Colindale, London, England // 7.38 pm // Mostly cloudy 10ºc / 50ºf
Monday, 23 February 2009
Sunday, 1 February 2009
Our lives are shaped
Colindale, London, England // 11.03 am // Cloudy 2ºc / 36ºf
I've had a great weekend so far, including a couple of fantastic gigs over the last two nights. On Friday night Elle and I went to Kilburn for the Talc gig. Before that though, we went for a drink in a pub just down the road from the venue, called the Brondes Age.
The venue itself was called The Luminaire, above the Kings Head pub. We were on the guestlist so managed to get discounted entry. The place was quite quiet when we arrived, but it soon got really busy and was quite packed by the time the band took the stage around 10.20pm.
Like I said in the last video blog, Talc are very entertaining and they did not disappoint on Friday! Dr Fun and The Gift, ie. Talc, were wearing the trademark suits and bowler hats, and the rest of the band, including Bobby Fame on drums, were wearing "Staff" t-shirts. They played a selection of tracks from both their albums, plus a couple of covers. There was a fair bit of swearing, and a rather surreal moment when Lionel Blair was mentioned in the lyrics of their track "Niteklub", when the band suddenly stopped, and Bobby Fame came to the fore to warn us that Lionel Blair just "appears" when least expected, quite possibly a figment of his own imagination.
As well as being entertaining, they are a really tight band too, especially the horn section which at one point featured the saxophonist playing two horns at once! And I always love to see and hear the vocoder being played live through a Yamaha keyboard, which there was an ample amount of.
All in all, a brilliant gig and a band I'd definitely love to see again. And it appears that, according to Elle, it is the best gig I've ever taken her to, mostly because although she's not a great fan of the music, there was more to it this time which kept her entertained!
We left there shortly after the gig and went home. I was absolutely shattered when I got in, having been awake for almost 24 hours. I almost fell asleep on the couch holding a can of beer which almost sprayed forth on the carpet, so I called it a night.
Felt really really rough yesterday when I woke up. I didn't drink that much on Friday night, but I think whatever I did drink combined with the extreme tiredness really hit me, and I had to go back to bed yesterday afternoon in order to feel better for the evening.
And by the time it got to the Sunburst Band gig last night, I felt totally fine. This gig was at Cargo, which is a club I've always fancied going to. We headed there after some greasy junk food in a local chicken place, and already the place was really busy, even though it was only 9.30pm. The venue is quite small, with an under-the-arches, warehouse-type feel to it. Great crowd though, and a really good atmosphere.
Benji B from BBC Radio 1Xtra was DJing, and some of the stuff he was playing was incredible. Really high quality 70s and 80s soul and jazz funk, most of it completely new to me but all of it fantastic.
By the time The Sunburst Band took the stage, the place was absolutely rammed from wall to wall, which was great to see. And the band tore the roof off the place - their gig at the Jazz Cafe last year was fantastic, but this was something else. I think the atmosphere of the venue helped too. It did take a while for the crowd to get really into it, but by the time the band signed off with the David Bendeth classic "Feel The Real", which was just stunning, I've never seen so many people crammed into such a tight space, dancing and grooving so enthusiastically to a piece of music. Definitely one of the best gigs.
Again, we left shortly afterwards, especially as I realised we could actually catch the last tube back home rather than suffer nightbuses for 1 hour and 10 minutes. And thankfully we did indeed catch the very last tube of the night.
There was one low point to the weekend, and in fact to the past few weeks, and is something I've not yet mentioned. My mum's partner, who has pretty much been a dad to me since I was 3 years old, is battling cancer. It started off as testicular cancer, which is something I've written about in depth before having had a scare of my own in the past, and in the knowledge that I have a higher risk of developing it due to complications when I was younger. John's cancer was missed first time round due to a ridiculous hospital error, which meant by the time he finally underwent surgery to remove the source, it had spread. The outlook is positive and everything looks good for a full recovery, but he started chemotherapy this week and that is never a good experience for anyone. I spoke to my mum for a good while yesterday after she had been to see him, and she was deeply upset at how much he was suffering as a result of the treatment. It's going to be a long road for the both of them, and as always at times like this I really wish I could do more. I'm just glad that my mum, who has had her own serious health issues over the last few years, is there for him. We're hoping John will get home today after the first round of his chemotherapy.
