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My photos from this event are here.
Now, I am going to write my report of the events of BITLive as I saw them myself. I really really really enjoyed the whole BITLive experience. For me, it was much more than just the BITLive nightclub event. It started when I arrived at Chris's house to travel to Birmingham early on Wednesday morning, and ended when I arrived back there Thursday afternoon. That is the timespan of what I am going to describe. The order of events may be skewed at times, because I can't quite remember which things happened before which other things, but I've tried to get it right as much as possible.
So, I arrived at Chris Abbott's house, and his living room was full of T-shirts, posters and CD's. Chris handed me the CD of the dance mixes and I listened to most of them, including the Anthem, and he also gave me a BIT3 T-shirt. He showed me the custom T-shirts he and Boz had made with slogans such as "When I grow up I want to be ???" where ??? was the name of pretty much every composer you can think of. Soon Ross Sillifant came downstairs and I met him. Then he and Chris went off to pick up the van and LaLa.
When LaLa got back, we all began to load up the van, rapidly realising it was way too small. We had to leave behind two thirds of the T-shirts, a few sets of posters, a TV and some other stuff. The rest we stuffed into every available place in the van, and carried on our laps. LaLa, Ross and I jammed ourselves into the middle of the van - luckily they were both pretty thin, since I'm quite fat. The stuff we talked about had very little to do with the C64, which seemed to disappoint Chris who expected us to be debating the merits of Rob Hubbard etc. At the Oxford services, I remember LaLa complaining about how expensive the burgers were.
On the way, Chris was unable to use his phone himself as he was driving, so he passed it on to me. Thus, I got calls from Martin Galway and Jogeir Liljedahl during the journey. I have to say Martin sounded nothing like I expected - but then again, hardly anyone looked or sounded like I expected.
When we arrived in Birmingham, we found the hotel carpark and someone pointed out Dave Whittaker getting something out of his car. As soon as we got out of the car, we encountered a group of people - I think Kenz was there, and Steve Barrett. Someone said, "Oh look, there's Jeff Minter," and sure enough it was. Jeff turned round and walked up to us, and shook Ross's and my hands. This felt, to me, like a pretty major event! When we went into the hotel, Jeff pulled out a digital camera and showed me a film of his sheep, Flossie, and also a bit of wool he keeps in his pocket.
Anyway, we checked into the hotel, and I met Alex Aris, who was my roommate. Once we'd dropped off our bags, Jeff moved his Nuon gear into the van and Steve climbed in with it, and Chris drove him up to the club. The rest of us went with Kenz and co, first to a bar in this place near the hotel called the Old Orleans, then to the club. Kenz carried a C64 which got soaked in the rain.
It took a while before the Club DNA staff let us in - after all, this was way before the event was due to start - but when I entered the club, I was amazed at the size of it. It seemed very big and empty. Some of the guys went into the DJ box and started playing music - they ramped up the bass at one point which went right through your body. Alex said later it felt like your kidneys were about to explode, which is a very good description. While some of the others explored the club, and LaLa took photos of everything from unusual angles, I hung around talking to Stoo and watching Kenz dance with his C64. Ross asked me to sign his autograph book - I didn't feel I was important enough, but he insisted, so I decided to go on an ego trip and signed it, "Best wishes from the great Darren Izzard." Someone pointed out Bjorn Lynne to me, who was chatting to people already at the bar. I think I said something to him about how wonderful his music was for Worms, particularly the Wormsong, and probably ended up looking a bit of a loony.
Kenz and his mates went off looking for a pub soon. I and some of the others tried following him a minute or so later, but he'd disappeared. We did find Fred Gray and Dave Whittaker wandering around looking for an Indian restaurant. They found one but we decided to return to the club.
At first, Chris and Jeff weren't there, but soon they turned up and things started to happen properly. Jeff got his equipment set up and eventually the video wall began to show dancing patterns of llamas and so on.
Chris pointed out which bits of the club were going to be the celebrity bar, and where the shop was going to be, and Kenz and his people wandered around putting up retro posters.
At one point, someone (Steve?) mentioned Ben Daglish was upstairs in the VIP room. It took me some time to work out how to get up there, but when I finally did, Ben wasn't there. I went down onto the dancefloor and saw a man I hadn't seen before walking around. I asked him who he was and he said "I'm Ben Daglish." So there. He was looking for Jeff Minter at that point and he found him in the DJ box.
