Month: November 2003

Well Echo and the Bunnymen wasn’t bad at all. I think I suffered by not being all that familiar with their music. I only knew 2 of the 20 odd songs they played.

Oh for those of you who may have thought that I went on about Radiohead playing Creep a little…NME’s headline for the gig review article: Radiohead play ‘Creep’ in UK for first time in two years.

Also, some notes on the Ryan Adams gig: Ryan Adams delights fans with extended London gig.

This could be a good week. Work is hectic, it’s a big big week there with some huge deadlines. Outside of work I have a couple of nights out. Tomorrow is dinner locally with the V/work people who live around here. Looking forward to it quite a bit. Wednesday night is quite a big work do and I’m looking forward to that a lot. I suspect I’ll be working hella late Thursday/Friday and perhaps in over the weekend taking what I’m sure will be a well earned break to see The Strokes on Saturday night.

Reading wise, John Connolly’s Every Dead Thing is ok, standard crime thriller with a bit of extra gore. Comics wise is the new Catwoman trade and then onto League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Volume 2.

I need a holiday, I really do.

2 out of three assembled. 2 screws missing and one cut…that’s not too bad I don’t think. I have to go out to the shop in a little while. Need to pick up some bits and pieces. Then some food is in order and then off to the gig. I’ll spend some time over the next few nights actually stocking up the shelves.

Alias season 2 has been seeded again this week. So I get some of that goodness to tide me over until the DVDs get released and I get a whole seasons goodness in one go.

Gah tired. Looking forward to tonight but starting to think that a seated ticket would have been good. Not planning on getting there till 8ish.

Some random surfing has now landed me with another gig by the end of the year. The Strokes in London next Saturday night 🙂

The latest Transmet trade Cure wasn’t bad, a bit of a return to form and I’m going to dig out the final singles to finish it off.

So the pub last night was on for a couple of reasons. There were some Americans vaguely connected to the V over in London for a long weekend and the V regs they are staying with are moving house and won’t make many drinks anytime soon.
So drinks were had and we sat around the pub for a few hours drinking and chatting. As it turns out one of the Americans comes over to me and taps me on the shoulder to introduce himself. He’d just been told who I work for…and well last week he was involved in fixing one of the biggest bugs in the project I’m working on…and it just turns out that his girlfriend sitting next to him and I spent last week on a conference call discussing another bug.

It’s a damn small world.

Other things of note:
– yet again Alex and I got home drunk, went on the internet and aruged about comics for an hour.
– Goth chicks…yum
– Does no-one share the Tiffany love?
– There is a distinct lack of hangover this morning which is quite good.
– Tonight is Echo and The Bunnymen in Shepherds Bush. Looking forward to it.
– I want to get my shelves assembled today and will do that when I get off the computer in a bit.
– Picked up comics yesterday so look for some thoughts on them soonish, although an early one is that Empire is awesome.

You know on paper this last week has been one of the best in a long time. In reality it has too…but I don’t feel like it has been. I know it’s has had some great high points (gigs) and almost no low points. Tonight should be a good cap to the week and I’m looking forward to it.

Drinks with the V are a good thing and should be done more often.

It has been a good week. It’s been a really good week actually. Nothing has gone wrong (watch me jinx it now), in fact everything has gone well.

I get my furniture tomorrow and I hope that’s going to let me get things sorted out here.

I’ll be off sorting out other things.

sleep

So a few more thoughts on last night.

May as well just get straight to the point. Radiohead don’t play Creep anymore. They aren’t fond of it, it’s haunted them since the early ’90s. So last night when Thom said something like “we have to hurry up, can’t have any silence” and then they started playing the audience went quiet for a moment as everyone heard the start of Creep. I think there was a moments disbelief, there certainly was from me and then boom. I remember standing there thinking my god that’s it. I’ve got Creep and my god did Jonny hit the chainsaw guitar and my god did the crowd go for it.
Moving from that into Paranoid Android rocked hard, anyone in the crowd who had not been with them by now was all the way there. A couple of new songs and then such a wonderful live version of No Surprises, certainly my favourite OK Computer track and one of my favourite Radiohead songs. Ending the first set with such a powerful three in a row had us all screaming for more.

An average second set, nothing standing out as being majorly impressive but then when they came back for a third, you just knew that something was coming. A decent We Suck Young Blood set the scene and left us waiting for a classic. Thom says “here’s an old one we have been enjoying lately” and in exactly the same way as Creep we hear the start of The Bends and the crowd goes for it. At this point it was perfect, to get those two songs in a single set these days from Radiohead was just awesome. Following this and appearing to be unplanned Thom goes into a solo for Follow Me Around an unreleased tune amazes the crowd.

The only thing which could have made it better would have been True Love Waits, but I’m happy with what I got.

