Linkin Park

On the 29th January 2008, I travelled down to the O2 arena with my friend Hannah to go and this Linkin Park live. Our seats were right at the top of the arena, pretty much in the corner at the back. Biffy Clyro came on stage, didn't have much interest in them at that time. They were good, very good live. I only knew two of their songs at that point but still loved it. In the break between Biffy Clyro and Linkin Park, it got really cold up there and I was shaking like mad. I also needed to go to the toilet about 234567 times! I took this as a bad sign, thought I was ill or something. The lights went off, stage lights came on, the first beats of "No More Sorrow" started playing and that was when I knew. This was going to be the best night of my life. The curtain dropped, and there they were. 6 of them, Chester, Rob, Brad, David, Joe and Mike. I knew that the shaking and the coldness came from my excitment of seeing them. It probably sounds sad but it honestly happened. Me and Hannah couldn't sit in the seats the whole way through it, so we spoke to the girls next to us, and we were the first in our block to get up and rave. The whole time I kept looking at the standing area and seeing everyone so close up. That is where I wanted to be...

And that was where I was on the 10th November 2010. The "A Thousand Suns" tour. For nearly 3 years, I was constantly on their website, the O2 website, you name it, looking for when they might be touring next. And finally, sometime in June, I was looking through my emails, when I saw "Presale Linkin Park today" This was at 8pm. *OOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMGGGGGGGGGGGGG but daymm I'm too late* Went crazy at my friend Oli, saying I'm booking tickets right now and you're coming with me! Rang them up and they said the standing is fully booked but there are a few seats left right at the top of the arena *daym - I don't want it like last time.* I could either wait until the morning, risking that I don't get "normal" tickets or go for the crappy seated ones. I went for the crappy seated ones. YES I WAS GOING! Come 9am the next morning, I was on that website with my mums credit card ordering 2 standing tickets. Ticket number 83. GET IN. I WAS GOING TO BE STANDING IN THE ARENA! WOOOOO! Now I just had to get rid of my other 2 tickets. Dan and Huw brought them off me. Now all I had to do was wait until the day, and iron my LP jumper.

The day came. During the day was just the same as any other day. Didn't really think much about it, travelled up there pretty much straight from school with the other 3. Had a starbucks and me and Oli had to queue in a really cold dark area of the O2 for like 2 hours. I was getting really impatient. Got into the arena... walked STRAIGHT TO THE FRONT of the floor. Eventually the support band "Does It Offend You, Yeah?" came on, I actually quite liked them. They were very rock electronic which I liked and it felt like my insides were coming out. These two boys in front of us, must have been about 19/20ish, turned around whilst we were standing there and we were just chatting about gigs we had previously been too etc. They were realy nice ;)


After they had finished we had to wait for Linkin Park to come on, that felt like a million years. We were all debating what the first song would be - we voted the catalyst.

At 8.32 the lights went off, the music of "The Requiem" came on, and this was it! They ran onto the stage and I died inside, too shocked that I was only a few metres away. They broke into "Wretches and Kings" which was pretty amazing! And then "Lying From You" came on, and the crowd went completely and utterly mental. I didn't know it was possible but I must have travelled forward about 10 metres. It was crazy, people were going mental, so I just went with the flow and made myself at home. Me and Oli got parted straight away but I managed to stay with the 2 guys in front of us luckily enough. So we would just shout and scream and jump up and down together. And look at each other like :O when a song WE LOVED came on. This happened for "New Divide", "Faint", "Numb", "Breaking the Habit", "Crawling" and "One Step Closer". They went off stage and my face was :/ :/ :/ :/ :/ :/ !!!!!!!!!! Okay they'll come back on for an encore but they haven't even played the ULTIMATE TUNES! Back they came,
20. "Fallout"
21. "The Catalyst"
22. "Leave Out All The Rest"
23. "In the End"(contains elements of "Pushing Me Away")
24. "What I've Done"
25. "Bleed It Out"(contains excerpts from "A Place For My Head")
Talk about a long encore! IT WAS INCREDIBLE!!!!!!!!!!
Then they officially went offstage and the lights came on. I relocated Oli and we followed the 2 guys out of the arena chatting to them as we went... and the night came to an end.

It was honestly hands on my heart the best night of my whole life. It is now 20:45 on a Saturday night and it hasn't for one minute exited my mind. I've had their songs on repeat and just haven't stopped loving them. Now I just await for the day that they next come on tour, because I'd never miss them for the World. Just my all time favourite. LOVE IT.