However, I went back to the VIP room later and found Ben talking to Warren Pilkington (iirc) and some others. They left shortly and I got the chance to speak to Ben myself. He let me take his photo, offered me a smoke of his cig (I declined, incidentally), and we talked about his current musical work for a while. Now, one thing everyone says about Ben at the event was that he was a great guy. It's true. He was also really energetic and crazy all the time, shouting things and running around, and doing other stuff too.
Back down in the celebrity bar, Chris's Dancing Brother pointed out the curries had arrived. I was hungry and there was one unclaimed curry left. Kenz recommended I eat it, and CDB got me a spoon and I did. Later I found out that Marcel Donne had been expecting a curry he hadn't got - I told him I thought I'd probably eaten it myself, and he seemed more-or-less happy with that.
It wasn't long before the first people started to arrive in the VIP room. Among the first few I remember were Press Play on Tape. Press Play on Tape arrived in the lift, and emerged looking like some sort of wierd clan, with their black T-shirts and instrument cases. I called out, "You're Press Play on Tape, aren't you?" and they all shouted back, "Yes!" That may not seem noteworthy now, but it was a you-had-to-be-there moment.
Another early one was Markus Klein (LMan), who was dashing around with his camera. He took my photo!
Puffy64 introduced himself to me - I recognised his voice from the early versions of the Last Ninja Hymn, when I'd helped Puffy64 with the lyrics. He gave me a free CD of the Last Ninja Tribute, which was really nice of him! Thanks, Puffy!
When Martin Galway arrived, I went up to him and he remembered I was the person he'd spoken to on the phone earlier. He was very approachable and was always in the middle of a huge crowd all night.
I noticed Fred Gray was up at the bar. I was nervous about talking to Fred, as I'd done Shadowfire for BIT3, and I knew Fred had asked Chris to make some changes that I'd said had spoiled the track. I was a bit cautious about Fred's reaction to all this. When I did introduce myself to him, he actually launched into a series of rather apologetic explanations for why he'd asked Chris to change things in my arrangement etc. and I felt reaaalllly guilty! But we talked for a while about things I can't remember. We met up several times during the event, actually, and I think we got on very well. I hope so, anyway! One thing I do remember was that I'd read about how Enigma Force was developed from Shadowfire, but when I asked him about it, he insisted they were totally unrelated pieces. We did talk about things other than music too, but I really can't remember what they were!
Throughout, the celebs were coming and going, doing interviews with the BBC, and with the other journalists that were present.
I'd seen David Whittaker around outside the club, as I said before. He was a little drunk by that stage, but I introduced myself to him. We talked about Rob Hubbard, and he tipped me off about Rob's current appearance - that is, he now has short hair, and a neatly-trimmed moustache, and wears small round glasses.
I spotted my friend Michael Delaney soon after, and he introduced me to Allister Brimble. Allister looked so much younger than I imagined him to! Allister wanted to talk to Fred so I called Fred over and he sat down with us and talked about Gameboy music and stuff. A man entered the room with a moustache, small round glasses and short hair, wearing a poloneck shirt. "My God," I thought, "it's not Rob is it?" I ran up to him at the bar and couldn't think of anything to say. All I could think of was, "I did Master of Magic for BIT4." He acknowledged me and said some stuff I didn't hear properly. I took his photo. Soon, I was pushed out of the way by throngs of people clamouring to take his photo, get autographs and talk SID. It was only later I finally got myself together enough to speak to him properly.
It was around then I met Richard Joseph with Ross. Richard was talking about how the Gameboy and mobile phone ringtones still demanded the talents of SID-like composition, and so on.
Jan Lund Thomsen introduced himself to me and we talked about kwed. I was impressed that he knew my name! I got a real kick out of the people who recognised me or seemed to want to meet me! Seriously, it was great to meet so many people from c64rmx and The Scene.
When I encountered Jogeir, I was amazed at how huge he was! Really tall! He frightened me! Nice guy though.
It became apparent that, while everyone seemed to be having a great time, they were all being social and chatting to each other rather than dancing. One of Chris's brothers suggested we get some people together to go down to the dancefloor and start dancing, to encourage people to join in. I persuaded a smartly-dressed guy called Nash to join us. Now, my concept of dancing is leaping around, twisting my legs about while making strange wavy motions with my arms, so that's what I did. Meanwhile, the BBC cameraman followed us down and filmed us as a group and individually! Somewhere there's a BBC film of me dancing like an idiot. I don't know at this stage what was used on the Midlands Today programme. However, hardly anyone joined those few of us down there, so we left the dancefloor and went off elsewhere.
