What Became Of The Likely Lads…

Seriously…

Last time we spoke it was just before results day I’m sure if you know me then you’ll already know what I’ve got. But here it is anyway.

• Sociology: B
• English Language: B
• English Literature: C
• Geography: D

Pretty happy with that except I’m gonna retake one of my Sociology exams to try to get that B up to a A. Did very well in English Lit considering i didn’t read either book and quoted Morrissey as a critic. HOPE YOUR READING THIS MRS. LEA AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

On the same day decided to celebrate by hitting the charity shops and I bought myself a Blackburn Rovers home shirt from 1996/97 season. Don’t support Blackburn (obvs) but you just can’t ignore the retroness and the four quid price tag. Later that evening went to a party that was fun. Not gonna write about the walk home…  The weekend came and so did my first University open day. Keele is very very lovely definitely considering going there. It’s near perfect, got a decent place on the league table, I could realistically get in, ten miles down the road and  the sociology department just looks brilliant (could study aliens and witchcraft if I wanted to). One catch though the dual-honour scheme. I would of course be looking at English Language to go alongside Sociology. So I go into the room that’s showcasing English and I ask how much of the course is language based. Of course I didn’t realise that English meant English Literature. *sigh*. The lecturer quite blatantly looking down on me for asking such a stupid question and there was my dad with a banana in his top pocket looking like a right douche. Oh well, don’t think you can afford to take these open days too seriously, especially when everyone else is.

Last week was pretty uneventful spent most of my time doing nothing, which is fine by me. Best Coast announced a tour which is pretty exciting. As always with band such like this the Manchester show is almost guaranteed to be +18 unless they announced a show at one of the smaller academies as per usual this didn’t happen.  Thankfully Birmingham is +16 so I have my ticket. Autumn/Winter gig schedule is lining up very nicely especially now that Hot Club de Paris have announce their playing Crewe. Will be taking ear plugs to the box that night. Staying with music I’ve been watching  a fair bit of the Reading highlights on the telly this weekend. SOOOOOOOOO glad I’m not there. Those people aren’t music fans, all they wanna do is get pissed etc. Can deffo tell that I’d find Reading an absolute nightmare.

Football yesterday really good overall performance by Macc yesterday, deserved the three points to be honest but I’ll take one considering we went a goal down late on. Definitely a lot more strength and physicality in the midfield, the return of Ross Draper was just what we needed. All we need now is for Sappleton to return to full fitness soon and then maybe after this poor start we could slowly work our way up the table. And it was good to see some good football being played as well for once like the ball Bolland put in for Tremarco to help create the goal was brilliant. It’s really good to see that kind of  on the floor football being played by Macc, don’t think it will work all the time but today it was near perfect. Heres my match ratings

• VEIGA: 6, hit and miss performance went from making great save one minute to going on crazy rushes out of his area and flapping about the next
• REID: 7, vastly improved from Shrewsbury game, much better from him
• TREMARCO: 8, put a superb ball in to set up the goal, worked hard doing the amount of work that two players should
• BROWN: 8, cracking performance from big Nat couldn’t have asked for more
• MORGAN: 7, good to see the Paul come back from injury and have a good first game of the season
• DRAPER: 9, just what Macc have been missing, someone with a huge amount of energy and effort winning every ball and completing every pass, definitely my man of the match
• SINCLAIR: 7, would have been another disappointing game if he hadn’t scored the equaliser
• DANIEL: 4, didn’t look like he even wanted to be there, shocking game from someone who played so well last season
• BOLLAND: 8, great display of midfield ingenuity can’t understand why Simo would have ever wanted to release him
• HAMSHAW: 7, another good game feel his best is still to come
• BARNETT: 6, think Tyrone is still trying to find his feet in the league game, showed little flourish of what he can do, expect him to hopefully improve as the season progresses.

Things are looking good for this week massive band practice tomorrow got some cracking songs wrote. Well ones that I feel have potential. The Tuesday the weather is looking good for a fun afternoon of football before returning to hell again on Thursday.

