Back in 2004, some friends and I booked tickets to see Blink 182 perform at Wembley. It turns out that this was to be one of their final performances before their infamous hiatus.
After the show, we made our way to the exits via the merchandise stand, which is where I picked up this marvellous hat. In hindsight that was a senseless purchase as I look like a bit of a moron in a hat.
More importantly, I didn't buy a T-shirt.
I wanted to - I always do at a gig - but the articles on offer were priced as though they had been handmade by the band members themselves, and I'd already bought a ridiculously overpriced stupid looking hat.
As we shuffled out, I thought long and hard about the T-shirts. I felt empty. I tried to reason with myself that I could perhaps break the bank and buy a tee? Perhaps sell the hat first? Maybe not spend too much on food this week? Maybe even eat the hat?
Or maybe if we kept walking there'll be a second merchandise stand just around the corner; a smaller more understated one with only a handful of special items reserved for people like me who savour the time making informed decisions about their apparel purchases. Yes, that must be it; a second-chance booth for today's more cautious consumer, ladened with bountiful T-shirt treasure...
Needless to say, the second-chance auxiliary merchandise booth was not an amenity installed at Wembley Stadium, or anywhere, anytime, ever.
I was down-trodden; feeling really low and as I stepped out into the street, I was ready to throw in the towel. But just then, I saw them. Lines of illegal street vendors pedalling their counterfeit and unofficial merchandise from the show - they're outside virtually every gig I've attended. They do their homework and knock up a fresh batch of badly replicated merchandise almost as soon as a bad announces its tour dates.
Now I want you to understand that I don't condone this sort of activity. Designers work too long and hard to have their creations reproduced in a sub-par and erroneous manner, as though crafted by chimps weaving oven gloves. I understand that what they're doing is wrong and illegal.
But they certainly don't lose points for convenience!
So today's tee comes courtesy of the shady backstreet T-shirt cloning community of Wembley. Thanks chimps!
