Marbella Eye and what appeared to be most of Marbella’s Hoi Polloi (it’s a Greek word, Google it) queued in insufferable heat at 8pm this evening to enjoy the first of many concerts of the Starlite Festival.
The last time so many people crowded together for one goal was when the first opening of the Berlin Wall appeared in the 80′s and half of East Germany flooded to the West.
As I predicted many months ago, the logistics of holding any 3,000 plus concert in the old Auditorium in Nagueles, Marbella (a legacy from the 
Jesus Gill days) would be a nightmare, and sure enough it was. We of course were on the VIP List as were most of the 3,000 it would appear, but where was the list of names?, ha they lost it, yes indeed Marbella’s finest sweating like Mad Dogs and Englishmen as Mr Coward would have said, all waiting for hours to get their tickets so they could get on the buses to take them aloft to the venue.
Four queues of people, a high street of buses and yet when I and Sir Thomas Foley asked the lone girl running the loading why not load 4 buses at the same time i,e one bus for each line she replied Oh no we can only load one bus at a time, to which Mr T replied ah but of course that would be too easy, Spanish logic at it best. To which end some fans I spoke to later missed the first 30 minutes of the Maestro, George Benson. By the way peeps Snr Benson is one of the finest guitarists alive today and well worth queuing for. By the way I thought I was rid of bus journeys when I left school, oh how wrong I was.
The venue is stunning once you get there, although I did notice a few giving up the ghost and sliding back down the hill for a quiet drink in town, it really was that hot. For those that made it to the top, it’s easier climbing Mount Kilimanjaro with a goat on your back, were shocked to find that a simple bottle of water would cost them 8 euros, yes 8 euros (captive marketing I hear you murmur) and 13 bucks for a Mojito which to be fair isn’t too bad.
As for the concert, having seen Georgie boy at least 5 times in this fair town, and don’t get me wrong I love him and his music to death, but 3 hours waiting for tickets, a bus journey, waiting in lines reminiscent of the depression just to buy a token to get into another line of sinners to swap said 8 euro token for a sip of water, Sofie and I decided, you know what, sod it, George will forgive us, lets go to the Old Town for dinner which we duly did (Tempora, well worth a visit)
Of course the concert was a roaring success and everybody was happy in the end, but please Starlite people sort out the token thing and load your buses four at a time, even Noah loaded the Ark two at a time…
But for your pleasure here are some piccies I took of George over the years, almost certainly the same as I would have taken tonight but was too busy with a nice Sauvignon Blanc, some very nice Turbot and of course my Swedish fiance, sorry George you can’t win them all.
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