This is my 'journal' of the trip to Scunthorpe to attend this gig. I probably wouldn't have gone if an album release was iminent, which would have been my loss. The evening was brilliant. I suffer from anxiety, so making a trip of over 130miles into unknown territory was quite a big deal for me. I dragged my dad along, as my friend hadn't watched the Fame Academy shows and wasn't interested (her loss). Oh, and despite my uselessness with cameras, I managed to get a few blurry pics, snippets of which you'll find dotted about below (and to the right).

:-) Lizzie

We left home at about 1:20pm and arrived in Scunthorpe at gone 4pm. It was easy to find. After checking in to the hotel we asked the receptionist how far the Hall was, and were pleasently suprised to find it was just down the road, only a minitues walk away. After a quick wander, dad had some tea (I wasn't hungry, didn't eat anything all day), and then we got ready.

The doors were due to open at 8pm. We left the hotel at just gone 8pm and wandered down the road to the Hall. There was already a queue forming, and no sign of the doors being opened. We were all eventually let in out of the cold chilly evening. There wasn't much in the way of seating, but plenty of standing room in front of the stage.

The backing tracks were put aside, and Nigel gave us a few acoustic tracks. One was a Lionel Ritchie song, dedicated to a recently deceased friend of his. He'd never sung the song before, it was requested by his friends girlfriend, so he needed the words on a sheet. Considering he wasn't familiar with the track, he did good. He also did a rendition of Christina Aguilera's (sp?) 'Beautiful', one slight hitch though... Nigel couldn't remember the first line, the poor guy blanked! Once someone got the first line for him he was into the song and gave a brilliant rendition. He also sang the Eagles 'Hotel California' on which he added some electric guitar cords of his own, live. That track was brilliant, Nigel can definately play guitar. My dad commented that he could have listened to the guitar stuff all night!

And of course I have to mention the original track that he sang for us, 'Walking In Your Shadow'. Absolutley brilliant! It didn't sound in the least bit out of place amongst all the other tracks. It's an excellent classic rock type piece. If that's the quality of tracks that he puts on an album I will most definately be buying it! I was very impressed.

And not forgetting the mystery guests!

First up was Ashley House, the first student to be evicted from the Fame Academy. He sang 'I Can See Clearly Now' and 'Lovely Day', and also dueted with Nigel for a couple of tracks, 'Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word' and 'Every Little Thing She Does'. Ashley's not my 'cup of tea', his voice seems to lack that extra something that Nigel and the other guest have, but he did sing well.

The other mystery guest was Marli Buck. She sang 'Torn' and 'Tracks Of My Tears', and also dueted with Ashley on 'Fields Of Gold'. She dueted with Nigel aswell, but I can't remember the song!! It was something Sinead and someone else had sung in the Academy. Marli rocks!

Nigel came back on and sang a few more tracks, including the three survival songs he'd sung on the Fame Academy show, 'In The Midnight Hour', 'Heaven', and 'Through The Grapevine'. He also dueted with Ashley on a version of David Sneddon's song 'Stop Living The Lie'. The gig was ended with all three singing 'Lean On Me'.

All in all a really great night. Nigel was brilliant, and the guests certainly didn't dissapoint. But the night wasn't over when the singing stopped. There was still the raffle to do, and of course the autographs. The raffle prizes included tickets to the Sheffield Fame Academy concert, and signed Fame Academy merchandise. By this time a lot of the younger kids were getting very tired, so the autograph session had the odd teary kid who wanted both an autograph and to go home to bed! Nigel was tired aswell, and the three stars sat on the edge of the stage to sign picture after picture. A number of the autographs Nigel was trying to write out went wrong and quite a few of the pics got tossed back onto the stage by him before he finally got it right.

I'm not very pushy so I was amongst the later to get his autograph. When I said who I was I got a hello kiss on the cheek!! We had a short chat, not about anything in particular, he seemed quite suprised at how young I look. I'm nearly the same age as Nigel. He made a comment about being tired and having a bit of a headache, and also that he wanted to go and get drunk! He was dragged away for a quick photo, before getting around to writing out an autograph for me, and I got another peck on the cheek goodbye :-) I'm sure I detected some stubble?

By this time it was nearly midnight, and I left the Hall very happy that I'd made the long journey there. It was most definately worth it! My dad said he'd enjoyed the gig too, and thought Nigel had a good voice and had sung well. As mentioned earlier, my dad particularly liked the electric guitar pieces.

We checked out of the hotel at about half past 10am, and headed south. My brother had said to pop in to his on the way back if we wanted, which is Leicestershire. We got there at about half past midday, but he wasn't in. His fiance was there, and she phoned him to let him know we'd arrived. It was over an hour later before he got home. We had a drink and a chat and went to leave, only my brother noticed my dad had a flat tyre!! There was a bolt stuck in it!! My brother and his friend sorted that out for us and we eventually arrived home at around 4pm.