Great night out in Cardiff!

The Tsunami Relief concert last night was a great success and it was a privilege to be there.

It was quite a packed day in fact. As I set off from our home in Llwynypia (in the Rhondda Fawr) for my surgery in Tylorstown (in the Rhondda Fach - we have two principal valleys in the constituency, the Fawr (large) and the Fach (small)) I could see our leafletters gathering in Tonypandy Square. By the time I got back they had finished two wards so the bulk of the work was done.

City were playing Burnley but I wasn't in my usual seat this time so I couldn't see if Alastair Campbell was there. If he was that's the second season running Ali has seen City beat his team. We went up two places because both Coventry and Plymouth lost. I'm starting to believe we can now escape relegation. Inamoto is making a difference in mid-field with his passing (he even put in some decent tackles yesterday) and Kavanagh has started the new year with a much more committed approach. This week we also had the good news about the planning approval for the new stadium and Sam says building could start in May. Fingers crossed.

Because of the City game I got to the concert after 6.00 so I missed Goldie Lookin' Chain though I caught a little of their act on TV and on the car radio. The BBC Wales announcer said after they left the stage you could see signs of relief on the BBC Executives' faces, presumably because the set hadn't been too risque for the 'anti Jerry Springer' types. You knows it!

The other 'home' bands did well. Kelly Jones played solo. One of the best gigs I have ever seen in Cardiff was the Stereophonics Cardiff castle gig during the European summit in 1998. Feeder also got the crowd moving, but I thought that the Manics really brought the stadium to life. They opened with Motorcycle Emptiness, then we got You stole the sun from my heart and If you tolerate this then your children will be next and they ended the set with Design for Life. I think I've left one number out there, but still.

Lulu also sent the crowd wild. The culmination was Jools Holland and his band and Eric Clapton. They were excellent, though possibly too bluesy for the audience. Clapton's guitar-playing was of course phenomenal. The encore of Shake, Rattle and Roll got people going again though.

The Millennium Stadium staff did really well. The sound and visuals were terrific. Much better in fact than I remember from the Millennium concert, when it was actually quite hard to hear the Super Furries' set before the Manics came on.

When we got out of the Stadium it was snowing.