Photo by aref-adib
Thursday, 21 February 2008
Monday, 18 February 2008
Fireworks Night, My Sad Captains - Hoxton Kitchen Bar and Grill
Missed the first band, having dinner with pa and driving over from the otherside of town. Why is Hoxton so difficult to get to? And parking, don't get me started, well, wasn't so bad really. Parked for free outside The MacBeth, haven't been there in a while.
So, the first band, I caught, the second on stage, sounded like the more bombastic Divine Comedy, and the same lilt as Ink Wilson's How To Swim, but with half as many people on stage. Two violins mind, which gave a rare depth. There was a banjo chap too, he switched to playing the wood saw for the final song.
Nice haunting wig out at the end, if I can find the name of the band, I'd check out their Myspace later.
Oh, Tom SoundsXP and Trev Lost in the crowd and that chap with the moustache from White Heat, three sets of bonus points.
I don't think I've been here since Architecture In Helsinki, its still got that annoying lighting where you can't see where you're going, and save the indiekids, its a bit too Shoreditchy in the crowd, all stubble and the Mighty Boosh.
My Sad Captains, getting into my top three favourite bands right now. Still like last time, when they play live, they sound different what's on my iPod, more stadiummy, epic even, extended play versions, with more depth and flourish. It caught me off guard, I thought it was just where I was standing that sounded different, but no, they're on fire tonight.
I like them in the same way, with the same passion I loved Ash in '95/'96, the way the set flows, not so much with hits, but with the ones I know, all neatly slotting in. Couple of new songs, a little different from their more familiar stuff, remember the difference between Trailer and 1977. Its a step change in the more commercial mainstream direction.
New single out at the end of March on White Heat Records. I hope they have some festival dates lined up.
Bands
My Sad Captains
Fireworks Night
Other Reviews
here
here
So, the first band, I caught, the second on stage, sounded like the more bombastic Divine Comedy, and the same lilt as Ink Wilson's How To Swim, but with half as many people on stage. Two violins mind, which gave a rare depth. There was a banjo chap too, he switched to playing the wood saw for the final song.
Nice haunting wig out at the end, if I can find the name of the band, I'd check out their Myspace later.
Oh, Tom SoundsXP and Trev Lost in the crowd and that chap with the moustache from White Heat, three sets of bonus points.
I don't think I've been here since Architecture In Helsinki, its still got that annoying lighting where you can't see where you're going, and save the indiekids, its a bit too Shoreditchy in the crowd, all stubble and the Mighty Boosh.
My Sad Captains, getting into my top three favourite bands right now. Still like last time, when they play live, they sound different what's on my iPod, more stadiummy, epic even, extended play versions, with more depth and flourish. It caught me off guard, I thought it was just where I was standing that sounded different, but no, they're on fire tonight.
I like them in the same way, with the same passion I loved Ash in '95/'96, the way the set flows, not so much with hits, but with the ones I know, all neatly slotting in. Couple of new songs, a little different from their more familiar stuff, remember the difference between Trailer and 1977. Its a step change in the more commercial mainstream direction.
New single out at the end of March on White Heat Records. I hope they have some festival dates lined up.
Bands
My Sad Captains
Fireworks Night
Other Reviews
here
here
Sunday, 17 February 2008
Antifolk Winter Festival - 12 Bar
12 Bar, Suzy Almond doing bluesy folksy music on her own with a big acoustic guitar in a drafty but crowded backroom that reminds me of some crumbling barn in Toledo.
At least 50% of the women here have the same hairstyle as an ex-girlfriend I had called Jax.
Its the Antifolk Winter Festival, dunno how this one sneaked under the anorak indiepop radar, but half the bands here are Indietracks favourites, and I've just had to text AJ Smith when I found out that The Television Personalities are headlining.
The band times are pinned to the wals all over the place. I've missed a day's worth of bands yesterday and one band today already.
Next on stage is Stuart James, so subtle the folk in the crowd hardly notice when he starts. What he's playing is awesome, just him and his guitar, but its almost spoken word, quickfire, mumbles, hardly pausing for breath, guitar hardly strummed.
I was listening to Nislopi the other night, this chap has the same accent. I think the subject matter is more Just Joansy, but more intense, dense, tightly packed. Maybe if The Streets weren't hip-hop.
He wears blue t-shit and brown jeans, that's what I wore last time I played a gig in London.
Other Photies
here
At least 50% of the women here have the same hairstyle as an ex-girlfriend I had called Jax.
Its the Antifolk Winter Festival, dunno how this one sneaked under the anorak indiepop radar, but half the bands here are Indietracks favourites, and I've just had to text AJ Smith when I found out that The Television Personalities are headlining.
The band times are pinned to the wals all over the place. I've missed a day's worth of bands yesterday and one band today already.
Next on stage is Stuart James, so subtle the folk in the crowd hardly notice when he starts. What he's playing is awesome, just him and his guitar, but its almost spoken word, quickfire, mumbles, hardly pausing for breath, guitar hardly strummed.
I was listening to Nislopi the other night, this chap has the same accent. I think the subject matter is more Just Joansy, but more intense, dense, tightly packed. Maybe if The Streets weren't hip-hop.
He wears blue t-shit and brown jeans, that's what I wore last time I played a gig in London.
Other Photies
here
Saturday, 16 February 2008
Friday, 8 February 2008
Twee As Fuck: Ipso Facto, Liechtenstein, The Winter Club - Buffalo Bar
I fucken hate queues. I hate them so much.
