From Indie to Screamo
This blog is a lot later then planned, a refreshing coctail of being really busy with important things and not having access to the internet has cocked up the timing, I would also like to warn that this first part is a bit ropey and all memories aren’t 100% accurate.
Back at around about May earlier this year All Tomorrows parties announced that Godspeed You! Black Emperor were to reform and curate one of the tenth anniversary festivals, with a statement saying that they would also announce UK tour dates. Then on the week of Glastonbury, I got an email from a website which I put my email address on 7 years ago when I first heard their music with tour dates and ticket news, and forked out 60 quid for a couple in a heart beat. As this gig approaches I have realised this is the first band that I can remember splitting, then having to wait for them to reform to have a chance of catching them live. Which then made me think about my life through live music and my attitude, and love and devotion to music. Through the different social scenes it lead me, the venues I got drunk in and the people I met along the way. This will probably take a while so I’ve taken the liberty of knocking it into several parts. This is my best attempt at a memoir, from The Zutons to Godspeed…
For Christmas 2002 me and my friend Lauren both got tickets to see the Zutons at the Brixton academy for the 23rd of March. At the time my knowledge of music wasn’t vast, my favourite band was as it still is now Oasis and that’s about all I remember. I remember a few weeks before the gig avidly researching the Zutons music and enjoying most of it and when it came to the big day I was quite excited for my first gig. I remember my mum giving us a lift to the Brixton academy, I remember me and Lauren sitting down watching the supports before heading in when the band came on. It was with this set that I suppose I then fell in love with live music. The electric atmosphere, the people jumping around, I also think it was my first experience with people taking drugs around me. After this gig I was hooked. I went home and got on to buying tickets for my next gig, which was to be a band I was quite fond of at the time, who happened to be the Kaiser Chiefs. I bagged a couple of tickets for 20 quid and it was for the now late Astoria. Again I kept having my passion for live music enhanced. A more intimate venue, at the time I found the Kaiser Chiefs to be a very exciting new band. Which I suppose they were considering their now success, despite what my view of them now would be. I’d caught a bug by this point and every bit of pocket money I earned I would save up, and spend it on a ticket to see one of my favourite bands play live. It was also by this point that I had first heard The Libertines and The Strokes, and the whole idea of Indie Rock seemed really good. Solid guitar rifts and cool vocals seemed to me the most flawless kind of music that was around, but it wasn’t until July the following year that I would then attend a landmark gig, which was to be seeing my favourite band Oasis, play at the Southampton Rose Bowl on July the 6th. I remember it being even to this day, the most violent gig I’ve ever been to. Football terrace crowd in a live music atmosphere and the beer was 50p a pint (unfortunately at this age I had no interest in drinking) and considering that 80% of the crowd was male, you could expect that fights were breaking out absolutely everywhere, even to the point where during the gig Noel addressed the crowd by saying “any of you chaved up cunts want to fight, focking take it outside and do it”. There was also many incidents involving Liam slagging off Pete Doherty for Babyshambles not showing up to for their support act. A member of the crowd had an inflatable penis to which Liam shouted “Ah good to see that focking cunt Pete Doherty showed up” After this gig there wasn’t a lot left in the way of milestone events, a Babyshambles gig here and there, a Kasabian gig here, an exciting night out at the XFM Winterwonderland at the Brixton Academy until one Saturday afternoon I was sitting in my room playing a bit of Playstation, listening to my Saturday afternoons intake of radio which XFM used to supply so well, Ricky Gervais and Karl Pilkington, followed by Adam and Joe, followed by Justin Lee Collins (which is what I was listening to) when he played ‘I bet you look good on the dance floor’ by a young band called the Arctic Monkeys, I remember at the time thinking it was one of the best track I had ever heard and instantly became addicted to a bunch of young lads from Sheffield. They were the Oasis of my generation, I paid through the nose to see them on their first full UK tour, bloody good gig it was aswell,. But it was with this love of this band, which was to be the downfall and the start of my disillusion to the entire Indie Rock scene, I had a good opinion of it at first and to be fair I don’t exactly hate it now. The style was cool, the birds were tasty and the people who followed it were more or less really nice. But it was the lack of progression in the music and the plummeting quality of the new bands that diverted my interest. The Arctic Monkeys second album wasn’t that good and by this time I was well acquainted with The Smiths, Manic Street Preachers, The Stone Roses and Radiohead. Whilst the radio was ploughing out shit like Calvin Harris, The Kooks, The Fratelise, It was when a new sub genre called ‘Nu-Rave’ emerged that delivered the final nail in the coffin for my relationship with popular music and when the Klaxons won the Mercury music prize I finally turned my radio off and went looking for music through other means…
As a recap I’d say that by the age of 16 I would have listed my top 5 bands as Oasis, Radiohead, The Smiths, Pulp and The Manic Street Preachers. A long summer had finished and I had just started at college, where I was to become good friends with a geezer called Matt, it was with this geezer that I was to attend my first screamo/metal gig. It was at the Dome in Finsbury park, a small pub venue which didn’t I.D at the bar and had just one security guy. It was an interesting experience I can’t remember much of, however one thing that did keep my attention and that was the energy that the crowd possessed. I have always been a fan of using gigs to blow off steam and go mental and these gigs helped me do that. I was never particularly a fan of the music as such. It all sounded the same to me. Really fast guitar rift and vocals that literally sounded like someone growling, but I suppose that was the point. Anyway for about 8 months all I ever went to was metal and screamo gigs, mainly because that’s were all my mates went and it was always fun to get really pissed and punch a scene kid in the face. A few gigs stood out for me, Suicide Silence at the Underworld, Job for a Cowboy at the Mean Fiddler and many visits to The Peel and The Dome for the unsigned acts. There was however a few flaws with the whole scene, the people seemed very elitist. Their music tastes rarely excelled anything but metal, they were all so immature and if you had long hair, a tattoo and/or a huge plug in your ear you would probably get laid by the unattractive and mostly horrible women on offer. There was no love between the audience, always bitching, constant relationship problems and the respect pecking order came down to how many Myspace friends you had and how old you were… It was also the only music scene were I never met a fellow football fan. I quickly got bored of the whole scene even though at the time I had a lot of fun, the ‘2-step’ dance was one of my favriotes to do at gigs even though I never properly mastered it and being the only person who actually stood out at the gigs was a guilty pleasure. I remember one night in particular I was getting funny looks whilst wearing my huge parker, trackies, a pair of blue tinted sunglasses, swaggering around the Meanfiddler smoking cigs and pretending to be Liam Gallagher. I never shagged a scene girl, looking back on it though I’m not too bothered.
Whilst swinging my arms around, pissed out my head was all good fun I needed something more from live music then I was achieving with screamo, and then one night whilst lying in bed reading and listening to the Xposure show on XFM I listened to a live session with a lovely folk singer called Emmy the Great, I didn’t know it at the time but I was about to become a huge fan of the London Anti-folk scene and got a chance to rub shoulders with artists that are now topping the charts….
Wednesday 22 December 2010
Friday 2 July 2010
Glastonbury 40th Anniversary (or the reason I love my friends)
It’s been 7 days now since Dinn, Dave, Sarah and I had just finished watching an overly satisfying Gorrilaz performance. A performance that consisted of such guests acts as Shaun Ryder, De La Soul, Mark E. Smith, Snoop Dogg, Mos Deff, Mick Jones, Paul Siminon and even Lou Rheed. Seeing this just hours after Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood surprisingly showing up for a secret was quite overwhelming. A night like this can only happen of course at the biggest and arguably best festival in the world that is Glastonbury. So I shall start from the beginning.
This year they let the car parks open on Tuesday night to ease congestion, a genius idea I thought and a genius idea executed, the Pussy Wagon made it in 2 and half hours and we was in the closest possible car park to the gate. Next was to execute my personal master plan, to make sure I get my first major festival friends (Bangface weekender I crew) and my chosen family of London (Bangface Hardcrew) to be camped up together to create my personal campsite of love. Which was achieved by late Wednesday afternoon. Right time to relax, get pissed, skin up and maybe have a walk, although by this time I realised which quite frequently seems to be with Glastonbury, was the following weather forecast. However this time fears of thunderstorms weren’t on the agenda, it was the fear of a sheer energy sapping heat wave. A sign of typical British behaviour from myself and probably a few of my fellow festival gowers. Never happy. The Wednesday however was a blur for me, I got in, got my mates camped up, shut my eyes for a bit then did a bit of visiting to some other mates. Thursday followed suit really except for getting so pissed that I was sick all over myself and passed out, but when I came to I realised that the long awaited Bangface Glastonbury takeover was about to come to life. I however got so munted that I had a “Where am I? Who am I? What am I doing moment?” and lost my phone as a result. Bangface I felt was a complete success and we concluded the evening with a visit to stone circle for sunrise and a mind expanding magic moment.
