McFly, Portsmouth Guildhall, Memory Lane tour - 14 May 2013

Fifth time is a charm for McFly, although every time I have seen them they have been amazing.

The band is celebrating its tenth anniversary this year, scary when you think about it as even though they have been doing other things the band has been touring pretty  much every year since they started.

The chemistry of the guys on stage is electric, you can almost imagine them playing in a spare room somewhere and having as much fun as they are performing in front of their fans. I also love with McFly that they haven't really, over the past few years, played big arenas but preferred to stay with the smaller venues which is great for fans.

I think this is probably the second greatest hits/memory lane tour I have been to but then you know the songs and you know what you are getting and can dance your heart out.

They are still my guilty pleasure and I do love them. I hope these boys are still going in another 10 years.

I was near the front for the first time which was great, and Harry threw his drumstick into the crowd which landed very close to me.

Great songs, great atmosphere and a fantastic band.

Set list: 
- Memory Lane
- That Girl
- Star Girl
- Transylvania
- 5 Colours in her hair
- Falling in Love
- Room on the Third Floor
- Obviously
- Corrupted
- Nowhere Left to Run
- Lies
- I'll be Ok
- Bubblewrap
- Smile
- It's Alright/ YMCA/ Don't Worry, Be Happy
- Shine a Light
- One for the Radio
- Memory Lane

Encore
- Love is Easy
- It's All About You
- The Heart Never Lies

The stage with Tom in the corner - 

Frankie Boyle, Portsmouth Guildhall, 15-04-2010

The controversial comedian Frankie Boyle played a second night at Portsmouth Guildhall last night. I have to admit I was a little apprehensive about this gig, due to the press a story in the press last week, highlighting how he had offended a mother who had a downs syndrome daughter. About three of his jokes are about downs syndrome; however, Boyle did make a good point in that the jokes about downs syndrome are probably the least offensive of his whole act!

No one and no thing is safe from the comedian’s dark humour, from religion to politics, Jade Goody to Christine Bleakley. There were a lot of his jokes when I wondered if it was right to laugh and some jokes were very close to the knuckle. But then you know what you are getting when you see Frankie Boyle, the things that used to be left in when he was on Mock the Week was shocking enough, so imagine him uncensored, if you didn’t like him then, you would hate him live.

He is probably one of the most un-PC comedians around, talking about Baby P and Jack Tweed’s recent rape case. Saying that he did make some valid points about Ashley Cole using an unregistered phone so he could send anonymous texts to women and then used said phone to take photos of his face! A true definition of a moron as Frankie put it himself.

I knew that he was probably one of those comedians who talks to the crowd, so I made sure all toilet breaks were taken before he came on. He tried to give career advice to some lad in the front row as well as trying to convince a social worker for young offenders to turn into a modern day Fagin.

One thing I found increasingly annoying wasn’t Boyle’s crude jokes but the people in the crowd taking photos. Particularly two girls in the second row who throughout seemed to be either filming, taking photos or texting, seemingly totally disinterested, why pay £20 to come to a show and then not pay attention! They did however, catch the attention of Boyle who asked the woman to turn her phone off and even threatened to chuck her out of the auditorium.

One mention has to go to Craig Campbell, the support act, a Canadian who has lived in this country for 10 years gave a brilliant and hilarious insight into England, he is visiting the south on tour, make sure you check him out.

Frankie Boyle was funnier than I was expecting but just as outrageous.