Music
Show diary: Area 11 report from their album launch gig at Borderline
Nottingham rockers Area 11 have just unleashed their new album, Modern Synthesis, and to celebrate they played a very special launch show at The Borderline in London.
Here’s how it went for them…
Our album launch show at the Borderline in London had sold out many weeks before we even arrived at the venue, but even so we had no idea really what to expect. The last time we released an album was back in 2013, to very little fanfare, but this show was a very different affair than three years ago.
It was to be a very busy day. In between loading in, sound-checking, dropping two cars at the hotel, picking up merch, doing press interviews, meeting friends and family, and actually playing the show itself, we had decided we were going to throw caution to the wind and play an acoustic in-store too.
Luckily the shop was only a five minute walk from the venue; I’m not sure it would have been possible if this wasn’t the case. Our soundcheck was performed at hyperspeed, but thanks to our crew everything was sorted in time for us to be only 15 minutes late for our acoustic show (oops!).
Returning to the venue after the acoustic show, the place was packed. The acoustic set had gone so well that we knew we needed to be at the top of our game for the main show. With a stream of friends, family and industry types moving through our dressing room, everything was quite hectic, but we managed to find some moments of calm to prepare for the performance. In the first photo, Kogie sorts out his bass before a quick line check before our set begins. In the second, Parv speaks to our front of house engineer Drew about some of his concerns for the show.
For me, the gig itself was one of the best I’ve ever been involved with. The gear functioned perfectly despite a slightly rushed soundcheck. The crowd were incredible; the support acts Falls and Milestones had hyped the place up suitably.
The whole thing went by very quickly, but will be a night I’ll remember for a long time. It seemed far too soon that we were playing our final song and packing everything back into the van again.
With the van packed, we left the venue at about 3am and headed back to the hotel. After checking social media and watching some American Dad reruns, it was straight to bed, as we had to travel to Manchester the next day to do it all again! As gigs go, this launch show was up there as one of the most difficult, stressful and yet rewarding, enjoyable and memorable shows we’ve ever played, and we hope there’s going to be many more of these in the future.
Area 11’s new album Modern Synthesis is out now, find the band at @Area11Band.