By Friday the temperature had risen and I wasn’t climatising anytime soon, Friday again is a blur and by this point I hadn’t stuck to my drug timetable well and everything I was pummiling myself with just didn’t seem to touch the sides, however I later concluded this might have been down to me generally having a really good time. I pretty much saw a Radiohead set then managed to find Dave, Sarah and Dinn to go see the Gorrilaz. We had a quality spot at the Pyramid stage, far right hand side, 50 yards from the bar, 15 yards from the toilet, view of the stage and plenty of room to dance. Like I said before the overwhelming scale of the guests was enough to make it a memorable set, but it was also very fitting to the theme of the 40th anniversary of the festival. World interludes followed by superstars of genres performing tracks. I’m not a fan of the Gorrilaz music, but they did very well. When they had finished performing I turned back to my 3 friends and said in the best way I could “If I looked up cunt in the dictionary all 3 of your faces would be there… But I couldn’t of asked to watch it with anyone else” Looking back on this it might of seemed harsh, but I did also have the genuine feeling that if I’d of watched that set with anyone else it would have been shit. Great Friday night… The following couple of hours then made me realise how lucky I was to have been stuck with the company I had. I put myself on man mission to drag my mates to a stage I’d never found in 4 years, and for a set that would be finished within an hour, I dragged them through every field on the west side of Worthy Farm, turning over to say “You are so lucky I don’t have any sharp objects otherwise I’d kill every single one of you” there was a part of me that meant this, but then I was overpowered by this emotion, this emotion I have chased for about 10 years, I think its called Love and considering their manor towards it I think that was exactly what stopped me from killing them all. I dragged them along for another until we found the stage and I pilled them and myself full of whiskey, popped into Bez’s Acid house then I lost ‘em all and headed back for some rest.
Saturday at Glastonbury for me has followed a ritual of dropping strong acid then going on an adventure of the green fields, healing fields, circus and cabaret and my personal favourite park stage. However this year I was quite horribly constipated and the heat was really starting to get to me. Instead of wondering around all trippy and happy taking in the magic of the place I sat at my campsite with a pack of wet wipes in hand insulting my best friends. Until night fall when my other plan of getting pissed up with Heide and seeing a god of music was to come to place… However it did have signs of a faultier when Heide did give the confession that she was going to see The Pet Shop Boys instead… This was never going to happen as my threats of murder earlier on in the weekend had settled in, but we did actually pull off my plan of finding a place that sold draught Guiness and getting pissed up for the man himself…. Christy Moore was brilliant, his soundman made him quiet for some reason, but the crowd and set list were pretty spot on. I don’t remember what happened that night but I think I enjoyed myself. My initial plan of pulling at Glastonbury had resorted to asking random girls to sit on my face, to which I had a reply of puzzlement or was just ignored.
By the Sunday I think I had finally acclimatized and was ready to actually do shit, unfortunately this is always too late, again Dinn, Dave, Sarah and I went to see Ray Davies perform the Sunday Legends slot which was very nice, that evening I saw Faithless, and Orbital. Orbital being a bit of a controversial one as I’d swarn to see Stevie Wonder on my “who will I have a chance of seeing again” Glastonbury Manifesto. But the atmosphere for Orbital was amazing, and seeing Dave in a moment of sheer awe and finally meeting Alan’s friends that he’d brung along each year, who were sound as fuck. That night I attempted to go see the Arcadia fire show and Shangri-la but was exhausted from a week of hedonism.
In conclusion this years festival was not the finest hour I had hoped for, the weather came into play as it usually does, I moaned a lot, threatened to kill my mates, missed pretty much everything I came to see, and broke my Glastonbury manifesto. But I have noticed with every year I’ve gone I’ve learnt something different….
2007=Festivals are the best things in the world
2008=You need friends at festivals
2009=Glastonbury is the best place to have the best week of your life
2010=I have the best friend I can possibly hope for…
Although this year I was mainly very aggy from the heat, and was probably a downer for the atmosphere, I have nothing but appricieation for the people that pulled me through it, and seeing them genuinely enjoy themselves was enough to keep me happy. I had actual intentions of killing every single one of them, but was stopped by the power of love. Which is that similar thing that stops you from killing a family member, but as the saying goes friends are the family you chose for yourself, and seeing my mate Jem having a laugh with Tom the nonse, or Julie getting wrecked with Dinn, or Sarah having conversation with Ian and Rosa, was magic enough for me. To have a week in the company of my two favourite sets of people and seeing them enjoy themselves was the only selfless thing I can take from the week. I can’t threaten to kill many people and them laugh in my face lets put it that way. So I’ll do a roll call and for those I’ve missed out it’s because I met you that weekend and my appreciation for you will be shown maybe after next years festival?
So… Alan, Dinn, Dave, Elliot, Fiona, Heide, Ian, Jem, Josh, Julie, Petch, Rosa, Sarah, Tom ‘The Nonse’… It was a privilege and a pleasure to serve under you all and if you’re ever in need of a kidney, lung, blood or even heart transplant, I will happily give it to any of you.
Until next year.
This year they let the car parks open on Tuesday night to ease congestion, a genius idea I thought and a genius idea executed, the Pussy Wagon made it in 2 and half hours and we was in the closest possible car park to the gate. Next was to execute my personal master plan, to make sure I get my first major festival friends (Bangface weekender I crew) and my chosen family of London (Bangface Hardcrew) to be camped up together to create my personal campsite of love. Which was achieved by late Wednesday afternoon. Right time to relax, get pissed, skin up and maybe have a walk, although by this time I realised which quite frequently seems to be with Glastonbury, was the following weather forecast. However this time fears of thunderstorms weren’t on the agenda, it was the fear of a sheer energy sapping heat wave. A sign of typical British behaviour from myself and probably a few of my fellow festival gowers. Never happy. The Wednesday however was a blur for me, I got in, got my mates camped up, shut my eyes for a bit then did a bit of visiting to some other mates. Thursday followed suit really except for getting so pissed that I was sick all over myself and passed out, but when I came to I realised that the long awaited Bangface Glastonbury takeover was about to come to life. I however got so munted that I had a “Where am I? Who am I? What am I doing moment?” and lost my phone as a result. Bangface I felt was a complete success and we concluded the evening with a visit to stone circle for sunrise and a mind expanding magic moment.
By Friday the temperature had risen and I wasn’t climatising anytime soon, Friday again is a blur and by this point I hadn’t stuck to my drug timetable well and everything I was pummiling myself with just didn’t seem to touch the sides, however I later concluded this might have been down to me generally having a really good time. I pretty much saw a Radiohead set then managed to find Dave, Sarah and Dinn to go see the Gorrilaz. We had a quality spot at the Pyramid stage, far right hand side, 50 yards from the bar, 15 yards from the toilet, view of the stage and plenty of room to dance. Like I said before the overwhelming scale of the guests was enough to make it a memorable set, but it was also very fitting to the theme of the 40th anniversary of the festival. World interludes followed by superstars of genres performing tracks. I’m not a fan of the Gorrilaz music, but they did very well. When they had finished performing I turned back to my 3 friends and said in the best way I could “If I looked up cunt in the dictionary all 3 of your faces would be there… But I couldn’t of asked to watch it with anyone else” Looking back on this it might of seemed harsh, but I did also have the genuine feeling that if I’d of watched that set with anyone else it would have been shit. Great Friday night… The following couple of hours then made me realise how lucky I was to have been stuck with the company I had. I put myself on man mission to drag my mates to a stage I’d never found in 4 years, and for a set that would be finished within an hour, I dragged them through every field on the west side of Worthy Farm, turning over to say “You are so lucky I don’t have any sharp objects otherwise I’d kill every single one of you” there was a part of me that meant this, but then I was overpowered by this emotion, this emotion I have chased for about 10 years, I think its called Love and considering their manor towards it I think that was exactly what stopped me from killing them all. I dragged them along for another until we found the stage and I pilled them and myself full of whiskey, popped into Bez’s Acid house then I lost ‘em all and headed back for some rest.
Saturday at Glastonbury for me has followed a ritual of dropping strong acid then going on an adventure of the green fields, healing fields, circus and cabaret and my personal favourite park stage. However this year I was quite horribly constipated and the heat was really starting to get to me. Instead of wondering around all trippy and happy taking in the magic of the place I sat at my campsite with a pack of wet wipes in hand insulting my best friends. Until night fall when my other plan of getting pissed up with Heide and seeing a god of music was to come to place… However it did have signs of a faultier when Heide did give the confession that she was going to see The Pet Shop Boys instead… This was never going to happen as my threats of murder earlier on in the weekend had settled in, but we did actually pull off my plan of finding a place that sold draught Guiness and getting pissed up for the man himself…. Christy Moore was brilliant, his soundman made him quiet for some reason, but the crowd and set list were pretty spot on. I don’t remember what happened that night but I think I enjoyed myself. My initial plan of pulling at Glastonbury had resorted to asking random girls to sit on my face, to which I had a reply of puzzlement or was just ignored.
By the Sunday I think I had finally acclimatized and was ready to actually do shit, unfortunately this is always too late, again Dinn, Dave, Sarah and I went to see Ray Davies perform the Sunday Legends slot which was very nice, that evening I saw Faithless, and Orbital. Orbital being a bit of a controversial one as I’d swarn to see Stevie Wonder on my “who will I have a chance of seeing again” Glastonbury Manifesto. But the atmosphere for Orbital was amazing, and seeing Dave in a moment of sheer awe and finally meeting Alan’s friends that he’d brung along each year, who were sound as fuck. That night I attempted to go see the Arcadia fire show and Shangri-la but was exhausted from a week of hedonism.
