"i don't make disco music"

For those who are remotely familiar with my writing it would seem as though I have a slight obsession with all things LA, while I can't dispute this fact, i must point out that I never go out of my way find music specifically from this corner of the world. It just so happens that almost everything I hear coming of the sunny state of California shines like a beacon and my ship can do nothing but be drawn in by it.
This time though I am going to write about someone a little different from what i'd normally rattle on about. Her name is Ramona Gonzalez aka Nite Jewel, Ramona is a artist specialising in video and sound installation and while i'm not really an art buff, in any sense of the notion, her CV is an impressive collection of collaborations and recommendations from all walks of underground art & music world. Her music as Nite Jewel is, refreshingly, recorded all on 8 track cassette deck which gives it the delicious lo-fi sounds we've come to associate with a lot of what's coming out of LA at the moment. The beautiful hazy sound of layering tape tracks lends the music a distinct esoteric quality, in the sense you feel as though you're sitting on her bed intently listening while she sways about the room wearing something elegantly sexy and performing solely just for you. Unfortunately, she's not but I did manage to get her to answer some questions for us.

**This interview was intended to be my first peice of editorial for a new blog i'm starting to write for thisisoffset but as a whole i'm not overly pleased with the outcome now so I thought i'd post it up here so that it's not wasted in e-space forever.**

BS: Firstly, could you describe your music as though describing it to someone who has never heard it.

RG: I think the Japanese got it right: "xanax pop". I also like "lounge".

BS: What made you choose to record on an 8 track, was it through lack of better equipment or was in a conscious effort to give the music a delicate, otherworldly quality?

RG: My friend Whitemare got me my 8 track. So in that way it was a matter of convenience. But also I don't jive well with digital material. It's not visceral enough for me.

BS: Your planning on releasing a 12" on the super hip Italians Do It Better imprint, how did that come about?

RG: It's already released. I was at Whitemare's house listening to some records. His roommate said I was biting "Glass Candy", who I had never heard of. So I listened. I didn't think we resembled, but I wrote to Glass Candy asking them what they thought of that comparison. That's how the lines of communication opened.

BS: Why do you think the sound of disco's past has been revived to such an extent recently?

RG: I don't really have an opinion about it.

BS: When I was younger I remember my Mum used to laugh at my Dad for being a disco fanatic in his youth. Do you think neu-disco is always going to carry that stigma in some peoples eyes or do you think sexy, cool acts like yourself, Glass Candy, Sally Shapiro etc. can rid it of it's misconceptions?

RG: I don't make disco music. I just happen to have grown up in musical traditions that also lend importance to bass and drums. Sometimes people can dance to my music, which is great. If people have misconceptions about dance music, so much the worse for them.

BS: You're from LA right? Are in involved/associated with the LA lo-fi youth punk scene at all? The Smell, Mika Miko etc. How do you rate the current scene in LA, does it help/hinder you in anyway?

RG: Actually I'm from Oakland. I'm not really associated with The Smell scene, but I love to play there. I can't really rate anything because I have such a tiny purview. I mean, I have a small group of friends and basically just go to see them play. Also, Los Angeles is so huge, you can't take such a broad brush to the music that is emerging here. I will say that Los Angeles gets an A+ for its ability to make its people feel comfortable NOT ascribing to any scene at all.
(BS: I wasn't taring LA with the same brush, i was mearly asking if - with her being based in LA an all - she's involved with that scene!?)

BS: And what about being immersed in a rich art scene, what are the benefits or downfalls, if there are any, to that?

RG: The benefits are all the crazy people and all their art information that gets stored in your brain so you can then spew it out in any configuration you please.

BS: What's next for Romana/Nite Jewel?
RG: My full length LP is out now on Gloriette records and full length CD out on Human Ear in a few weeks. Touring with Times New Viking and Deerhunter next week. Some possible dates with Glass Candy in the future.

BS: Lastly, what tracks are guaranteed to get you on the dance floor?

RG: Over and Over by Shalamar

You can purchase Nite Jewel's IDIB LP here
And you can check her myspace here

Read More...

