We're off to Glastonbury tomorrow night but the weather looks, erm, dicey. English Summer and all, I guess.
It's been raining all day today but should clear up tomorrow. The big worry, however, is the forecast for 20mm of rain on Saturday! Ack!
Well, this is my third Glastonbury so I guess I'm about due for a mudbath...
Our Glastonbury tickets just arrived. Wahoo! So getting up at 5am in Sydney to buy the tickets was worth the effort.
According to their web site, Orbital are breaking up after the next album. Fortunately, their last UK gig is at Glastonbury for which I have tickets...
Three and a half years ago, Holly and I spent our last night out in Sydney at Club Kooky. All this time on, and it's gone through moving location, stopping for a time and now it's back at Club 77.
I went last Sunday night and had a fab time. Club 77 has removed a bunch of internal walls and stuff, making it a much better space. The sound still sucks and the air conditioning is still inadequate, but it is an improvement.
Kooky is just awesome because it's one of those rare places with a great, consistent crowd, excellent music and a quality vibe. It's a queer club in the truest sense: completely mixed in terms of gender and sexuality, making it quite unique.
I wish I could find something as diverse in London...
Also went to Frigid last Sunday before Kooky. The new venue (old Newtown RSL) is excellent, the crowd great and the vibe very good. Had a great time and managed to catch up with loads of people I wouldn't otherwise have seen.
I saw Kraftwerk play at the Brixton Academy on Saturday night. It was a midnight show and they played for about two hours. Wow! Absolutely amazing.
This is a band I've wanted to see for many many years, and they definitely lived up to my expectations. Brilliant music, incredible visuals.
When the robots came out for the second encore, it was quite amusing because the robots moved about quite a bit more than the band members on which they are modelled.
I've been enjoying this great online radio station recently. The Global Pop Conspiracy plays a suitably eclectic and fun mix of indie pop music, with a bit of pure pop shoved in for good measure. Nice stuff.
This is what I love about London: any band that's doing any sort of tour ends up playing a gig here. So in May, Fantomas are playing at the Astoria. Yay! I've wanted to see a Mike Patton band for years, and they don't come much weirder than this one!
I'd heard about Franz Ferdinand before, but hadn't heard the music. So I got hold of the album and it's excellent! Kinda New Wave in a way, a bit Stranglers or Clash even. Energetic, witty, intelligent and fun.
Think I might see if I can get tickets to their gig at The Astoria...
As a side note, if you're starting a band in roughly the same style and want to get some gigs the easy way, try calling your band Gavrillo Princip and you'll no doubt land the support gigs for Franz Ferdinand.
One of my fave record labels, Warp Records has just launched their digital downloadable music site, Bleep. At last, someone has done it right!
Have a look at this little exerpt from the EULA:
You shall be authorized to store as unlimited copies of the
Product on any media, provided that these copies are for personal
non-commercial use only. The Product or copies of the Product may not
be resold or streamed either for profit or non-profit use,
You shall be entitled to export, burn or copy Products solely for
personal, noncommercial use.
Brilliant! Their prices aren't particularly cheap though. Lower than the CD prices, but not much. For example, the new Broadcast album is £6.99. Not exactly cheap! Sure, Amazon are charging £10.99, but you'd think the costs of digital distribution would be much lower...
Still, the quality should be good and it's nice to see someone trusting users. I'm off to get that Broadcast album!
