So there’s a “Trinity FM” society in college, which I joined, along with a friend of mine, let’s call him Joseph, for that is his name.
Four (I think) of the big colleges in Ireland share a radio frequency, so basically, every month, Trinity FM has a week slot on the radio. An email went around recently asking people to submit applications to do their own show.
Of course, Joseph and I procrastinated and ended up submitting our application two days later than the deadline. We also never attended the training things to show us how to use the equipment. And neither of us had done anything like this before.
We were given the opening hour slot, 9-10am on Tuesday morning (Monday being a bank holiday). Someone else had this originally, but had to cancel.
Naturally we did nothing until Monday night, when Joseph came around to my house to try prepare something for the show. We ate pizza, picked a few songs for the playlist, went to tesco, and had crisp sandwiches, and were left with a sheet of “planning” that was just a load of doodles. It was so pathetic looking that it was funny.
The following morning comes, and we’re on the bus trying to convince ourselves we’ll be fine.
“We’ll be grand, we’ll have plenty to talk about, sure it’ll just be like us hanging out normally, except broadcast over all of Dublin. Feck it, nobody’ll be listening anyway”
We got in early and were quickly taught how to use equipment, it wasn’t too complicated.
We decided to be open about how unprepared we were, and generally take the piss out of ourselves. It actually went really well! Conversation flowed very naturally, and we had a really good laugh. Also, the songs we played were damn good. I was really happy with the playlist.
The few reactions we got were all very positive, and I felt really pleased with how it went. After the show I was actually disappointed that I hadn’t told anyone about it beforehand (I figured that with no planning, we could end up failing miserably).
The radio frequency is 97.3, for anyone who wants to listen to other student radio shows.
Hopefully we’ll do another show next time that I’ll mention on here in advance. We wanted to get a recording of the show, but didn’t manage it, but if one turns up (from the station or whatever) I’ll upload it here.
Here’s the playlist of the show.
Be Prepared - Shellac
Good Woman - Cat Power
Waiting Room - Fugazi
Sexy Boy - Shawn Michaels (this was for the lulz)
I’m Housin’ - Rage Against The Machine
Flume (new version) - Bon Iver
Kids Will Be Skeletons - Mogwai
We had more songs on the playlist, but ended up talking more than we thought we’d be able to, so had to cut some off - a very good sign in my book.
I spoke to the guy who was following us with his own show.
“Done anything like this before mate?” (I was expecting him to say no)
“Yeah. I used to work for the BBC”
“Oh.”
Overall though, I’m really happy I did the show (we toyed with the idea of just not showing up - it was early and we were hideously unprepared), and I’m looking forward to doing something like that again.
On Wednesday, third level students marched through Dublin and up to the Dáil to show our feelings at the idea of fees being introduced. I was torn between going to my French lecture and marching. On one hand, I was hating French so far (through no fault of my own, the way we’re “taught” it is awful, my secondary school teacher was far superior). On the other hand, fuck French, this is a protest march. Won’t get to do that often. Rage against the motherfucking machine.
Feck it, I’ll go march. Sure I can get the French notes online anyway.
So I went. Apparently there was 12,000-15,000 students marching in total. Mainly from TCD, UCD, and DIT from what I could see. It was quite good actually. There was never really a fear of there being any trouble, although with the number of gardaí around it wouldn’t have lasted long anyway. The highlight of the entire thing was reading the signs people had made.
Some normal ones like :
“Education is a right, not a privilege”
“More fees, less degrees”
But I preferred the following :
“Stick your fees up your gees”
“Fees are silly, go suck my willy”
“Down with this sort of thing” of course accompanied by “Careful now” (Father Ted)
“Free Joseph Fritzl”
“You’ve made us very angry”
“Grrr”
Fair play to everyone that marched, especially those who made signs, I’m sure there were other funny ones I’ve just forgotten about. If anyone can remember any more, let me know and I’ll update the post and give you credit for it.
But for non football fans, have a ram on a power line.
For some reason the lack of punctuation in the caption(s) crack me up. Perhaps it’s time LOLcats were replaced by LOLrams.
Curses on :
This. The Sunday Round-Up is getting difficult to manage. Later on today I’m going to have to compile an excel file or else just a hand-written table of all the previous things that have been on the round-up.
Whenever anything happens during the week I have to think to myself : “That’s going on the blog, but should it be in the Sunday post or does it deserve a post of it’s own?”.
