Matchbox Twenty, Wembley Arena, 1 May 2008

I am proud to report that Matchbox Twenty remain as cheesy as ever and God bless 'em because someone needs to!

Loyal readers of my blog* will know that I have seen MB20 on 2 other occasions (read here). Personally 2 was quite enough for me but Matt, having discovered them by default after inheriting Hank's cheesy music collection, discovered "Push" and had this need to see them, so we hatched a plan to turn up late at Wembley to find two cheap tout tickets, the rationale behind it being that MB20 aren't that huge in Europe and if a tout hasn't sold his tickets 20 minutes into the concert then we'll have the upper hand! Supply outweighing demand and all that.

Upon arrival there was a momentary panic when the streets were empty and we could not spot any touts. Bollocks. We finally found two and lo and behold, they had two standing tickets left and actually wanted to sell them to us for a profit. Piss right off. Eventually we got them down to £15/ticket (face value was around £30/ticket). We could have gotten them down to £10/ticket but it was pissing it down and I wasn't in the mood to haggle anymore.

In the arena, I was quite shocked to find that it was PACKED! Fekkin' hell when did they become big in Europe? The last time they played Wembley Arena the place was half empty (or half full, if you're the optimistic type).

Rob Thomas of course could not shut his gob. I can't believe that in my teenage years I used to love his little monologues before each song; this time round I was like "Shut the fuck up and just sing!". They played a few stuff from the new album but I couldn't tell you what they were. And it doesn't matter because it was the old stuff that got the crowd going. And in the same vein of never forgetting how to ride a bike, I instinctively knew all the words to all those songs... I'm not sure if I should be proud or embarrassed... 3AM, Long Day, Bent, Unwell, If You're Gone, Bright Lights, Back 2 Good (dear God I had forgotten how much I lurrrvvvved this song)... they did not play Mad Season or Soul, what's up with that? Anyway, as I stated in the beginning, MB20 are the Cheesemeisters! You just know Rob Thomas has never had to suffer anything more than a bad hangover, a broken heart and maybe a bad doobie comedown - it's all there in his pop rock, heart tugging lyrics. And that's ok, because we don't want all our rock stars to OD and go through rehab do we? They performed well but one thing I do notice about MB20 (and having now seen them 3 times I think I am right on this), their songs live do not deviate at all from the album versions; each song sounded exactly the same as it does on the album. C'mon guys, add a new riff or a new verse or something; for fucks sake Rob you talk so much normally just ad lib a chorus or whatever! Bottom line, MB20 does what it says on the tin. But God bless them, the night brought back some nostalgic moments from me, I had no choice but to reminisce about all those times a cheesy Rob lyric got me through some shitty break up. "There's always something tearing you apart".

Oh and guess what song they closed with? Go on, you'll never guess! Click here if the suspense is killing you!

*In danger of becoming extinct