Summary only...

the circle of life

rings (http://myspace.com/firstnationlove) are three girls from new york, they came about when drummer abby joined other members kate and nina who up until then had recorded a 7" and a full length together under the moniker first nation. they continued to play under that name until the recording of their most recent effort black habit, by which time they felt that their name change symbolised much more accurately what they were doing and what they represented. like a circle, they are all connected, they are uninterrupted they are whole. their music also mimics the pleasant shapes that are willingly thrust into our thoughts; effortless, soothing, continuous.

still, this isn't as wholly pleasant as one might imagine upon picturing the geometry and it's aforementioned principles, sure it takes great pride in appearing an unassuming folk outfit but underneath all the enchanting multi-layered three way vocals lurks a much more experimental, maniacal beast.
in 'double thanks' the vocals become short, sharp daggers that stab through circles and the haunting effect created by keyboards and ghost-esq wailing. 'is he handsome' is broken up with electronic noise that explodes into the furor from nowhere and the breathless gasping conjures the song a sense of urgency which perfectly compliments the frantic, yet beautiful keyboard hook.
upon each listen to black habit another door is opened into it's darker depths and you start to notice all manor of twisted intricacies that you were previously unaware of. this alone gives the album a great sustainability and has certainly had me reaching for the replay button.
as unpredictable as animal collective, as thoughtful as high places and as oddly unrestricted as (old) gang gang dance, this is certainly worth a listen, or two. or three, or four....

rings - double thanks.mp3 (zshare)

Read More...

Summary only...

yes we can.

"If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer."

powerful words from the man who captured not only the hearts and the hopes but the doubts and the fears of not just the american people but the world over and overcame all the obstacles all the ignorance and sits now in the oval office atop the dawn of a new age in not just american politics, but history itself. we here at stop scratching couldn't be happier that at 4.00am today barack obama clinched the all important 270 electoral colleges and became the 44th - and not to forget first african-american - president of the united states. today america has risen above the cliches and the stereotypes and proved to us all that it's more than just a nation of obese, ignorant idiots and have voted in possibly the most exciting politician of recent times, one who promises change in america, which i'm sure will inspire change in the rest of the world, change that i for one, welcome with open arms.
i'll bet that today, for the first time in a long while, is a proud day to be an american and if i had a glass right now i'd raise it to them, to barack, to democracy and to a seemingly brighter future.

click here to watch barack's acceptance speech in full.

meanwhile, as the rest of the world is caught up in election fever and history is preparing to be written i've been spending as much time as i can this week watching the writers of arguably my favourite album of all time, why? playing live in both oxford and london. that's something one doesn't get to do every week so i figured i'd make the most of it.
on monday i travelled to the regal in oxford with alex and sally, we set out early so we (sally and i) could enjoy the sights and tastes of it's offerings and so that alex could swoon over a new lady friend. after walking around in an attempt to and failing at finding a decent charity shop we decided to settle down for a few drinks in a quaint little old fashioned hole in the wall named the white horse and after ordering beer and mulled wine we took a seat at a table which was opposite to one seating none other than the mighty boosh's julian barret (& the american one with the funny voice. sorry, i'm not the biggest fan).
we decided to stay for food as the prospect of 'oxfords best fish and chips' was one i felt i had to get involved in. sally had her whole meal in a yorkshire pudding, which apparently is a very exciting and tasty way to eat your dinner. the fish and chips while they were great, left me wondering how average the rest of oxfords fish and chips might be (perhaps someone could enlighten me here?) and definitely failed to make the top 5 in my opinion. after food we noticed that the bar had a very appealing and unique feature in that of a carton to take home 2 pints of your favourite ale/cider/draft, this is also something we now felt obliged to take part in so we opted for addlestons cider and black to take away, a brilliant choice until i spilt the majority of mine all over the streets of oxford.

the first support, whose name i forget, were okay but they seemingly wanted to be architecture in helsinki way beyond citing them as an inspiration and their abundance of people/instruments on stage mostly just sounded cluttered and unnecessary.
i actually fell to sleep during jonquil, that says pretty much everything about what i think of their music and their performance, the music sounded to me a little as if it wanted to be a british arcade fire, the vocalist as though he wanted to be morrissey or something, it all ended up sounding a little to much like keane, or something else frustratingly middle of the road.
the dead science were shockingly uninteresting, the vocals were irritating and pointless and despite the drummer being incredible, they failed to realise his brilliance and instead opted for a rather insignificant minimal approach and succeeded in only boring the hell out of me and everyone i spoke to about them thereafter.
i realise these are all quite unjustified ways to sum up those bands but none of them captured my attention nearly enough for me to write anything more, apologies.