Also, I purchased a few new posters recently, and put them on my wall this week. I had to rearrange some of the ones that were currently on there. For the past few nights a different poster has fallen on me during the night. The initial fright and confusion of a big poster falling on your face in the middle of the night is difficult to match. This is followed by annoyance at the blue-tack for not doing it’s job. The one job the blue-tack has to feckin’ do.
Finally, there’s forgiveness the next day as you put the poster back up with a little more blue-tack and an extra shove into the wall.
I’m pleased with :
The clocks went back one hour last night. That’s an extra hour of sleep!
This vital daylight savings technique is the reason I got up this morning rather than this afternoon.
And, Presidents Of The United States Of America have announced another Dublin gig, on April 3rd, a day after my birthday! Savage.
A pointless anecdote from this week :
The day of the march I mentioned above, I was in the pub in Trinity campus, the beloved “Pav”.
Anyway, a guy walked by me and I had to stop him and ask “Sorry, are you Dan?”
He says yeah, and I explain to him we met at a Babyshambles concert (back in 2006!) and he’d added me on Bebo and such afterwards. The reason I remembered him was because he’s a very busy guy. Does his own solo acoustic music (which is actually very good) and is very involved in politics, which is not something you see often - a young guy who cares enough about politics to get involved. He told me that he’s off college for a year as he’s doing some student union stuff in his college this year, no surprises there!
We chatted for a while, and he remembered me quite well, which was a pleasant surprise for me. Very nice chap, but how strange was it to meet (and remember him) after we’d met over two years ago at a feckin’ concert?
I love stuff like that happening.
Great guy/gal of this week :
Ruth from Pete Doherty Forum (dot com). She’ll probably never read this but it must be done anyway.
Firstly, Ruth was one of the first decent members on the forum when I first created it.
She is also the one who gave me the ticket to see Dirty Pretty Things a few months ago. This resulted in me meeting the band, and getting the picture with Carl Barat that I treasure so much. Not just this, but no matter how much I insisted, she wouldn’t take payment for the ticket.
And this week, she has pointed out to me that if you search for “Carl Barat” on google images, the picture of me and Carl is on the first page of results, and as she put it : “That’s a claim to fame if I ever heard one.”
Product/Service I like this week :
Check out the two posters I got on Tuesday. There was a big poster sale in a place just off Trinity campus, I got both of these for a tenner. It was €6 each or two for a tenner, so obviously I simply had to get two…
That second one is for the band, Tool. I wanted to get a poster of theirs back at their concert in 2006, but by the time I got to the counter they’d sold out. Now I can look back and say fuck you, merchandise stand. Fuck you right in your understocked ass.
A quote :
“Three o’clock is always too late or too early for anything you want to do.“
- Jean-Paul Sartre.
How true’s that?
Favourite song this week :
Time For Heroes - by The Libertines
Had to be careful not to make the typo “Time For Herpes”
Have I had the Libertines on this before?
This song is one of their most famous, and regarded by many as their best. Written by Pete after the Mayday riots, the lyrics make it one of my favourite songs. I just watched the video there, and it’s good yet depressing to see Pete and Carl together all young and happy. Before the “troubled rocker” or “junkie rocker” headlines.
Did you see the stylish kids in the riot?
Shovelled up like muck, set the night on fire. Wombles bleed, truncheons and shields, you know I cherish you my love.
But there’s a rumour spread nasty disease around town, You caught round the houses with your trousers down
A headrush in the bush, You know I cherish you my love.
Tell me what can you want, now you’ve got it all
The whole scene is obscene
Time will strip it away
A year and a day
And Bill Bones
Bill Bones knows what I mean
He knows it’s eating, it’s chewing me up
It’s not right for young lungs to be coughing up blood
And it’s all
It’s all in my hands
And its all up the walls
Well the stale chips are up and the hopes stakes are down
It’s these ignorant faces that bring this town down
And I sighed and sunken with pride
I passed myself down on my knees
Yes I passed myself down on my knees
There are fewer more distressing sights than that
Of an Englishman in a baseball cap
And we’ll die in the class we were born
But that’s a class of our own my love
A class of our own my love.
When someone (or you) is falling asleep. Their neck gets limp looking and their head begins to sort of sag listlessly. You’re waiting for it to come.
Finally, we get the nod.
Their head falls forward in a glorious arc and just as it seems like they’re about to chin themselves in the chest, they wake up, open their eyes and bring their head upright dramatically. The temporary embarrassment of this soon passes as their eyes start drooping once more and off they trot into the land of nod once again.
I fucking love seeing this happen.
