#148

I was in Paris

I had moved there about 6 weeks earlier. At the time I was writing songs with/for a Swedish singer who was signed to Warners and living in Paris. We’d been working with an English producer who was sleeping on the sofa at my place while we finished some demos and had some meetings.

We actively had no TV in our chic Marais apartment

That afternoon we had a big meeting with the head of Warners Publishing Europe and me & the producer were just packing up to head across town for our big meeting (the biggest of our young lives) when his mobile rang. It was his dad.

What I heard was half a phone call, something like this.
He was like
‘Dad, can we talk later, we have this big important meeting…
…what?!.. what sort of plane?! …on fire ?!.. no, we don’t have a TV, look, can I call you back in a couple of hours …muffled squeal thing that I could hear from down the line …HOLY FUCKING SHIT’

This was the moment the 2nd plane hit. Then my mobile rang, it was Tony my mate from London. "m88888888, World War III is kicking off, turn on the telly.’

So, no TV. But we lived on the 5th floor of a narrow 17th century street and could see straight across into all the apartments opposite and I look out and every TV was on and it was George W at the Primary school delivering a hasty statement

Anyway, we had to go. They’d immediately ordered a no-fly over Paris and there was not a soul on the street as we made our way to the meeting

Of course the meeting was just an hour and a half of us watching CNN. The head of Warners publishing at the time was an Australian lady whose parents were diplomats to the US. She had her dad on the conference call while we watch the replayed footage of the towers collapsing over and over. Listened to 30seconds of one of our demos and she was. ‘Let’s reschedule this meeting for next week or the week after.’

Then went to meet my girlfriend from work. She was working at Chanel on Rue Chandon which is a short walk from Place de la Concorde and the US Embassy which is there at the end of the Champs Elysée. She had no clue about what had happened, it hadn’t properly filtered through to Karl Lagerfeld’s studio there bless 'em, but we walked down to the Place de la Concorde to walk home through the Jardin de Tuileries and there were fucking tanks across the entrance to the Champs Elysées and a massive cordon around the US Embassy and jet fighters criss-crossing overhead

I think we (me, gf & producer) had a chill walk home and ate a rotisserie chicken

The follow up Warners meeting never happened & the Swedish singer ended up getting dropped from Warners. I also lost a very lucrative job doing a series of station idents for the Disney Channel (I think their offices were in WTC7)

I still have a bunch of French newspapers from the next day with their screaming WTC headlines and graphic ‘picture specials’

5 Likes
#149

And what was your mother’s maiden name when Diana died

6 Likes
#150

I was a lazy grad student at the time, and woke up to my alarm at 9:00 which was set to the radio news. Since this was the west coast of Canada everything had already happened, so the news cast was disorientingly awful and I kinda assumed I was still dreaming.
I went to the lab for a few hours where nobody was doing any work. Then I left and bought some new shoes.

1 Like
#151

I was in the pub. Met a friend i had worked with all summer for a few lunchtime drinks before heading back to manc the next day. Really took the edge off an all day drinking session and ended up going home slightly drunk and watching it on the news. really weird day.

#152

I remember going up to the shop the next day to buy loads of newspapers to make a 9/11 scrapbook. I was 11 so I think I was trying to process the significance of it but looking back that was such a weird thing to do :woman_facepalming: :alien: I’m sure I’ve still got the world’s most depressing scrapbook somewhere.

1 Like
#153

How many bizarre jobs have you had?

#154

I was in Belfast. Sitting in the bar of the Crown in central Belfast. Someone behind the bar put the telly on. Watched the 2nd plane hitting. Stream of American tourists coming in and understandably freaking out.

I was over there for 2 days to sort out accommodation for starting my PhD at Queens later that month. Had already started to talk myself out of it, and the panic involved in flying back home later that afternoon didn’t do wonders for my already shaky mental health at that point. Deferred the PhD for 3 months, then a year, then never did it. I do often wonder what I’d be doing if I’d actually cracked on with it.

#155

Was 14, came home from school with my mate a bit early. We had a guy called Tim doing some decorating so he was there when we got home.

We turned the tv on, was the news explaining about the first plane. We did not tell Tim. Saw the second plane hit, was quite startling even not really comprehending what was happening, still didn’t tell Tim though. Plane hit the pentagon too. Was shocking, but we didn’t know what the pentagon was so we asked Tim. He explained. Did not let him know about planes. Went back to tv. About half an hour later first tower collapsed. Tim came in, saw what was happening and was quite surprised we hadn’t let him know.

Probably should have told Tim about 9/11.

5 Likes
#156

Well I never ended up having these ones. Disney had seen the Nickelodeon (UK) idents I did music for and asked the director to do 8 for Disney Channel (US) and he asked me to do the music for ‘em. Job got cancelled the Friday after 9/11 as a direct consequence of them losing their NY HQ

#157

Wow. Never really considered that 9/11 had such a negative impact on some peoples lives.

2 Likes
#158

You’d be amazed!

Wait til you find out what Tony Blair did!

2 Likes
#159

I was in year 9 i think, came home from school and my mum was watching the news and caught me up, I remember lingering by the living room door staring at the TV in shock at the images

#160

Was at school as the news started to spread for sure, remember kicking it outside the tech labs and talking it about it with friends, and someone filled my bag with the big rocks outside while I was distracted (a classic gag). Had no idea what the World Trade Centre was but I kind of got the gravity (edit: of the situation, not the heavy rocks in my bag).

Got home and met my (elder) sister outside my house. She had tears in her eyes, and said to me with a completely straight face “I can’t believe someone would bomb Wembley”, which was very confusing.

6 Likes
#161

I wish I’d thought of doing this in school.

1 Like
#162

In the pub at lunchtime. It was all kicking off by the time l sneaked back. Bit of luck there.

#163

Bum whacks

#164

Back sack and

2 Likes
#165

All that lasagne, ruined

I’d be crying too

5 Likes
#166

Had just got home from school, was 14. Don’t remember if I turned on the telly before my mum rang or the other way around (she worked in politics at the time so it must have been quite a day in the office). Very distinctly remember assuming that it was some kind of horrific accident, being totally incredulous when my mum/the news told me what it actually was.

#167

Took the dog for a walk on the beach about 10 minutes before it happened, was away for hours and didn’t have the radio on in the car. Didn’t find out until pretty much everyone else on the planet knew about it.