so with all these poor to average bands and performances as the only ground to stand on tonight, and despite my childlike anticipation and excitement, i can honestly say i wasn't expecting to much from the ohio quartet, (which coincidentally started as one of the major deciding states in barack's battle to take the whitehouse) now in hindsight i believe they undoubtedly played the most exhilarating live show i've seen this year.
the sound in regal was one that perfectly captured all the intricate beauty of yoni and co's music while still managing to be loud and clear enough to immerse you completely within the performance. in a time when every man and his dog is using/abusing any instrument they can get their hands on in order to create their own abstract version of what pop music should be why? shine like a beacon to all these budding would-be instrumental whores and proceeded show everyone exactly how it should be done with their infectious, multi-layered hip-pop.
i can't remember feeling that level of excitement upon hearing the opening note or vocal of a song taken from an album i've listened to religiously for the last couple of years probably since i saw something corporate play at the irish center in birmingham about 6 years ago. i found myself singing along at the top of my voice without even realising it, which then made me notice that not many other people in the crowd seemed to be enjoying themselves as much as myself. this then brought to mind the question, is it uncool to sing along at gigs now? my guess is it probably is, everything is looked upon with to much cynicism in this day and age, gone are the times when we could just let down our metaphorical locks and let loose with a complete and selfish disregard, i write of course from solely my own perspective.
tonight though, i managed to recapture some of this youthful vigor, just as japanther had helped me do last month, and it fills me with hope that live music is returning to the days of old and i think i probably have a certain move to london to thank for me renewed faith. so, thank you.

the future certainly is looking very bright today.

Read More...

Summary only...

sons and daughters.

happy sunday everyone, we have some nice news and music to accompany t4 and your roast dinners today and that is that we're very pleased and equally excited to announce that we'll be doing a tape for the righteous lo-fi synth pop act, baby venom! (http://www.myspace.com/babyvenombaby).

they hail from baltimore, which for me along side LA and brooklyn is home to one of the most exciting underground music scenes in the US and everyone involved seems fiercely intent on keeping it that way, underground that is. with the likes of the notorious collective wham city, dan deacon, videohippos and cult tv show the wire to boast but a few of it's offspring, this is a city that oozes cool and conscious excellence. now couple those contemporaries and being from a city so culturally rich as baltimore and i can imagine that there is a great deal of pressure on new bands to uphold this level of integrity so it bodes well for baby venom that they are doing exactly that.
as a band they are still somewhat in their infancy, which gives it a real positive, esoteric quality. they make music that sounds like it was made solely for you, warm and affectionate full of endearing vocals and beautiful hooks. think along the lines of telepathe meets high places only that it doesn't sound like it wants to be either, it sounds as though it wants to be precisely what it is, which is the perfect pop music. but don't take my word for it, go listen yourself, you won't regret it. so, if i was baltimore and baby venom was one of my children, i'd be very proud them.

we'll be re-releasing a tape that the band put out themselves with a few extras thrown in for good measure as our fourth tape to replace the gap that will be left by doom patrol which for various reasons, we regret to inform you, we unfortunately won't now be putting out. we do wish both matt and curtis all the best though and just to clarify there are no hard feelings at all. hopefully you can expect to see something for baby venom before the end of the year but just keeping checking back for news on that.

baby venom - frank.mp3 (zshare)

Read More...

Summary only...

anything but crass

sorry i haven't updated in a while i've been busy working in order for me to be able to stay in london, it's going well, and in between pouring pints of peroni and sailor jerrys and coke i've managed to find time to attend two of the most exciting gigs i've been to in a long while, foot village @ the luminaire and japanther feat. pennie rimbaud @ the old blue last.

foot village, for those who aren't aware, are somewhat of an underground supergroup of sorts, hailing from LA they feat. members of the awesome gang wizard, among others. put along side that the fact that one of their members also helps to run deathbomb arc and the smell and this really becomes a band that demands your undivided attention and they certainly know how to go about getting that. from the moment they begin setting up their vast array of drums all eyes in the room are fixated.

