You often hear of people saying that certain lyrics, songs or artists changed their lives.
You know the way.
Oh, I’m your biggest fan, your music got me through some really hard times, and I just wanna say th-th-thank y-y- (inaudible through sobbing and tears).
So, what of stuff did it for me?
A man who could spin either rhyme or metaphor and turn it into melody.
A musical marvel.
A man who wore a baseball cap like no other.
Fred motherfuckin’ Durst :
If the above face isn’t that of a lyrical genius, then I don’t know what is, friends.
The lyrics that truly changed my life and guided me along the way are :
“Hey kids, take my advice, you don’t want to step into a big pile of shit”
(Fred Durst in “My Generation” by Limp Bizkit).
Wow. Just take it in folks.
Such eloquency.
Oh no mate. You see this pile of shit right here? Well I’ll tell you one thing you don’t wanna do : step in it. Oh no. One of the last things you wanna be doing is stepping in the afore-mentioned pile of shit.
Up until I heard this song and let these words flow from my stereo and into my soul, I’d been romping around town jumping into every pile of shit I laid eyes on. Sometimes, when all the shit had been jumped in, I overate and went into my back garden, let nature take its course, and had a lovely jump around in the shit. Everyone loves their own brand yeah?
But then along came Fred. And I realised, I don’t want to step into these piles of shit.
I’d lost all my friends. They were either sick of the smell or sick of me calling around to their houses either carrying a bag of shit for jumpin’ in, or asking them if they had any shit lying around. My clothing and washing budget was through the roof. My bowels were starting to wane under the relentless pressure they were under.
No, no, no. It was all wrong. And Fred showed me the way. In the next line of the song, he tells me what I should be doing.
“Captain’s drunk, your world is Titanic. Floating on the funk, So get your groove on.“
There it is ladies and gents. I had to get my bloomin’ groove on.
Halt this mindless stepping into piles of shit! Alas, it’s time to float on the funk and get my groove on!
And that I did.
I’d groove around the village endlessly, watching the faces of the locals as they realised shitboy was no more. I was now a groovy guy. A regular cool cat I was. I’d be groovin’ and movin’, and between women choosin’. That’s a little line I made up myself there, you can see Fred’s lyrical prowess is rubbing off on me.
Pete Doherty, my favourite musician, was due to visit my university, Trinity College, at 5pm to give a talk and answer some questions, maybe play a few songs. It was organised by the Phil society. I was very excited to say the least. It was a big deal for me, the one person in the world I’d most want to meet, visiting my university.
At about 2pm I met some friends who were fans of Pete, but not students in the college. Helped them get signed up so they could attend the talk, and then we started queuing. We had to start queuing early, as the room he’d be talking in was quite small, we had to be sure we’d get a good seat.
The queue really started to grow quite quickly, which was surprising since it was freezing outside. There was going to be a lot of people that weren’t going to get in.
I think we were let into the room at around 5.30pm, but were told Pete’s flight was delayed, so he’d be a bit late, but he was on his way. Me and two friends were sitting about four or five rows from the front, by the aisle. Very good seats (the first two rows were for press etc).
Cue nearly two hours of sitting, waiting for his arrival. Just after 7pm he was introduced and walked in, guitar in hand, looking rather well.
He was interviewed at the top of the room by a guy from Hotpress magazine. I don’t really like Hotpress, but the interviewer was pretty good. Then there was questions from the floor. I had my hand up but didn’t get to ask my question, but the girl beside me did, and another friend on the other side of the room did too.
He did a couple of songs too.
When it ended, we went up to try get a signature. I had his book with me, desperate to get it signed. He was rushed out before this could happen, as he was supposed to be doing the Late Late show on RTE soon. He did sign as much as he could though. Two friends of mine got things signed.
So we waited outside, along with a shitload of paparazzi. As he came out, he was surrounded by people, security or whatever, bustling him into a car. I held out the book, thinking there was no chance he’d be able sign it, as he was being literally shoved into the car. But good ol’ Peter, stopped and struggled to sign it, in a situation where he really didn’t have to. I really appreciated that, and don’t imagine many people would have gone to the bother of doing it, when being forced into a car by a ton of people. So fair play to him. Was absolutely delighted to get the book signed. Here’s a picture :
But it doesn’t end there! We went into the Phil room after, got a free beer, and said goodbye to some friends who had to go. Then me and a friend (Robin) decided we’d head to RTE, and try to actually get a chance to talk to Peter after he came out from the Late Late. Robin had to go to meet someone for a drink first though. So off we went, quick pint of Guinness for me, and then we drove to RTE.