In conclusion this years festival was not the finest hour I had hoped for, the weather came into play as it usually does, I moaned a lot, threatened to kill my mates, missed pretty much everything I came to see, and broke my Glastonbury manifesto. But I have noticed with every year I’ve gone I’ve learnt something different….
2007=Festivals are the best things in the world
2008=You need friends at festivals
2009=Glastonbury is the best place to have the best week of your life
2010=I have the best friend I can possibly hope for…
Although this year I was mainly very aggy from the heat, and was probably a downer for the atmosphere, I have nothing but appricieation for the people that pulled me through it, and seeing them genuinely enjoy themselves was enough to keep me happy. I had actual intentions of killing every single one of them, but was stopped by the power of love. Which is that similar thing that stops you from killing a family member, but as the saying goes friends are the family you chose for yourself, and seeing my mate Jem having a laugh with Tom the nonse, or Julie getting wrecked with Dinn, or Sarah having conversation with Ian and Rosa, was magic enough for me. To have a week in the company of my two favourite sets of people and seeing them enjoy themselves was the only selfless thing I can take from the week. I can’t threaten to kill many people and them laugh in my face lets put it that way. So I’ll do a roll call and for those I’ve missed out it’s because I met you that weekend and my appreciation for you will be shown maybe after next years festival?
So… Alan, Dinn, Dave, Elliot, Fiona, Heide, Ian, Jem, Josh, Julie, Petch, Rosa, Sarah, Tom ‘The Nonse’… It was a privilege and a pleasure to serve under you all and if you’re ever in need of a kidney, lung, blood or even heart transplant, I will happily give it to any of you.
Until next year.
Wednesday 26 May 2010
Why Alabama 3 are the best replacement
Yesterday it was announced that U2 were to cancel their headlining Friday night slot from Glastonbury due to U2 lead singer and infamous hypocrite Bono having a bit of back trouble and needing surgery. This now leaves a slot open for one of the most covenant slots in all of music, a chance to headline the biggest, and most famous festival in the world. This following blog is my reasons for why in my opinion Alabama 3 should take the slot….
Now I know first of all Alabama 3 are already playing twice at this years festival and they are almost part of the furniture there after playing pretty much every other year and I know traditionally the festival headliners are top selling artists mainly of the rock genre, however I feel that since this year is the 40th anniversary of the festival, a festival from my own experience and from what I’ve been told is a festival rich in tradition, diversity, and high quality and due to these circumstances the organizers should try something new and celebrate these traditions with a band like Alabama 3 headlining the Friday.
When asked who Alabama 3 are and what they play, my usual response is “have you ever seen the Sopranos?” and if they have then the reply of “They do the theme music to it” and when they haven’t I usually get the question “What kind of music do they play?” which is when I’m given the opportunity to explain the concept of the best band in the country today…
Alabama 3’s obvious main influence lies within their southern American country and blues vocals, as well as adding acid house drum loops, rock n roll guitar rifts, politically and socially charged lyrics which usually involve communist, anti racist and drug based themes, as well as frequent references to old delta blues and country singers (Robert Johnson, Woodie Guthrie, Hank Williams etc) sometimes sung in the style of a rap by supporting vocalist and co writer D-Wayne Love.
Now you may be wondering how a band like this could of possibly spawned well the founders are; Larry Love (aka: Rob Spragg) who is the son of a Welsh Mormon minister and D-Wayne Love (aka: Jake Black) who is incredibly Scottish. The band aren’t from Alabama, they was formed in Brixton and there aren’t 3 of them there are between 8-11 when they perform live. Now it’s not just A3’s diverse music style and eccentric set up which I think makes them worthy of headlining Worthy Farm, it’s everything else they represent and for everything they stand for…
Now I often get asked by fellow fans of the band “Why aren’t they bigger then they actually are?” I think the answer to this lies within the bands ethics of making music and going about as a band. They are on an independent record label for starters, they have never played a venue bigger then a 2,000 capacity and even when they do it’s for no more then a reasonable 20 pound a ticket, one of my particular favorite traits of theirs is the fact that they let the producers of The Sopranos use their track ‘Woke Up This Morning’ for nothing! And to this day have absolutely no regret to what they did and never actually mention it unless asked, now I don’t know how much it would cost a television producer to play even one of the later, mundane U2 tracks like “Vertigo” or “City of Blinding Lights” But I’m pretty sure Bono and his men wouldn’t let it be played without a figure with at least 4 0’s on the end of it. Also when it comes to charity work Alabama 3 have trumped’s U2 yet again. Now I know U2 have given a lot of money to charity, if you don’t know this then you must be completely death or have ignored everything for the past 25 years. But despite what ever U2 does for charity it just proves them of further hypocrisy. The band hold duel passports to several different countries and as a result do not pay any tax to either of them since they don’t live in the country for long enough, they support helping climate change but are currently on a 14th month around the world tour, where they are probably all flying in their own private jets and also jetting around there 20 ton 360 stage, burning Christ knows how much electricity on one of their over produced 2 hour stage shows. Another thing I’d like to note on the recent tour was the irony behind the tours sponsors and one of the recent U2 tracks of their latest album. I don’t know the tracks name but the premise behind it is basically a dig at how are communications are being controlled by technology. THE TOUR WAS SPONSERED BY FUCKING BLACKBERRY!!!!. Ok I think I’ve vented enough anger about U2 so I can get back to promoting my campaign….Now the contrast between U2’s preaching, hypocritical charity campaigns and Alabama 3’s slight mention of a charity every gig and ask to donate to it at the end is a great one, also considering that all of U2 are on multi million pound contracts who could probably pay off the 3rd world debt if they all chipped in a bit and Alabama 3 make enough money off ticket sales, merchandise and their music to probably live without thinking of having to take up a day job. Like that passage in the bible where Jesus and his mates are hanging out in a temple and there is loads of rich people donating money to it, then a peasant woman comes up to the box and puts in like one coin and all of the rich people turn their noses up, I think Jesus then has a bit of a go at them which then leads to one of his mates asking him what the deal was, to which Jesus replies “those rich blokes have given just a fraction of what they can just to look good, even though they gave loads it don’t mean anything to them. Where as that bird is completely skint and has given all she has to the cause” It was words to that effect anyway. But anyway my point is Alabama 3 on the whole do more for charity.
I would like to start rolling things up now as I’ve noticed that I’m starting to ramble a bit and kind of getting away from my point, which is this in a few words….
Glastonbury festival is like I said earlier, a festival of great tradition, diversity and love. It also gives lots to charities and gives creative people platforms to express these on, The main one being the headlining slot. I feel that Alabama 3’s contribution to music and the world is worthy of that slot. The Guardian to this day states that they are the best live band in the world, and I probably wouldn’t fault that statement, not only do I feel that they are of the quality and have the back catalogue to headline, I also feel that a band that has been able to mix so many traditional forms of music from all over the world and turn them into songs refrencing old time artists as well as famous Brixton landmarks and streets, they have written one of the greatest drinking songs of all time (Old Purple Tin) a tribute to Tennants Super. ‘Mao Tse Tsung says’ which is mainly just a Jim Jones sample with D-wayne hitting a nice rap in the middle of it. The song isn’t much of a recorded track, but live it is followed by a left handed communist salute and is one of the bands landmark tracks…I could go on but I’ve got things to do….I just feel that a band as inspiring as Alabama 3 should have the privilege to headline this years festival instead of some shit like Coldplay.
Further watching….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpGgLyfDERI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAFU9cHZ1Xo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grPFfrLRBRI&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHEjuZmVTi4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tmxVAEMxDI
Now I know first of all Alabama 3 are already playing twice at this years festival and they are almost part of the furniture there after playing pretty much every other year and I know traditionally the festival headliners are top selling artists mainly of the rock genre, however I feel that since this year is the 40th anniversary of the festival, a festival from my own experience and from what I’ve been told is a festival rich in tradition, diversity, and high quality and due to these circumstances the organizers should try something new and celebrate these traditions with a band like Alabama 3 headlining the Friday.
When asked who Alabama 3 are and what they play, my usual response is “have you ever seen the Sopranos?” and if they have then the reply of “They do the theme music to it” and when they haven’t I usually get the question “What kind of music do they play?” which is when I’m given the opportunity to explain the concept of the best band in the country today…
Alabama 3’s obvious main influence lies within their southern American country and blues vocals, as well as adding acid house drum loops, rock n roll guitar rifts, politically and socially charged lyrics which usually involve communist, anti racist and drug based themes, as well as frequent references to old delta blues and country singers (Robert Johnson, Woodie Guthrie, Hank Williams etc) sometimes sung in the style of a rap by supporting vocalist and co writer D-Wayne Love.
