It doesn't always rain, surely!

Only a week late this post, but based on my past (and I'm sure future) performances, then that's not too bad.

Last Tuesday me and Susie went to see Travis play at Koko (used to be something else, I forget what, feel free to look it up for yourselves), in one of the concert/football combinations mentioned in a previous post. The last time I saw them play was at my first Glastonbury, possibly 2000, when they headlined and I was front row. It meant I had to get to the stage at about 4, and sit through Reef, Ocean Colour Scene and the Pet Shop Boys (an possibly somebody else, I forget, to see them, but it was well worth it, despite my shoulder doing its popping out trick several times. This time I wasn't that sure what to expect. They had been away for a few years and some of their recent stuff had been a little samey, but I thought it was worth a go, especially at a small venue.

Supporting we had Brinkman, who I remember were tipped at the start of the year by those music afficionados, the Sun, as one of the bands to watch out for in 2007, and I remember checking their stuff out and not noticing anything stand-out, and it was the same during their set. I thought they had 2 or maybe 3 memorable songs, but the rest was all pretty much standard guitar fare. We did get a band sticker to give to Gary at work (his last name is Brinkman) and he was very happy with that when we gave it to him.

The main act, though, was a completely different proposition. When I was transferring all my CDs onto my PC to stick on my iPod, I got to the Travis albums and thought I had lost one as I couldn't find their greatest hits. I looked around for about half an hour, including in drawers and in bags we might have taken on holiday, until I realised that I didn't actually own their greatest hits, as I remember thinking that I didn't see the point seeing as I owned all of their other albums.....I'm so stupid.

The fact I do own all their albums meant that I actually knew about 2/3 of the songs, and most of the words to boot, which is pretty good going for me. Apparently I was quite enthusiastic in my singing (would you expect anything less), and Sooz reckoned I was singing in more of a cockney accent, no idea why that would be. I also had my sore throat so it is more than likely I was out of tune trying to hit notes, like I care.

Fran Healy (lead singer) seemed very pleased to be performing, and his little talky bits in between were very engaging, and the whole band were enjoying themselves. The new songs sat nicely with the old (I think they played 5 new songs, maybe 6), and there was never a moment when I felt bored or was clock-watching, which is always a good sign. My highlights were probably Writing To Reach You (which was possibly the first song that got me interested in the band, and is still my favourite of theirs), Pipe Dreams and Side, but pretty much everything they did was very good.

Of course they finished on Why Does It Always Rain On Me, which is always a good sing-a-long, and I'm very happy we went, as for me, it was even better than when I saw them before.

That's it for a while, my noticeboard is empty of tickets.....Glastonbury 2007 goes on sale on Sunday, wish me luck in my ticket pursuits won't you????

I want my hour back....

So, losing the hour at the weekend meant that I got up a the ludicrous time of 2pm, rather than the much more civilised 1pm.....and also meant I wasn't tired when I went to bed in the early hours of the morning, and so I got not much sleep and was pretty much still awake when Tina left for work at the uncivilised hour of, I don't know, lets say 6am....and it's all the fault of British Summertime.....damn you!!!!

Cough

I've had a stupid tickly throat and cough for about two weeks now.....I'm not sure I am helping it though, as in the space of twelve days I have been to three concerts, four football matches, the pub twice and played football in the cold once.....maybe doing nothing is the answer, but that is a bit boring

How did I manage to do it twice?

So yesterday I was getting a battenberg cake out of the cupboard, and obviously had my head too far forward as, when I closed the door I closed it on my head, causing a bump and a bruise.....fast forward to today, and I was reaching for the cupbboard without looking, opened the wrong door, and opened it straight onto my head again, dammit!!!

Every time I close my eyes

Me and Susie went to the Brixton Acadamy yesterday (which for me was the first time in about 18 months) to see the Arcade Fire.

To be honest, I'm not that big a fan of their music, but they are consistently nominated for best live act so I thought I would take the opportunity to see why. As with the concert on Monday, the support act were rubbish (I'm not even sure what they were called, I'm thinking it might be Electrelane). If it is them, then they are an all girl guitar based band with boring songs.

The Arcade Fire, on the other hand, consist of about 10 people playing dozens of instruments between them (including an organ, a double bass, an accordian and a french horn, and rotating who plays what as well). This alone made them interesting to watch, expecially when they were darting all over the place, and some of their music is better live too. One extra bonus about the gig is that is was (allegedly) no smoking, and although a few people did flout the rules, it did mean it wasn't as bad and so I didn't come out smelling of smoke like normal, roll on July.