foot village you see are everything but conventional, they aren't just out to make music and sell records they are out to create a civilisation one where "the national language is drumming and the national pass-time is screaming". they start with the ocean of drums which spill out over the stage from the inside out, presumably heading for new land and thus the promise of fresh resources and followers to help realise their intentions of a new age. the boats land ashore and the primitive sounding drums hit you instantly and perfectly notify you of the arrival of these forward thinking explorers obsessed with creation, but refreshingly, it's creation which is very much on their own terms. as the conquering continues, you become less and less aware of how involved you are as you're just so immersed in the evolution of the feral drumming, from what at first seemed like unrefined chaos to that which you soon understand - through their leadership - to be uniformed precision and the founding of their nation. the vocals shriek and wail out the orders over the top as the everything starts to come into place.

by the time it's all took shape and you're just beginning to understand what they are all about they already have london quartet pre (who did an amazing job of head support on the night) dancing under their banner, who join them onstage to aid them in our own complete conversion. you very soon begin to realise that these aren't just a bunch of tribal savages with a radical idea, because in terms of discovery and creation, they know exactly what they are doing and if that is building a world based on this background and these simple principles then write me up a deed of citizenship and i'll be on the next boat out to join them.

here is a track taken from their latest album friendship nation (tome) which was recorded by jonathan snipes of captain ahab and mastered by pete swanson of yellow swans!

foot village - materialist crap.mp3 (zshare)

a few months ago i had a brief e-conversation with one of the two members of japanther which left me with a sour taste in mouth due to him telling me that they are tied down with touring commitments in the u.s until at least early next year. this was awful news for me as their most recent effort, skuffed up my huffy, with it's distorted sing-a-long vocals, dance inducing hooks, hilariously defining samples and positive lo-fi energy has been a permanent fixture in my stereo this summer. so you can imagine my excitement when i get a facebook invite, of all things, on friday afternoon informing me that they're playing a gig at the old blue last that coming sunday. not only that but that they'd also be feat. pennie rimbaud of infamous punk legends, crass (at this point i'd been working may to much recently to realise japanther had brought out a new album very recently feat. pennie doing spoken word/beat poet on a few tracks).

they opened their set with pennie doing some of this spoken word and at first it was very interesting, if not awe-inspiring to be watching this totally still with-it old punk rocking back and fourth with complete disregard for his surroundings warbling on about africa being so very far away and other such vague insights. unfortunately this ended up making up what felt like the majority of the set and while i completely respect what both pennie and japanther are doing with this i couldn't help but think that this perhaps would have been best suited for the album and just a little bit to much live. despite the lack of audience participation during these mellow offerings it took not much more that a few notes of a song we all recognised for japanther to whip the crowd up into crowd surfing, floor punching, teeny bopping frenzy, which exactly what they did, consistently. the energy during the room - perhaps partly due it it being so pent up during the rest of the set - when they played their older material was so delightfully enthralling i couldn't help but find myself singing along at the top of my voice, which is something i haven't done in a long time!

japanther describe themselves as pop-punk, a term which so often has people turning their noses up, recalling misspent youths queuing up and getting drunk hours before gigs and generally being feeding off of each others excitement to see our heroes play all our favourite songs onstage. i'm happy to say that this gig, in it's element, did a wonderful job of recapturing my somewhat lost youthful enthusiasm and i left with that feeling you can only get from seeing a a band you love play the songs you love to sing-a-long to, a joyous warmth that kept me smiling all the way home.

here are two tracks which between them perfectly portray japanther and for serve as a great introduction for anyone who hasn't heard them. the first with it's simple hooks and distorted vocal chanting taken from skuffed up my huffy and the second from an older release wolfenswan which highlight's their knack for consistently using samples so effectively. enjoy.

japanther - boyz donut cry.mp3 (zshare)

japanther - cocaine sucks.mp3 (zshare)

Read More...

Summary only...

How to: destroy one soul

Take one 6.30 alarm clock and combine with a que for the bathroom and a 20minute walk. Ensure that the wind blows for added flavour. Take a dollop of grumpy commutors and roll into a late train, sprinkle with four pounds. Repeat this process but substitute the train for a bus, preferably with no seats. Mix these ingrediants in a bowl with some bitterness and a faint hangover. Now you can start adding the patronising supervisor, weak tea and broken mouse, but do so slowly to make sure the mixture does not appear flat. Once fully combined, put the mixture into a liquidiser and set to grating collegue laugh, and spin for 30 minutes. Then carefully spoon the mixture into a square tin, previously greased with emergency tax and bake in office temperature for 8 hours.

