Ben Folds Five
Melbourne, 23rd & 24th August 1999
by Julie 'anti-gavin'

DAY 1

Well....my day started at 10am at the Palais, I arrived and the roadies and loaders were just unloading the two (TWO!) semis of BFF stuff..and we watched that for awhile...but nothing special happened there. Then my friend Kelly turned up at 2pm, and we just sat and waited for the boys, being told by the drivers that the band is getting picked up at 4pm..then Robert came walking sown the road at about 3:30pm and we started talking to him and got pictures and autographs and stuff..then he went. Then Ben turned up about 30 mins later, and yeah..the usual rara...autographs, photos, talking to him bout stuff..and gave his presents we got for the twins (2 sesame street toys) and it was cool. Then he went inside and came out about 20 mins later, and he talked to us, and told us he was going shopping, so off we went walking around St Kilda with Ben Folds for a lil while, then we left him alone..hehe..Ben also told us Darren had missed the bus..so yeah, we had to wait for him. Eventually he turned up and he only talked to us for about 5 mins and only I got my photo with him :D. Then...umm...we talked to the Piano tuner gerl michelle for ages and stuff...that was cool. Then the show.. (ooo also we gave Darren this funky sparkly beanie..hehe its ace) Then..yeah, the show, Darren wore his beanie, and Ben wore the sesame street toys in his suit pocket, it was soooo cute...and they played *gets her setlist*

Don't Change Your Plan
Battle of Who Could Care Less
Army
Alice Childress
Magic
Kwami's Last Nite in Town (Kwami by request of us)
Your Redneck Past
Mess
Hospital Song
Philosophy
Fair
Nacolepsy
Regrets
Dwarf
Underground

And Video was in there somewhere...

ENCORE:

Boxing - actually..it was only the first verse of this song....very wrongly sung too, then ben couldn't remember the rest of it..hehe it was soooo funny
Jackson Cannery
Song For the Dumped

Then after the show, we talked to Doug Goodman (tour manager if some of you dont know) and he told us to meet him at the back door....so we ran to the backdoor..and away we went backstage.

All these other fans came backstage as well...and then all these crew people and media and stuff, and then Ben came..and I talked to him about some weird vile and pepper ice cream, and it was heaps cool..then i let the others talk to him, and rob and darren came in. Robert came in...DRUNK, it was soooo funny, he was talking about how to spell his name, and it started with a W and hehe..man, I had NO idea what he was talking about and he did this weird thing and it was SO WEIRD...hehe..i have NO IDEA what he was doing Then he asked some girl if she wanted him to sign her titty.......at that stage I realised he was making an ass of himself and went to talk to Darren about his hair :D Darren kept thanking me for the hat, but told me it itches too much, and yeah..I had one exactly the same on my head and heeh..i scratched (haha thats weird of me to say) Then yeah, i got some cool pics of ben, and went outside and got lotsa pics of Darren with fans and stuff..

DAY 2

hehe..umm..I talked to Ben before the show, and he went and bought a scooter...he told us about his cool clarinet and said his mouth was all sore cos he was playing it for 3 hours and then we discussed playing instruments, saying how you can't just learn a song, you have to learn the entire instrument first...then I said "i can play brick and thats it" and he said "yeah...cept brick" then he told me the notes to brick i didn't know..hehe..then we told him how we go into this music store allans and play brick over and over again...and he asked if there was one around here, and said if there was one he'd take us...but GODAMMIT, there wasn't one around :/

Then Ben went inside, and yeah..we went to ring people..hehe Ooooo also, between ben going shopping and coming back, Joe the bass and drum tuner guy, gave us 3 bass strings and Darrens broken drum tuner Then we went and got our backstage passes from the front..and went inside to see em.. The setlist for the second nite:

Don't Change Your Plans Emaline - after this he asked who there was there the first nite..and it seemed to be just us, and he said "oh good..no one.....cept for our lil friends down the front here)

**I should also note in here that the venue they played both nites was seated :/ first nite i had 2nd row middle tix, and 2nd show I have front middle**

Army
Missing The War
Magic
Steven's Last Nite in Town - I handed ben the pink feather boa..and he danced around with it..then gave it back (i made sure he did)
Your Redneck Past
Mess
Hospital Song
Philosophy
Fair
Narcolepsy
Regrets
Best imitation of Myself - for us...we kept screaming it out and asked ben to play it the day before and he apologised for not playing it...he said "actually..i'm gonna play best imitation for these girls because they got my twins presents.....not that I can be bribed"
Dwarf
Underground

ENCORE:

Brick
Jane
Song For The Dumped

Then, we got the piano tuner to get us Darrens drumstick, and setlists (which she gave us later..after we went outside the palais) and we tried to get people to get bass picks for us...Joe threw one and it fell down this huge hole between the stage and front row..and crazy me jumped down there without thinking and it was a slight challenge to get back up..hehe Then we bugged joe for more stuff..and he goes "hang on, i got something better for you guys" and we were like "oooo" and he said "you dont want anyone around when i give you this" and we were wondering what it was "oh my god...maybe hes gonna give us darren" hehehehe.. then he came out and gave us two tympani drum skins...HUGE MOTHER DRUM SKINS hehehe..the security guards almost didn't let us out.. then we got them autographed and i got my drum stick and setlists..and stuck around after bff left talking to the roadies and tuners and stuff and yeah..was the best

so..yeah..thats it

I have photos...if anyone wants ask...i'll have them on my site in the next couple of weeks...so yeah :))

[The photo's are now up of course]

Check out Julie's Australian Ben Folds Five website!