Tonights setlist…

There There HTTT
2+2=5 HTTT
Sit Down. Stand Up HTTT
Where I End And You Begin HTTT
Lucky OK Computer
Backdrifts HTTT
I Might Be Wrong Amnesiac
Myxomatosis HTTT
Creep Pablo Honey
Paranoid Android OK Computer
Go To Sleep HTTT
Sail To The Moon HTTT
No Surprises Ok Computer
The Gloaming HTTT
Just The Bends
Exit Music For A Film OK Computer
Idioteque Kid A
——————————-

Like Spinning Plates Amnesiac
The National Anthem Kid A
A Punch Up At A Wedding HTTT
How To Disappear Completely Kid A
——————————-

We Suck Young Blood HTTT
The Bends The Bends
Follow Me Around Unreleased
Everything in it’s Right Place Kid A

I really don’t need to say anything else.

So blogger is fucked at the moment…yay.

Email to myself to post later.

Ryan Adams. Well that was a strange gig. The worst audience I’ve ever been in that’s for sure. I was upstairs which I hadn’t realised, I thought I had booked a standing ticket so that annoyed me a little. Then there were two guys who looked to be brothers obviously at their first gig a couple of seats in front. They kept standing up and sitting down for the entire night. Blocking the view every few seconds, looking around to see no-one else was standing, one would nudge the other and they would slowly sit down. Wankers.

The music itself was also strange. About 5 songs in it was not going well. It just wasn’t coming together and the band new it. They stopped playing and had a brief chat. It started to come together after that but not towards the end of the set. Having announced around 10pm that he was going to play for two hours when they finished the set and left the stage at around 10:30 I wasn’t too impressed…when they were still playing the third encore at 11:45 I was impressed. Certainly someone I want to see again but with a whole other audience. For the second encore it was all acoustic. Ryan and his guitar and that was it. And the silence fell…except for the people arguing at the bar and the people kicking cans and the fuckers trying to clap along and it just being wrong.

Also despite being (or at the least appearing to be) pissed out of his school for the entire gig, the man can sing, play guitar and play drums pretty damn well.

Still a good artist and I’m going to enjoy listening to some of his stuff tomorrow.

Whoo hoo. I see Glastonbury 2004 is on.

Other stuff, oh yes I went to bed and then read Breakfast After Noon. It’s really good stuff.

I went to the post office today and if I can be bothered in the morning there is a story there too. I managed to send 4 letters today. This is an amazing feat…(I’m shit really, I know)

I need to dig out my camera too. I want to get some photos taken and posted onto the interwebnet.

Funnily enough I feel more settled today…it’s been a good day overall and tomorrow promises to be better. That has just reminded me to put my ticket in my wallet now. I really can’t wait, it’s gonna be such a good evening. Reviews of the past few weeks gigs have been great and I really can’t fucking wait. It’s gonna be so good.

I want to study again, I really do. I have a friend doing it at the moment and it’s really making me want to learn something which I can use. More on that one shortly.

Also I remembered something on Tuesday. I was in conversation with one of the guys on my team I suddenly thought of the date. Monday was my 4 year anniversary with my company. 1 Redundancy, 2 major job changes, 1 country change, 4 bosses, 4 desks and a 350% payrise.

I think that’s been a source of some thoughts lately. I knew it was coming up and it ties into some other stuff.

More on that later too.

oh yes Mozilla’s Firebird is ace.

I’m not sitting here listening to David Bowie’s Magic Dance because I like Labyrinth…really I’m not.

On a completely unrelated topic Jennifer Connelly is hot.

I’m bored tonight again. I went for a drink with the lads after work, came home to hit the chat and then went to the local for a drink. Watching all of the beautiful people in couples depressed me and so I came home.
I’m not really doing much. Hit some boards, managed to order my furniture for a Saturday delievery which is good. Then in the afternoon I am going to collect some comics and then I suspect the V drinkup in the evening.

I have been listening to the last Robbie Williams album a bit tonight. I like a couple of songs which in fact I already liked and is the reason that I’m listening to it. Feel and Come Undone are not bad at all.

I cancelled my training course for Thursday/Friday. I’m a little annoyed but work is hectic and I have to take care of that. I suspect I’ll be in over the weekend anyway, the training would just have ensured I was. It’s at the point where I am getting results on a daily basis and it feels good…if a tad stressfull. I really hate it when I don’t get what I need by the deadlines I need them by. It’s very frustrating, it also means we are going to miss some dates…oh wait we just did.

*sigh* I have a feeling which I want to get down on paper but I don’t know quite what the feeling is, there is a sense of transience here and there and perhaps moving on is a good way of phrasing it. Things have changed (contradictory moi?) or is that thoughts have changed? The latter I think.

Oh yes, the whole Michael Jackson thing (what rock have you been living under?)… two things, innocent until proven guilt and what a back catalogue. The man’s musical talent cannot be denied or forgotten. Somehow I think the music world would be very different without him.

I am so very shit at going to the post office. I *really* have to do it tomorrow, really.

I have to go and reread some Andi Watson. He has been mentioned on the V recently and just now the thread has been bumped. I think I need to read Breakfast After Noon.

I’d like a stereo and a big tv. It would be nice. I don’t really have the space for either but I’d still like ’em.

Gah