Now you may be wondering how a band like this could of possibly spawned well the founders are; Larry Love (aka: Rob Spragg) who is the son of a Welsh Mormon minister and D-Wayne Love (aka: Jake Black) who is incredibly Scottish. The band aren’t from Alabama, they was formed in Brixton and there aren’t 3 of them there are between 8-11 when they perform live. Now it’s not just A3’s diverse music style and eccentric set up which I think makes them worthy of headlining Worthy Farm, it’s everything else they represent and for everything they stand for…
Now I often get asked by fellow fans of the band “Why aren’t they bigger then they actually are?” I think the answer to this lies within the bands ethics of making music and going about as a band. They are on an independent record label for starters, they have never played a venue bigger then a 2,000 capacity and even when they do it’s for no more then a reasonable 20 pound a ticket, one of my particular favorite traits of theirs is the fact that they let the producers of The Sopranos use their track ‘Woke Up This Morning’ for nothing! And to this day have absolutely no regret to what they did and never actually mention it unless asked, now I don’t know how much it would cost a television producer to play even one of the later, mundane U2 tracks like “Vertigo” or “City of Blinding Lights” But I’m pretty sure Bono and his men wouldn’t let it be played without a figure with at least 4 0’s on the end of it. Also when it comes to charity work Alabama 3 have trumped’s U2 yet again. Now I know U2 have given a lot of money to charity, if you don’t know this then you must be completely death or have ignored everything for the past 25 years. But despite what ever U2 does for charity it just proves them of further hypocrisy. The band hold duel passports to several different countries and as a result do not pay any tax to either of them since they don’t live in the country for long enough, they support helping climate change but are currently on a 14th month around the world tour, where they are probably all flying in their own private jets and also jetting around there 20 ton 360 stage, burning Christ knows how much electricity on one of their over produced 2 hour stage shows. Another thing I’d like to note on the recent tour was the irony behind the tours sponsors and one of the recent U2 tracks of their latest album. I don’t know the tracks name but the premise behind it is basically a dig at how are communications are being controlled by technology. THE TOUR WAS SPONSERED BY FUCKING BLACKBERRY!!!!. Ok I think I’ve vented enough anger about U2 so I can get back to promoting my campaign….Now the contrast between U2’s preaching, hypocritical charity campaigns and Alabama 3’s slight mention of a charity every gig and ask to donate to it at the end is a great one, also considering that all of U2 are on multi million pound contracts who could probably pay off the 3rd world debt if they all chipped in a bit and Alabama 3 make enough money off ticket sales, merchandise and their music to probably live without thinking of having to take up a day job. Like that passage in the bible where Jesus and his mates are hanging out in a temple and there is loads of rich people donating money to it, then a peasant woman comes up to the box and puts in like one coin and all of the rich people turn their noses up, I think Jesus then has a bit of a go at them which then leads to one of his mates asking him what the deal was, to which Jesus replies “those rich blokes have given just a fraction of what they can just to look good, even though they gave loads it don’t mean anything to them. Where as that bird is completely skint and has given all she has to the cause” It was words to that effect anyway. But anyway my point is Alabama 3 on the whole do more for charity.
I would like to start rolling things up now as I’ve noticed that I’m starting to ramble a bit and kind of getting away from my point, which is this in a few words….
Glastonbury festival is like I said earlier, a festival of great tradition, diversity and love. It also gives lots to charities and gives creative people platforms to express these on, The main one being the headlining slot. I feel that Alabama 3’s contribution to music and the world is worthy of that slot. The Guardian to this day states that they are the best live band in the world, and I probably wouldn’t fault that statement, not only do I feel that they are of the quality and have the back catalogue to headline, I also feel that a band that has been able to mix so many traditional forms of music from all over the world and turn them into songs refrencing old time artists as well as famous Brixton landmarks and streets, they have written one of the greatest drinking songs of all time (Old Purple Tin) a tribute to Tennants Super. ‘Mao Tse Tsung says’ which is mainly just a Jim Jones sample with D-wayne hitting a nice rap in the middle of it. The song isn’t much of a recorded track, but live it is followed by a left handed communist salute and is one of the bands landmark tracks…I could go on but I’ve got things to do….I just feel that a band as inspiring as Alabama 3 should have the privilege to headline this years festival instead of some shit like Coldplay.
Further watching….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpGgLyfDERI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAFU9cHZ1Xo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grPFfrLRBRI&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHEjuZmVTi4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tmxVAEMxDI
Friday 14 May 2010
A rushed look at this years Premier League
The End of Season Review
The date is the 14th of May 2010 5 days after the rollercoaster of the Premier League jolted to a complete holt. A season, which has at times lacked in quality but has never been short of surprises, a season where mighty forces of the past have fallen, and where finally enquiries are being made about the corporate bastards using our football clubs as toys and business opportunities after the first ever Premiership club went into administration. As well as all that there was one of the tightest battles for fourth place I can ever remember, the title race kept
The first few months started off like any other, there were a few changes to some of the top sides, Chelsea had a new manager in but no real big signings were made in the summer, United has lost their wonder kid to Real Madrid for a record 80 million pounds, Arsenal again went in with the belief that they could go and win the league with a youth team and City splashed out more cash then any other premier league club with their new Arabic owners. The opening day did have one significant result in it that at the time spectators wouldn’t of predicted, Tottenham beat Livepool at White Heart Lane. As a Chelsea fan I always do find it amusing when Liverpool lose because having had to witness a Chelsea and Liverpool tie over 20 times in the past 5 years is no laughing matter. But yes would you believe it everybody’s favourtie whipping boys Tottenham managed to fight for and win the dog fight for 4th spot this season and change the face of the “Top Four”, they deserved it more then City and was more consistent then Villa (Although Villa were my favored team for the spot). There was always this constant horrible feeling that even though Liverpool were playing without any spirit or any skill and for the first time in their history dropped out in the group stages of Champions League, as well as going out in the 3rd round of the FA Cup to Reading, that despite all of this I could still picture how the last day of the season would play out, 3rd minute of stoppage time, it’s 1-1 and if Liverpool win they seal fourth after an unprecedented 10 wins on the trot, ball gets wipped out from a corner “ It comes to GEEEEEEEERRRRARRRRRRRRRRRDDDDDDDDDDDD” and Steven Gerrard, savour of Mersey side belts in a 30 yard volley in the last kick of the game…Typical Liverpool. But instead they finished 7th, one of their worst performances in the league for years. Benitez looks like he’s out of the job, and towards the end of the season all their star players were looking unbelievably depressed. It wouldn’t surprise me if one of the big 2 (Gerrard or Torres) were to leave in the summer.
The race for the title however was a bit of a different beast this season. Those of you who know me will know that I am a Chelsea supporter, always have, always going to be, but this season my love for them changed ever so slightly. The same way that your relationship is with a mate who you love dearly, but whenever you go out and get pissed he can’t help but start trouble. This was pretty much Chelsea’s attitude to games this season, whenever we would look like losing most of out star players would get aggy with the referee and we’d lose all faith in getting anything out of the game. This was shown when the Special One came back to the Bridge to tactically, mentally and physically out do us in every department. The loss came without shock really, Mourinho knows Chelsea inside out and he is the greatest manager in the world…we never stood a chance. But he had it played out so well. Shut Lampard out the way so we had to no playmaker, get on Drogba’s nerves so he loses his temper and probably gets sent off (Which he did) and hit us on a counter attack where we was consistently weak this season. A situation we was never in when the Special One was in charge of us. Despite the loss in Champions League I took many positives out of it. Both United and Arsenal were left back in it, this meant another 2 mid week games for top players to get injured in, or to just generally get jaded in. A lot of my non-Chelsea fans couldn’t understand this but as it goes I turned out to be right. Rooney was injured in the first leg of Uniteds tie against Bayern Munich, the Wednesday before we was set to play them, and Fabregras and Arshavin were injured for Arsenal in their fantastic game against Barcelona at the Emirates. Which did eventually lead to a dip in form for both of our rivals and for us to steam ahead. There were a few further hiccups but nothing major and more or less throughout the season played like a tank in Tiananmen Square, stopping only once or twice to minor teams. We got 6 out of 6 against the top 4, most goals scored by any club in a season ever, highest ever goal difference, topped off by an emphatic 8-0 win on the last day of the season. Which also included a Drogba hat-trick to give him the Golden boot for the season. The Premiership returns to Stamford Bridge.
It is the FA Cup final tomorrow and in true cup final fashion it is an underdog challenge. Botom side Portsmouth against League winners Chelsea, now despite my love for Chelsea and how I’d love us to pull off our first ever League and Cup double, I cant help but have this hope that Pompy do the impossible tomorrow, not just because I have a respect for the town of Portsmouth as it has been good to me over the years and is the home to some of my friends and is supported by my mentor. But because I feel that the fans deserve it more then any other. The way that that club has been allowed to be run into the ground by an owner who obviously didn’t have a clue has been absolutely sickening. A guestermat to the high courts and customs said that Portsmouth owed around 60 millions pounds in bills, it now turns out that they owe nearly 130 million and then the bills were released to the public. Ridiculous amounts owed to ridiculous people. 500 pounds owed to the milkman, 700 pounds owed to the local florist, 13,000 pounds owed to Chichester college, and I’d like to know what dealing they did with Qatar airways because they owe them 20 pence. This has been a harsh reminder that corporate bastards are being allowed quite happily to use our football clubs as toys without having any knowledge what so ever about running a football club, or having any respect for the fans that devote their lives to it. So tommorow at 3 o’clock when two 2 blue sides go out onto that pitch at Wembley I will have this slight support for the underdog. If we snatch an early goal, it’ll be a repeat of last week, but if Portsmouth play with the attitude that they have nothing to lose, then considering this is the oldest and greatest domestic cup competition in all of sport where anything can happen I turley believe that Pompy could do it.