What’s also good is when we get the variations of the nod, such as the sideways lean into the person beside them. This is particularly funny if the person beside the sleeper is a stranger.
The other day I was coming home on the bus at rush hour, everyone tired after a long day at work or college. I sat at the back, meaning I would have people beside me and in front of me, facing me. The guy in front of me was first to go. I saw the eyes close serenely and soon he was doing the aul’ sleeping nod every few minutes. Jolting back awake every time it seemed he was about to fall properly asleep.
I was pleased to see he didn’t give a bollocks, and was nodding off every so often without an ounce of shame or embarrassment. He was sitting beside this glamourous looking Eastern European girl, who was not a bit impressed when he very nearly fell asleep on her shoulder.
Then the guy beside me started to go. I was sitting there, surrounded by these nodding dogs, wondering who’d be next to go.
It really helped pass the time.
I really wish I could sleep on public transport, it’d be so feckin’ handy! No matter how little sleep I’ve had, I always find it difficult to sleep when other people are around.
Some friends of mine are not so troubled, and have told me stories of them falling asleep on the bus, and being awoken by what can only be described as their own sleepy drool trail. Now that’s what I wanna see!
On the 12th Sunday Round-Up my true love gave to me…
My abstract distraction this week is :
Meeting celebrities! Well, sort of celebrities. It started last Sunday after a gig by a band called This Will Destroy You. They played a good gig, quite a short set, but still very good. Afterwards I got to shake hands and chat to both guitarists, nothing major, but I was happy.
The next night I was at an official opening night for a club in Dublin. A friend of mine had somehow gotten a load of tickets for the event. We went in, managed to get our first round of drinks for free, then were each given four vouchers for free drinks. On top of that, there were people going around all night with rum & cokes on a tray for the taking. Then the free food was brought around to each table. Swanky! Supposedly there was a(n) FHM model there, but I was more interested in getting to see Ms. Rosie Webster from Coronation Street. Her real name is Helen Flanagan, and it was perfect for me that she was the celeb attraction for that night, as the Football365 forum has a bit of an obsession with her.
I started a thread on the forum (I won’t be linking to it!) before going out, stating that Rosie was going to be in the club I was going to that night. A lot of people gave me instructions, the general concensus was that I HAD to get a picture or video of her. Just last week someone on the forum claimed to have met her, and gave a picture, but it turned out to be a lie and the picture was two years old and of someone else, so a lot of pressure was on me!
Luckily enough I managed to find her (upstairs, protected by some security lads) and got the picture. Because of all the free drink that was going and being consumed, I don’t actually remember speaking to her, but I have the photographic evidence.
The photo was put on the forum, and I was complimented quite a lot for my “Top forumming”. Of course there were plenty of slaggings and insults and people comparing me to other famous people (a footballer and a singer from a particularly shit band!), but overall it went down very well.
Something that made me laugh this week :
I found a ton of these hilarious exam answer pictures, and will be putting them all in a dedicated post sometime, but for now, here’s two of my favourites.
Curses on :
College things being cancelled without me knowing. I went in the other day for 10am, was worried about being late but managed to get in around 5 minutes late - grand. Got in and the lecture hadn’t started, and there was only about a third of the usual turnout there.
Turns out the lecture had been cancelled, and my next one wasn’t for another two hours. So I missed two feckin’ hours of sleep. The anger you feel at this sort of thing.
“Two fucking hours! I’m wrecked now, whereas if I had those precious two hours I’d be on top of the world. This is fucking bullshit. Fuck this college shit, wasting my god damn time here I am. Should be off learning a trade and earning some-
Fuck it. I’ll go get a breakfast roll. That’ll make me feel better.
Yeah. That’s it. Breakfast rolls solve all.”
Then two days later, I’m finished one lecture at 12, and have my next one at 1pm, and then I’m done. The 11am-12pm one finishes. So I’m arsing around for an hour waiting. Finally we get into the tutorial, and the tutor tells us we’re being split into two groups. Anyone with their surname from M-Z may go home and come back next week, as that tutorial need only be attended every other week.
Seriously? You couldn’t have emailed us that yesterday and saved half the class the hassle of coming in?
Seriously, if you haven’t watched this show, start watching it.
A pointless anecdote from this week :
There I was on an hour’s break in college. Had a bit of a hangover, so decided I deserved some lunch.
Went and bought some lunch and sat on a bench on campus in Trinity that’s sort of secluded, it’s really nice. As I was sitting there, I heard someone walking by the railings behind me, saying “I can’t fucking believe this shit”.
