Kasabian in concert at Berlin's Columbiahalle on June 2.
Earlier this year, Daisy and I drove to Berlin to see two concerts during the same weekend at the same venue -- Columbiahalle -- of two of our favorite bands -- Maximo Park and Kasabian. We were pretty excited.
Maximo Park played on March 2 as part of a small festival of bands gathered to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Intro magazine. We couldn't find out when MP was scheduled to take the stage, so we got there around 8, just to make sure we didn't miss them. Only when we got inside did we discover that they weren't expected to take the stage until after midnight.
No matter how much we love those guys (we'd already seen them in Prague and Amsterdam), there was no way we were going to stick around for four or five hours, and the venue wouldn't let us back in once we left. So we ate the 50 euros or so we spent on the tickets and just went back to the hotel. Bummer.
But at least we had Kasabian on March 4.
Kasabian performs "L.S.F." at Columbiahalle on June 2.
When we arrived for the Kasabian concert, the sidewalk in front of the venue was noticeably absent of beer-drinking concertgoers. The lights had been turned off. Turns out the singer, Tom Meighan, had come down with laryngitis and the band had to cancel the gig.
Talk about bad luck. We'd come to Berlin for two concerts and had ended up missing both. (Reminded us of the time a few years back when we drove -- drove! -- to Amsterdam from Prague to see Lucinda Williams, only to find out, when we arrived at the Paradiso with tickets in hand, that the show had been canceled.)
Kasabian rescheduled the show for June 2, so back to Berlin we drove. It was a fantastic show. Kasabian routinely -- and deservedly -- win Best British Live Act or Best British Group at the Brit Awards each year. (We saw them perform at the Open Air Festival outside Prague in the summer of 2010. See my blog post about that weekend here.)
The band even bought everybody a beer to say they were sorry for the canceled gig. Upstanding gents.
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