We didn’t really know what to do, so just went to reception and asked if there was any chance we could get into the audience for the show. A woman went to check, but there were no spare seats.
I asked if I could use a bathroom, and while the chap seemed reluctant, he showed me the way. As I left the bathroom, I floundered a bit, trying to remember the way I’d come in (anyone who knows me will know I have an awful sense of direction). Then I heard a woman down the other end of the corridor say “Thirty seconds Pete”. I looked down and saw Pete walking the opposite way, obviously towards the stage, complete with his hat and unmistakable swagger. It was pretty cool to see. That was something anyway.
I found my way back to reception, and there we were allowed watch Pete’s interview with Pat Kenny (seemingly we shouldn’t have been allowed do this). There were two other fans there with us, not to mention about four photographers outside the building. Pat Kenny was pretty shit at interviewing Pete. Not a single question about his new album coming out next month, nothing about music, just focusing on the drugs. Pete seemed irritated at this.
I can understand asking a question or two about the drugs, but for fuck’s sake, leave it there, and ask about the music, gigs, albums, whatever! I don’t expect Pat Kenny to have an extensive knowledge of Pete’s music, but surely he’s being paid quite a lot to do this job, so would it hurt to have done a little research? Even if he’d flicked on youtube and watched a Jonathan Ross interview with Pete he’d have gathered something.
I did enjoy Pete saying “You probably couldn’t name one song I’ve written if I asked you”.
To which Pat replied “Possibly not”.
A single song? Possibly not? You twat.
Almost more annoying was the fangirl in the audience shouting things out at Pete, like a right idiot. Pete even saying “she doesn’t mean that” after one particularly stupid interruption.
He played his upcoming single anyway, and did a good job of it.
So then we were told to wait outside, amongst the four paparazzi. These guys seemed like total wankers, we steered clear.
Again, when Pete came out, he was surrounded, by both his own security and paparazzi, but I managed to shake his hand and ask if I could get a photo, as I’d been queuing at Trinity College all day.
“Yeah go on then”.
Jackpot.
Got the photo, thanked him, and he said something like “Nice one, cheers”. Again, he didn’t have to stop for that photo, he was being forced into the car. He was very polite and calm, especially considering how frenzied everyone around him was.
So I got an autograph, handshake and photo, what more could I ask for?
A really great day, special thanks to Robin, without whom I wouldn’t have been able to go to RTE.
I’m wary of putting the photo up here, so have a look on my bebo/facebook if you want to see it. (It’s not hard to find my Bebo, I think there’s even a link lying around on this site somewhere).
There’s actually two photos of me with Pete, the second one has Robin straining to get himself in it and me looking like a deer caught in headlights - great photo!
There was four us in Trinity who knew each other only from PeteDohertyForum, the first decent website I ever really set up. It was pretty cool that we’d met because of the forum I made a long time ago (pictures will probably be on there too!).
Overall, I was not let down by Pete in the slightest. Meeting your heroes isn’t always going to be a disappointment it seems.
Edit : Forgot to put in two videos (both poor quality) that I got of Pete in Trinity. One is Robin asking him a question, and the other is Pete playing a bit of “Back From The Dead” in response to being asked what song he’s most proud of writing.
I’m getting sick of blogging about concerts (four in the last month) so I’ll try to keep this short enough.
On Monday I went to see Dirty Pretty Things for the second time.
I was to meet with people I either knew from the last gig, or PeteDohertyForum. Having met the band last time, we were hoping to get lucky again and get more pictures or autographs. Time passed, the doors were due to open, and no luck.
So we were in watching the support band when the person beside me says “Is that Anthony?”. There he stood, the guitarist from DPT, so we went up for a chat, handshake, and autograph. He was very nice, and seemed really into the band that were playing. However, the fact that he was out there instead of in with his own band was a bit worrying. Rumour had it there were tensions in the band, and this wouldn’t be surprising, since this is their last tour before they split up.
The support acts were pretty good actually. But does anyone ever really care that much for the support?
DPT came on and were fucking great. The crowd were a bit subdued at the start, but soon enough it got going and it was actually pretty rough, which I think is a good thing (within reason obviously) and we were right at the barrier at the front.