Naturally I turned around to look at him, saw he was on the phone, wearing a red jumper.
A few seconds later he walks into the little secluded spot I’m in.
“Oh great, here comes the psychopath having a bad day. This is bound to end well.”
He walks in my direction and says, in a bit of a posh voice :
“Sorry man, are you in the college?”
“Yeah”
“Right well I’m sorry to bother you, but I’ve locked myself out of my car, have no wallet, nothing, and need to get home again. Any chance you could give me a little spare change for a train home? The amount of people who’ve told me to fuck off is unreal.”
I was in quite a good mood, and felt for the guy.
“Eh, alright yeah, how much do you need?”
“Dunno man, how much is a train ticket? Two something?”
“Here, just take that” And I gave him 3 euro.
“Aw cheers man, thanks so much” etc.
And off he went.
Then a few minutes later I saw a security guard jogging past my secluded spot, and he looks in my direction and points at me. I thought this meant I wasn’t supposed to be eating or drinking from a can there. I was just finished my food and drink anyway so put the can and wrapper in the bin before he came back. Then I took out a book and read.
“Sorry there” - the security guard is back and right in front of me.
“How ya doin’?”
“That chap in the red top, he give you some story about a car or something?”
“Yeah he did.”
“We’ve had trouble with him before, don’t be afraid to give us a shout if anything like that happens”
“Ah he seemed genuine enough though”
“Yeah but you need to be careful, these people can rob you blind”
“Alright, thanks a lot”
“Sound”
So the well dressed man with the posh accent may well have been no more than a clever beggar.
Great guy/gal of this week :
Adam Ficek and Helen Flanagan of course.
Honourable mention also to Danny from Adam’s record label, 360 Degree Music, who sent me an email after I made the blog post, thanking me for coming down on the day and also for making the blog post. How nice!
Product/Service I like this week :
Trinity student discount for Captain America’s. Technically it’s actually only for members of the Hist society, but practically everyone joins that. The deal is that from Monday-Wednesday we can get two main courses for the price of one.
I went in with a friend the other night, I ordered a nice manly steak meal while he got some lasagne.
“And to drink sir?”
“Just some lovely free water please”.
The meal was massive, really filling and much better than getting some crap from McDonald’s or Burger King (though I have been converted to BK’s recently).
How much did it cost me? €7.50, including a tip.
Thank you college discount!
A quote :
“Do not weep like a woman for what you could not defend like a man.“
- Some chap’s mother.
We were out on Friday and a girl said this quote. I remarked on how good it was, and if she made it up herself. She then gave me the full story behind it. Here’s an explanation I found online :
When the Christian took over the Muslim Spain, the last place left under the Muslims was Grenada. And the ruler of Grenada, Abu Muhammad, signed a treaty with the Christians that they would not forcefully convert Muslims and they would not oppress them. But as soon the Christians got hold of Grenada, they went and hung up a cross on the top of the Hamra Palace. When Abu Muhammad saw this he started crying and then his mother rebuked him by saying “Do not weep like a woman for what you could not defend like a man.”
Favourite song this week :
Goin’ Against Your Mind - by Built To Spill
The first time I listened to this band’s album I thought it was utter shite.
Then I gave it another go, and fell in love with this song (such a good intro!) but hated the rest of the album.
I now like the entire album.
Enjoy.
That’s that. I’m relieved to get this finished, I feel really sick and it’s honestly painful to do anything but lie in bed like a vegetable. Sympathy plzkthx.
I’m home from a very long day at college. I had a four hour break and for the last hour of this there was an “instore” performance in Tower Records by Roses, Kings, Castles.
Roses, Kings, Castles is the solo acoustic project by Adam Ficek, the drummer from Babyshambles.
I’m a big Babyshambles fan so was delighted to have a chance to meet Adam.
He was due to come in at 5pm, I was in there fairly early, browsing around with friends. At about 4.40 I decided to buy the album and hopefully get it signed later. Grabbed the cd and walked up the aisle towards the counter. Looked up and saw who else but Adam Ficek walking by me, with who I presumed to be his manager or something.
Without thinking I just said “Adam?”
He stops and looks at me, I tell him I’m a big fan, shake his hand and tell him I was just about to buy the cd, and show him it in my hand. He raised his arms and goes “Yeaaaoh!”. I tell him I hope he’ll be signing it for me later, he says “Yeah definitely mate” - very polite chap he was.
