Months ago Pauline and I paid nearly £80 for nosebleeds seats to see her highness perform at Wembley Stadium. When I say nosebleed seats I mean it – I think we were about ten rows from the absolutely last seat at the back of the stadium. I suspected these tickets were seriously over-priced but it wasn’t until the show tonight that we just realised just how much of a rip-off it was.

We got to Wembley Stadium relatively early to grab some grub also keen to see who was supporting Madonna. It turned out to be Paul Oakenfold – well we think it was as 1. we could barely see the stage and 2. the sound was awful and we could barely hear the music. We thought it was only for the support act and that they’d beef up the music for Madonna when she came on. Boy were we wrong.

Oakenfold’s set went for about 40 minutes and then we were left to sit. And wait. And sit. And wait. And sit. And wait. For nearly an hour and a half!!!!! It wouldn’t have been so bad if they’d at least put some sort of music on to fill the void but we were given nothing. As it turned out Madonna was about an hour late coming out on stage – which turned out to be annoying in more ways than one … including creating transport chaos at night’s end with many people left stranded and with expensive taxi rides home when the Stadium emptied out after public transport had stopped running. I was lucky enough to get the last tube home.

Considering Wembley Stadium is one big @rse venue I was expecting there to be speakers utilised all over the stadium with giant screens everywhere so everyone could see what was going on on stage. Instead the stage was set at one end of the stadium with two of the tiniest screens set on each side of the stage. The sound system was very disappointing – some songs we could hear and others were just a buzz in the background. Due to the size of the stadium it was also difficult to feel the show. We would have been better of in the standing section on the ground cause at least there was some atmosphere down there. Pauline and I really did try to get into it but you feel kind of foolish getting up and dancing and singing when you can barely see and hear the show. Lots of people left about halfway through the show and never returned. Truly disappointing.

Here are some pics of those who were about 1 m from the stage:

I wonder what celebs Gwyneth Paltrow, Kate Hudson, and Fergie thought of the show from their tents near the front. We might as well have been at home watching the show on the tv – probably would have got better sound and vision. Additionally, and I don’t know if it was because of the rubbish sound system and our distance from the stage, but I’m fairly sure Madonna was lip-synching most of her performances. Not that I would begrudge her that if this was actually what she was doing – she really was hitting the dance moves something fierce. For a 50 year old she can realy move.

As for the show itself – from what we could make out the show would have been really quite good. Original and fantastic I’m tempted to buy the DVD just so I can see how good it was and also so I could give her dancers a closer look – all giving the impression that they were tight and fiiiit!!! The show was broken into four parts mainly showcasing her latest releases but featuring a few oldies including the ever popular Vogue and Like A Prayer. Projections and videos helped lift the concerted and great melding of scenes into the next. I don’t want to take away from Madonna’s effort because she really did leave everything on stage. Just a shame she was let down by everything else. It should have been an amazing show. Never will I go to Wembley Stadium for a concert again – felt like I was just part of some giant money making scheme.