Having is job is baaaaadddddddd. Reading in the metro that an 18 year old girl won 7 million on the euro lottery nearly reduced me to tears the other morning. I dont need 7 million. Just enough to buy me a little shop and a house and maybe some mussels in that italian near charing cross every once in a while.

Read More...

Summary only...

viva la revolution

four straight days on the sauce has given me a painfully sore throat. was it all worth it though? very much so...

saturday night was shunt, a club that is made up of a sprawling labyrinth of caverns and tunnels underneath london bridge. the club is ran by a collective of artists who take it turns to curate a uinque event based around a certain theme. everyone bailed on me so i ended up going down on my own to dj a three hour set from 12midnight-3am, when i got there i was instantly stopped by a barrier and two men dressed in full militant attire adorning pig noses, who were refusing to let some customers through and even giving them some (in charachter) grief, luckily i told them i was playing and avoided their totalitarian ways. after being propositioned for gay sex by one of the workers, which i politely declined, i moved through an impressive corridor scene scattered with authentic looking props, dancing woman, men with accordions and all sorts of other atmospheric goings on. the vibe, all though was meant to be that of shunt-state control felt to me more like i'd stepped into the middle of a military coup détat with everyone around me behaving in an fun, inspiring and friendly manor.
i went and set up in the humid, dark, sweaty corner of one cavern in front a dancefloor that already consisted of around 150 people and after the national shunt anthem i began my set. i quickly learned that the crowd weren't into guitar based music and were here to dance their shoes into heelless oblivion. i of course complied. after warming it up the dance floor consistently had 300 or more people on going for it all night and when i finally managed to run off for a toilet break i realised that i wasn't just djing to that room but the music i was playing was in fact being played through the whole club, which had to stop letting people in at 12 because it was so busy. daunting to say the least, but none the less it was easily the most receptive crowd i've ever played to and by far the best experience i've ever had as a dj. i recommend you all go to shunt at some point. they've invited us back to play again, so i'll let ya'll know when that happens.

the rest of the four days of abuse and lack of sleep consisted of the last ever tuck shop in birmingham, the no shows forever house gig and the rolo tomassi album launch party. all were incredible but a special shout out has to go to banjo or freakout who played the house gig on sunday, who totally stole the show for me (gentle friendly teamed up with ponytail to the tune of a huge super group improvisation and while it was very impressive and exuded talent it didn't quite capture my attention like either of the bands actual music would have). the focus of banjo's set for my was on the enchanting drums played himself and dan from gentle friendly, i've not seen such a captivating display of drumming since i saw duracell play in the middle of the crowd in the middle of drained out pool last year at supersonic, it had me hooked from start to finish. unfortunately i missed all but 2 songs by pens because we were outside and hadn't realised they had started by which time the room was so packed full of immaculately dressed beautiful young people that we couldn't even see anything anyway.

i've got a job interview in a bit too, wish me luck.

Read More...

Summary only...

i need a job.

monday morning, the worst part of almost everyones week. i'm not even at work and i still can't ignore the distaste for this particularly gruelling part of the week, after an amazing weekend of free bars, good food and amazing company i'm having to go back to trawling through monster.co.uk and reed.co.uk in search of a crappy job. so i thought i'd procrastinate for a while and bring you a long overdue update on the next stage of stop scratching's plan for world domination.

so today i bring you the news on the next four tapes we shall be releasing after doom patrol. we decided that we're going to do releases, in terms of packaging and artists, in groups of four. for these next four though, we're making them extra special by giving away a fancy screen printed poster (by meesh of danger! laser! phaser! razor!) with each release, and when put all together form a four frame comic of their own. so without further a due...


the opening riff to human hair's 'happy birthday' is discordant, post-punk gold. it instantly crawls under your skin and pollutes your unconscious and you won't even notice until 5 minutes later when you're suddenly singing the notes aloud. human hair are a 4 piece from nottingham featuring henry of lovvers fame, they play cohesive, sullen post-punk with infectious, jangly hooks and smart, inviting vocals. they combine the abrasive, at times slightly uncomfortable elements of arab on radar, with the the importance (at least in my eyes) of les savy fav circa the cat and the cobra. they effortlessly blend together the confrontational with the listenable. i'm really exited for this.