Anyway, he was tuning up his guitar and looking bored, so I went up for a chat, and to get my album booklet signed. He duly obliged and asked me if I had the single. I said no, and he went and grabbed me a copy of the single to give me. And there I stood, chatting to Adam Ficek about when Babyshambles are coming back to Dublin, the antics of Pete Doherty and Patrick Walden (”Peter” and “Patrick” - it was weird hearing them being talked about by someone actually close to them). He asked me what I’m doing in college, where I lived, and all that. I know he’s not a big celebrity or anything, but considering this man is on a poster on my wall, it was weird just having such an everyday conversation with him. A very down-to-earth guy, total gent.
He played a good few songs, really nice stuff, and stuck around for photos and autographs.
Funnily enough, I met a guy from PeteDohertyForum that I met after a Dirty Pretty Things gig a few months back, and he loaned me his camera to get a photo with Adam, which he’ll hopefully be sending me soon.
Gigs. Bon Iver on Tuesday (see previous blog post) and I’ve going to see This Will Destroy You tonight. I’ve another two gigs to attend over the next month too.
Concerts are just brilliant. The anticipation while watching all the equipment being set up and then finally seeing your favourite artists in the flesh, doing what they do best.
Lately, with me being a broke college student, I’ve gotten into the habit of not drinking at concerts, and it’s not so bad actually.
Something that made me laugh this week :
In town the other night, waiting for a nitelink. I had just gone and bought credit, and had spent more money that night than I’d intended. A homeless guy came up to me as I was leaving the shop, and started talking to me. When you’re in the city often, you begin to desensitise to homeless people and their asking for spare change, though I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a bit of a sucker for those less fortunate.
This guy says to me : "Sorry to bother you mate, I’m completely harmless, I’m not a criminal and I don’t abuse drugs. I haven’t drank in 8 years. I’m desperately trying to get 18 euro together for a hostel, would you have any spare change?"
I couldn’t say no after something like this. He really made a good pitch!
Even though I knew there was every chance it was complete bullshit and he was off to buy a naggin of vodka as soon as he got the money, he seemed genuine and one thing was for sure - he was far worse off than me. Here’s me thinking I’m broke because I have to stay in the odd night instead of going to a club, and going to college during the week, while this guy is walking the streets trying to scrape some change together for food or somewhere to stay. I gave him the change I had in my wallet, and said "Sorry it’s so little, the only change I have".
He shrugged and said : "Better than a kick in the balls mate. Thanks." and walked off.
I did a genuine laugh when he said that, and was glad I gave him money.
Curses on :
Motherfucking Eircom. The main phone company in Ireland, and my internet provider.
Something’s wrong with the internet in my area. Certain sites are being blocked by Eircom while they’re fucking around with something, and it’s very irritating. Yesterday I noticed none of my sites on my server were working. So I asked a friend to check if they loaded for him. They did.
He then told me that a load of sites hadn’t been working for him the day before, and it’s something to do with Eircom. This guy is my main computer nerd advice person, so I suspect he’s right. I then tried my sites using a proxy server, and they worked fine.
Right now I have to do this post through a proxy, which is just a pain in the hole.
I’m pleased with :
Learning to save my money a little better.
I’ve begun to learn when to take it easy and stay in for the night. And as I mentioned above, learned not to drink (much) at gigs etc where there’s actually something to do aside from getting drunk.
The best thing is saving money on food. Being in college during the day, you get hungry obviously. This is when people go and buy food. But I have discovered a brilliant money-saver.
Just starve!
Even the other day I was given money to buy lunch, as presumably my parents felt bad about me buying my own food every day.
There wasn’t a single second where I actually considered buying food with that money.
A pointless anecdote from this week :
You know when you do something that just makes you think "Fucking hell, I’m a complete idiot"?
The other day I was walking down towards the bus stop to head into town to meet some people. I get around the corner where I can see the road that buses drive down, and see one bus driving off. Feck. If only I’d tied my shoes a bit quicker and walked a bit faster, I’d have gotten that bus. Not to worry, there’ll be another.
In the place where I usually get the bus, there’s about six different buses that regularly pass through, of which I can get five. I get around the corner to where I can see the bus stop, but still have a bit of walking until I get there. And I see another bus. Feck! It was stopped at traffic lights, behind a car. If I miss this one too, then I could be waiting a while for the next.
So I decide, fuck it, run to the next stop, to get there before the bus does. So I ran. Ran like a motherfucker I did. Was getting close, and then saw a car go by me, which meant the bus was next. Threw an arm out as I ran, to indicate to the passing bus that I wanted to get it. He slowed down dramatically, and stopped just after the bus stop, waiting for me to continue running and get on.
