"DENMARK + AN extra confused tomo"
21.2.2014 - Copenhagen, Denmark
The morning after the 2nd MARS show in Paris, we got on a plane up to Copenhagen ready for another dose of our drug which is the live MARS show. We arrived the day before, so explored the town on foot, sticking triads around the city as we did. On the morning of the MARS show, we had a sleep in, went out for lunch then headed to the venue. Check-in for Adventures In Wonderland was at 4:15pm so we arrived around 3pm. There were about 50 Echelon outside waiting outside the hotel, but nothing compared to the lines I had seen in Paris. We went inside to the hotel café and waited there to avoid the cold. As I had a tonne of MARS stickers and chocolate left, I went out to the Echelon and handed them out… it was quite hilarious as Echelon just swarmed me for stuff! I thought I’d have to go around to everyone but nope, they came to me! I had a couple of extra special things on me so I went outside and yelled to get everyone’s attention. I asked who had been lined up the longest, to which about 8 people put up their hand. “No, no, really… who has been here the longest?” I asked again. Finally, everyone pointed at 2 small groups sitting beside the door, so I handed the gifts to them. I have no idea if they liked them or even knew what the heck they were, but I thought it was a good reward for waiting in the cold. At 4:15pm Reni came out, a desk was set-up and she checked us all in one-by-one. Once we were past Reni, we went and collected our Merch from the bar-come-merch-table – I realised this time the pack didn’t have a wristband. As we were about 5th in line, we ended up waiting for about an hour until everyone was in past Reni, then we were let into the venue. It was a massive M&G – bigger than Paris! We sat in front of the table/photo backdrop as usual and awaited the guys. We ended up having a bit of a MARS sing-a-long while we waited which was interesting.
I can’t remember what time it was when the guys finally arrived, but they walked in, Jared leading the way and said Hello. Jared talked about their last visit to Copenhagen and that the scenes of the guys riding bikes in the Do or Die video were filmed there also. When it was time for the Q&A people asked standard kind of questions, though when one Echelon asked Jared what the difference between acting and singing is, he immediately said “Nope. Next question.” (not that I blame him) He then went on to say that he gets asked that every single time he does an interview and he has just started saying he’s not answering it. Oops! Another Echelon asked where Thirty Seconds To Mars had gone, saying he misses the old MARS and (in a polite way) isn’t as keen on the new direction. I completely agreed with what he said, and I give the guy props for actually speaking his mind because I definitely wouldn’t straight to the bands face! Anyway, Jared got a little defensive (naturally) and said they were definitely never going to go backwards with their music, he said it is a ‘Pop world’ now and who knows if Rock will ever come back “in”. He did make a good point about he thinks it is a lot of association to people’s lives that create an association to music. He said something along the lines of “If your favourite song was new when something was going on in your life, where you connected with it and it meant something to you, there may be people hearing “End of all days” right now who are feeling exactly the same way you did when you heard whatever song you love.” As much as I don’t like the new stuff as much, I think the reason is because I don’t have any emotional attachment to it, so I think Jared had a really good point! The guy who asked the question apologized to Jared but Jared kind of just shrugged it off. I’m sure he hears stuff like that all the time anyway. He mentioned that he was never really into "Rock" music (as Tomo and Shannon nodded in the background and pointed at themselves) Jared then looking at them and saying how they were into heavy rock, where he was into Depeche Mode and U2. He made some reference to Metallica too. Shannon made some comment about Danish women being really attractive (I can’t remember exactly what he said) and someone asked if MARS would ever play a show in the Artic (or something crazy like that) Jared kind of laughed and said we already did with 'A Beautiful Lie' but he misunderstood the question. The questionaire re-asked in a different way which sparked Jared to speak about holding an "Echelon" festival somewhere in Europe... he said somewhere that's easy for everyone to travel to - like St. Tropez. Uh-huh, or maybe just cus you like it there? LOL. I actually think that would be pretty incredible, but who knows what will happen in the future.
It was then time to get our stuff signed. We lined up in a huge circle right the way around the floor of the venue. I whipped out my LLF+D CD insert and put it down on the table. Not that I overly wanted it signed, but I didn’t want another poster and I had nothing else. It went along the line, Tomo and Jared signed it upside down (sigh) but oh well. I don’t even know if the guys looked up at me this time, I know Shannon did, but the others, I have no idea. #MindBlank We then went round the huge loop again for the photo. Emma wasn’t there to lead us into the photo today, so Reni stepped in and Tomo was kind of just doing it himself as well. Considering how fast it is and all the new rules I wasn’t sure I’d be able to use my cut-out cardboard names I had made, but I asked Reni as I was about to go into the photo. “Ask the guys” she said to me. I stepped toward the guys holding the 3 names for them in a fan and said “Do you mind holding these?” Tomo said sure, Shannon just grinned at me and as Jared took “Sugar” he looked at it with a curious face. “You’ve all got the wrong name so just look confused.” I said as I stepped in between Jared and Shannon. I pulled a stupid face and put my arm around Jared then just like that, the photo was done. They handed me back the names and Tomo said “I looked extra confused for you Sugar!” I chuckled and thanked him. I got out of the shot then turned to watch my friend take her photo before re-joining the line again. We had to stay in the line so that it was fair for everyone to get a spot on the barrier, which made sense.