James

Life Outside The Sprawl

The holidays are well and truly in full swing now, seems crazy almost half way though and where is the good weather. Seriously sun can you please come out for a little bit getting bored of day after day of cloud. Shame I can’t control the weather… So last time I wrote a blog about my life it was before Indietracks which was loads of fun. Coming back wasn’t. On the Tuesday my gran went to hospital cos’ she was suffering from heart problems so she stopped in hospital over night found out all was fine came back home the next day. My dad of course got stressed by all of this, probs wasn’t the best idea to have her over for tea then. This wouldn’t have happened if the lift was working in her apartment. So she came over and my dad instantly started questioning her about why she went to hospital because him and my uncles just think she’s making her heart condition up. They seem to think that’s she’s doing it to test the system in the sheltered accommodation she’s just moved into. My gran of course won’t answer his questions just to be awkward. So then both of them are equally stressed and then all this leads to my gran phoning for a taxi to go home because of the way my dad had been acting. So then I’m expected to go and try to persuade her to come back home. How am I expected to choose sides when both of them are acting as bad as each other. So I tell her not to come back and go home because my dad isn’t thinking straight. Don’t understand why my dad acts the way he does sometimes he only ever thinks about himself but I know he only does it because he cares. So by the end of this everyone was in tears, what can you do eh. Bad stuff happens at the best of times

So apart from the above summer hasn’t been to bad so far apart from the fact that my dad has changed the date we’re going on holiday so I can’t go play football on Friday. Last week played a lot of FIFA, had two FIFA tournaments knocked out in the first round in one and then lost in the final in the second. Nothing better than playing a bit of FIFA with my bros during the summer. On the subject of football went to watch Macclesfield’s final pre-season friendly against Rhyl on Saturday. Wasn’t too bad for a fiver and Brian was there always a plus hadn’t heard his crazy ramblings in so long. Have to say Macc are looking in good shame for the new season and really loving Gary Simpson’s tactics. Good to finally watch us play some football rather than just hoofing it up and hoping for the best. The new signings all looked good especially Jason Beardsley and my man of the match Sam Wedgebury. Just hoping this season we won’t be sucked into yet another relegation dog fight and looking at the squad I really can’t see that happening to be honest. Just hoping we can start the season in winning ways against a tough Stevenage side on Saturday.

This week has been pretty nice so far went into town on Monday I bought myself the new Arcade Fire record which to be honest after about five listens I have to say is a little over-rated. There isn’t one song on it that evokes the same sort of passion that either ‘Funeral’ or ‘Neon Bible’ do. Don’t get me wrong it’s a good album and there are some quality tracks just maybe a little too much filler. Also bought the Best Coast record on Monday doesn’t it just have the best artwork ever. LOOK!!!

It’s also made me want a pet cat really bad specially as one as cool as Snacks. Really good record too ‘Boyfriend’ has gotta be one of my favourite songs of the year so far. Seriously can’t resist American girls singing about how much they want a guy. Just hoping I get to spend some time listening to this on the beach next week. Weather permitting of course, not gonna go out and lie in the rain and get all wet am I, that would be shit.

That’s all for now going on down to Wales on Friday should be good, gonna visit Spillers, yay

James

Indietracks Festival 2010: Review Part 1

FRIDAY

The day began well, left the house soon after booking tickets to see Belle & Seb in December. The train journey to Alfreton was pretty fun and successfully managed to annoy the majority of people on the train, especially this one guy where we accidentally sat in ‘his’ seat. He could have had it back if he’d ask but instead of telling us to move he decided to complain to the staff on the train and the glare and us from where he was sitting for most of the journey. Really don’t get some people. Alfreton remind me a lot of Winsford in the way that is well and truly miserable. Continued to cause more disruption on the bus to the camp site some elderly woman behind us complaining about how long it took us to get on the bus. The bus driver however had more sympathy and was very helpful and friendly. The campsite was brill it had everything and it was all for free plus we were put in the stewards, bands and other festival worker people field. Used the same tent we had for Glastonbury some how it had a pole missing in these times of missing poles we had to make do. This meant making do and almost destroying the tent every time I tried to get in.

