From Aaron Lockton

I saw them on Tuesday night at Southend, and thought they were great. The venue was quite full but not packed out. After a brief appearance by Libido and then support band Rialto, they appeared on stage fairly late. I eventually made it to the front during Rollercoaster, and stayed on the bar for the rest of the gig.

The tracks they played, as far as I remember were: Firecracker, Inbetweener, Lie Detector, Nice Guy Eddie, Sale of the Century, Delicious, Dress like your mother, Romeo me, Rollercoaster, Traffic Accident, What do I do now?, Miss You, She's a Good Girl and Vegas (Not in the correct order, but close?). Overall a good mixture from the three albums, although one or two omissions IMO including Alice in Vain which was my favourite song the only other time I saw Sleeper (UEA, Norwich in 1996). Firecracker and Traffic accident were great live, proving the new album is no disappointment.

Louise looked gorgeous as usual. She threw some water into the crowd, and appeared towards the end of the gig drinking from a bottle of wine. She didn't say that much during the gig, although she said before traffic accident "This one is for politicians - they're all crap", and she said delicious was "For all the Essex boy racers". Before the last song she said something like thanks for coming - you've been fucking brilliant. I don't think she played any guitar.

Overall a very good gig, and I really hope that Sleeper survive given all the rumours going around and the lack of success of PTMY and its singles. I'm looking forward to the next tour!