As we snaked around to the last person, Tomo stepped out of the photo and said “Thanks for coming guys” and before he’d even finished everyone sprinted for the barrier. It was actually fucking hilarious. As soon as my hands hit the barrier in the middle of Jared’s catwalk, I looked over where the guys where and the 3 of them were standing there, still in position with a look of shock on their faces. Hahahahahaha, I was laughing like crazy. Jared’s face was like WTF just happened?! My friend had got the barrier to my right which was great, but then an extremely rude “Echelon” pushed left to try and get her friend on the barrier and completely squashed my friend into me, squeezing her out and off the barrier. I was furious, as was she. Honestly, the rudeness of that girl was unbelievable. Fortunately, I know once you hit that barrier, you hold on for dear life to avoid that happening, but my friend didn’t realise. I couldn’t move what-so-ever so she ended up watching the show over my shoulder. I noticed how low the stage was at this venue – it was actually lower than the barrier! I knew this was going to be good!
After the support act; Twin Atlantic (who are really great!) the lights eventually went down and ‘Birth’ began. The setlist was basically the same as the previous 2 shows, Jared waving the Danish flag around during ‘Do or Die’. At one point he got 2 teenage boys on stage who were just hilarious. They were absolutely losing their minds that they were on stage :D Jared also commented that there were a lot of guys at the show, beckoning them all to scream. Jared looked around and said “What the?” then said “now all the girls, scream your asses off.” To which the high-pitch squeal encouraged Jared to open his jacket, pull a crazy face and wiggle his body about. Haha. He got a couple on stage and the girl started crying… the boyfriend was kind of just standing there, lol. During the acoustic set, about 5 of us decided to try and request ‘Revenge’. As he asked for songs, we all yelled over and over “Revenge! Revenge!” He said “What?” and looked at us and we all yelled again. He closed his eyes and sang the first long note of Revenge then stopped, then said “What else?” I guess he didn’t feel like singing it after all :P lol.
As it came to the part where Jared gets people on stage, I launched myself up and over the barrier with my friends help. The security guard pulled me the rest of the way then threw me up onto Jared’s catwalk. I’m not sure whether I was disoriented, my feet were numb, or the MARSfetti was just very slippery but as I got to my feet, I fell straight back down onto my knees/shins. I was so mortified! I got up and once again, I fell back down. At that point I was not only embarrassed but now also frustrated. I got up to my feet again, and AGAIN I went straight back down. I remember yelling “FOR FUCKS SAKES!” in frustration. Hahahahahaha. The next time, I got to my feet and managed to stumble up to the stage, jumping right into the middle of the pack next to a friend who had watched from the side of stage. Only 2-3 more people came up after me and then as Jared wound up with a long “Whooooooooaaaaaaaaa” I realised I was in the best spot on the stage and about to be ‘Up In The Air’ all over again. I noticed one of Jared’s guitar picks on the stage just in front of me so I leant out and grabbed it and shoved it into my pocket.
Jared came down and stood right in front of me before we all jumped around crazy and sang. He went out his catwalk then came back over and over, pointing at me at one point and singing right in our faces. He actually grabbed a girl a few spots down from me around the neck briefly as he sang “I’ll wrap my hands around your neck.” Or at least, he pretended to. As always, the lights went down and we had to “get down real low”. The lights came to life, we all jumped up and we screamed ‘Take no more!” When the song came to an end, Shannon came out on the catwalk and threw drumsticks to the crowd and Tomo stepped forward to wave. I took a few mandatory photos on the stage with friends then as we started leaving the stage, I saw one of the roadies by Tomo’s stuff. I went up and said “Can I pretty please have that setlist?” pointing to Tomo’s setlist taped down to the floor. He smiled, paused, then said “Go for it.” I kneeled down and carefully peeled it from the stage, happy as a pig in mud.
I went down to the mosh pit and met my friend, buzzing with excitement, took some photos, then we left the venue and got the bus back to the centre of town to walk home. It had been a really great show; everyone seemed to be singing along and for a small venue, the atmosphere was really good!