This is Part I of II – a two part
series from BlurBalls all about Blur’s 5-day visit to Mexico City, where they
played a gig in El Plaza Condesa (March 15th 2013) and then in the huge
Vive Latino Festival (March 16th 2013).
For this
part, Mirja García writes about her
meeting with Blur and reviews the El Plaza Condesa concert.
Author’s Foreword: Hello Blur
fans! This is my 5-day summary of my Blur experience in Mexico (Part II here). First and
foremost, I will try to keep it fun and short because I don't want to bore you
with words. So, I thought the best idea was for my review of Blur at Mexico to
be divided into a "Blur Chronicle" by days.
I hope you can enjoy my
review, experience with meeting Damon Albarn, Graham Coxon and the rest of
Blur, and some pictures I took with the band.
Day 1: Wednesday, March 13th
2013
I had
contacted someone few days ago and he was totally nice by picking me up after
work, so afterwards we headed to the airport and arrived at 6pm. we really
thought Blur would arrive at this day,
but sadly it didn't happen. The Blur team, crew and staff arrived this day and
told us they were arriving next day at midnight (24 hours). However, the day
was worth it as I got to meet other Blur fans, which was so nice because I have
never met any other Blur fans before! I
left the airport at 10pm.
Day 2: Thursday, March 14th
2013
I had
expected Blur to arrive in Mexico the day before, so my original plan was to spend
this day trying to look for them at the hotel or something. It wasn't that way
(as they didn’t arrive yesterday), so a few fans and I planned to head right to
the airport again. They HAD to arrive this day! I got there at 6pm- apparently
Blur should have arrived at 6:30 or 00:00 hrs (Friday midnight).
It was 8pm,
and we had one last hope left. One bloke told us they had arrived one day ago.
We all tried hard to hold onto our instincts and hope that they will arrive soon.
11:42pm came, and anxiety started eating us alive. At 00:00 hrs, the same bloke
stood in front of us and quietly told us "Just
do not scream and try to be calm”. Hearing that made me nervous and relieved-
the moment I had been dreaming of for probably for more than 11 years was about to really happen.
The first
member of Blur who came out was Dave Rowntree. And then I just lost it and
became very excited when I saw Graham Coxon coming out of the plane. I didn't
see Alex James and Damon Albarn walking out because of Graham, who of course got
freaked out and said he needed to smoke
first.
Then I went to Alex; I was so very nervous and he said to me
"How are you darling? Are you alright?" Alex signed my magazine and
had a smile upon his face.
And then,
there was on my right side came Damon Albarn himself. I got there and he
started to sign things. Since I am a small person, it was hard for him to see
me and I had to try and get his full attention. Finally, he saw me, and I asked
him if I could hug him. Damon nodded, and then I asked for a picture. Right
away, he looked at me with his typically deep eyes and a smiley expression, and
said: "Oh, I have to stop".
I felt like
dying right there on the spot, and what Damon said made me laugh. I told him
"Yeah..." and both of us posed for the camera but Blur’s security guard
waved her hand in front of our faces and said: "You, everybody, can't take
pictures of the inside".
Both Damon and
I didn’t care about what the security guard said; Damon was such a saint
because he stopped for a very long time, posing with me for pictures. A friend also
wanted some photos with Damon but it was too late, he had to go. Damon was very nice that day to all the fans. I
have to admit I was scared about meeting him. Because I was worried about
making a fool of myself or making the Blur boys upset. My fear turned out to be
far from reality – Damon and the band were amazing!
At this
point, I had to leave. But before I got a chance to leave, Dave (such a lovely
man) spoke to me and asked, "How are you?” However at this point, I was so
nervous that I didn't quite catch the question. All I said back was "What?"
He repeated his question, and I told him "To be honest, I'm dying and
going to heaven right now!" Funnily, he replied "Oh, don't you
die" and then gave me a big hug.
All that was
nice, but I had one thing left to do before I left- I had to catch up with
Graham Coxon! Someone told me that he was outside, so I finally found him. He
made me lot more nervous than Damon did, but in the end I got another hug and
he signed my ‘A+E’ album. He was
quiet surprised about seeing my copy of ‘A+E’ and smiled when he saw it. As
Blur left on two separate vans, the fans and I gave them a goodbye by singing the chorus of ‘Tender’: "Oh
my baby...Oh my baby…Oh my…" It was definitely one of the best four days
of my life!
 |
Top: With Graham Coxon
Bottom: Signed copy of Graham Coxon's eight solo album 'A+E' |
Day 3: Friday, March 15th
2013
Review – El Plaza Condesa Concert
I woke up early just to get to the line for the Blur Mexico warm up show
and to be right in first row. This day was mostly for waiting for the Blur gig.
We knew where they were staying, so we planned that we will visit them later. It
was nice as I could speak to lots more fans like me- there were two girls named
Carmen and Lizzy who have the most best-looking pictures taken with Blur. They
are such nice people; all the Blur fans are. I ended up being so friendly with
the fans (shout outs to Michelle, Oscar, Brenda, Scarlett and of course Carmen
and Lizzy), I started considering them as part of my “family”!
We waited two
hours for the show to begin in the Plaza, and then some people at the gig
started playing Gorillaz music. I
wonder if Damon heard it because everyone, including me, started singing out
loud. The gig turned out, of course, to be the best gig of my entire life!
 |
| The popular "Gramon Inspires Me" sign |
I sang along to
each song; I jumped, I smiled. I tried to hold Damon's hand each time he got
close to us. I brought with me a "GRAMON
INSPIRES ME" sign, and the first member of Blur to see it was Graham.
When he saw it, he gave me a beautiful, naughty and embarrassed smile, and then
laughed. The second person to see it was Damon- he smiled with an "Oh Dear"
expression and turned to look at Graham knowingly. Alex also seemed amused and
surprised by my sign. Then one of the blonde trumpet players tried to read the
letters, and both Liz and I can read his lips: “GRAMON”. I held it up for a bit
more; he laughed, pointed out my sign and called on his other trumpet-playing
mate. I think my sign was very popular – it definitely made people laugh.
I enjoyed
each song during El Plaza Condesa. During the gig, my camera’s battery died;
this proved to be both a good and bad thing. I hated the fact that I could not record
the Blur show in HD (which would have looked amazing) but loved the fact that I
could enjoy the show and screamed as much as I wanted. Every song was my
favorite- I was very surprised when they opened the gig with ‘Popscene’. When ‘There's No Other Way’ came on, it caught me by surprise. ‘Caramel’ was very gorgeous and well
played. The encore was marvelous too.
When ‘The Universal’ came, I couldn't hold back
the tears anymore because I knew it was going to be the last song. I wanted to
make the Blur show go on forever. On a happier note, I managed to get Graham Coxon’s guitar pick at the end
of the show- it was the best feeling in the world to touch his guitar pick.
After the
first ever Blur show of 2013, and after watching Blur in my home Mexico for the
first time in 10 years, I went to sleep with a smile upon my face.
Written by Mirja
García
