We'll drink and drink at these gigs

Courtesy of Tara and her place of work, we were lucky enough to get VIP tickets to see The Enemy perform at the Ricoh Arena last Saturday. I must admit I'm not a fan, having only heard a few of their songs on the radio, but we had no other plans for the evening and an evening of corporate hospitality sounded entertaining enough.

There was a little confusion when we turned up whether we were actually allowed in the VIP section or not, but shortly afterwards the organiser turned up - and armed with our "Corporate Hospitality Guest" lanyards we found ourselves entering the hallowed sanctum of ridiculously excessive corporate budgets..

The hospitality was taking place in a very nice area of the Ricoh called The Jaguar Rooms. A bottle of Red and chilled white already sitting on the table, complete with a buffet and a free bar all evening. After a few hours of chatting with Tara and her work friends, having doors opened for us and basically being treated like, well, VIPs all evening, I'd almost forgotten there was a band playing. We briefly checked out on the two support bands (going in via the exclusive VIP area and not queueing up, obviously) but the free drinks in the Jaguar Rooms (and the mystery of why Jon Gaunt was in the VIP rooms) were way more appealing.

I am usually uncomfortable with being waited on. It often makes me feel guilty when people do things for me that I'm perfectly capable of doing for myself, and I felt like a fraud. I half expected security to come wandering in at any second, point at me yelling "He's the one!" and dragging me out of the room by my lanyard and depositing me with all of the other concert-goers - I'm ashamed to say though after a few hours of this I realised I could become quite accustomed to nights like this..!

And The Enemy themselves? They sounded like a Sixth form Jam tribute act put together for a second rate Battle of the Bands competition. Either the accoustics in the venue were terrible or the Lead singer genuinely does mumble like he has a mouthful of cotton wool -

"Mmmfff bmmmmf mmmmf Coventry!"
*cue huge cheers*
"Mmmff bmmmf good to be back mmmmf mmmmf bmmmmf Ricoh!"
*More huge cheers*
"Mmmmmf bmmmf mmmmmf we wish we were The Jam! mmmmf bmmmmmf"

Actually, I may have made that last line up.

Credit to them, it must have been great playing for a home crowd like that, but I still prefer The Specials.