Sorry this is brief and rather rushed I wanted to complete it before tommorows game and I’m currently getting ready to go to an Alabama 3 gig…here is a brief list of awards for the season
Player of the year – James Milner: Did he have a bad game for Villa? An absolutely certainty for Capello’s 11 in South Africa surely.
Best goal – Danny Rose: Spurs V Arsenal: your 19 years old, its your premier league debut and you score a 30 yard volley in a north London derby that you then go on to win for the first time since you was born. An absolute dream come true and a cracking goal.
Manager of the year: a toss between Harry Redknapp and Roy Hodgson: Premier League I’d give it to Harry for his achievement with Spurs, but nothing can be taken away from the spirit that Fuhlam have played with this season.
Signing of the season: Adam Johnson, Middlesborough – City: He might of come in January but young Adam Johnson has impressed amongst a team full of over payed pre madonna’s. good on him
The date is the 14th of May 2010 5 days after the rollercoaster of the Premier League jolted to a complete holt. A season, which has at times lacked in quality but has never been short of surprises, a season where mighty forces of the past have fallen, and where finally enquiries are being made about the corporate bastards using our football clubs as toys and business opportunities after the first ever Premiership club went into administration. As well as all that there was one of the tightest battles for fourth place I can ever remember, the title race kept
The first few months started off like any other, there were a few changes to some of the top sides, Chelsea had a new manager in but no real big signings were made in the summer, United has lost their wonder kid to Real Madrid for a record 80 million pounds, Arsenal again went in with the belief that they could go and win the league with a youth team and City splashed out more cash then any other premier league club with their new Arabic owners. The opening day did have one significant result in it that at the time spectators wouldn’t of predicted, Tottenham beat Livepool at White Heart Lane. As a Chelsea fan I always do find it amusing when Liverpool lose because having had to witness a Chelsea and Liverpool tie over 20 times in the past 5 years is no laughing matter. But yes would you believe it everybody’s favourtie whipping boys Tottenham managed to fight for and win the dog fight for 4th spot this season and change the face of the “Top Four”, they deserved it more then City and was more consistent then Villa (Although Villa were my favored team for the spot). There was always this constant horrible feeling that even though Liverpool were playing without any spirit or any skill and for the first time in their history dropped out in the group stages of Champions League, as well as going out in the 3rd round of the FA Cup to Reading, that despite all of this I could still picture how the last day of the season would play out, 3rd minute of stoppage time, it’s 1-1 and if Liverpool win they seal fourth after an unprecedented 10 wins on the trot, ball gets wipped out from a corner “ It comes to GEEEEEEEERRRRARRRRRRRRRRRDDDDDDDDDDDD” and Steven Gerrard, savour of Mersey side belts in a 30 yard volley in the last kick of the game…Typical Liverpool. But instead they finished 7th, one of their worst performances in the league for years. Benitez looks like he’s out of the job, and towards the end of the season all their star players were looking unbelievably depressed. It wouldn’t surprise me if one of the big 2 (Gerrard or Torres) were to leave in the summer.
The race for the title however was a bit of a different beast this season. Those of you who know me will know that I am a Chelsea supporter, always have, always going to be, but this season my love for them changed ever so slightly. The same way that your relationship is with a mate who you love dearly, but whenever you go out and get pissed he can’t help but start trouble. This was pretty much Chelsea’s attitude to games this season, whenever we would look like losing most of out star players would get aggy with the referee and we’d lose all faith in getting anything out of the game. This was shown when the Special One came back to the Bridge to tactically, mentally and physically out do us in every department. The loss came without shock really, Mourinho knows Chelsea inside out and he is the greatest manager in the world…we never stood a chance. But he had it played out so well. Shut Lampard out the way so we had to no playmaker, get on Drogba’s nerves so he loses his temper and probably gets sent off (Which he did) and hit us on a counter attack where we was consistently weak this season. A situation we was never in when the Special One was in charge of us. Despite the loss in Champions League I took many positives out of it. Both United and Arsenal were left back in it, this meant another 2 mid week games for top players to get injured in, or to just generally get jaded in. A lot of my non-Chelsea fans couldn’t understand this but as it goes I turned out to be right. Rooney was injured in the first leg of Uniteds tie against Bayern Munich, the Wednesday before we was set to play them, and Fabregras and Arshavin were injured for Arsenal in their fantastic game against Barcelona at the Emirates. Which did eventually lead to a dip in form for both of our rivals and for us to steam ahead. There were a few further hiccups but nothing major and more or less throughout the season played like a tank in Tiananmen Square, stopping only once or twice to minor teams. We got 6 out of 6 against the top 4, most goals scored by any club in a season ever, highest ever goal difference, topped off by an emphatic 8-0 win on the last day of the season. Which also included a Drogba hat-trick to give him the Golden boot for the season. The Premiership returns to Stamford Bridge.
It is the FA Cup final tomorrow and in true cup final fashion it is an underdog challenge. Botom side Portsmouth against League winners Chelsea, now despite my love for Chelsea and how I’d love us to pull off our first ever League and Cup double, I cant help but have this hope that Pompy do the impossible tomorrow, not just because I have a respect for the town of Portsmouth as it has been good to me over the years and is the home to some of my friends and is supported by my mentor. But because I feel that the fans deserve it more then any other. The way that that club has been allowed to be run into the ground by an owner who obviously didn’t have a clue has been absolutely sickening. A guestermat to the high courts and customs said that Portsmouth owed around 60 millions pounds in bills, it now turns out that they owe nearly 130 million and then the bills were released to the public. Ridiculous amounts owed to ridiculous people. 500 pounds owed to the milkman, 700 pounds owed to the local florist, 13,000 pounds owed to Chichester college, and I’d like to know what dealing they did with Qatar airways because they owe them 20 pence. This has been a harsh reminder that corporate bastards are being allowed quite happily to use our football clubs as toys without having any knowledge what so ever about running a football club, or having any respect for the fans that devote their lives to it. So tommorow at 3 o’clock when two 2 blue sides go out onto that pitch at Wembley I will have this slight support for the underdog. If we snatch an early goal, it’ll be a repeat of last week, but if Portsmouth play with the attitude that they have nothing to lose, then considering this is the oldest and greatest domestic cup competition in all of sport where anything can happen I turley believe that Pompy could do it.
Sorry this is brief and rather rushed I wanted to complete it before tommorows game and I’m currently getting ready to go to an Alabama 3 gig…here is a brief list of awards for the season
Player of the year – James Milner: Did he have a bad game for Villa? An absolutely certainty for Capello’s 11 in South Africa surely.
Best goal – Danny Rose: Spurs V Arsenal: your 19 years old, its your premier league debut and you score a 30 yard volley in a north London derby that you then go on to win for the first time since you was born. An absolute dream come true and a cracking goal.
Manager of the year: a toss between Harry Redknapp and Roy Hodgson: Premier League I’d give it to Harry for his achievement with Spurs, but nothing can be taken away from the spirit that Fuhlam have played with this season.
