I caught the 3.55pm train from Wokingham to London Waterloo, destined to arrive at 5pm, figuring that an hour would be plenty of time in which to find the venue before opening time.
I was wrong. The train journey went perfectly ok (with the added bonus of there being a couple of attractive beings of female description, sat adjacent to myself, whom i ogled for much of the journey); but, the walk to the venue went awry. I took numerous wrong turnings, or, to phrase it more accurately, the roads in London are insufficiently marked. Having failed to find the Waterloo Road bridge over the Thames, i looked instead for the Hungerford Bridge, which i found, only to discover that it was closed. Eventually i took the Westminster Bridge which was considerably off course from my planned route. After begrudgingly admiring the architecture of Westminster Hall, i made the only mistake that was my own fault: looking at the section of the map that i should have been on, as opposed to the section of the map that i actually was on, i was, naturally, unable to find the roads i was looking for. As a result i continued walking down the road i was on until, finally, i realised my mistake and had to backtrack for a considerable distance. Eventually i found the turning into Whitehall, but the palaver didn't end there: when i got to the end of Whitehall i failed, due to the signposting (or lack thereof), to take the correct turning onto Charing Cross Road. Many wasted minutes were spent walking round in circles and taking wrong turnings before i finally found Charing Cross; once there, thankfully, it was an easy matter of walking straight down the road until i reached the Astoria venues.
But even once i finally reached the venues there was room for yet further confusion. I saw the main venue, the Astoria, perfectly well, but i was confused by the advertising board: 'Tonight - Southside Johnny' it read. 'That can't be right' i thought to myself. I looked down the lists of other acts advertised and saw Saxon; so, after some debate, i concluded that it must be the correct entrance - i assumed that it must be the entrance to more than one venue. I was mistaken: it soon came to my attention that none of the other people entering the venue really looked like Saxon fans. After hovering around at the entrance wondering what to do for a little while, i heard a couple of people nearby debating whether they were at the correct venue for Saxon - they decided they weren't and that Saxon was just down the road. I swiftly made away from the entrance, embarrassed that i'd probably been mistaken for a Southside Johnny fan for the last five minutes, and followed them down the road - they were correct and at last i got inside the Mean Fiddler at 6.30pm.
Even inside the Mean Fiddler itself i managed to become confused: i walked back and forth between the bars on either side a few times before finally realising that the stage was downstairs! Having arrived half an hour after opening time, i was unable to get a place in the front row; instead i had to be content with a place in the second row off to the right.
And so, at long last, it was time for the evening's entertainment to get underway:
I must say that i feared the worst when i saw the singer from Area 54's dyed-red hair; but happily my doubts proved to be unfounded. They were a predominantly traditional metal-inspired band, their lead guitarist was very impressive and they had a pretty girl-bassist to boot! Their songs aren't as memorable as Saxon's, but they made a highly favourable first-time impression upon me nonetheless.
Then, after the customary interval, it was time for the mighty Saxon to hit the stage:
They opened with the opening and title track from Killing Ground (a very good album by the way); after that they roused the audience into a frenzy by playing one of their greatest and most celebrated classics - (747) Strangers In The Night. Acknowledging the ecstatic crowd reaction that greeted Strangers... Biff promised that, if we maintained the same level of enthusiasm throughtout, they'd play a couple of extra songs at the end. The performance continued, maintaining a good balance between classics and more recent songs, and included Backs To The Wall from the first album that was as impressive as it was welcome - i love the early Saxon sound. It seemed far too early when the band left the stage, but everybody knew that they were coming back for one or more encore(s). Princess Of The Night and Wheels Of Steel made their presence felt in the first encore, and, in the anticipated second encore, And The Bands Played On and Crusader followed suit. When they left the stage a third time, it was more touch and go whether they'd return; but after a certain amount of time had passed without the road crew coming on to dismantle the equipment, it became clear that we were in store for more classic heavy metal. When they returned, Biff announced that they were going to play one more song: the bloke behind me started yelling, as he had been all night, for Motorcycle Man; but i knew what was coming next - my favourite Saxon song, Denim And Leather. I can't sing to save my life, but i'm proud to say that, during the chorus of "DENIM AND LEATHER" and the chants of "SAXON, SAXON" which followed, my shout was the loudest in the entire audience. The band then made to leave the stage for the fourth and final time, but - at the very last moment, presumably having had a swift onstage discussion - they turned back and returned to the front of the stage: "We're gonna do one more" announced Biff. "This one's called... Motorcycle Man!" The bloke behind me was overjoyed, needless to say, and the rest of the audience were somewhat chuffed as well - awesome stuff!
