Saturday 25th August 2007
Song: Metric - Wet Blanket
So, it's been a while, thought I'd write some things.
The other night I went off to London with James and two of his friends, David and Greg, to Decydance fest. This was a shindig put on by Pete Wentz/Fall Out Boy where FOB, Panic! At The Disco, Gym Class Heros, The Academy Is, and Cobra Starship would all be touring together. On the whole, it was a very good night. Perhaps a little too long, as we left home at 4:30pm and didn't arrive back until 1am. I also getting feel that I'm getting too old, my legs and back hurt, and I thought it was too loud. :( The main reason I wanted to go to this event was to see Panic! and although they were definitely good, I was a little disappointed in them. I was hoping for a bigger "show" of sorts from them, including dancers, and a windmill, as well as extra musicians on stage to do all the other instruments in their songs. But no... Just the four of them, no windmill, and sadly a lot of "nearly live music". There was one song where Brendon picked up a guitar, which I thought was good, didn't know he played guitar, but then he just did one firm strum and immediately muted it (perhaps a means to begin the pre-recorded track?) and then some guitar was playing, but both guitarists on stage weren't doing it. I kind'a feel with two guitarists on stage, they should be equipped enough. Also a lot of their songs use synth-y stuff which was present in the output, but there was no one on stage with a synth, keyboard or anything. As I said, it was a good set, I just felt I'd got my hopes up a bit too high. Pleasingly Fall Out Boy rocked nice and hard, and an array of people from the other bands kept coming out to sing bits with them which worked quite well. I feel I had underrated Fall Out Boy's "leading man" a little before. He seems a more accomplished guitar player than I had first realised. I always thought he was primarily a singer who could knock out some mean power chords, but no, he definitely went up in my estimations. Oh and they did a cover of Michael Jackson's 'Beat It', which was really good too.
In other news, I've got a little bit obsessed with 'High School Musical'. It's just so wonderful. Pleasingly High School Musical 2 has just been done, and is just as good as the first. Fingers crossed for the third. I've noticed a pattern emerging, so I have some predictions for the third one. They'll all start off as friends, and sing a song together. Then over the next hour the main couple will have a falling out over something orchestrated by the main bad character. Then she'll go off and sing a song about it, and he'll think long and hard about it, then at the end the main couple will end up getting back together and singing a song about it, which will climax with all the cast joining in on this song. Then at the very end they'll all be friends again, including the bad ones.
I've not yet seen Hairspray, though James tells me it's better than High School Musical. I have my doubts...
Sunday 12th August 2007
Song: Kate Nash - Play
So this is it... My official coming out: I like Lily Allen, and Kate Nash. I won't be ashamed. It took me quite some time to come to terms with the Lily Allen thing with my secret affection initially masquerading as disinterest and branding her 'chav in a dress', but as time went on I found myself being pleasantly entertained by 'Smile'. Also seeing her host the Friday Night Project a bit back was a bit of a turn around, as she on the whole seemed quite endearing, I felt. Yes, she might be a bit of a chav, and yes she did wear dresses with trainers... But I do find her album fairly entertaining and she does have nice skin and lovely teeth.
So then this Kate Nash person turns up in the scene. Sounds like Lily Allen, except armed with an electric piano. She looks younger and her skin doesn't seem to be quite as good as Lily's, but still... The more places I caught bits of 'Foundation' all over the place, the more I found myself getting more interested. So earlier I downloaded her album, and have it on now. I hope I like it. She seems a bit more credible than Lily. Not citing MySpace as your reason for fame being one reasons... Especially as I've since heard that that isn't even true. I just saw a video of her on YouTube, performing on Jools Holland's show, which was quite good. She seems to have some substance to her, which I like. Also, with song titles such as 'Dickhead' and 'Shit Song', I feel there's definitely some good material there.
Went to see David Ford the other night, in a 'transexual strip club' in Soho. It was quite exciting. Seemingly no trannies in the crowd, but it was a rather nice looking place. Ford himself was as impressive as ever, with State Of The Union in particular being as brilliant as it always is live. Also he had his new woman in tow, Hannah, filling Frances' shoes. However she seemed far more impressive than Frances was, IMO. I think I may have fallen in love with this Hannah person. She seemed wonderful.
Hi Lauren.
Wednesday 1st August 2007
Song: Dragonette - I Get Around
For a long time now, I've been considering getting a contract phone... and I've finally done it. It makes me feel all grown up having a contract. With it, I got a Nokia 3600 6300, which is the same as what Anthony has, so we can no longer be seen out in public together. The only substantial loss from the changeover has been my Monkey Island ring tone. Rob, if you see this before I see you next, do you still have that one you made? I've found the main theme MP3 online but it has a load of drums and stuff that detracts from the main tune.
Also, I have now joined the world of Bluetooth. Can anyone tell me if there's any point on me getting a Bluetooth adapter and installing a stack for my pooter? The phone has a USB port so I can use a cable for moving files about on it, but didn't know what Bluetooth might have to offer, if anything.
Only annoyance so far is that all the Nokia SDKs are for Windows only. This is upsetting me... Especially for a company which makes use of open source stuff. Additionally annoying is that it's all Java so will work on Linux. The only thing I need Windows for is to unpack the .exe file, but all three of us living here use Linux. Bit frustrating.
Anyway... I need to get on with some work.