So overall, despite my mind wandering a bit during the duller songs, it wasn't too bad (although Susie said I wasn't allowed to sing made up words as I didn't know the real ones).....next up is Travis

At first, when I see you cry, it makes me smile....

and laugh, and spill your drink, and smoke, and swear....

Yep, last night we went to see Lily Allen at the Hammersmith Apollo in what was one of the most fun concerts I think I have been to. I think it helped that miss Allen was a tad worse for wear in the sober stakes, but it didn't seem to affect her performance at all and it maybe even loosened her tongue even more in between songs, if that is at all possible.

As I have mentioned support acts before in my other reviews, i suppose I had better be fair to the Bird and the Bee. Erm, I thought they were boring. I guess they kind of looked like a sixties pop pastiche type band (I'm not really the best at describing types of music, they had a guitarist, a harpsichord or something similar, a singer with a guitar and then two girl singers in fiftes or sixties type dresses), but the music was dreadfully boring and whiny. That was until they did a cover of 'Do you know the way to San Jose', when the singer girl actually looked happy and the music was poppy again. And then the last song followed this same vein, and if thay had been like that from the start it would have been very good. However, they weren't, and the only thing that sticks in my mind is that they had a chorus in a song that went something like "Why won't you be my fucking boyfriend"....er, maybe because of your use of foul language love.

Back to Lily. The concert was full of young girls, which was great (and not for that reason you pervs!!!). Being short, I can't normally see much of the stage unless I am sat upstairs, but young girls means lots of short people which made it one of my best visibilty gigs (which obviously helps with the enjoyment).

The whole set kicked of with a lively version of LDN (below)



with Lily roaming the stage, and she continued like this for the whole concert, occasionally breaking to get some more drink (when she wasn't spilling it down her dress and then telling everyone it looked like she had wet herself) or another fag. My particular favourites were 'Everything is Wonderful' and the closing 'Alfie' but there were not too many boring parts. She also took a couple of playful digs at Amy Winehouse and Cheryl Cole, plus some less playful ones at Tony Blair and George W. Bush.

I wondered what she was going to do to extend the performance as her album is only about 40 minutes, but she slipped in a couple of new songs, not really selling the second one by saying "This appeared on my MySpace page for a couple of days, but we took it off as it was a bit shit". She also performed three covers, a reggae pop version of Heart of Glass by Blondie which was superb, Oh my god by the Kaiser Chiefs which was OK, and Blank Expression from The Specials, which was also OK, though I have no idea how it is supposed to sound anyway.

Her voice was going by the end, I guess drinking and smoking not too helpful to your voice.

It seems she went to town afterwards and got in a bit of trouble (no surprise as whe was well on her way at the end of the concert). Here is an article with a few pictures (she's wearing the same clothes so I assume it was the same night anyway).

Jamaican Funk

It's the family party tonight, and I'm sure you all know what that means.....yep, family dance time. So for those who wish to learn the steps, here is a brief description.....

Frist, you'll hear the yeaaaoulllllll from the jazz trumpet of Funkin' for Jamaica, by Tom Browne



and you'll get yourself onto the dancefloor for when the baseline kicks in. The moves are pretty simple....they go: -

step forward to the right, then bring your left foot alongside your right
step forward to the left, then bring your right foot alongside your left
step forward to the right, then bring your left foot alongside your right
jump back to the left
jump back to the right
kick your right foot forward
kick your right foot back, pivoting 90 degrees anticlockwise on your left foot
and repeat

so you can all go and practice now

Do I know you?

I don't know if anyone else does this, but when I wander around somewhere different, I always keep an eye out to see if there is anybody I know there. The only time I ever remember it happening was when I was at Chessington one time and did meet someone I knew, but I still do it......and seriously, how likely is it going to be that I will meet somebody I know in a shopping mall in Budapest, or Singapore airport, or Bondi beach.......as I've said before, I'm pretty sure I'm not mental

Beers from where?

Yesterday we went out with Andy and Thea and Twoozy and Andy and some other people who, whilst probably are worth a mention, aren't getting one. Anyway, we went to the Porterhouse pub round the back of covent garden, and I had beers from the following countries: -

Mexico (to remind me of when I was in Mexico)
Australia (same reason)
Canada (and again)
Germany
Ukraine
Belgium
Mauritius

I did want to try both the Albanian and Ugandan beers, but they didn't have them (at least at the bar I went to). There was alo a band playing, they were a bit rubbish to be honest, although they were squashed into a pretty small space, the drummer looked like he was a Tyrannosauras Rex his arms were that squashed together