The last song they played was actually by Carl’s (lead singer and guitarist) old band, The Libertines, called “I Get Along” which was amazing, everyone went pretty mental hearing that song.
My friend got the setlist, (and according to that they hadn’t planned on doing the Libertines song) and I got Carl’s (the lead singer) bottle of beer, of which he’d only drank a little bit, so free beer for me!
So we were waiting outside for some of our party to be collected, when out walks the drummer (Gary). He had been in The Libertines too, so it was great to meet him, get a photo and autograph. He was so nice. Whenever anyone apologised for keeping him he’d reassure that it wasn’t a problem, and even spoke for a while on the phone to friends of the people present. Couldn’t have been more pleasant.
That meant I had two out of the four members’ signatures on my ticket. The main man to get was Carl though, and it didn’t look like he’d be coming out anytime soon.
So we left, and I met with friends who had gone to the (inferior) MGMT concert.
After a while one of them got a phone call - the rest of DPT were leaving the venue. Let’s go.
Met with Carl, got a photo, and autograph (two actually, the pen wasted half way throught the first one - feck!) and had a chat. The best part was when some drunk idiot ( “Is the concert over?! Can I buy a ticket?!” - it’s fucking midnight and they’re going back into the tourbus) was trying to talk to Carl. Not only was he pissed, but he had a seriously weird voice/accent.
Carl turns to me and says “What the fuck’s he saying? I can’t make out a word” in his lovely British mumble.
Oh Carl, old buddy, old pal, forget him, just come back to my place, you can have my room, I’ll sleep on the couch.
Overall, the band were really nice. It was just Didz, the bassist, that I didn’t get to meet.
How many autographs and photos from bands is that lately? I’m doing well.
I’ve yet to see the pictures of me and Gary, but the one with Carl looks well, you can really see how much weight he’s lost since last time (he had to cut out drinking for a good while). I’m not really bothered putting the photo up here, since there’s already one of us in the other post, but if anyone wants to see then let me know I guess.
Sad to think they’re splitting up, but there even seemed to be tensions on stage, particularly with Carl and Anthony. Though that could easily have just been us reading into things too much.
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.
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.
Not that I’m trying my hand at music journalism or anything, but I’ve talked about this band enough on here, so why the hell not give a quick review of the album?
Edit : Actually, fuck this. I typed about two paragraphs of a review and got annoyed and deleted them - I didn’t like my review at all. Functional writing is not my thing. I’m just gonna fly through this.
Overall, it’s good, but not their best album. It needs more fast paced, rocking songs.
“Use Somebody” (track 4), “Revelry” (track 6), “Closer” (track 1), “Sex on Fire” (track 3), “Crawl” (track 2), “Cold Desert” (track 11) and “Be Somebody” (track 10) - all good songs.
I love the haunting “Whoo-hoo-oooh” Caleb does in “Revelry”. Great lyrics too.
However, there’s a few dodgy tracks. A song called “17″ (track 7) is pretty atrocious (fucking Christmas bells?!), and “I Want You” (track (9) is no great shakes either. Manhattan (track 5) seems well liked by everyone, but it didn’t do much for me, I’m not sure why. The last song for me to mention is “Notion” (track 8), which didn’t stick out in my mind, but now I’m listening to it with the intent of reviewing it, it’s actually pretty good vocally, and I like the bassline, but the piano is pretty ghey. Meh, it’ll do.
You’d think since I’m saying so many songs are good and so few are poor, that it’s a pretty good album. Well it is. Just not as good as their last one. I can play it right through and enjoy most of it, but there’s very few songs that actually make me stop and think “Woah, this is class”. It’s grown old on me already.
Earlier on I listened to the previous album “Because Of The Times” (the last two albums have pretty shite titles don’t they?) and much preferred it. Edgier and more longevity - as shown by the fact that I chose to play that ahead of the new one.
The latest effort came out fairly soon after the last one, and they’ve done a lot of touring in the meantime, so I was pretty surprised it came out so soon. They were never a band for hanging around between albums, but I can’t help but feel that if they took a little more time with this, we wouldn’t have songs with fucking Christmas bells on them, and we’d have some better, faster-paced rocking songs like the good old days on Youth And Young Manhood. Great first impression, but I imagine you’ll be bored after a few listens. I am.
