Frank Turner-Thunder Road beneath my feet

Last Sunday I piled on the train westwards from Lincoln to Nottingham, the first time I'd left the Lincoln city limits in just under a month, to see my first concert in almost the same amount of time. Being my third time seeing Frank Turner, once supporting Gaslight Anthem, and once in a brilliant instore appearance at Pure Groove records in London, I knew what to expect and was therefore pretty exciting. After a quick dinner at a friend's student halls we made our way into the centre of Nottingham and trundled up to Rock City to collect tickets then join the queue to get in (and more importantly get up the front)

However there was nobody at the box office and thus we decided to go round the corner for a quick pint before making our way back in time for doors at 7 30.

And make our way back in time for doors we did, joining the queue for tickets which fed us straight in, which was nice.

However what came next was nicer. As we walked in walking up the stairs was Frank himself, with entourage going upstairs to checkout the first support, Beans on Toast (a guy called Jay, who's namechecked in second album opener "I Knew Prufrock Before He Got Famous") after a minute or so of bashfulness my friend and I plucked up the courage to go and have a chat, he was a lovely guy and said that he'd certainly consider my request of Thunder Road, and he'd have to check with his setlist creating machine. If, as he says in "Try This At Home" "There's no such thing as rock stars, there's just people who play music, and some of them are just like us and some of them are dicks" he definitely appeared to fall in the first camp, signing my phone and saying that he liked my "I am the real Frank Turner" T-shirt

Having missed out on the chance to be at the front we manoeuvred ourselves to the balcony and started to watch the action onstage

Beans On Toast was fairly good, but nothing to really write home about, just a bit of fun but not much more.

Fake Problems, the second support act were a bit of a surprise really, rather good, but more the sort of band you'd expect to be supporting a pop group really, I expect to hear more of them in the future.

Putting the punk in punctual, Frank arrived on the stage at about 9:30 as promised, and the band launched into Live Fast Die Old; a fantastic track, despite losing me a bet, having been sure that he would start with Prufrock like he did the last two times. And it's incredible how much they've advanced too, now functioning with a greater feeling of coherence than last time they run amazingly smoothly. Launching into the Road, the first single from the album the power keeps coming, as does the fantastic feel of community that only really comes from a giant singalong... rearrangements of the touching Long Live the Queen and Substitute (probably the song that I feel speaks to me most, even though they all do) the force keeps coming.

A couple of stripped down tracks follow, with a harmonica solo by "my friend Phil" and the fantastic ode to hangovers the Real Damage, a track that most people can relate to... the band return for a couple of songs before Frank informs us that the show sold out, thus making it a sell out tour... not bad considering that last time he was here with his old band, The Million Dead they were told to "Fuck off and never come back" this little story serves as the introduction to a cover (does it count as a cover if he wrote it?) of Million Dead track Smiling at Strangers on Trains.

Sons of Liberty, a track about how people are no longer proud of their heritage follows, with him being "so angry he'll actually do a guitar solo"

And then, undoubtedly the best part of the night for me

The band leave again and Frank begins the story of how he met some guy before the gig who asked him to play this song, and caught him at a good time and anyway this is "the best fucking song ever written" by this time I'm going more than a little bit mental, and he launches into a fantastic version of Thunder Road

Call to arms "Love, Ire and Song" follows starting off another series of full throated sing alongs before the main set ends with Journey of the Magi (which follows the theme of the last two album closers Ballad of Me and My Friends and Jet Lag in saying that the journey is more important than the destination)

He returns to the stage and rather disappointingly begins his traditional closer, the aforementioned Ballad of Me and My Friends which brings the roof down before bringing the band out for one last time and launching into the fantastic Reasons Not To Be an Idiot

Then out comes the support acts again, with Frank giving his guitar to the lead singer of Fake Problems and the band playing a beautiful and triumphant Photosynthesis, celebrating the glory of staying young at heart and true to oneself

And then it's finished and my sore throat has developed into an absent voice

But it was worth it

He's going places is our Frank