diamonds are a girl's best friend.

So yesterday was the long-awaited Marina & The Diamonds gig at the Bloomsbury Ballroom, London. Oh. My. God. I actually love her.
The day began with a Modern American Lit exam. But I'd rather not talk about how that went so we'll move on. Got the train at 4.02pm. Had to run and make everyone wait, but got it nonetheless.
Sat on the train, I was trying to reply to Facebook threads on my phone (with great difficulty, as I haven't entered the world of the Blackberry or iPhone yet) so I'm sure my eyes were squinting and my tongue was poking out of my mouth due to my intense concentration. If only I'd been that attentive in my exam. A man in a very expensive-looking suit gets on, sits himself down, and pulls out said iPhone. Looking at him jealously, I got distracted by his bow tie. Panicking, I remembered the name of the Marina venue, and suddenly wondered if I should be wearing some kind of ball gown. Shit.
Obviously, I wasn't but it got me thinking for a second. Stupid iPhone owner.
Anyway after reaching Victoria and pestering various policemen for directions and tripping up numerous escalators, I finally made it to Charing Cross to meet A, my fellow Marina lover. After some more trekking, we stumbled across our venue. I say stumbled for two reasons. Firstly, because London drivers have no mercy for pedestrians, and crossing the damn road was apparently too much to ask. Secondly, because we had grabbed some food and had no idea where we were, when we noticed a queue of teens outside a very big building, guarded by some bouncers. Sat in the queue, we decided we'd regress to a few years back, and graffiti ourselves with eyeliner and lipstick. As you do. After more waiting and having Jagermeister reps throw orange garlands of flowers over us, we finally made it inside. Upon entering, we were accosted by a bloke trying to sell the gig merchandise. I should probably tell you that I am very easily swayed, and this is not my best trait. Infact its quite annoying, even to me. My eyes must have doubled in size at this point, because he tried everything in his power to take my money off me, even resorting to "this is the last one" when I questioned him about some £10 lip paint (it was UV!!) even though we were one of the first to get inside. Silly man. Although I did buy a t-shirt because I am just that cool. I'm glad I didn't wear it during the gig, because its fashionable, high round- neck would A) have probably killed me in the heat and B) looked ridiculous as another girl decided to tear most of hers apart, leaving little to the imagination.
Back to the actual gig. Marina was supported by Spark, a newcomer to the music industry who wowed the crowd with her voice from the moment she opened her mouth. Favourite songs of hers include Revolving, Scream and Blow. Since the only place I can find these on the web is on myspace, I feel like I'm fifteen again.

Check her out, www.myspace.com/sparkthemusic

Marina finally comes on. She opens with Girls, my favourite lyrics being "Girls, oh girls, wag your tails to the beat". She chatted to the crowd between songs, remarking on the business men at the back who weren't clapping her and how she'd need some help singing due to her voice being affected by the "secret ciggies".
She goes on to sing pretty much her whole album; The Outsider, Rootless, Numb, Guilty, Hollywood, Shampaign, Oh No! Mowgli's Road, Obsessions and of course, I Am Not A Robot. She included a song called Seventeen which isn't on there, but just as good as the others. She sang perfectly throughout, regardless of the shouting "WE LOVE YOU MARINA" and "WHAT A SONG" after announcing she was to sing Guilty. She finished by singing her Radio 1 cover of 3OH!3's Starstrukk, which was incredible. Her second outfit of the night was made up of one of her own Marina T-Shirts, with some very fetching Coca Cola dungarees. She pulled it off, somehow.
Loved every minute and definitely buying tickets to see her again in November.