2girls1band

Think rock and roll is a man's game?

Gemma and Amie of UK Prog-Power metal band Dakesis are here to say otherwise....whilst constantly searching for the ultimate dressing room.
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Rampage @ Ropers Hall 3.5/5

After a full days work in my day job, I left the building to be greeted by the rumbling of the Steel Mobile in the visitor’s car park ready for my collection.

We made our way towards the nearest motorway, stopping off at a local garage for some overpriced munch and to laugh at all those queuing for petrol following the news of a potential fuel strike. “Muhahaha what fools” we mused whilst staring like love sick puppies at our LPG conversion on the Dodge.

After stocking up we began making our way down the motorway, broke out Gem’s new Iron Maiden DVD and settled down for the journey.


Some way down the M6 (OK just before Junction 13 to be precise) we are greeted by a loud hissing sound. Thinking it is either a blown tyre, or we have gained a small magician blowing up balloons with helium (you know how much we love balloons and magicians) we pull onto the hard shoulder to have a gander. 

It was apparant that it wasn’t either of these when Wayne shouted “everyone out, we have a gas leak.”  Oops … flammable gas … pouring out of the van … which is likely to become hot whilst driving … with three smokers on board.


With this news, Matt and Adam bravely escaped unharmed, leaving Gem and I to bumble out of the drivers side (it’s worth noting suicide doors on the right hand side of the car is not a good exit strategy when on the hard shoulder!) Who said chivelry is dead? (Well..it is…at least in Dakesis)

Safely at the side of the road, Wayne made a brief and panicked phone call and thus we eagerly awaited the road saviours … The AA.


Easily amused, we were treated to a small musical by Wayne, Matt and two traffic cones, Matt performed some stone juggling, and Adam adventured up and down the grass verge picking up a variety of objects and going to look at trees.  

Herein follows a brief visual documentation of our time spent waiting for the AA…


After amusing ourselves for a few hours, the AA made an appearance and towed us to the nearest garage where thankfully we were given the all clear to carry on.

Service stations are a somewhat familiar sight these days given the hours we spend on the road - we made our usual quick stop for petrol (driving on LPG was a no-go, how we regretted mocking those people earlier), tea and Matt’s obligatory “takes a thousand years to pick a sausage roll/coffee/confectionery” selection and we were on the road again.


A welcoming sight eventually came before our eyes when we spotted our faces on a small board outside the venue. With that we begun the great unload!


Being late meant a rush to get the gear on stage, setting up the merch board and the first band going on. No dressing room was seen so it was off to the toilets with us.



As far as toilets go, I think this was pretty good for changing. First off there were toilets with locks … and toilet paper (note the photographic evidence) even more to my surprise was the handwash in the soap dispensers on the wall.


The glittery red/orange worktops made for a even more fabulous hand washing experience and there was ample mirror display including a full length mirror near the door. The floor didn’t look as though it was covered in aids, and it was pretty darn clean all round.

It remained fairly quiet the entire time I was changing which meant I wasn’t met with strange looks as I begin removing my clothes in full view of the mirror. (Gemma however was caught with her ample wears on display by first a rather confused looking girl in a bunny onesie, and later a drunk lady who stopped to have a full blown conversation about “the size of those knackers”!)

© Neil Forshaw Photography

Although this wasn’t an actual dressing room I’m going to give this place three and a half krieg points. 

To top it off the gig itself was great, a lovely responsive crowd and two great support acts, not to mention a great set of enthusiastic promoters who have done a fab job of bringing a metal scene back to Preston as well as the ample help they gave lugging all our heavy equipment in and out of the venue, and were very understanding of our tardiness given we were very close to a near death experience in a freak Gas explosion. 

Definitely somewhere we will go back to!


Until next time.


Panties
xxx


Dressing Room Rating: 3.5
Venue: Rampage @ Ropers Hall
City: Preston

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