Musics I done

Monday, March 17, 2008

tsch

so i've not blogged since the first proper gig - four weeks, a full page of my google calendar. i'm just finding it tricky to keep up with the moving and the band and the interacting with people too much. i'm looking back over a very long weekend now, four days of bedlam and sodomy and actually realising i live here and how did that happen?

so we did a gig in newcastle. it was the gig we got together for, which feels a funny way round to do things -
oh i'm really too tired for this and i need to wash up and apply for a job i don't meet the specification for and it's really too long ago...
the gig... the gig was watched on video last week by most of the band and it was pretty comical. we're not as good as we thought we were - you can't fool a camera with wit and charm. so it's back to the drawing board under sam's watchful gaze; he seems to be much more up for the 'things are more fun if you're really good at them' idea much more seriously than even i. my main memory - or lack of - of the gig was the megabus, 7 hours trapped each way, with islets of conversation that lasted until i could crane my neck round the chairs anymore. we need to avoid this kind of thing, this kind of slapdash last minute planning.

so what else happened..
i saw sarah's new band madam with ed, who didn't really move me tbh. then laurence and julie came over. (realising how much there is to write up..) i met them at the royal exchange at bank, a huge epic crossroads of power, &c. basically it was a good landmark with some cover for the rain... we hopped on the bus and dropped things off at rachel's, then headed straight back out to the ICA for st david's day. there was a bunch of welsh bands on, and ben and mim came out too. gigs aren't great places to go to catch up with people, but mc mabon was palying and how often does that happen? so mr huw played and was good in a brit pop kind of way - proper chord based indie - and then mc mabon who was a bit more melodic and rappy too, then radio luxembourg who were great and obviously very into their gorkys (even to the point of being produced by euros childs). then genod droog who were immense dumb fun - kind of black grapey, finshing their set with a cover of house of pain's jump around. it was a good night. then we all wandered into soho for drinking which didn't really happen and curry which did but with a central london mark-up. then we wandered off.
l & j managed to stay the whole weekend, due to it simply being more convienent. the next day, although rachel had bought all the things you'd want for a lovely fry up, they insisted on going out for one, for the real british fry up experience; we brought some more with us and sat around in the corner cafe. then we went out to camden - crowded, smelly camden, to catch up with aimee and nicola, who initially spurned us for shopping. we got a pint at the lock tavern, home of the girls girls girls' acoustic set that i played guest guitar at. then wandered round as much of the market as possible, finding out where 'neverwhere' got it's inspiration from. there was a really good metal shop too. once we met up with n & a, we went back to london fields and the dove, railroaded into the dining area for lack of room and ending up eating as usual. then we went home, played backgammon, and watched the brazil documentary.

the day after, sunday, we went to brighton. it was quite a focused visit - we saw chris t-t and rifa, and jess, went to all the shops we needed to. the juice bar where the bobby mcgees worked has disappeared so i didn't see them, which i do need to do very soon or we'll collapse.
i think i'm gonna have to break this into sections. we met chris and rifa in wai kika mu kau, which seems to have become the hangout of choice for the young parents. every table but ours had at least one child. it's a generation thing. then seeing jess and stompy in our old local, the park crescent was good, marred by the usual electronic music. it should be nice relaxing folk in there, always has to much of a pre-club feel. badger ale and so many dogs, i bought a 'save iceland from big business' tshirt which i'm very proud of. and there's always the train journey to brighton to pacify you.
the next day rachel and i weren't around to entertain them, so they went to kew, as one does.then they bought us curry. julie had to get up at 5 in the morning, and we were woken up by the sound of laurence trying to get back in through the deterioting lock which no longer works right.

laurence took himself round town then we met up after work and went to see girls girls girls at their 'most important gig ever', doing the old whiskey & ginger beer at islington precint trick again. loads of old familiar faces and joy and a really short set. then we went home eraly enough for laurence to play through almost all of portal, until he got stuck on the annoying box-tube/missile launcher puzzle while i was asleep. such is life.
xx

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