Saturday, February 25, 2006

Babyshambles Leeds

Off to Leeds to meet up with the wonderful Babyshambles. I drove up with Tahirah from AllSaints Clothing Stores. We go to Leeds late afternoon and headed straight to the Radisson Hotel in Leeds city centre. We checked in and then, drove round to the University to find the tour bus with the band on board. So, obvioulsy we went to the wrong part of the university first. There was a band doing a sound check and a big old tour bus outside. Funnily enough, I didnt recognise the tour bus. Anyway Tahirah and I went inside, only to find that this wasn't the Babyshambles gig. They were playing at another part of the University. So, off we went. We soon stumbled upon the venue and tourbus. Luckily we found this part of the University easily as Tahirah had once gone to Leeds University. When we went inside and met up with Adam Ficek. He was setting up his own drums. I still find this kind of od. He should really have a road crew member doing this. After he was sorted we had a chat and he told me that Peter was having a sleep on the tour bus. I asked him if he wanted to wake him up and then we could head over to the AllSaints Clothing store in Leeds City Centre. A min later Johnny Headlock, as he is affectionatly known, came over to me and said Peter is now awake and wants to come with us to the store. So, I pulled my car up to the side of the tourbus and out came Peter, Adam and Johnny. They jumped in to the back and off we all sped.
Copyright 2006 Danny Clifford.
All rights reserved
We headed straight round to the store, where the staff had been briefed and were waiting after hours to keep the store open for us. So, we arrived and in we went. Peter immediatly started trying on clothes and I started to photograph the whole event.
It was quite funny watching Peter and Adam trying on clothes in the middle of the store. Suddenly Peter dropped his trousers and found a new pair to put on. I photographed all of this.
Copyright 2006 Danny Clifford.
All rights reserved
Anyway, after quite a session, Tahirah and staff sorted out all of the clothes that they wanted and checked them out. Somewhere in the middle of this Peter managed to borrow £5 from me. He said he needed to go and buy some pipe cleaner. That's funny, I didnt know he smoked a pipe. How unobservant of me. We left the store and headed back to the tour bus. On the way back to the bus, Peter was fidling around with some silver foil in the back of my car. Dnt know what he was up to, but it smelt like he was burning pastic as well. I couldnt see what he was doing ads I was driving. I dont think it was anything sinister !! So, we got out of the car and headed into the venue and up into the dressing room. There were loads of hangers on as usual. The dressing room had no band members in it though. Evenetually, the band came in, one by one. Then stage time and off they went. I started to shoot the show from the photo pit. This is always a slightly risky thing as there is usually a load of drinks and people thrown into the photo pit duringa Babyshambles gig. As usual, it was a great gig. Yes, I got soaked as well... We headed back up to the dressing room. There were so many people in there. The whole band were there as well. Mind you, Patrick who has recently rejoined the band left very quickly and headed back into the tour bus. One of the people in the dressing room was Pete Doherty, in fact there were two. One of them was a fan. After a load of nonsense, we left and Tahirah, Adam and his brother Darren & I headed back to the Radisson hotel. We ended up meeting loads of others from the Babyshambles team in the bar. They heard that Tahirah and I were staying there and that seemed like a better bet than the tour bus. So, we sat in the bar until dawn and then I headed off to get some sleep.