Signing of the season: Adam Johnson, Middlesborough – City: He might of come in January but young Adam Johnson has impressed amongst a team full of over payed pre madonna’s. good on him
Tuesday 11 May 2010
A silver lining in a very black cloud
Today was one of the darkest days in my living memory. Within hours not only has the countries fate been given over to David Cameron’s army of Tory’s thanks to the treacherous Liberal Democrats, but one of our finest sanctuary’s was forced to cancel due to rising cost’s forced by local money grabbing police. A stark reminder that our civil liberties have no sign of letting up when it comes to them being stripped from us without argument and that money is still the main evil preventing us from having a good time. Now I know next to fuck all about politics, so this isn’t going to be a politically based blog (I was only 7 when the Tories last had the ruling of the UK anyway) and I only ever went to 2 Glade’s so this isn’t going to be one on the history of my time there (Fantastic them 2 festivals were though). But there’s one thing would say I know a lot about and that is the history of music and film and its surrounding cultures, but again most of the stuff I’m going to document hasn’t come from my own personal experiences due to me being full of youth. But I feel that in my time I’ve been able to gather enough research from an addiction to IMDB and questions of curiosity when it comes to meeting people from that particular era as well as obsessing over music from that period. One of the main positives that can be taken from the new Tory government is a possible return to quality guitar music. Brit pop ended in allegedly ended in 1997, partly because of the New Labour government and something to do with Princess Diana generally putting a dampener on things as well, but from what I can see from 1979 to 1997 music, especially British music, was at its peek. Factory Records was a year in and starting to make some noise by 1979 and Thatchers call to power, Joy Division had released their first E.P and shit seemed like it was properly kicking off. Factory records then went on to sign many more influential bands and hold host to many at the notorious Hacienda. By the mid 80’s we had such class Indie music like The Smiths, The Stone Roses, The Fall, James, The Happy Mondays and so on, back when the term ‘Indie’ actually had proper meaning and the bands didn’t all sound the same. The Hacienda can also be credited with the rise of Acid house, ecstasy culture and the rise of raving. Hosting 808 State in 1989 and having reports of some people “crawling through the air vents just to see them” (according to Wikipedia), with this came the birth of free parties, which then led to ‘the law against rave’ also known as the “Criminal Justice and Public Disorder act 1994” which was bought in by John Majors Tory government mainly because of the infamous Castlemorten festival in 1992, where approximately 30,000 people descended on the tiny village for a week! The mighty rave was dealt its first major blow, not helped by the closing down of the Hacienda (although eye witness reports say the club had been truly dead for several years anyway). I’d like to at this point intervene the history lesson to note that the reason I give this period much praise is because of its lack of motivation for profit. Free parties lived up to their name, and got it’s meaning from “being free from the restrictions of legal club nights”, and Tony Wilson with Factory records famously made many calamities when it came to running a club night and a record company by spending more then they was taking. They released L.P’s that cost more to make then they was actually charging for, and literally rinsed all of New Orders profits from their biggest ever-selling Blue Monday single by putting it straight back into the Hacienda. Why? Because they loved music and felt this is how it should be, and from it we was given quality music from many quality bands. Now at this point you’re probably wondering what this has to do with Glade’s cancelation and a new Tory government, but I’ll be getting to that in a minute…. Anyway 1994 marked the first death of Rave (although I’m sure many still went on for a long time afterwards for arguments sake we’ll call the 1994 law the first death). 1994 also bought along a new band, again another Manchester based band 2 lads and a couple of mates who in 2 years went from the dole cue to performing to having the fastest selling debut album of the time and now one of the biggest selling British albums ever and to then performing to 250,000 people at Knebworth. The absolute Rock n Roll dream despite what anyone’s recent opinions of them are there is no doubting that Oasis were a revelation to Rock n Roll and proved that if you wanted to be the best at something all you had to do was rip off what you’ve heard before. There are many aspects to Brit Pop that I love; The Blur V Oasis war, the rise of Glastonbury, the peak of British Rock n Roll, Jarvis Cocker, I even like that an artist like Damien Hurst could be called a genius, literature such as American Psycho coming in from the states and Irvine Welsh writing his tales of decrepit Scotland and Film makers such as Danny Boyle making films like Shallow Grave and Trainspotting. A time when Britain seemed like it actually had some proper balls. Until of course like I mentioned earlier it all came to a bit of an abrupt end with the New Labour government, death of the peoples princess and the release of Oasis highly anticipated, and somewhat disappointing 3rd album, ‘Be Here Now’ from then on nothing happened. Music started to decline, a new Millennium was rung in and bands like Travis, The Darkness and Coldplay, even Robbie Williams was being praised for his excuse for music, Blur and Pulp put themselves on permanent hiatuses and everything else Brit Pop had was almost forgotten about, Glastonbury was then restricted by a massive fence, and television shows such as Pop Idol and then the X-Factor showed that mainstream music was just a tool for a bunch of gormless cunts to produce another production line fad of a performer, tricking the innocent public to come on and lose all their dignity or sell their soul on live television. This has been allowed to continue ever since, despite the brief rise of a new look of Indie music (which was very brief) and being saved by the reformation of a few bands from the old days. Popular music got so shit that I decided to abandon it and find new avenues in Folk and Electronic music with great results. Although the music was fairly bad we have now been given an amazing opportunity through the internet, an opportunity where any of us with a musical note and a lyric can produce a song and put it out to the world via the internet. Yea I know most of it’s shit but that’s not the point, musicians are back to promoting their music and giving it away for free and being more in touch with fans then they’ve ever been.
I think its now time I got to my point well here it is... I like to believe in omens and signs, and I find it more then coincidence that on this black of all days, a community’s legal festival has been stripped from it and the very government that tried to destroy it before is back, I find this more of a coincidence as music, just like the weather or may I be so bold to say the economy, change with every generation and I think a new Tory generation will be just what we need for our muscians, film makers, writers and artists to start giving a shit again and turn Britain back into the super power it once was. The previous Tory government might of stolen your milk, banned you from drinking on the terraces of a football stadium, forced you or a parent out of work due to privatization, and even tried to force a new pointless tax on you. But shit there wasn’t there some great music made under their reign? A Labour government was probably a bit easy on us, we got a minimum wage, tuition fee’s for higher education which could have been paid off by an easy little student loan, as well as a shit load of increased benefits and allowances which will probably now be cut. Now I'm not saying that the past 13 years will be known as the glory years of Britain. Don't get me wrong any government that goes to War illegally, bans the civil liberty of smoking and draws alliance with the dangerous, war mongering, bully Americans is not a good one in my view, but we are working class people and a change over from Red to Blue is against an unwritten social code, which is also why I think so many people voted for the Liberal Democrats this time round... So I ask that on this black of all days you try and have a little hope that beyond the inevitable lower standard of living, us working classes who enjoy our drink, cigarettes, music, films, drugs and parties can look forward to an increase of quality in the arts. It’s been a long time coming and it’s a new decade anyway so its bound to happen, lets use this time not to morn or moan, but to stand up against the new law of the land. I’ve already seen a Facebook group asking for support for a free Glade festival, and with the catalyst of the glorious Internet I’m almost certain that guitar music will return in this of all dark times. The Tories will moan, and living will probably only get worse, my main concern that the greatest institution left in this country, I am of course referring to the mighty BBC, will be allowed to be sold off to the evil Rupert Murdoch, that however is a blog I shall write if the situation arises, but fuck it lets go take in a film, get wasted and then listen to some tunes.
Thanks for reading; Sorry if my Wikipedia based research was all bull shit,
RIP Glade. 2004-2009
Lahm
I think its now time I got to my point well here it is... I like to believe in omens and signs, and I find it more then coincidence that on this black of all days, a community’s legal festival has been stripped from it and the very government that tried to destroy it before is back, I find this more of a coincidence as music, just like the weather or may I be so bold to say the economy, change with every generation and I think a new Tory generation will be just what we need for our muscians, film makers, writers and artists to start giving a shit again and turn Britain back into the super power it once was. The previous Tory government might of stolen your milk, banned you from drinking on the terraces of a football stadium, forced you or a parent out of work due to privatization, and even tried to force a new pointless tax on you. But shit there wasn’t there some great music made under their reign? A Labour government was probably a bit easy on us, we got a minimum wage, tuition fee’s for higher education which could have been paid off by an easy little student loan, as well as a shit load of increased benefits and allowances which will probably now be cut. Now I'm not saying that the past 13 years will be known as the glory years of Britain. Don't get me wrong any government that goes to War illegally, bans the civil liberty of smoking and draws alliance with the dangerous, war mongering, bully Americans is not a good one in my view, but we are working class people and a change over from Red to Blue is against an unwritten social code, which is also why I think so many people voted for the Liberal Democrats this time round... So I ask that on this black of all days you try and have a little hope that beyond the inevitable lower standard of living, us working classes who enjoy our drink, cigarettes, music, films, drugs and parties can look forward to an increase of quality in the arts. It’s been a long time coming and it’s a new decade anyway so its bound to happen, lets use this time not to morn or moan, but to stand up against the new law of the land. I’ve already seen a Facebook group asking for support for a free Glade festival, and with the catalyst of the glorious Internet I’m almost certain that guitar music will return in this of all dark times. The Tories will moan, and living will probably only get worse, my main concern that the greatest institution left in this country, I am of course referring to the mighty BBC, will be allowed to be sold off to the evil Rupert Murdoch, that however is a blog I shall write if the situation arises, but fuck it lets go take in a film, get wasted and then listen to some tunes.
Thanks for reading; Sorry if my Wikipedia based research was all bull shit,
RIP Glade. 2004-2009
Lahm
Wednesday 5 May 2010
Farewell teenage years
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It is exactly 56 minutes until I turn 20 and leave behind me the first development years of my life. The best way to write about it would be to do it in the style of a decade review I suppose, try and recall what change me as a person, what had an impact, what I experienced, landmark moments and the people that were there throughout all of it. For some of you that have known me through these 10 years some of this will ring bells, to some of you I have known for a couple to 3 years this is a chance to get to find out what I was up to before I met you. For those of you with no interest in the gory details, I’ve put a lot of effort into doing my stats at the bottom of the page I don’t know how this is going to work, but if I get it done before 12 it will be the fastest entry I’ve ever written for anything in my entire 20 years on earth. I suppose I should start from the point when I first started to have a clue what was going on in the world and for many people of around my age this date would probably have to be September 11th 2001. The last chance any of us will ever have to experience world peace, the start of fear and the beginning of a war which will last longer and probably be more pointless then the Trojan one. From now on no one was safe on a plane, anyone with a beard was a terrorist and your human rights were to be exploited for the interests of safety. I have tried to ignore this atmosphere for the past 9 years. Even when having to experience it happen just literally 3 miles up the road from me 5 years later. But this isn’t a blog about terrorism, more a blog of what I’ve noticed and learnt in the past 10 years. I grew up not knowing what its like not to have a mobile phone or not being connected to the Internet and I suppose I could argue that I've grown up in the fastest technological revolution in human history, also I’m yet to really understand the perils of a possible Tory government. I haven’t had a bad teenage life; but of course it has been plagued with the usual loneliness, self-consciousness, self-loathing and incredibly down periods where I stopped seeing the point and I’ve also discovered the evil of money and what it does to people. But despite the obvious harshness of adolescents, I’ve also learnt that within this world of morons and corporate bastards there is also so much more beauty if you look for it. I’ve experienced intense highs, explored unchartered mental territory and even discovered the joys of free love. But I have to say my favorite discovery is that no matter how hard life gets, how much them bastards grind you down, even when your own family starts to seem alien to you, you always have your friends, who are the family you choose yourself.