Reported to the church stage for stewarding duties later that afternoon where we given all the free food and drink vouchers we could possible ever want. As well as finding out that I would be working backstage later that evening. Three bands were playing the festival on Friday and I thankfully had the pleasure of seeing all three of them. Veronica Falls sadly only played six songs. This was down the fact that the morons working the sound desk had still had them in sound check mode playing to themselves for ten minutes. It had looked like the band had stormed off stage but they came back on to play some of the finest indie pop songs around at the moment starting with recent b-side and personal favourite ‘Stephen’. Songs that hadn’t been put out yet sat equally as well along side the likes of ‘Beachy Head’ the perfect song about suicide for a sunny afternoon. Snooping around backstage I found out that the band are now going off to record their debut record and to be honest it couldn’t come soon enough, guaranteed to be awesome. Here’s a photo of them from where I was standing wish I could have gone done the front but stewarding got in the way.

Next on were the very lovely Allo, Darlin’ starting with the ultra twee ‘Henry Rollins Don’t Dance’ a song that throws about it’s fair show of Grease references . By this point everyone had put their dancing shoes on and from that moment they’d pretty much stayed on all weekend. Still stuck watching from afar though but enjoyed as myself as they ploughed through a set of tracks from their long-awaited debut album. Front woman Elizabeth was clearly relishing the opportunity to play on the main stage with some severe Ukulele moshing on the go . Overall a great set from a band who I sometimes feel are a little hit and miss but tonight they disproved all doubts and played a wonderful set from start to finish.

Headlining the Friday night were one of many of Eddie Argos’ project’s Everybody Was In The French Resistance… Now! I of course working backstage got a little bit star stuck  with Eddie Argos constantly walking in out of the area. Also learnt a little bit about his toilet habits went twice in ten minutes before coming on stage to the sound of the French national anthem. The ridiculousness then continued by playing a song about the French resistance. The great thing about this project is that they really couldn’t take themselves any less seriously Eddie playing the jester in the court of the other indie pop titans headlining this weekend. Eddie himself couldn’t be more pleased to be there creating hilarity with his onstage banter throughout describing the formation of each one of his so called ‘response’ songs. Including ‘responses’ to ‘Jimmy Mack’ by Martha Reeves and a song called ‘Billie’s Jean’s’ in response to Jacko in which Eddie declared himself the illegitimate son of the dead superstar. Other stories included one about the time when Eddie worked in a chippie and stupidity reached a climax during the encore in which they played ‘Formed a Side-Proeject’. Think that pretty much sums up Everybody Was In The French Resistance… Now! definitely one of my favourite bands of the weekend and was so great to finally see Eddie Argos. Heres a really crap picture.

Me being me though was far too shy to go up and talk to him at the merch stall after the show so I went and got my free beer and me and the guys sat listening to some tunes at the campsite and reeled over how surreal and brilliant the opening day of the festival had been.

James

‘You Will Be Older When You Wake’

Tomorrow I shall turn 17 and I have to say 16 has been pretty flippin’ good. Yeah I’ve made my fair share of mistakes don’t we all but the positives way outweigh the negatives. So many fun moments but let’s not dwell on the past the future looks even better. School ends for six weeks of summer tomorrow and it really couldn’t have come soon enough. Had enough of that place and the people there it’s really gonna be nice to just get away from it all and wait in paranoia for results day at the end of August. One or possibly two more festivals to go which is always nice to look forward to as well as a holiday to South Wales.

Nothing much has really been happening since I’ve come back from Glasto about just over two weeks ago. It was nice to see family etc. Both parents have been in hospital over the last month (my dad today). There both fine, everything always turns out fine in the end. Autumn gig schedule is coming together booked tickets to see Beach House in a Cathedral can’t wait for that. Just waiting for Arcade Fire to announce a tour really there new stuff isn’t sounding bad but not really on the same level as ‘Funeral’ or ‘Neon Bible’.

The World Cup was rather disappointing to be honest wasn’t really one game I watched where I could have said it was brilliant. Think this was probably down to how good the tactics from the various coaches involved were brilliant. Think Spain were pretty worthy winners managed to stay solid throughout the tournament even if their opening game was a bit of a shambles. Don’t think the Dutch had any right to complain about the refereeing of Howard Webb, they had it coming to be honest. For South Africa it couldn’t have really gone much better they did a fine job of hosting the tournament. Hoping for some better football in 2014 though. Not long til the start of the domestic season now, can’t wait for that.

