Would tonight's audience with Bob Geldof be worth the long wait? The answer was a resounding Yes! A capacity crowd were definitely up for tonight's proceedings. A rescheduled show from November last year. Geldof was forced to postpone the original date after he received a call asking him to strum his guitar and shoot his mouth off in South Africa at Nelson Mandela's 46664 Aids Awareness Benefit concert. I guess we can forgive him for blowing us out in favour of Mandela.

I'd always been a closet Boomtown Rats fan, I have all the albums and all the singles. But for some strange reason had never seen the Rats live. So tonight's gig promised to be something to remember. Geldof and Co have just released a Best of The Boomtown Rats compilation CD. I was hoping tonight that we would be treated to some of the golden oldies. He did not let us down. I cannot remember the last time I attended a concert that lasted so long. A full three hours and five minutes of pure nostalgia. Unfortunately for me, I was situated right in the middle of a row, so no chance of a dance, but more importantly, getting out to relieve my bursting bladder. You have to remember, us Rats fans are fast approaching pensionable age, so we have those little weaknesses we all dread. Bob obviously wanted to make up for the delay in his appearance.

Geldof has assembled a really tight band. The back catalogue was well and truly aired. The first of the Rats tracks to appear was a track from Fine Art of Surfacing (one of my favourite albums), When The Night Comes. Geldof tells us that the tracks for the compilation CD were chosen via a website poll and many of the choices pleasantly surprised him. Not just the hits. When The Night Comes was one such track. Geldof told us they had never played this track live in the Boomtown Rats days.

Monday's, Joey, Diamond Smiles, Mary of the Fourth Form, Dave, Rat Trap, Someone's Looking At You, Banana Republic were all performed in a gigantic Rats marathon. The rest of the show was made up of Geldofs solo offerings. Many of these were new to me, especially the Sex, Age & Death material which was his last solo album. Another amazing thing about this show was Geldof's delight in relaying the stories that lay behind many of the tracks, which made for an interesting insight into the great man's life. Of course, much of the chat was splattered with the usual expletives but there are only a few people who can get away with it so beautifully, Geldof is one, Billy Connolly is another. Geldof uses the most extreme four letter words, but seems to offend no-one. In fact you would feel rather cheated if he left out the odd curse.

The show seemed to be over in a flash and all too soon we were on our way home with memories of my childhood. A great night. Thanks.

Perhaps next time we may even get round to 'doin' the Rat'.

Margot