human hair - happy birthday.mp3 (zshare)

teeth!!! are a three peice based in london, they fuse punk rock energy and ethics with positively unrestricted electronica. pitch bending infectious synth lines layered over the top of earth shaking drum beats and topped off with the seductiveness of lead singer veronica's raw but somewhat relaxed vocals. musically they are much more akin to the likes of a less polished dat politics, or if poney p of les georges leningrad headed a more balls out extreme politics, less rehearsed but with no less conviction. for those of you who are out of the loop, they basically just sound like kap bambino raised on a diet of punk instead of electro. they have remixes by the magnificent eats tapes coming out soon and are recording for the tape at madonnas studio in notting hill in october.

teeth!!! - dead boys.mp3 (zhshare)

male bonding are 3 guys from london, the play brattish garage punk with an un-ignorabley natural edge. scuzzy, brittle percussion that almost but not quite overpowers the frenzied but dynamic guitar playing. the vocals splutter with confidence and a sort of clarity and while each section is clearly defined and has a definite individuality it all comes together with the same clumsy cohesiveness found in the sounds of the butthole surffers and kin. it's britain's answer to everything that is coming out of LA at the moment, fun, energetic good times punk. they have a split 7" with pens coming out soon on paradise vendors inc. so keep an eye out for that.

click for link to male bonding's music (myspace)

chupacabra are a mysterious bunch, i've only heard two recorded songs by them. on those recordings, they create dark and atmospheric noise that makes you feel like you're cloud walking through an industrial graveyard on your way to the final showdown with sephiroth. live it's certainly a lot less daunting affair, lauren's wrangler brutes esq guitar sound ferociously rattles away with careless abandon while the pummeling tribal drums earge the march onwards and charleigh's wailing, eerie vocal lines bring it all together with complete unity. they're recording this month in new york and will apparently be returning next month, complete with a couple of new members to boot.

click for link to chupacabra's music (myspace)

so there you have it, keeps your eyes peeled for developments on those little beauty's.
x

Read More...

Summary only...

the n35 to elephant and castle, the n something or other to new cross and the n136 to catford.

good morning.
sorry i haven't wrote anything on here in a while, i've been busy making like the majority of female a-level or equivalent students in the country with delusions of being a fashion designer and i've upped sticks and moved to the capital. i hope dior will buy my crappy designs or something, failing that i can just go work in american apparel and live on apples & cosmopolitans and tell people i'm a model.

anyway, london life is suiting me quite fine at the moment, it was all a bit of a whirlwind of events and i only wish i had a little more money so i could be a little more picky with the shit job i'm inevitably going to have to get to be able to enjoy it all. yesterday i went for an interview with what i can only imagine is the epitome of your slick city cockney wide boy idiot, as soon as i sat down he told my i had to lose my moustache, and made some ridiculous sounds as though it were causing him actual distress. i knew then i wasn't going to accept the job. then he answered his phone, harped on about something unbearable pretentious and uninteresting to his friend for about 5 minutes (not standard practise in most interview) then he spoke about the money and bonuses, didn't tell me anything about the role and said i could start monday. i won't be starting monday. i told the agency who got me the job he was one the worst people i've ever met in my life, which he genuinely was.

so deciding i was in dire need of a drink and some socialising with real people i headed down to the old blue last to watch teeth!!! play at the vice launch party. i got there way to early and decided to read my book alone in the corner with a pint, which was going quite nicely until a mammoth party of young western european louts and their infuriating dates decided to pretty much sit on top of me and blow those insanely loud party whistle things at 3 second intervals without fail and pretty much ruined any concentration i had going on. anyway, it was about 9.00pm now and i imagine that reading a book alone in a pub at that time might come across as a bit desperate, or as though i might appear to be trying to look solitary and intellectual in order to impress girls or something. i really wasn't, i just have no friends.
so, i started flicking though one of the many new issues of vice scattered about the place in hope that it would at least make me look like i was there for the same thing as everyone else. i've never really read anything more than the reviews or the music interviews in there and here's what how i would sum it up; we've all seen city of god right? great film. anyway, take that, put it into a magazine some eastpak and fly 53 adverts, write some pointless reviews that don't ever talk about the music on some admittedly good bands and you've pretty much got vice.
there's only so long you can sit around pretending to read that magazine before you might actually start to look like you're enjoying it, so i decided to go upstairs and see if teeth!!! were on. they weren't, so i had to stand around and flip through it some more.
i'd had a fair few pints by this point and i actually quite enjoy my own company, so i didn't much mind. i was curious as to where the free shots and laughing gas were though, i was hoping to re-live atp 07 when me and trav followed the dude who was selling laughing gas around for like 2 hours and bought most of his supply. but no, no clowns on tables pouring spirits into peoples shot glasses, and not even a single balloon, save for the three behind the bar that were oh so comically arranged to look like cock and balls. bad form.