Don’t think I’ve really got much else to say, bye

James x

Glastonbury Festival 2010: Review Part 1

Where to begin…

WEDNESDAY

7 o’clock and were on our way out of Sandbach down onto M6 and the mammoth drive that awaits. My dad managed to keep his cool for the most part in the relentless heat. Managed to avoid a lot of queueing which was good but still ended up crawling at a snails pace through Shepton Mallet. After about seven hours spent on the road we arrived at the drop-off point where the eight of us boarded a short coach journey to the festival. Arriving was probably easily the worst part, having to carry all you bags in the mid-afternoon heat to look for somewhere to camp is no way to start the festival. But after severe amounts of moaning we found a nice little spot next to the toilets which were next to the dance village. Most of Wednesday for me at least involved exploring the sight and just sitting and chilling up by the top of the Park area. Most of this is irrlevent

THURSDAY

Suppose this is the day Glasto actually begins. After little sleep (because of those bloody Welsh guys in the tent behind us) a few of use went of down to watch Where The Wild Things Are. It was cancelled. So we went back to the tent and came back for Ponyo at the Cinema tent. Ponyo not Miyazaki’s finest work but a fun film non the less. Would have been better if I hadn’t of needed the loo all the way through it. Music then began later in the day at the Queens Head stage. Two Door Cinema Club were the first band we saw. Well heard, the place was packed but managed to get down the front from then after. Watched worst band of the festival Chapel Club. Could music possibly sound anymore boring and contrived. Micachu was very good, so good that her drummer proposed towards the end of the set. Local Natives ended the night a band who have really grown since seeing them for the first time on a cold Sunday night in Stoke.

FRIDAY

Started off a little slow not that Rolf Harris wasn’t brilliant/hilarious and all but there just seemed little on elsewhere. Tune-Yards weren’t bad and neither were The Stranglers. However earlier in the day I received a text saying that Thom Yorke will be playing a secret set up at The Park. This had to be investigated so off I went to the Info booth up there and asked. Apparently he was. Risks must be taken I thought to myself so after watching a rather good Phoenix i wandered up to The Park to see Local Natives once again who sadly said exactly the same things inbetween songs as they had the previous night. The came The Big Pink who were too loud for my liking, thank god no one I know saw me singing along to ‘Dominoes’. But the came possibly one of the greatest moments of my life, as soon as the various pieces of equipment and instruments came out I knew what was coming next. After a short wait Michael Eavis arrives on stage announcing the pair who were about to grace the stage as two superstars yet still refusing to say who was about to arrive.

“Hello I’m Thomas Yorke” he says before taking a seat next to his piano to whack out a few tunes from solo LP ‘The Eraser’ starting with the aforementioned track. Don’t think I’d heard Glastonbury this quite all weekend, everyone around hooked by his every word as if they were a group of school children listening to their teacher reading some sort of marvellous story. He continued to play through tracks from ‘The Eraser’ even messing up ‘Black Swan’ in which he called himself a ‘fucking amateur’. The magic however really began when Radiohead band mate Johnny Greenwood arrived on stage. Every song played felt special and intimate from then on in, ‘Weird Fishes’ even more magical than on ‘In Rainbows’. Then the hits just continued flowing from ‘Pyramid Song’ through to ‘Street Spirit’ everyone around totally engrossed and captivated by what was being played out before them. Personal highlights for me were ‘Idioteque’ in which Thom took to the piano and played it on that, just sweet. But you can’t beat ‘Karma Police’ really can you. Don’t think I’ve ever heard a sing-a-long that loud before, so loud that Thom decided to carry on playing when the crowd wanted more of it. The band closed on ‘Street Spirit’ to a rapturous applause and as people left the park area the mass sing-a-long continued. So good to know that we could possibly have another Radiohead album out by the end of the year. They’ve been away for far too long.

