Go West, Young Man (Part One)

When I came to Manchester in the summer of 2004, I remember I had three ambitions:

a) Form a band, play a gig
b) Get a job as a journalist
c) See the Pacific Ocean

The first one took a while, but come February 2007, I'd done it. The second one I achieved first, my first day in that occupation being my 24th birthday, then a few months later I found myself zooming over the Atlantic Ocean to Los Angeles. How did that come about?

The first factor making it possible was that I had a friend living in Hollywood. We'd met online when I was a young neer-do-well wasting time in some music chat room. We got talking: she was 12 years older than I and I think she felt sorry for the huge gaps in my musical knowledge. From henceforth came a steady stream of bands to check out - the Jesus and Mary Chain, Mazzy Star, Ride, Galaxie 500, the House of Love and so on. She'd seen all these bands, too, and compared to mine, her life seemed incredibly glamorous. In any case, she said if I ever wanted to visit LA, I'd be welcome to crash in her apartment.

In terms of raising the cash to get there, a few months after moving to Manchester I'd managed to snare a three month position doing admin for a big company. I'd put a bit aside, but the main boost was that when April came around, I worked out I was due several hundred pounds back in tax. Enough to pay for a ticket. Arrangements were made and so it was that seven years ago, I finally made first use of a passport I'd gotten six years previously.

People who know me well will tell you I hate travelling. As someone who on a bad day can have a panic attack about getting on a bus, this should have been a big deal. But somehow the incredible excitement of the whole affair overcome any nerves - on the flight, I was joyous to get a window seat, which paid off big time as it was a clear day seemingly across my entire flightpath.

There was also free drinks, and within 30 minutes of being airborne, I had my first Jack Daniels and Coke in hand while enjoying Spongebob Squarepants: The Movie for the first of three times. I also timed one of my frequent walks well enough to see the frozen Greenland out the other side of the plane. Then there were the glaciers of Northern Canada! The badlands of the States - flat deserts with Roman-straight roads, on which I could just make out tiny trucks on their lonely drives. My mind, as they say, was blown.

The journey was nine hours or so, but it seemed much shorter. The massive urban sprawl of LA was soon below me and despite the amount of alcohol I'd knocked back, I was perfectly clear headed enough to still be buzzing with excitement despite having not slept in over a day. In the airport, I'd been warned of ultra-tight security, but it seemed like I was outside with my bags in about 30 minutes.

Then, panic. I couldn't find my friend. Though we'd not met, I knew what she looked like and in any case, I'm pretty hard to miss. Wandering round for a minute, some beefy guy stops me.

"Hey, hey, been looking for ya."
I look back, blankly. I suddenly feel like I'm six years old again, lost from my mother.
"Was told to meet some tall white guy..." He adds.
I'm getting close to terrified now. Then he bursts into warm laughter.
"Just messin' with ya, man."

Turns out he's collecting for some charity, taking any spare currency travellers might have. I have about £2.50 in loose change which I hand over. He's impressed (for some reason) that I'm English, shakes my hand and leaves. I feel like my knees will give way and my whole body screams relief when my friend shows up.

In her car, we ease out of the airport and onto the Interstate 101, heading North to Hollywood. She turns on the radio and Crash by the Primitives blasts out. We both sing along and I know it's going to be the best two weeks of my life coming up.