I did spot Chris's brother Pete and Kenz dancing alone on the dancefloor later and joined them. That must have looked really odd. We stopped after a couple of tracks.
Later, we were bemoaning the lack of dancers again, and I said we really needed to tell people to dance directly. We went up to the VIP room, and into the celebrity bar, and persuaded Kenz and a few others to come down to the dancefloor. We formed a ring and did our respective dances. Gradually, people joined us, including a couple of women who put their handbags in the middle of the ring. Then someone put Kenz's waterlogged C64 in the middle. We danced round it like some wierd ritual, bowing before it etc. until Pete had the great idea of getting people to sign it. We all signed it, and the dancing continued. The BBC man returned and filmed us all some more, with Chris's Dancing Brother dancing really quite well in the middle of the ring. That's why I call him Chris's Dancing Brother. That and I can't remember his name.
Then the dancing girls arrived. Two of them took up positions by the dancefloor and did their thing. I realised soon after that I was getting quite tired, so I said I would go back up to the VIP bar, which I did. The others, in various combinations, continued dancing in that ring for a long time after.
I soon realised I was utterly exhausted. It wasn't even midnight and I was already falling asleep. I decided to rely on Red Bull to keep me going, and it really worked. (End of advert!!) I was sitting down with Boz and a couple of his friends (one was called Bob - Boz kept introducing me to Bob over and over again. Bob insisted he had never owned a C64 but he believed my remixes must be really good, or really crap, alternating each time he said it). Also, Marcel Donne was there too. We talked about silly stuff, and eventually Boz spilled his beer over my trousers and I wrung some of it out and flicked it back in his face. He seemed quite pleased about the latter part.
At one point, loads of celebs started collecting at one end of the VIP room, and I realised it was for a "real" photo shoot (as opposed to the one earlier when Ben was talking to Rob, and got irritated by the constant photos and yelled out, "right, everyone take photos NOW!"). It took some time to track down Ben but they all posed for loads of pictures together. Apparently it was Martin Galway's idea. Eventually, Chris was persuaded to join them. I took one photo but my film ran out!
Watching the air-guitar contest from the VIP room with Boz and Marcel, we had a laugh about the antics of these people on the stage. Someone pointed out Ben doing an air-guitar routine of his own under the steps by the stage area.
At one point I found someone else wearing identical clothes to Jeff. More on this bizarre occurrence later. (Hey, it was late at BITLive, everything seemed bizarre and surreal to everyone by now. 90% of conversations started with the words, "This is waaaayyyy too surreal.")
Chris started clearing stuff up at about 1.30am, and I went up to the VIP bar to retrieve my coat. Dave Whittaker made it known he was buying drinks for a number of people there who were talking to him. Suddenly he turned around, saw me, grabbed me and dragged me to the bar where he shouted he wanted a drink "for this man too." I asked for a cola - Dave yelled "Cola????!!!!" - but he paid for it and, hey, I drank it.
Ben Daglish burst into the VIP room, screaming about how he'd not been allowed to enter the air-guitar contest. I said I'd noticed him doing air-guitar by the stage during the contest. He said he was doing it because he wanted to show them how it should be done, and that "these f**king kids have NO IDEA!!" Then he started air-guitaring at the bar.
At around 2.30am, the music was turned off. With some prompting from Stoo, I finally got the nerve to approach Rob and thank him for being so excellent and shook his hand. Once it was obvious that the music was off, everyone started leaving, except for those of us on Chris's "crew," making sure everything (ie. merchandise, cashboxes, personal belongings, etc.) was cleared up. Rob said to a few of us that he hoped we'd have another reunion in another 16 years' time. Chris commented on how so many people had preregistered tickets but not turned up. They missed a legendary event.
Once the club's manager came downstairs to the conference room and said they were locking up, we all decided to leave. It was 3am, and although taxis arrived for most people, a bunch of us got fed up waiting for taxis and one guy wearing glasses (see below) said he knew the way back to the hotel. We decided to follow him, and soon encountered a man who'd been at the event but said he hadn't booked a hotel. He asked if Chris had any spare rooms booked as he'd have to sleep on the streets otherwise. Chris found him a space in a room. As we were walking to the hotel, the Glasses Guy pointed out that Ben's curtains were drawn and we could hear talking inside.