I paced it back to the Other Stage following this with a grin from ear to ear to try and catch the end of Hot Chip and from what I saw they looked brilliant. Of the three songs played it looked like they’d taken another step towards to big time with songs like ‘I Feel Better’ sounding epic as the sunset over the festival. Next up the band I was most looking forward to seeing of the whole festival. If anyone knows how to kick start a party then it’s The Flaming Lips, consistently one of the best live bands on the planet and a brilliant alternative to the averageness that is Gorrilaz headlining the Pyramid. So the madness began with Wayne Coyne running around the crowd in a giant hamster ball, whats not to love? Confetti and balloons showered the audience from above with Wayne screaming gibberish down a megaphone. After a few songs from recent double LP ‘Embryonic’ the awesome tunes that the band are famous for begin to kick in. Starting with ‘She Don’t Use Jelly’ featuring dancing Caterpillars and Frogs of course.  The ever enthusiastic Coyne continued leading the crowd through a set of old and new. Favourite for me being the supremely awesome ‘Do You Realise?’ a song that could be considered even more poignant at somewhere like Glastonbury. By this point and the end of what was an unbelievable day let alone performance from The Flaming Lips I decided to head back to the tent where me and my friends sat and discussed what a brilliant day we all had. And by 2.oo (ish) we were all in bed dreaming of what would lye ahead for the rest of the weekend.

James

Me and My Guitar

Today I have spent most of the day just sitting around playing Heartsink by Blood Red Shoes, so much fun to play. Anyway going off the title Eurovision was on Saturday and I decided in favour of going against going to watch it with my friends cos’ I wanted to watch with my dad and sister instead. I’d say personally that I felt that this years Eurovision was probably one of the best Eurovisions there has been for a number of years. Not a fan of Lena’s winning song to be honest although fair play I’m sure the rest of Europe enjoyed it (wouldn’t have won otherwise duh) but I just thought lyrically it was bit silly and the metaphors we’re just wank. Of course like every time I watch Eurovision with the family I made us a little score sheet on Excel and colour coded the cell with each country in in correspondence with their national colours. Has to be done to be honest… We voted for Romania this year based on overall scores. Eurovison gold glad it came at least third. But oh dear U.K. last place. How shit is that? Our song was that bad but come on Europe it wasn’t as bad as the Israeli guy going out of the tune and over-whelming boredom of Russia. But hey theres always next year, hopefully we’ll scrap the X Factor style talent contest and actually have some famous and or popular compete for us.

Been ages since I last blogged about my day to day life and it also seems ages since exams have started and for the most part it’s been pretty good considering how little revision I’ve done. Geography was a bit hit and miss but Sociology has been good so far and English Language went well. Four down two to go, got Literature and second Sociology paper to go. Definitely needed this week off.

And So far apart from dot to dot I haven’t really done much. Apart from Tuesday morning which involved myself and a friend wandering around Manchester at god knows what time in the morning. Manchester is rather beautiful at night it has a calming sort of quality to it, very atmospheric. After wandering around and avoiding drunken people we tried to go to sleep in Piccadilly Station, this failed. So I got back in at 6:15 after walking half an hour from Crewe station to my house and even then I only got just over three hours sleep. The train back was lovely just stared out of the window looking at the countryside, took a different route to the one you usually take going there and back to Manc.

Oh and also on Friday I went to the gym for the first time in about ten months. It wasn’t as fun as I remember it being but going to the gym is one of the few blokey things I do which felt good. And even better some woman came up to us saying that she called one of the machines downstairs Bill it was rather surreal.

That is all for the moment, maybe something exciting will happen soon… oh wait I’m going Glastonbury in three weeks

James x

P.S.

P.P.S

(skip to 2:19)

That Bit In Life When All The Good Stuff Thats Happening Is Really Close But It Seems Really Far Away

So first blog in ten days and I have been pretty busy… Mainly moaning about how much I dislike school. Today however I feel I have managed to break away from the misery. The sun is shinning and it is four days until my first Geography exam, soooooo happy get the hard one out of the way first. We did a pass physical paper on Friday and oh dear I failed massively. Oh well, just carry on revising I suppose. Most other subjects seem to be going well, think I can probs scrape a C in lit that would be nice. Most of my time has been spent up doing boring school work however but you just gotta live with that I suppose. Carry on the subject of school Thursday was higher education evening *yawn*. I do not care about foundation degrees I would like to go to a proper uni rather than Mid Cheshire College. Got some prospectuses through this week Keele and MMU(not Crewe campus) are looking like the most realistic so far. Don’t wanna go too far away from home considering how bad I get homesickness. And at Keele I’ve got the chance to go abroad (scary) and I could do some really stupid subject as well as Sociology. Generally feeling a bit happier about all this crap.