Then I looked at the bus number, and it was the one fucking bus that doesn’t go into town. I didn’t know what to do then. I had ran for ages, looking like a right dope, and the driver had stopped for me and all, and was waiting just ahead. I just waved it on, in the hope the driver would be looking out his mirror and understand what happened. He did, it seemed. And drove off.
So then I was waiting the next bus stop on from my usual. I didn’t like this. I much prefer my usual one - you can see the bus coming for ages from there.
So I check the bus timetable, and see there’s no other buses coming for a few minutes, so decide to walk to my usual bus stop. A fucking stupid decision if ever I heard one.
You know what’s going to happen don’t you?
About half way back towards my bus stop I see a bus coming, and it’s one I can get.
"Oh for fuck’s sake".
Back and forth like a feckin’ yo-yo here!
And so I turned and ran back to my second bus stop, having to do the throwing-your-arm-out-to-stop-the-bus thing yet again. Thankfully this bus also stopped for me, and I was ever so grateful until I saw some people getting off there, so I didn’t even need to run like I had done.
Got on the bus and sat there for the journey thinking about what a fucking idiot I was.
There’s no sweat quite like the sweat you build from doing a whole lot of unnecessary sprinting.
Great guy/gal of this week :
Whitney Doyebi. For two reasons :
1. I’ve nobody else in mind this week.
2. She asked me, in a drunken email.
Whitney is a friend of mine that moved back to America (where she originally came from) when we were in first year of secondary school. All American she was, with her accent and her enthusiasm and mannerisms.
About two or three years after she left us, Whitney found us all through myspace or bebo and has been keeping in contact ever since.
The other day Whitney sent me a drunken email explaining why she deserved the great guy/gal of the week.
She is a great girl however. Once, back in fifth class I think, Whitney loaned me some accessories to enhance my "goth" costume that I was wearing to a fancy dress party.
Shitney <3
Product/Service I like this week :
The pub on campus in Trinity.
Cans of beer for half the price of a pint? Yes please!
Why don’t more pubs do this?
You can still make good profit (they’re charging over double the price that a can of beer retails at), there’s no cleaning glasses, no cleaning up smashed glasses, and you draw in the broke students.
You can still get pints in there of course, but very few people do. Guinness is my drink of choice (yes, I’m an old man) so I tried that in there first. They gave me my pint in a plastic glass.
Are you serious? Guinness in a plastic cup? Why not just give it to me in a muddy old wellie or something while you’re at it?
A quote :
"Show me a man who lives alone and has a perpetually clean kitchen, and 8 times out of 9 I’ll show you a man with detestable spiritual qualities."
- Henry Charles Bukowski
Favourite song this week :
You Can’t Hold No Groove - by Victor Wooten
Best bassist in the world in my opinion.
I’m not sure if non-bassists would appreciate this song, but fuck it, I think it’s class.
Time is scarce these days, this whole college thing is taking a lot out of me!
Anyway, I went to see Bon Iver last Tuesday in Tripod, Dublin. I think I gave Bon Iver the coveted “Song of the week” spot on one of my Sunday Round-Ups before. He’s a mainly acoustic singer, and recorded his album (”For Emma, Forever Ago”) in some wooden cabin in the middle of winter. Great album, and I was really looking forward to seeing him.
Supporting was a girl called Anais Mitchell, who really took me by surprise. She was on her own, playing guitar and singing, and she was excellent. Like a mix of my two favourite female singers, Cat Power and Joanna Newsom. It was actually shocking how much her voice reminded me of Joanna Newsom.
Without too much waiting around, Bon Iver came out, accompanied by three guys. One on guitar, one on drums, and another switching between drums and bass guitar.
I can honestly say it was one of the best gigs I’ve ever been to. The four of them would all sing together for some songs, and it sounded great. One song (”Creature Fear” I think) was particularly intense when it all went a big Mogwai-esque towards the end.
Afterwards I bought posters for both Bon Iver and Anais Mitchell, for €5 each, sure ya can’t go wrong!
He’s doing another gig in December, which I’d advise everyone to grab a ticket for.
Apologies for the lack of blogging lately, I’ve plenty of material to write about (probably more than ever infact) but just don’t get any spare time these days. I meant to make this post on Wednesday, but fell asleep shortly after switching on the laptop. It was about 6pm for feck’s sake, I don’t think I’ve ever fallen asleep so early before.
