Sometimes we all do something a little mad, something where the thought process just seems to be circumvented and replaced with ‘What could possibly go wrong’. That day in September 2015 was one such day where in a moment of utter madness and complete frustration at not being able to get decent UK tour tickets we had instead just bought tickets to see Muse play at the O2 arena in Prague.
Since that fateful day I had had strong feelings that this show was either going to be something else or completely fucking disastrous… That none of us could speak an atom of Czech, that we had totally failed to book the flights or accommodation when they were really cheap and had instead left it to the last minute and got totally fleeced seemed a precursor to the latter rather than the former…. That we then had the flight from hell due to some of the worst people ever to call themselves nurses, that the flight was also delayed and potentially screwed up all of our onward travel plans in a strange city late at night, only seemed to back up this fact further. Thankfully from the moment we arrived in Prague fast approaching midnight things improved massively, the nurses had by this point pissed off to play with the baggage carousels which improved things no end; it also seemed that our transport link was intact as the driver was waiting for us when we landed. In addition our contact for the accomodation was amazingly helpful and was waiting for us as we pulled up, to ice the cake the apartment we had rented was much much better than expected and we could not have asked for more.
We had one day to explore Prague, a Saturday with the gig in the evening and then a ridiculously early flight out the following morning. The day was blisteringly hot, what seemed like a good idea at first, a tour of the city inside effectively a plastic box, was uncomfortable but could not detract from the beauty of the city; the sights of Prague had captured 6/8ths of my family hearts (that is to say 6 out of 8 of us not just a portion of all 8 of us!). I remember feeling very foreign as we made our way to the venue, Europe in general was on high alert after the earlier Bataclan and Brussels incidents and so it was no surprise to see so many armed police around the city and at the venue itself. The inner entrance to the venue was very utilitarian, heavily manned and with strict security that you rarely see in the UK. We then made our way for refreshments and were promptly not allowed into the auditorium due to the strict no drinks policy, it was gonna be a dry night without a drink for sure….. Once in the auditorium though I have to say that I was pretty amazed by the venue itself and I felt sure that we were in for a great night….
What actually followed was, by a long stretch, the best concert I have ever been to to date; yes Paris 2013 was special and for very different reasons was the gig of a lifetime, a perfect storm in fact. The show that I saw on that balmy summer evening was though very different to what we all saw in Prague; what we saw in Prague was unquestionably the best live band on the planet right at the very top of their game with an amazingly well put together visual and musical set to a fully engaged audience. The result was the gig of a lifetime… I love that most of our girls got to see this particular gig and that as a family we were all so lucky to be in the right place at the right time for a true one off, best of breed show. The most remarkable thing though is that Muse were able to do this despite the long and gruelling tour that they were nearing the end of.
The trouble is when you have a gig this awesome, and it was off the scale awesome in case I have not mentioned it, committing to a highlight is incredibly hard. The Globalist, and Reapers were of course as always stand out for me, No Map of the Problematique or Resistance to be nominated automatically and so for me the one song I remember above all (with the exception of Mercy) was Uprising, not normally a favourite but on this night, in this city, with these people and this fabulous tribe I find myself in it was perfect. It was my response to this song that gave rise to the blog title ‘I Fucking Love Prague’.
And the reason that Mercy was so stand out…. Well, just judge for yourself though the video has nothing on actually being there.
Less than 8 hours after this video was taken we were on board a flight back to the UK having slept a little in between, thankfully we were not sharing a flight with our nurse friends and through the extreme tiredness I think that we all knew that Prague had stolen a little bit of our hearts. We will all, I am sure, return to Prague another day though I doubt that it will be to see a better concert.
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