Other News: Football season has come to an end for another year. Can’t complain with Macc’s performance considering the tragic death of Keith. Highlight of course being the 4-1 battering of Crewe back in December. However can’t really understand why Johnny Brain and Lee Bell have been released seems like they probably can’t afford to keep the. Especially sad to see Johnny go considering he’s been one of our best players over the last couple of seasons. But we move on and look ahead to next year and hopefully improve on this season. Can’t really see a play-off push happening to be honest but what do you expect. Nicely done Chelsea for winning the double can’t really complain with that Ancelotti has done a brilliant job in his first season. And also well done to Roy Hodgson brilliant job done with Fulham in the Europa League but nothing to cry other though… Also I feel Fabio’s done a good job of picking the England squad only really complaint is the inclusion of Heskey really don’t rate him. But I can understand why he’s put him in. Heres my starting XI, feel free to criticise.

• GK: David James
• DR: Glen Johnson
• DC: Rio Ferdinand
• DC: John Terry
• DL: Ashley Cole
• DMC: Steven Gerrard
• MR: Aaron Lennon
• ML: James Milner
• AMC: Frank Lampard
• ST: Wayne Rooney
• ST: Peter Crouch

Such a tough selection he’s got to make for the midfield.

My End of Season Awards

• Best Macclesfield Town Player: Carl Tremarco (for being constantly brilliant at left-back throughout the season)
• Worst Macclesfield Town Player: Ben Wright (enough said)
• Best Player: Wayne Rooney (obvious choice but he really has been in outstanding form this season)
• Worst Player: Johan Elmander (sure theres probably some who are worse but still, what a pile of shite)
• Goal of the Season: Colin Daniel for Macclesfield vs Crewe (cracking 30 yarder into the top corner past ‘Shit’ Phillips right in front of the Star Lane End faithfull)

• Biggest Dick of the Season: Ricky Sappleton (but thats why I love him)
• Best Moment of the Season: As soon as Colin Daniels goal hit the back of the net
• Worst Moment of the Season: The death of Keith Alexander
• Manager of the Season: Roy Hodgson (amazing what he’s done in the Europa League)
• Why???: The signing of Francious Kompany
• Most Improved Player: Gareth Bale (why can’t he be English)
• Most Underrated Player: Lee Chung-Yong (put some much effort in for Bolton on the right wing)
• James Walker Award for Diving Header of the Year: Park Ji-Sung for Manchester United against Liverpool (pure genius from the South Korean)

The world cup of course being something to look forward to, it’s only a month away but it seems like forever. Then there’s Glasto of course (duh?). Dot to Dot Festival which is now only two weeks away and I’m pretty excited especially about seeing Beach House who I’ve just totally fallen in love with this year. It really is gonna be soooooooo much fun, really signifies the start of the summer for me. It would be better however if my ticket had actually arrived. Slow Club first though, can’t wait to hear what their new stuff sounds like.

Saturday night was an interesting experience. Went to my first ever Speedway race at Stoke, it was pretty fun. Such an interesting array of people there but the majority of which were quite clearly from the old working class mining community. They’re the kind of people you can tell have come here all there lives and stand there shouting with their clipboards and pens writing who won each race down in their programmes. And it seemed as if even though these people have aged and seen the area change from Tory to Labour and not back to Tory (well sort of again) the place in which they’ve watched the races hasn’t changed one bit

There just seemed to be something romantic about the rusty floodlights and terraces combined with a  back drop of a beautiful sunset and the rolling hills. Think I might go again next time I’m over at my dad’s.

James x

Hi School!

Apparently the school are reading this, err so hi. Well I only found out because apparently members of staff go searching for their names on the internet and see if people have written bad things about them in blogs. The school of course read this and thought I was skiving the Friday before Record Store Day. Of course I wasn’t I was inside learning all sorts of wondrous things.

