Am I turning into a miserable old git or are arseholes becoming more prolific?

[Dymetrie]

So last night me and Mrs Dym headed over to Wembley Arena for the Prodigy concert.

I've been a fan of the Prodigy since the early nineties and was looking forward to seeing them live for the fifth time, plus the tickets had been a birthday present from my brother and sister.

Whilst on the Metropolitan Line there were some unsavoury types (you know the ones, loud, brash, bloody annoying) who were also on their way to the gig. Not really a problem with them as they were just high spirited.

Once at the gig we ended up sat next to a couple, the bloke was very lively (he was dancing to Dizzee Rascal, the support act!) and a little bit drunk. Absolutely fine, even if he did spill a bit of beer and stepped on my foot.

However, once Dizzee Rascal (Nice pair of lads, very lively, no idea what they were going on about but I did enjoy them performing The Ting Ting's "What's My Name" as their opening track ) had finished Mrs Dym headed off to the loo.

I was happily sitting in my seat, enjoying the 'Old Skool' DJ set whilst the stage was prepared when there was a tussle on the set of stairs right next to me.

The tussle resulted in one of the lads being thrown down the set of stairs (a good 20-30 feet) into the concrete barrier. From the looks of things he had a broken wrist. The people sat (well they were standing) in front of me decided to have a shout at the guy that did it, and then the steward (an SIA licenced door supervisor) turned up and the guy who had been ranting and raving (and blatantly assaulted someone quite badly) went back to his chair.

Hmm.... Surely he should be escorted out of the premises and handed over to the Police... No?

When Mrs Dym returned from the toilets she was quite shaken up as someone had started throwing around green paint (which had gone all over her coat and top) whilst she was in the queue for the loos...

Hmm... Surely bag checks on the way in should have picked up on that... No?

The general atmosphere in the area where we were sitting was very tense and quite aggressive, so after quite a bit of thinking, we decided to leave.

Very dissapointing as, despite having been at the venue for over two hours, we'd not managed to see the band we were there to see.

We made a complaint with the venue security on the way out and they did comment that it had been very rowdy and aggressive during the performance the previous evening as well.

Also, whilst at reception complaining, a young couple who were seriously the worse for wear (either from drugs or just alcohol) had a stand up row right next to us which resulted in 5 security guards escorting them out of the venue (the last we saw of them the girl was having a stand-off with a Land Rover Freelander on Bridge Road outside the tube station).

I've been going to gigs for nearly fifteen years now and this is the first time I've ever left early because of the atmosphere and general demeanour of the other people there. If you're a fan of Spaced then it's like the clubbing episode and Brian's phobia of clubs after what happened to him in the 80s.

Good point of the evening was that we picked up a curry at the Indian just round the corner from the new flat and it was remarkably good (Feek, you have to try that next time you come over, it was soooooo much better than the attempted kebab last weekend ).

Going to see Berkoff's interpretation of On The Waterfront next Friday night, hopefully the clientele there will be more civilised!