School Days
People always told me that your school years are the best years of your life…. That person was wrong. I went to a Jesuit run all boys school in Wimbledon, and it was filled with cunts. Prisons probably have better morals between the inmates. Grassing was not a crime, no one could be trusted, the banter was fun don’t get me wrong, but 90% of the people were arrogant, vicious and lacked a lot of human decency, Don’t get me wrong, I was never a victim of bullying as such but the enviroment of them classrooms was an absolute chore. I also hated that it seemed like it would never end, 5 days a week 9-3.30 for 11 years, learning stuff which a majority of which is useless and then years later realizing that the importance of these “GCSE’s” was all a complete fabrication. The idea that without them you would fail at life and never achieve your dreams was a lie and I felt like those 11 years of my life was taken from me unfairly. However it weren’t all doom and gloom, with the help of my mates Jul, B, G, Lloyd, Charlie, Stinky, Scott and maybe a few other acceptations of which I’m too tired to list at the moment I was able to survive them pointless years in that building. All of us had no interest in any of the work that was set and as a result pretty much all of us flunked our exams and kind of went our separate ways. Which is when things started to get fun….
Adolescents
Now I’m no expert on what its like to be a teenage girl, probably because I’ve never been one. But I am aware of hormones and all that emotional shit. But I honestly think that the years of 14-16 are by far the hardest years for the teenage boy. A Catholic all boys’ school isn’t the best environment to discover girls in. The teenage years I feel should the main years of sexual experiments, it’s a great practice patch. Find out how things work, how to put what where, how to react to certain reactions, and what to say when the whole ordeal is finished. Unfortunately though at this age if you ain’t got the development you ain’t got a bloody chance. I for one at the ages of 14-16 was shorter, quieter, and less adventurous and had less self as teem then a Guantanamo prisoner. I did however at the age of 15 manage to somehow lose my virginity to a girl called Emma Watson (unfortunately not the star of Harry Potter) I wont embarrass the girl with too many details of the filth we endeavored in. But it was the most awkward and seemingly pointless act I’ve ever had and I cant help but feel that the brief relationship I had with that girl has turned me into the unlucky sex crazed, buffoon that acts before you, but what I discovered from the experience and then further experiences is that sex should just be a bit of a laugh…because it is isn’t it? Love has got little to do with it when your that age because I don’t think your really capable of being truly in love with your first girlfriend or whatever so your just doing it for fun, in which case WHY DIDN’T I GET LAID MORE!?. The reason being is that the last I heard of that girl was that she was acting odd and had lost all contact with any friends that I knew of her. It was a time I’d rather forget and on that note I would like to start talking about the good shit….. The second significant date of my teenage years was the 23rd of March 2004, the reason being this was my first live gig and the start of my love of music. I went to see The Zutons with my life long partner in crime Lauren. I have vague memories of the set list even, but considering this was in the wake of the Libertines split and the Indie world was still in a daze after The Strokes released “is this it?” I was soon to be a bit of an Indie boy. (At this stage I would like to point out that age 12 I would wear heavily baggy jeans, nirvana hoodies and bike chains). Now I don’t know whether it’s because I’m starting to get tired and I’ve already just completed a 1500 word essay but I’m far too jaded to discuss my journey through the love of music. But may I give thanks to Morrissey for saving my life again and again. Noel Gallagher for his fantastic Rock N Roll and to Thom Yorke for teaching me that rock music didn’t have to have guitars in it, Damien Rice for teaching me that your deepest feelings and stories could be told through songs… O and a little cheeky shout out to Nick Bracegirdle for teaching me that music could be made using computers. Since that date I have no clue how many gigs I’ve been to, or how many bands I’ve seen live but without music I’d probably be a dunce.
College
When I discovered that you could do a course at college that involved watching films, talking about them, and even making them, I thought it was far too good to be true. Until I met a man at NESCOT College who was going to then be a bit of a life mentor for me. When I failed my exams not a single soul had any hope in me, even my own mother had given up hope on my future, but I will always remember what Catlow said to me… “…O well, not the end of the world. Your young, a year is nothing, if anything its just another year of experience for you.” That mans belief in me gave me the first piece of real self-confidence I’ve ever had in myself. The good lord may never have blessed me with athletic ability, good looks, intelligence or even common sense at times. But Catlow made me believe that I could do anything I wanted if I really wanted. But my journey from the quiet boy at the back of the room was just beginning. My first year of college introduced me to two pivotal people in my life. The first was a young man called Matty, who by complete coincidence was friends with my life long partner in crime Lauren and through this my social life was born. I learnt the essential basics of how to drink, smoke and stay up late. The second was a young man who turned up late to his second day of college after skipping his first because he couldn’t be bothered to show up. This fellow is Jack Sparling or Del as I like to refer to him, he took me for my first drink (which I paid for) and was the first person I could properly have in-depth conversations about film with. He also taught me how to smoke and generally act in public although none of it ever set in. He told me once the only reason he went on the course was because whist visiting on a mates induction a girl smiled at him so he enrolled to see if he could find her… I dunno what kind of person I would of turned out to be if that girl didn’t smile at Del. My second course at college ( a 2 year national diploma media course) was by far the 2 best years of my life. A completely new introduction of people and a new appreciation of the pleasures of cannabis, I look back at those 2 years now with a sense of complete bliss. What other college could I get get top class teaching at, watch films all day, get stoned on a break, play football at lunch, watch another film, have a load of banter with some quality people and then get an education out of the end of it, of course I had my 3 main partners in crime there also. Lewis, Aaron and Josh. To this day I think they should of put us on the front of the college prospectus as a sign of the colleges multi-cultural vibes. Aaron chaved up to the eyeballs, Lewis with a 12 inch Mohawk and laced in punk gear, Josh pulling off a Chicago style coolness of a swagger and a Jackson 5 style afro and myself whatever the fuck I was. We would of looked brilliant on that front cover, if it weren’t for the spliff we al had in each of our hands anyway, But anyway… Aaron, Lewis, Josh, Chapman, yid, Steve, Luke, Freeman, Nick, Lizz, Sardine, Bud, Sam, Joe and all the rest. Cheers! Also as a result of that I can confirm that if you haven’t a GCSE or an A-level to your name, you can still get into a top university if you really, really, really try.
Drugs, Raves and Bangface!
During the hot summer of 2006 at a party in Cheam I bumped into a gorgeous South African girl called Kate. We got talking about football and music, exchanged numbers and the next week I went to her house to hang out. It was a large mansion like house in Wimbledon village with a massive garden and a converted garage which was a banging party room…It was in this room where I first experimented with hard drugs, an interest which was to turn into a bit of an interest of mine. I suddenly was hit with the realization that the reason take drugs was because they was fantastic...If only there was other environments where these chemicals would work well? Cue exactly one year later, sat in on a sofa in the notorious Electrowerkz club. I asked a geezer named Tree (that really was his name!) for a lighter and got chatting, he then recommend that I’d attend again but on a Bangface night. I headed his advice, and again me and my life long partner in crime attended and to this day I am Hardcrew. The amazement of this viciously loud and fast music being played in this cramped, sweaty, filthy club which stank to high heaven of ganja. Everybody with a smile on their face, everybody approachable to talk to…. Now as much as I’d like to go on about Bangface I really do think I should save that one for another time. As much as I’d love to let loose and tell tales of all the amazing people that I have met and all the amazing friends I have made thanks to a club night, I really am going to save it for another time and when I say another time, I mean a long time from now. Maybe when I’m bored of it all, or if I physically cant hack it anymore. But even on this of all blogs. A blog which I said I was going to reveal all…I honestly don’t have it in me to let loose that emotion on this my last time as a teenage boy.
What I’ve learnt
I am a Lazy bastard
The majority of the public are idiots.
It’s easier to be nice to people then to be horrible, and you always get a better reaction to a positive approach to things.
Money rules all!
(on seducing women) If you make the pussy laugh, you make the pussy wet!
