When my friend Tom asked me a few weeks back if I wanted to come along to Optimus Alive! festival in Lisbon I obviously jumped at the chance. The festival itself being only an hour away from where N and I live in Portugal and of course getting to spend time with Tom, who's not only lovely but with the added bonus of watching him play with White Lies.
With sunny skies and great music, this weekend was clearly going to be a winner.
We took with us our little brother/sister Courteney from New Zealand, who had never been to a music festival before, never heard of a rider and can't say no to a free beer...disaster.
Courtney and N having a few beers when we arrive.
Courtney and a very excited moi, getting ready for Angus and Julia Stone, who were of course wonderful (but they didn't play Mango Tree!)
As the night rolled on we were blissfully unaware that the main stage was closed for the evening. We started raving to pass the time.
and kept raving..
and raving..
you get the picture, the dance stage was a lot of fun. The Portuguese love their house music.
Team Rave.
The main stage came back to life later on that evening we had a little bounce around to 30 Seconds to Mars (Jared Leto is still yummy) and it was time to head back to our hotel in the outskirts of the city.
On the Saturday White Lies rocked the Portuguese fans, it's so much fun to see the die hard fans who know every word singing, bouncing around clapping. If you look very closely you can see Tommy pulling his sulky keyboard sex face ;)
A few hours of being spoilt by backstage hospitality we all headed to the side of the main stage to watch Paramore, and boy can Hayley Williams command a crowd, rock red hair and pull off two tone trousers, that girl is beautiful.
A brief photo with Tom before going back to perving on Hayley.
Feeling like rock stars we said our good byes and headed home to our quiet coastal life in sleepy rural Portugal. Going to the local salt festival yesterday kind of brought us back down to earth with a bump!
Thank you dear Tom for a lovely weekend, can't wait to see you again soon.
E x
ps You can follow Tom here if you like.
Awww shucks, well isn't that lovely. Twas an awesome night!
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