So the past week has been rather uneventful, seriously nothing has happened of note apart from the above… err… The new Foals album has leaked and me lack a bad boy went and downloaded it. And first let it be said I have pre-ordered it and it really really surprised me. Just it’s expansiveness and the way it progresses throughout. From the summery groves of early tracks like ‘Miami’ and ‘Total Life Forever’ then through to the darker ‘After Glow’ and the beauty of my personal favourite track ‘2 Trees’. Personally I think it dicks on their debut and will probably end up being one of my favourite records of the year can’t wait to see them at Glasto now just how the songs work out live.

Speaking of live music it’s all I’ve got to look forward to at the moment. Tomorrow night I’m seeing Chew Lips for a second time and then the big one that is LCD Soundsystem. This will be by first gig by myself and here some questions arrive:

1. How sad will I look in the queue outside the venue just standing there with my headphones in?
2. How sad will I look probably playing games on my phone in-between bands cos’ i can’t afford to text anyone?
3. How sad will I look dancing by myself?
4. How said will I look when my dad and sister come to pick me up from the venue?

Apart from the above I am generally really looking forward to it especially from what I’ve read about how good their love shows are and how good the new album is.

Oh yeah forgot to say I wrote a song this week and recorded it. It will be pretty hard for you to find it on the net though proper hidden away. It’s weird when song writing you notice how much you rip of other bands especially Television Personalities. Feeling more confident about my ability as a song writer both with my music and lyrics cos’ my band mates both like it.

Revisions going well got a bit done this weekend sat on by mums boyfriends canal boat answering questions about Marxists views on education. The boat was nice enough not too bad just sat there not doing a lot and playing Nintendogs for the most part. On the subject of games the gap in-between revising is now to be taken up by completing Super Mario Galaxy with Luigi so I get the final extra two levels at the end. Which to say the least is a little bit nerdy but I think I’m about 40% of the way through with Luigi which is pretty good going. Plus it’s getting me excited for Super Mario Galaxy 2 which is out in June and promises to be ‘2’ times the fun. On that note. Byeeeeeeeeeee

James x

“The gap, the gap, the gap…”

First of all let me start on a sad note as I was informed today over the internet that Devon Clifford drummer in You Say Party! You Say Die! has died of a brain aneurysm. I remember YSP!YSD being one of the first bands I ever really got into it must have been about 2006 or 2007 listening to Steve Lamacq when I first heard them. Since then they disappeared off my musical radar until recently where I went back and to listen to them for the first time in ages and they were equally as fun as they were those years ago. My thoughts are with the band, family and friends.

So, back to school Tuesday had a nice inset day where i finished all the work that needed to be finished and made myself a nice motivational revision poster. If i do not revise then I do not get to see Slow Club and Summer Camp next month. Summer Camp’s debut single was released this week and I of course got it all nice and pre-ordered from Piccadilly Records and it is very nice indeed. School hasn’t been too bad you’ve just gotta get on with it really put you foot down and pull through the nightmare that is A-Levels. Theres a lot to be happy about which helps

Wednesday night saw the Glastonbury line-up and oh isn’t it beautiful nearer the time  I will do a top 10 bands I want to see at Glasto list. For me though really there was one massive name that stood out and that’s The Flaming Lips. Definitely one of my favourite bands of all time and from what I’ve read about their live show it proves to be flippin epic. And it’s only made better when you’ve got Florence and Hot Chip playing before. On Thursday I found out that I’ve got someone who can get me some alcohol which is good

Yeah so Thursday evening went out to celebrate my mums boyfriends daughters 21st and we go with various extended family and one of my mums boyfriends friends called Bob

PROBLEMS WITH BOB

1. HE IS A TORY
2. HE IS ARROGANT
3. HE IS SEXIST
4. HE IS OBNOXIOUS
5. HE THROWS FOOD AT HIS KIDS IN THE RESTAURANT
6. HE GET’S DRUNK AT EVERY OPPORTUNITY
7. HE IS OPINIONATED
8. HE DECIDED TO SHOW OFF HIS PANTS TO EVERYONE
9. HE STARTED BANGING ON THE TABLE LIKE A DEMENTED GORILLA
10. HE IS AN EMBARRASSMENT TO BE SEEN WITH

I hope I never get to meet him every again

Apart from that I sat quietly without really saying much, got some good uni and glasto advice though, wine in a bag is apparently the way forward.

