – absolutely beautiful. Equally awe-inspiring was the line-up. If I had to pick the best line-up of any gig or festival that I’ve ever been to it would be this one. There were more great bands packed into one day than most three day festivals, and all for the ridiculously low price of £25. I honestly have no idea how they managed it – especially at such a grand venue. Anyway, the line-up:

Funeral for a Friend

Finch

Coheed and Cambria

Rise Against

Alexisonfire

Mae

The Lucky Nine

Fightstar

MC Lars

mewithoutyou

Keep in mind that this was when most of these bands were just putting out albums and EPs that were nothing less than incredible – Casually Dressed and Deep in Conversation, What it is to Burn, In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth, Song of the Counter Culture, Alexisonfire, They Liked You Better When You Were Dead and Watch Out! Each of those was probably in my top twenty records at that point, and some of them still are. More exciting at the time was the fact that most of the bands playing were recording new albums so there was a chance to hear some new tracks from my favourite bands – this was obviously back before digital distribution was a thing so you couldn’t just hop onto your dial-up and check out new live tracks or leaked songs.

First band of the day were mewithoutyou who didn’t really seem to fit so well on the line-up and performed to quite a small crowd whilst most people were queuing for drinks or checking out merch. I was blown away by how great they were live. I wasn’t sure if their spoken-word vocals would translate well to a live show but the vocalist was so energetic – he just seemed to radiate positivity.  The highlight of the set was The Cure for Pain is in the Pain and after they left me and Steph went off to look around the merch stand. If I remember rightly I bought a mewithoutyou t-shirt, as well as a Fightstar t-shirt, and Steph picked up a Finch hoody. Fascinating insight there.

I didn’t pay a whole lot of attention to MC Lars but when Fightstar took to the stage everybody’s attention was focused on them. They’d only released an EP at this point and people were still hung up on the Busted connection which meant they didn’t always receive a warm welcome. They blasted through thirty minutes of blistering post-hardcore though, including a great cover of Nine Inch Nails’ Hurt, and won the majority of the crowd over – although there was still a fair bit of booing. Next up were Mae, who I have absolutely no recollection of at all. So yeah, moving swiftly on.

One thing I’ve loved about writing these, yes all two of them, is that I remember to listen to music I haven’t heard in years - The Lucky Nine definitely fall into this category. A kind of British alternative super-group featuring members of A, Hundred Reasons, Cable and earthtone9 they only recorded one album before they turned their attentions back to other projects. They weren’t bad, but to be honest they were quite bland. However it was always nice to see Colin Doran bounce around the stage.

The first of the bigger name bands were up next – Alexisonfire. They performed an intense set that got the crowd really moving for the first time of the day. Unfortunately this my cue to head to the bar as nearly everybody that was lining up for a drink ran to watch their set. Rise Against were up next and Dallas Green took to the stage with them to help out with vocal duties. It was one of those unique performances that only the people in attendance got to see, and would never be repeated. The only thing that detracted from a great set jam-packed with sing-alongs was the customary breaks between songs so that the band could be ‘punx’ and lecture the crowd about politics. I fucking hate it when bands do this, always have and always will.

Coheed and Cambria were always one of those bands that seemed to split the scene in half – afros, guitar solos and high-pitched crooning not fitting in alongside the sea of fringes, skinny jeans and copy-and-paste song structures. I never did work out the big sci-fi story behind the music but it really didn’t matter because they put on one hell of a show. Finch were up next and were quite frankly lacklustre. They played a lot of new material which was a complete departure from what I was used to. I remember being pretty disappointed with them at the time and they disbanded pretty shortly afterwards.

The headliners for the day were Funeral for a Friend and they were absolutely immense. They played hit after hit from Casually Dressed and Deep in Conversation and a few tracks from Four Ways to Scream Your Name. They debuted one new track which was the incredibly catchy Streetcar, which despite being a much softer song vocally was one that was made for singing at the top of your lungs. FFAF have always been a spectacular band live, always tight and energetic and this night was no different. At this point it seemed like they were ready to take over the world but they never reached that next step like Biffy Clyro or LostProphets did – hitting the mainstream hard.

As far as the music went it was an amazing day – all those great bands for just £25. However the execution of the first iteration of Give it a Name left a lot to be desired. There were only three bars open at a sold out Alexandra Palace, which meant that many people went thirsty. There was a dearth of food made available in the venue and there were no re-entries, so a lot of people went hungry too. It didn’t ruin a great day out though and if they announced this exact line-up playing tomorrow I’d go again!