You know queues at cash machines, thats a load of people who really want to spend money, but have been stopped from doing so. Some would say we're heading for a recession here in the 21st century, banks could boost the economy in seconds by making their machines give out money quick. Fuck fraud. The government hand out our personal details at every opportunity and banks already charge us through the nose, so fuck so that. When we want to spend money, don't make up wait for it.
Queuing up outside the Buffalo Bar for Twee As Fuck presents Ipso Facto, Liechtenstein, The Winter Club. Its cold and the queues not moving, its kind of stationary. It only moves very slowly, not because they are letting people in slowly, but because guestlist folk are escorted to another queue or people give up and fuck off to some other gig. Every so often the queue moves backward as folk push in, spotting their friends nearer the front. "Its not what you know, its who you know".
Listen to this
*jingle jangle*
that is the sound of my pockets full of cash, I want to pay the girl on the door to let me in, I want to buy a few drinks, I want to watch some bands, maybe I want to buy some merchandise.
But I can't because I'm stood outside in the cold in a queue that isn't moving.
Imagine, hypothetically, in some crazy fucked up world, that I didn't go to gigs out of a rabid obsession with seeing as many bands as possible and then spewing my own vitriol and agenda online, but as some kind of social event, and rather than just seeing people at gigs socially, I'd seek to swell the size of the scene by bringing along my own, still hypothetical, friends.
"Aw man, you'd love this band" Sayeth me to hypothetical friend
"Ach, but we'd have to stand around for hours" quoth said hypothetical friend
"No no no, look at this graph..."
"... which clearly shows people expect bands to start half an hour after the Facebook quoted doors time, but actually the bands start an hour after the Facebook quoted doors time. (months of research went into this graph)"
"Wow Chris, you've convinced us. We ought to invite you out to the pub and parties and stuff more often, and I'm going to put a good word in about you to that girl you're scared of talking to."
Quick scene change to queuing up outside the fucking Buffalo Bar in the cold for ages. Hypothetical friends would turn to me and say something like "Chris, I'm going to stamp on your throat for this" and they'd be completely justified.
Twenty minutes outside in the queue without it actually moving, almost an hour after the doors time, and I give up and head home, musing briefly about the bands I've missed...
Liechtenstein, I saw them once before, at the Albany, thought they sounded like a girl-fronted Specials, kind of cute too. No idea about the other bands, The Winter Club and Ipso Facto, maybe I never will.
So apart from my cold getting a wee bit worse, the best thing about tonight's gig was that when I got home, I had thirty quid in my pocket! Fucken aye!!
Bands
Twee As Fuck
Ipso Facto
Liechtenstein
The Winter Club
Other photies
here
You know queues at cash machines, thats a load of people who really want to spend money, but have been stopped from doing so. Some would say we're heading for a recession here in the 21st century, banks could boost the economy in seconds by making their machines give out money quick. Fuck fraud. The government hand out our personal details at every opportunity and banks already charge us through the nose, so fuck so that. When we want to spend money, don't make up wait for it.
Queuing up outside the Buffalo Bar for Twee As Fuck presents Ipso Facto, Liechtenstein, The Winter Club. Its cold and the queues not moving, its kind of stationary. It only moves very slowly, not because they are letting people in slowly, but because guestlist folk are escorted to another queue or people give up and fuck off to some other gig. Every so often the queue moves backward as folk push in, spotting their friends nearer the front. "Its not what you know, its who you know".
Listen to this
*jingle jangle*
that is the sound of my pockets full of cash, I want to pay the girl on the door to let me in, I want to buy a few drinks, I want to watch some bands, maybe I want to buy some merchandise.
But I can't because I'm stood outside in the cold in a queue that isn't moving.
Imagine, hypothetically, in some crazy fucked up world, that I didn't go to gigs out of a rabid obsession with seeing as many bands as possible and then spewing my own vitriol and agenda online, but as some kind of social event, and rather than just seeing people at gigs socially, I'd seek to swell the size of the scene by bringing along my own, still hypothetical, friends.
"Aw man, you'd love this band" Sayeth me to hypothetical friend
"Ach, but we'd have to stand around for hours" quoth said hypothetical friend
"No no no, look at this graph..."
"... which clearly shows people expect bands to start half an hour after the Facebook quoted doors time, but actually the bands start an hour after the Facebook quoted doors time. (months of research went into this graph)"
"Wow Chris, you've convinced us. We ought to invite you out to the pub and parties and stuff more often, and I'm going to put a good word in about you to that girl you're scared of talking to."
Quick scene change to queuing up outside the fucking Buffalo Bar in the cold for ages. Hypothetical friends would turn to me and say something like "Chris, I'm going to stamp on your throat for this" and they'd be completely justified.
Twenty minutes outside in the queue without it actually moving, almost an hour after the doors time, and I give up and head home, musing briefly about the bands I've missed...
Liechtenstein, I saw them once before, at the Albany, thought they sounded like a girl-fronted Specials, kind of cute too. No idea about the other bands, The Winter Club and Ipso Facto, maybe I never will.
So apart from my cold getting a wee bit worse, the best thing about tonight's gig was that when I got home, I had thirty quid in my pocket! Fucken aye!!
Bands
Twee As Fuck
Ipso Facto
Liechtenstein
The Winter Club
Other photies
here
Thursday, 31 January 2008
Monday, 28 January 2008
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