Note: Glasses Guy contacted me after reading this, so I now know it was actually Mat Allen. Thanks Mat!
When I got to my room, Alex was already tucked up on the sofa (he'd offered me the bed - he's way too generous!), but was having difficulty getting to sleep. He commented about the noise from the room above - it was Ben's - which wasn't loud or anything, we could just hear people talking and feet pacing around. There is in fact a bit of a story behind what was going on in Ben's room, which I heard about later, but I won't go into that now! We both eventually got to sleep.
When I woke up, only two hours later, Alex said he'd given up on trying to sleep, so we just sat about, talking retro games, poetry and stories. A couple of hours later, I looked out the window and, guess who was hanging about outside, but Warren Pilkington. Warren came over and we talked about stuff. Shortly, Richard Joseph and Fred Gray wandered past, trying to find the breakfast room, and we all exchanged greetings and brief musings. When Alex said his train was leaving soon and he had to check out, we both went to the reception to find someone who could book him a taxi. Steve Barrett was in reception, going out to breakfast with his partner (I'm ashamed to say I can't remember her name or relationship to Steve, so sorry for that) and I went with them.
In the breakfast room already were Chris (we'd been wondering where he was), Rob H, Fred G, Richard J and Tony C. I also spotted some of Boz's friends going to another area. Chris was talking to Rob and Tony, but a short while later he and Peter Connelly came over to our table for a while. (Heh, and Rob Hubbard even borrowed my pen for a few minutes at one point!)
Kenz and friends soon came in. Chris got plans sorted out with us all for packing up the stuff from the event, which was still locked in the club. Kenz et al went in search of cash machines while the rest of us checked out of the hotel. A load of us had congregated in reception - I remember Fred was there, Chris, Ross, also Rob for a while. Meanwhile, Jeff Minter was needed to retrieve his video equipment from the club, and since time was getting on, Chris asked me to go up to his room and see if he was ready. He was, more-or-less, Jeff mentioned he was really cold as he had given his coat away to a fan the previous night. The man had apparently offered him £100 for it, but since (a) the guy was drunk, and (b) Jeff didn't consider the coat to be worth £100, he gave him the coat for free. I told him about my encounter the previous night with the man wearing his coat, and Jeff agreed it must have been the same guy. Mystery solved. Boz and his friends passed through our little crowd briefly, too, with Boz sporting a severe hangover.
Once the paperwork of checking us out had been dealt with, a few of us (ie. me, Chris, Jeff, Ross, Marcel and Chris's Dancing Brother) piled into the van and set off for the club. I sat next to Jeff, and, on the way, he fingerpainted the word "BAAAA!" in the condensation of the car window while explaining to me the noise llamas make when they are rutting. Apparently the males make a sort of low hum. He said he really loves sheepiness above all things. He's not interested in anthropomorphic sheep, just sheepy sheep. He baaaaaed a few more times too. Oh, and he said my pronunciation of "Ancipital" was correct. I'd always wondered if I got it right, and now I know.
At the club, we and Kenz's posse packed all the stuff into the van, then Chris took Jeff back to the hotel so he could move the Nuon into his own car. Marcel, Ross and I exchanged parting messages with Kenz and the others and soon the three of us were hanging around outside the club in the rain on our own. Chris had said he'd be back very soon to pick up Ross and me, but quite some time passed and eventually I asked Marcel to call Chris and see what the holdup was. It turned out to be nothing major, and Chris arrived soon after with the van. Ross and I got in, said goodbye to Marcel who was hanging around in Birmingham until the evening waiting for his flight. Then we began the trip back to Bromley.
Once again, I was the Holder of the Phone, and this time it was Rob who was calling. We were all a bit tired, and Chris got the directions for Rob to get to his hotel a bit confused, and also since everything between Rob and Chris was having to be passed on by me, Rob got a bit stressed out with both of us. But, as far as I know, we got it all sorted out in the end.
Aside from that, Ross and Chris and me had a great time on the way back. We chatted about our experiences at the event and everything, and the future of the London event, which will be different but I hope still fun, as many of us non-celebrities will meet up again. Back at Chris's house, Ross and I both commented on how it felt like we'd been away much longer than just one night!
It was great. It was The Scene happening right around us. It was, as Jeff or Ben said to Chris, like the last fifteen years never happened. It was Back in Time, Live.