finally 20 or so minutes of leaning against the bar with my arms folded later teeth!!! were ready to go on, at which point oscar from sister mantos came in (who played my night last saturday and was incredible and certainly lived up to my expectations of being a genuine, interesting guy) so we headed to the front the stage for a better view. i don't know how many of you are aware, since i've not really mentioned it at all probably not many, but were doing a tape for them soon, so i'm going to save all the musings (as this post is getting to long for anyone to bother reading anyway) for another post, maybe later today, on all our new babies with some mp3s etc. they played a great set though, energetic and lively, fused together with a punk rock spirit and a general good time party vibe. it propbably wasn't gothic indie enough for the crowd as nobody seemed to move at all, they must have been to busy talking about the birthday party or nick cave or something.

we left shortly after that and went down to simon's (from teeth!!!) night nails at the fili bar, we were greeted by a 7 foot man in a gold leotard, long fur coat, afro wig and gold body paint, not quite what i was expecting but i guess that's the beauty of london. anyway, we headed down stairs where there were just as many interesting characters all seemingly having a great time, which is what i like to see. a reasonably jack daniels later and some dudes from manchester dressed head to toe in lyca with balloons stuffed inside their skin tight attire came onto the dance floor, danced around to some house track and preceded to pop all the balloons in a rather provocative manor. i haven't a clue what that was all about, but it made me chuckle all the same.
next, blechdom and blevin blectum were on. blectum sung about 30 minutes of delightfully quirky, but beautifully sincere pop songs, accompanied by some extraordinary piano playing, at times it was heartfelt, at times it was hilarious and at times it was a little south park, but in a really enjoyable way. i only managed to see about 15 minutes of blevin, who started with some incredible rhythmic electronic noise that had me wanting to stay, defiantly have to check out more of her.
i decided though i was starting to slow down and that i better had embark on the perilous quest of the night buses back to catford, thing is i didn't actually know what bus to get or where to get it from and as my housemate alex had it phone off, i ended up getting three separate buses, at £2 each and not getting home until about 3am, when i left at 1am.

in all, i think it was a great first night out in london on my own and a great introduction to the city. despite the occasional feeling of being so obviously on my own, i think i'd much rather than be here than in birmingham at some wannabe disco night or another.

Read More...

Summary only...

early, late and exactly on time birthdays.

loooooookkkkkkkk whaaaaaaaatttttttt ivveeeeeeee gotttttttttttt!!!!!

its actually the best birthday present ever, and 4 weeks early! it arrived on tuesday and after 4 hours of me trying to help build it but actually getting in the way and annoying my very patient and helpful step father, i hopped on and rode to sarahs house (stopping along the way to post some letters). its the most wonderful bike to ride, as i sped down theale high street a nice old man waved at me and i dinged my bell at him! all i need now is a nice little dog to pop in the basket and im set for life. my cat will have to do for now, although she is majorly in my bad books for killing lots of things and leaving them around our conservatory. bob would never do that.

the next 7 days looks to be wonderful. ive got my bike to play with and im off to birmingham on sunday to see benjamin and jennifer. then on monday, approximatley 80 days after his actual birthday i am taking benjamin to stratford and we are going to stay in a lovely hotel and eat lovely food and probably get rained on but we wont mind.

THEN on thursday, i am off to the isle of wight for bestival! we went last year and it was the most perfect weekend so we are hoping for the same but x a million as it will be sarahs birthday on the friday. ive got a feeling its going to be one to remember.

well, back to the type writer. in the last couple of days ive done 9 hours of type writing and im nowhere near to finishing. last night my dream was about gentle friendly and type writing noises! scallywags.

Read More...

Summary only...