I play bass myself, so tend to focus on the bass a lot more than anything else. Jared in KOL improves with every album (I think he was 15 years old when they made the first album) and I really love the sound of the Thunderbird bass he uses, so that’s a good point for me. Nathan on drums and Matthew on lead guitar are solid as always, but Caleb’s singing is really noteworthy on this album. He has such a distinctive voice, and seems to be stretching himself more and more.
Overall, good album, if a little too mellow for my liking.
This shouldn’t have taken so long, but Kings Of Leon have announced a Dublin gig, after announcing a shit load in Britain a while back.
Here’s the information : Following their triumphant headline appearance at Oxegen this year, KINGS OF LEON have announced two concert dates in The O2, Dublin on Saturday 19 December 2008 and The Odyssey, Belfast on Sunday 20 December 2008. Tickets for both shows go on sale this Friday at 9am. (from Ticketmaster)
An early Christmas present for me!
But because o2 are wankers, their customers will have priority, and can order tickets tomorrow, here’s the instructions on how, copied from an internet forum (excuse the txtspk, I’m wrecked and not arsed fixing it up) :
Ok the deal is, u have to be an o2 customer. if you are you can go onto www.o2blueroom.ie at 9am on Wed to get tickets but to do so u must have a password which u get by sending the word KING to 51020. When u send txt O2 will confirm u are an o2 customer then u will get password to be used on www.o2blueroom.ie website to buy tickets (it’ll redirect u to ticketmaster.ie).
This does not guarantee u will get tickets!!
Passwords will be sent ONLY ONCE to any number so if u get one DO NOT LOSE IT!!!
Thats all the info I got from a lovely girl on o2 helpline.
Hope it helps!
Also this will not mean all tickets will be sold out as they are only allocated a certain number so dont panic if u have to wait til thurs.
Any of you smug little o2 cocksuckers want to get me a password?
Hopefully I’ll manage to get tickets anyway. There’s a shitload of gigs I need to buy tickets for, why is it always either a feast or a famine?
Edit : Forgot to mention that tomorrow is Leaving Cert results day.
Kings of Leon are one of my favourite bands. I’ve liked these for ages (I actually got slagged for liking them years ago, and look at them now ya shower of bastards!).
Their fourth album, “Only By The Night” is due out in September, but of course, we get to hear some of the stuff before then. The label gave one song “Crawl” away for free download, so there’s good quality versions of that going around. Here’s a youtube video for it anyway :
Then the Kings released a video trailer for the album, which featured a song called “Use Somebody” which sounds just class, and I reckon will be a big hit. Here’s that video :
A third song has been released to radio stations etc, called “Sex on Fire”, Here’s that one, complete with an interview with Caleb (the singer) by Zane Lowe (who’s really fucking annoying, every second word out of his mouth is “man”).
Finally, the last one going around is called Manhattan, and I can only find a live version of this song, which is here :
It looks promising. Kings Of Leon release albums very quickly, they don’t seem to mess around like other bands do. Zane Lowe said they’ll have 10 albums out before we know it, and will be selling out stadiums every tour. I don’t think he’s wrong. I’ve seen them live twice, once at Oxegen 2007 and again last November.
Anyway, this post was mainly to get all the new material together in one place for any fans, as it was a pain in the arse for me browsing around trying to find what I wanted. Enjoy.
It was made back in 1993 and stars Michael Douglas. It’s absolutely hilarious. It’s this guy basically having a shit day and going on a bit of a mad one, doing all the stuff you wish you could do when you’re having one of those days. My favourite bit is when the guy goes into a fast food restaurant for some breakfast. He’s two minutes late for the breakfast menu and they refuse to serve him breakfast, only offering from the lunch menu. Imagine you’re having a shit day and this happens, it’d annoy you. Just watch the film, it’d do no justice for me to write here about what happens.
I’ve also eh, “bought” some new music. The Holloways and The Noisettes (both bands supported Babyshambles when I saw them in 2006, and it’s taken me this long to finally get their stuff!). Both are very good bands, both from Britain I believe. Check ‘em out if you’re a bit of an Indie head.
Also, there’s finally been time for a little business on my part! I’m just waiting to tie up loose ends on the deal, so I’ll post about it when it’s all done. It’s nothing major, but it’s a nice boost considering so little time I’ve had.
