Matchbox 20, Melbourne, October 2012

Check another item off the bucket list!

My love Affair with Matchbox Music...

Matchbox 20 has been near the top of my list of favourite bands for around eight years now. The band features quite heavily on every playlist I have, from "Housework" to "Driving" and especially on "Writing Inspiration". Some of my best writing has been done with my headphones on to drown out the constant drone of the TV and Matchbox 20 pumping as loud as I can bear it.

Musically, the mid to late nineties just passed me by. I married in 1994, and had my son in 1995 and my youngest daughter in 1998. The TV was always on and though I had the radio on in the car, most of what happened in the music world just flowed right by me. I remember asking my eldest daughter about Matchbox 20 when I saw the "If You're Gone" video (in 2000) and being told that they might be too grungy for my taste.

Fast forward a few years and my husband and I were watching one of those Celebrity Wedding shows. One wedding they showed was Rob and Marisol's. I vaguely knew who Rob was by then. They showed Rob leaning over to say something to Mari, and you could tell he was just a blob of jelly. She was so beautiful and he was so handsome and the image just stuck in my mind. So when I next saw a Matchbox 20 video, I took more notice of them, and their music, and found that I enjoyed it.

A few more years and I was chatting to my new online friend, Marilyn, and discovered she was a fan. Rob had released "Something To Be" and the ads on the TV played every morning as I was trying to wake up. I bought the CD and ordered all the Matchbox 20 albums from an online site for $10 each. Rob's Australian tour was announced and Marilyn and I made plans for me to fly from Darwin to Sydney and stay with her so we could see him together. Unfortunately those plans fell flat and I had to stay home playing my CDs while she went to see him. I lived vicariously through her reports for a day or two.

The CD's were played on repeat in my car and my younger children developed a liking for them, to the point where I had to provide them with their own copies of the CDs. Matchbox 20 reunited after some time working on individual projects and announced a tour. Again Marilyn and I made plans but they fell through when my family and I decided to move from the Northern Territory to Victoria. As we drove for two weeks through the NT, Queensland and New South Wales, I was aware that the band was in the country but avoided knowing where they were on any given day. Then we arrived in Sydney, and I called Marilyn to see if we could meet up. She told me she was getting ready to go to the Matchbox 20 concert that night! 
My husband suggested getting a motel room so I could go in on the train and hopefully get a ticket to see them. But I shied away from the thought of travelling alone on a train, of being in a crowd that was close to the size of the population of Palmerston, (the place where I'd lived for the past nine years), and of being there and not being able to buy a ticket. So we drove out of Sydney towards Canberra and I could have cried at being so close and not being able to see them.

Some time after we settled in country Victoria, Rob released "Cradlesong" and I forked out a lot of money to take the whole family to see him. It was worth it to see my son smile. His uneasy entry into his teenage years was only made worse by the big move away from everything familiar, and to see him enjoy the concert made me very happy. Of course, seeing Rob on stage myself made me ecstatically happy also. I don't remember who the support acts were but I do remember that INXS came out to do the encore with Rob and that was amazing! INXS music is a huge part of the soundtrack of my mispent youth.

Tour 2012

The release of "She's So Mean" caused a small ripple of excitement in my house. A new single meant a new album and then a tour announcement. My husband ultimately decided he didn't want to go, and my daughter felt she was so deafened by her first concert (Rob) that she wouldn't go either. (She is going to see Reece Mastin in a few weeks. Note to self: buy her some earplugs.) My son and I were excited enough for everyone though. We bought the North CD the day it was released and had the date for ticket sales written on the board near my desk. The CD was played until the songs were burned into our brains. 

And then I caught Whooping cough! Two weeks of being sick, not moving far from the couch, not sleeping more than fifteen minutes at a time, coughing till my whole body hurt. Six days between being declared not infectious and the Matchbox 20 concert. I vowed to attend no matter what, even if I collapsed from exhaustion afterwards.

Son and I were up early on the day of the concert, since we had to travel three hours on a coach to get to Melbourne. I felt sick and stressed out, and actually uttered the words "I don't want to go..." Eventually we made it to the bus in one piece. I listened to my Matchbox 20 playlist on my iPad all the way, getting into the right mood. In our hotel room, we spent a sunny Saturday afternoon chilling out rather than tiring ourselves exploring the delights of South Yarra. 

Finally, it was time. We arrived in good time and were in our seats to see Evermore, the support act. I tend to avoid support acts these days but I'm glad we caught this one. I knew some of the songs and enjoyed the whole set. During the break, I caught up with some friends, then returned to my seat to enjoy INXS.  I saw the band a few times in my mispent youth and have always liked their music. I loved watching them when they played the encore with Rob on his last tour, counting it the best part of an amazing show. So having them support Matchbox 20 was incredible. It was like having two main acts. We were pretty much wondering how Matchbox 20 would top INXS.

I will admit I didn't know who the singer was this time. Ciarin Gribbins, I discovered while researching for this review. He's done a lot of great things and he's Irish, so as long as he keeps talking, I can forgive him for not looking like JD Fortune. While I was musing over whether he wore the mantle of Michael Hutchence comfortably, and wishing I had actually seen JD Fortune even once before he and the band parted ways, Ciarin leaned down to sing to the girls near the side of the stage. I saw his face on the huge screen above him. His eyes met someone else's eyes, and he smiled... and I promptly forgot any resevations I may have had about him. I hope he stays with them for a long long time...

Just as Matchbox took to the stage, I messaged Marilyn "Seeing Matchbox live right now, soon I can die Happy." When I try to describe how amazing it was to see them, words nearly fail me. I know I used Awesome many times in my status update on Facebook. I was in a bubble that night that I wished would never burst. Two hours of my favourite music played by some of my favourite people and I could have stayed there for many more hours. I'm even finding it difficult to write this review now because words bring that night back into the real world and trivialise it. I have Matchbox music blasting through my headphones and I'm loving how it takes me back to that night, like my inner soundtrack has a video clip now that wasn't there before. 

I couldn't even begin to list all the songs they played in those two hours. Songs from the new album, of course, and enough from the older albums to keep any real fan happy. I do remember that when they came back for the encore, the first song was "Put Your Hands Up", a great party song from North. It was the best song to play at that point. Son and I were very happy.

I think if I had to choose one thing that I love the most about Matchbox, it's the way Rob uses words. "Lose Affiliation with the Real" has to be my favourite line of any song ever. He inspires me to be a better writer.