There’s a certain amount of nostalgia attached to any walk down the quays for a concert at The 02. Undeniably an improvement on its previous incarnation as The Point Depot, you still find yourself with a hankering after a few merch stalls, a concrete floor and a balcony that really made you feel like you were taking your life in your hands.
The fact is, we’ll always feel sorry for those young pups who never got to experience a concert at The Point Depot. In the same way they don’t remember the pound coin, they’re blissfully unaware of the amount of time you could spend queueing for the ladies loos while listening to the last few muffled bars of your favourite song creeping through from the main arena and awkwardly crossing your legs. Instead, they’re mollycoddled with multi-storey parking, drinks holders on the seats and a LUAS straight to the door.
In essence, you might wonder what more bang you could get for your concert ticket buck than you already do these days.
Enter Mr Carlsberg and his VIP Club.
The nice people at Carlsberg invited us down to see Snow Patrol last weekend and check out their wares. With a swish guest list sign-in at the Premium Club entrance to make you feel like you’re proper special, some complimentary drinks before and after the gig, a cloakroom (think it might have been a euro or two for that…) and an after party with DJ, not to mention the general handiness of having somewhere to sit down with your mates pre-gig, order some food (we went for the nachos) and settle in after your trek down to the Docklands, it’s well worth signing up for.
If you’re already heading to a gig at the o2, it’s worth your while heading over to their Facebook page, checking to see if Carlsberg are running their VIP club on the night, and applying to upgrade. It’s first come first served and at last check there were still some places available for their next two nights - Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds (supported by Culch favourites Cashier No 9) and Florence and her Machine.
On the night we were there, they did a post-gig raffle and someone picked up a pair of tickets to Florence. The winning ticket was 204. Imagine how flipping devastated we were…
That aside though, we highly recommend picking up something for nothing and enjoying the comfy couches and surrounds of The Premium Club. Of course, it won’t save you from the likes of this…
Those dotted lights in the crowd represent the modern-day scourge that is people recording gigs on their shit phones and paying zero attention to what’s going on. That aside, we had a fairly deadly night of Gary Lightbody saying ‘bless your hearts’ rather a lot and discovering we know roughly 100% of the lyrics to ‘Chasing Cars’. They didn’t play ‘Spitting Games’, but we did get to sit in front of a girl who screamed ‘Gary I love you’ after each song and uberfan zeal will always do wonders to whip you up into the spirit of an event. Thanks, random girl.
