The Rolling Stones at Twickenham: It was only rock 'n roll, but we liked it

"You were not born in a crossfire hurricane," I said to Simon, despite his protests to the contrary. "You were born in West-Mid hospital."

And so began the Sparky family outing to see The Rolling Stones play the first gig of their UK A Bigger Bang tour at Twickenham Stadium.

Sparky Ma has wanted to see the Stones for years - since the sixties, in fact. Yes, she might have met ALL FOUR BEATLES (!) when they were FILMING 'HELP!' DOWN HER ROAD (!), but at heart she is a Stones lady. And so I clicked my fingers and made it happen - eeeeey... (Actually, I ordered four tickets off ticketmaster, but the result is the same).

Anyway, we got to the stadium, got to our seats, and laughed at all the people in the really expensive seats on the pitch when it started raining; aaaah, the joys of being undercover in the north stand.


Feeder were supporting, and I do like Feeder. Feeder! FEEDER! FEEEEEEEEEDER!! As they started playing their first track, Simon lent over and asked me why they were singing about Heathrow airport. WTF!? Heathrow airport!?!? "Yes," he said. "He's singing 'terminal four."

"You dumb joey," I replied. "He's singing 'Tumble and Fall!'"

So Feeder were great, culminating in a rousing singalong of 'Just a Day,' complete with all the prerequiste "DO-DO-DO-DOOOOs."

And then - 40-odd minutes later, in an explosion of lights and, er, explosions, the Stones hit the stage.


And, by God, they've still got it! Mick still moves around the stage like a five-year old on ketamine, Keef still looks like he hasn't got a clue what's going on (but f**k it, he's got a guitar so he's damn well going to play it!), and Charlie still looks like he'd rather be at home watching Corrie. Oh, and Ronnie just looks like he's a complete nutter - and good for him!

Mick apologised for the fact that we all should've been at Wembley (I had no problem with Twickers - far more convenient for me, in fact!), then said that he'd heard that the new Wembley stadium was going to be ready for the farewell tour of the Arctic Monkeys. We all laughed... then realised that never a truer word was spoken in jest.

The stage was amazing, and changed colour quite a lot:

The stage went yellow.


The stage went blue.


The stage went red.


The stage went bang!


The stage even drove into the centre of the pitch while a big inflatable tongue poked out at us!


Of course, they also had some amazing visuals on the big screen - like a half naked chick dry-humping the Eiffel Tower (there's something I never expected to see!).

And as the show hit the last few minutes they rattled through the hits. We "WOO-WOO-ed" to Sympathy for the Devil, "Yeah, yeah, yeah - WOOO'd" through Brown Sugar, and 40,000 people shook their booties to Satisfaction.

Then there was a few more explosions (they do like their explosions), some flame throwers, some huge rolls of fabric that shot out the top of the stage onto the audience, a few MORE explosions, some fireworks, and that was it. (I'd hate to have to clean THAT lot up...)


As all 40,000 of us tried to squeeze out of the gates we passed a guy with a megaphone directing people. "Turn left for Hounslow buses, right for Richmond." Then he smiled, held it to his lips again and shouted "WOO-WOO!" to which we all turned and "WOO-WOO'd" right back at him.

And that was it. I was "WOO-WOO-ing" and strutting all the way back to the car (I do a mean Jagger impression).

If you get the chance - go seem them. They might have a collective age of about 4 million, but they've got more life and energy in 'em than any band a third of their age that I've seen this year. I hope I'm as limber as Mick when I'm 63.

Rock on - till next time!