Music is magic
Film is the greatest art form that I’ve experienced
Friendship is god’s greatest gift
Human deceny is our gift to God
I will always notice things getting worse but will never notice the benefits of life
Absolutely anything can be achieved if you want it to be
Festivals are a sanctuary for kindness, peace and love
Football harnesses a stronger passion then marriage and religion put together
Drugs were put on this earth to speed up and help the evolutionary process
A smile can go a long way
Having sex is just a laugh, making love is the important part
Personality is real beauty
Just be good and kind to each other because after all we are all we’ve got
Violence is a shit answer, wit takes real intelligence
Corporations will probably destroy society
Greed is the ultimate evil
Women are the devil
….Theres probably a lot more but as I mentioned earlier its been a long night and my mind is spent
Statistics
Days alive: 7304
Education: GCSE’s: 6 D’s, 3 E’s, 2 F’s A-Levels: None Diplomas: 2
Arrests: 1
Jobs: 5
Football Teams Supported: 1
Girls I’ve charmed: 11
Relationships: 0
Fallen in Love: 0
Festivals attended: 13
Cup Finals Attended: 4
Countries visited: 6
Bands seen live: 150 (approximatley)
What I do now?
Finish Uni and get a job out of it
Stop being lazy
Stop making excuses
Show some more respect to my parents
Save money
Find real actual love
Actually live out one of my passions
Travel
Shag more women
Run a marathon
Continue getting wasted but control it more
Have twice as much fun as I’ve already had
Final words and special thanks
To be honest with you I’m glad to see the back of the teenage years, I’ve seen all they’ve had to offer, I’ve learnt a lot, and I’m still learning which is exciting, I’ve met some of the finest people a young man can possibly hope to meet and I have a good idea of what I want to do with my life, sorry for lack of detail of certain events and life skills in this blog and it wasn’t as revealing as I’d hoped it be, I haven’t experienced that much bad stuff happen to me for it to be a thriller, I also hope you can respect I’ve just tried to sum up 10 years as quickly as possible. But if I could some it up in a sentence I suppose It would be something along the line of…I didn’t achieve everything I set out to do, and I made a lot of excuses, but I had a laugh and I regret nothing…but anyway a special thanks and respect to… (in no proper order)
Mam and Dad, Lauren Springer, G Brown, B and Jul Smith, Charlie O’Grady, Scott O’Conner, Kate Wessex, Jack Sparling, Matty Ashwood, Sam Fifield, Nairobi Affuko, Jay Sullivan, Craig Catlow, Alan Hardcastle, Lewis Grimwood, Mike Andrews, Axel Olson, Ian Gaughran, Lesley Remdond Josh Braithwait, Matt Chapman, Matt ‘The Yid’ Sharp, Matthew ‘freeman’ Carter, Luke Flight, Lizzie Millard, Stephen Hubbard, Sam Dowden, Neill, Leefus Fitzpatrick, Richard Unwin, Pete ‘razor’ Medlock, James Bangface, Sarah and Graeme King, Heidie Prag, James ‘Jean’ Simmons, Dominick Medler, Alan Mcleod, DAN, Dinn Warde, Mike Neufield, Dave Feneron, Jem ‘Gurner’, Hayley Morgan, Lee Hutcheon, The Regime Boys (Mic, Lloyd & Howard etc), Big Scottish Dave, Joe Amos, Holly Parker, Rosa Macey, Ian Hamilton, Tom ‘The Nonce’ Radford, Fiona Hamilton, Julie Pritchard, Adam Emberson, Ryan Mcfdagey, Duane Melius, Elliot Snook, Chris ‘Baldo’, Jenny Garton, Page Perrier, Annie, Charlotte and Callum Graham, Dylan, Josh Kerr, Laura Wood, Matty Treagold, Lloyd, Michelle, Jamie, Natasha, Nanja and too anybody who I’m too tired to remember. Cheers you made it all worth while
Monday 25 January 2010
The reasons for my recent absence (pathetic excuse for problems)
Hi. May I apologies firstly for my slack attempt at updating my blog. The reasons behind my recent laziness will be explained in the following through paragraphs, and I must warn you this is probably going to be a depressing one.
Shockingly the last time I wrote here I was still living in Morden, living up the summer and probably being slightly nervous about the next few months of my life, probably because I was moving out and starting university. Well here I am around 5 months in and I have found myself to be suffering from total de-motivation. Now I know that some of you will think that its just a fancy word for being lazy, but I’m a grand master in being lazy and I can tell you this is a whole lot more soul destroying. I find it’s probably the same difference between having the blues and being completely depressed. The worse case of this de-motivation came at around Christmas time, when I had 6 weeks off uni and all my housemates went home for the holidays. I completely isolated myself in the house, had no money to do anything, and wouldn’t move from my chair for about 14 hours until I would go to sleep. Now even a lazy person would use this time constructively, they would listen to new music, sit there and watch a shit load of films they hadn’t seen before or watch the whole series of The Soprano’s or something. I however sat there in my arm chair, blocking out the whole concept of Christmas, played a few games of Football Manager every day and had a routine of day time television, I would also drink myself stupid every day without fail so I could kill the boredom. The most horrible part of all this was that I knew I was doing nothing and I was unbelievably unhappy about it. Being so lethargic as to not even be bothered to listen to music was probably the lowest point of it all, but I battled through and made it into the New Year alive and well although slightly apprehensive about how things were going. I learnt a valuable thing about myself last Christmas. I’m not designed to be alone because my mind and me really don’t get on when we’re together; this is where I think the copious amounts of booze were helping.
Another issues I’ve had to face with my recent identity crisis are my sudden dip in confidence and self esteem. A year ago I’d walk into social situations with the excitement of meeting new people and making new friends, however a few weeks ago I couldn’t even ask a station supervisor when the next train to Victoria was, which unfortunately is just a small fact in a long list of recent quivering messes I’ve found myself in just lately, and what bothers me even more is that even though I’m aware all of this is going on I just lie in bed thinking about it and getting myself angry, which has also lead to another problem your faithful narrator has been having, which is confrontation. The past few months I have screamed at traffic wardens, spat in the direction of doormen, wrote unnecessarily aggressive letters to councils and nightclubs and just generally been a right arse to anyone who hasn’t shared my opinion on something. This entirely new concept of being angry hasn’t faired to well to my current situation because I’m not really used to making a fuss about anything, I’m also worried it could get me into a bit of trouble if I cant vent it better then I’m already trying to do.
This leads me on to another problem I’ve been having, which is my loss of passion for things I once loved loads. Music, like I mentioned before now has very little impact on me. Tracks I usually love now have no effect and whole idea of listening to anything new just seems like a choir. Film. Although until as recent as last (although with the help of my old friend Mary Jane) I had no interest in watching any films, I couldn’t bring myself to have the attention span to concentrate on anything at all, although this is facing a kind of revival recently and I’m seeing it as a silver lining to a massive black cloud. Then there’s my most favorite hobby… Getting wasted. Now the main answer I give when asked why I like to inebriate myself is simply that I feel that I’m quite good at it. I stay out of trouble, I can control myself quite well, I can handle a lot, rarely noticeable freak out, and can take care of myself pretty well, as well as enjoy myself immensely and be really social at the same time. But like everything else that I’m moaning about, this has become somewhat of a choir recently. Most noticeably for me was a recent adventure to Brighton. I was of course going for The Regime like I always do but had told my old friends B & G that I would meet them at the club. When I met them I was struggling to string a sentence together let alone make good conversation with my old mates, I stood almost lost in the corner of the club not talking to anyone and generally losing control of myself, this was when I realized that there had been previous stupid moments like this one. The squat party when I lost my wallet and keys, getting on wrong busses and trains home, getting myself lost in Enfield, and the bizarre anxiety attack I also had after one night. I’m hoping this passes as I miss the pleasures of letting off steam through the method of poisoning myself.
Now I’ve tried to think of a way of how to resolve this predicament I’ve found myself in. What can I put it down to? I blame the following…
The horrible weather – I’ve always hated winter ever since I was young. Short sunlight hours, grotty wet London settings, dead tree’s and plants, no wildlife, and freezing my bollocks off is a form of torture really.
The decline of Bangface – I loved Bangface because it meant that every second Friday of the month without fail I could go to a place were my favorite artists would be playing and the best people I know from all over the country would all gather to get messy and have an absolute right laugh in a grotty club called the Electrowerkz. Now I have to wait almost 2 and half months for one in a venue I’m not keen on, and an atmosphere that deters me a bit.
The realization that change is shit and more things are changing and getting shitter – I cant get a job because there isn’t any, everything is ridiculously expensive, popular music shows absolutely no sign of improving, Football is continuing its horrible downfall as a middle class and businessman’s sport, even my favorite band has split up. I can not note one single piece of change in my life that has effected me for the better in anyway what so ever… O and the fact that for the rest of my life; me, my friends and my family will all be addicted to money.
Now if your still reading your probably wondering what my solution is going to be or this? I haven’t quite decided yet to be honest with you. I’m actually waiting for the weather to get better so that I think straight again. I’m also trying to stay positive in a way and trying to imagine myself with real problems. I have probably angered some of you reading this with my petty excuse for problems. There has just been a major natural disaster in an undeveloped country and I’m moaning about how I’m too lazy to get off my arse and actually do something with myself.
Thanks for reading, and I hope that next time you come to read my ramblings it will be on a more positive note, but for those of you who actually enjoy reading this thing (And there must be a few because I don’t think I can get over 300 profile views for 6 posts accidently.) These are the reasons why I haven’t posted lately.
Nice one, take it easy
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