Friday built up the anticipation for what as an absolutely brilliant Record Store Day at Piccadilly Records in Manchester. Woke up at 6:30 to and got the 7:30 train to Manchester with Michael Kinge and Jack Mitchell. We arrived outside the store to already see that the queue was already round the corner and going to down towards Afflecks. Before this i bought myself the Daily Mirror to read if I get bored (It had a great picture of Eidur Gudjohnson as a cloud, can’t remember what the pun was). I also bought a Frappachino. I have no idea what a Frappachinno is but it tastes very strange and made me very hyper. I didn’t realise that it was supposed to be cold I was expecting a nice warm cup of coffee but no what a mistake I made. So we were there two hours early and as you do you getting chatting with people you don’t know. There were free flavoured water for everyone in the queue it was all very nice indeed got asked by lots of people what was going on. So doors opened and Kinge got the very last Blur 7″ and a Hot Chip 7″he was very lucky indeed, Jack got Factory Records 12″ and I got a She & Him 7″, Dum Dum Girls/Male Bonding 7″ and LCD Soundsystem 12″. After this we bumped into the girl I was talking to in the queue found out that she had actually added me on lastfm a few months ago. What a small world we live in.

Here are a few pictures

So we continued to spend the rest of the morning/early afternoon wandering round Manchester buying things and enjoying the sun before hopping back on the train home. Got to mine and played everything, think I personally enjoyed Kinge’s Hot Chip 7″ the most. In the evening it was band practice, things just seem to be getting and better for us

Today I got up an enjoyed watching the F1 with my dad this morning, wasn’t a bad race. The game the greatest festival of the yeah…

SANDBACH TRANSPORT FESTIVAL

YEAH!!!

As if you don’t love wandering round a car park with a few cars and lorries on then walking through down watching the masses get drunk in the afternoon. Hasn’t Sandbach got anything better is this all people have got to look forward to in the year. I suppose it’s the same in most small towns such as ours up and down the country and it’s quite sad. I really do wish there was something interesting here. Nothing changes.

James x

Spring!

Well it’s here at least. I went for a little walk around in the sunshine this afternoon to celebrate how lovely the weather has suddenly come and to send back my Dot to Dot tickets cos’ apparently there’s something wrong with them. And as I was out walking I noticed a few things:

1. It seems like everyone is in love and holding hands
2. The blossom always looks beautiful
3. It’s that time of year where people are always out walking dogs or on bike rides
4. ‘Brighten the Corners’ era Pavement is always the best kind of music to walk around to in the sunshine

Anyway what have I done this week. Well Monday was Bank Holiday and my mum and sister decided to go on the canal boat with Stuart so I went on a nice walk with my dad in the countryside. Tuesday was rather uneventful. Wednesday was good though. Went to see Kick-Ass with a few friends and I have to say it was absolutely brilliant. Probably the best film I’d seen since watching Control, which I watched the night before. Kick-Ass however was a long way from the doom and gloom of an Ian Curtis bio-pic. It had absolutely everything, a little controversy, romance, action, a stupidly brilliant amount of gore, comedy, those tender little emotional bits that are just lovely. You could list it’s brilliance for ages, maybe the plot was a little bit unintelligent but that was just about it’s only flaw. Heres a clip for you encase you haven’t seen it. Oh and it also had Starry Eyed by Ellie Goulding in the soundtrack, always a good thing.

So following that I got home and saw my mum for about the first time in a week and watched the United game. Looked like they we’re gonna destroy Bayern in the first half but no wasn’t to be. Bit disappointed that no British teams reached the semi-finals of the Champions League. But I would like to congratulate Fulham on reaching the Europa League final and while on the subject of football well done to Pompey as well for reaching the FA Cup final, well deserved after such a season they’ve had.

Thursday went to see my nan played a lot more Tomb Raider and have done very little work. Friday was along the same lines, and Saturday and Today, so today I am left with this fucking huge pile of work to do for Tuesday, wish me look people. At least I got a little bit of motivation now. If I don’t stick to a revision timetable then i do not get to go see Slow Club and Summer Camp next month, gonna write a massive sign in front of my desk to remind me to work. Only two months of this. Can’t fail, right…

James x