I've had a great weekend so far, including a couple of fantastic gigs over the last two nights. On Friday night Elle and I went to Kilburn for the Talc gig. Before that though, we went for a drink in a pub just down the road from the venue, called the Brondes Age.
The venue itself was called The Luminaire, above the Kings Head pub. We were on the guestlist so managed to get discounted entry. The place was quite quiet when we arrived, but it soon got really busy and was quite packed by the time the band took the stage around 10.20pm.
Like I said in the last video blog, Talc are very entertaining and they did not disappoint on Friday! Dr Fun and The Gift, ie. Talc, were wearing the trademark suits and bowler hats, and the rest of the band, including Bobby Fame on drums, were wearing "Staff" t-shirts. They played a selection of tracks from both their albums, plus a couple of covers. There was a fair bit of swearing, and a rather surreal moment when Lionel Blair was mentioned in the lyrics of their track "Niteklub", when the band suddenly stopped, and Bobby Fame came to the fore to warn us that Lionel Blair just "appears" when least expected, quite possibly a figment of his own imagination.
As well as being entertaining, they are a really tight band too, especially the horn section which at one point featured the saxophonist playing two horns at once! And I always love to see and hear the vocoder being played live through a Yamaha keyboard, which there was an ample amount of.
All in all, a brilliant gig and a band I'd definitely love to see again. And it appears that, according to Elle, it is the best gig I've ever taken her to, mostly because although she's not a great fan of the music, there was more to it this time which kept her entertained!
We left there shortly after the gig and went home. I was absolutely shattered when I got in, having been awake for almost 24 hours. I almost fell asleep on the couch holding a can of beer which almost sprayed forth on the carpet, so I called it a night.
Felt really really rough yesterday when I woke up. I didn't drink that much on Friday night, but I think whatever I did drink combined with the extreme tiredness really hit me, and I had to go back to bed yesterday afternoon in order to feel better for the evening.
And by the time it got to the Sunburst Band gig last night, I felt totally fine. This gig was at Cargo, which is a club I've always fancied going to. We headed there after some greasy junk food in a local chicken place, and already the place was really busy, even though it was only 9.30pm. The venue is quite small, with an under-the-arches, warehouse-type feel to it. Great crowd though, and a really good atmosphere.
Benji B from BBC Radio 1Xtra was DJing, and some of the stuff he was playing was incredible. Really high quality 70s and 80s soul and jazz funk, most of it completely new to me but all of it fantastic.
By the time The Sunburst Band took the stage, the place was absolutely rammed from wall to wall, which was great to see. And the band tore the roof off the place - their gig at the Jazz Cafe last year was fantastic, but this was something else. I think the atmosphere of the venue helped too. It did take a while for the crowd to get really into it, but by the time the band signed off with the David Bendeth classic "Feel The Real", which was just stunning, I've never seen so many people crammed into such a tight space, dancing and grooving so enthusiastically to a piece of music. Definitely one of the best gigs.
Again, we left shortly afterwards, especially as I realised we could actually catch the last tube back home rather than suffer nightbuses for 1 hour and 10 minutes. And thankfully we did indeed catch the very last tube of the night.
There was one low point to the weekend, and in fact to the past few weeks, and is something I've not yet mentioned. My mum's partner, who has pretty much been a dad to me since I was 3 years old, is battling cancer. It started off as testicular cancer, which is something I've written about in depth before having had a scare of my own in the past, and in the knowledge that I have a higher risk of developing it due to complications when I was younger. John's cancer was missed first time round due to a ridiculous hospital error, which meant by the time he finally underwent surgery to remove the source, it had spread. The outlook is positive and everything looks good for a full recovery, but he started chemotherapy this week and that is never a good experience for anyone. I spoke to my mum for a good while yesterday after she had been to see him, and she was deeply upset at how much he was suffering as a result of the treatment. It's going to be a long road for the both of them, and as always at times like this I really wish I could do more. I'm just glad that my mum, who has had her own serious health issues over the last few years, is there for him. We're hoping John will get home today after the first round of his chemotherapy.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
