A Minor Catch Up

I'll get Pamplona finished soon, I promise. It's taking a while because it is really long.

In the meantime, here's the latest:

Last night was the first of two Killing Joke gigs, and it was unbelievably good. After the gig I was wandering around and saw someone who looked familiar - so I asked him if he was Guy Pratt. And he was! So I had a chat to him, he seemed quite surprised that I'd read his book (of course I had, it was Pink Floyd related!) and we talked about Floyd, Rick Wright, Roger Waters's band and heard the final truth about the reunion. I would've loved to have talked for a bit longer but he had to go (as did I, stupid tube), but that was a nice surprise ending to a brilliant night. Even better, I'm going to tonight's gig as well - this time it's an entirely different set, part two of one long show if you will.

I'm no longer on probation for my new job, which means I'm a fully-fledged member of the company now. Enjoying it a lot, and not just because of the extra money (although it definitely helps). I'm learning new things all the time, which is exactly what I wanted as I feel I've been stagnating skills-wise for the last couple of years.

My guitar is coming on in leaps and bounds, I've definitely made a lot of improvements in the last six months. The problem is I hate my guitar! Warning, guitar nerd talk coming up: I will never, ever buy another guitar with a floating tremolo, they're just too much of a pain to deal with for something I don't even use! I snapped a string on Sunday, so I bought new ones and restrung it. The problem is the new strings were slightly heavier, so it threw the tremolo out a mile. After a lot of tinkering I finally got it almost right, but now the springs in the back are stretched to their limit so I've had to buy new ones to compensate. I've had my eye on a new guitar for a while now, I just need to find one to play before I order it. You'd think in a city like London it'd be easy...

I've not done any other travel since Pamplona (aside from a pleasant journey to Heathrow Terminal 5, as documented previously), but now I've set myself up fairly well I've been thinking about how to change this. I realise this blog was supposed to be about my travels over here, and aside from the first couple of months it's been a bit bare, but I think I've worked out a plan that should see this change - starting next month. Watch this space...

It's been a bit quiet for gigs up until now, too. Aside from some London bands I've been seeing (I'll get to that in a minute), the list has been a bit short - but definitely quality. One of the most enjoyable was Ladytron, which was interesting in its own way as the first night was cancelled half-way through the show! Apparently the front of stage lost all power and there was no backup, so they had to postpone the rest of the show for a couple of months.

A few weeks later was the reformed My Bloody Valentine, a band I'd heard loads about over the years but have never actually listened to - something I rectified quickly and instantly kicked myself for not doing sooner. I was very lucky for this one, a friend of mine had managed to score an extra ticket for this very sold out event and I was very pleased when he offered to me. This is the only gig I've ever been to where earplugs were handed out at the door, and believe me they were needed. Even with them in it was easily the loudest gig I've ever been to - and you could tell the ones who opted out of the free earplugs. During the last song, they stopped half way through and just played one chord constantly, letting it build up slowly and gradually - over about 15 minutes. After five minutes it was loud, really loud - you could see people starting to feel uncomfortable. After ten minutes, dotted around the crowd people were clamping their hands over their ears. By the time they went back into the ending of the song, the only thing you could hear was the carefully constructed cacophony they'd been generating - it was still going long after they put their instruments down and walked off stage. And it kept going for another ten minutes or so while we waited to see if they'd come back (they didn't). Very, very glad I took the earplugs after that!

Coming soon is three nights of Jesus Jones, two of them with The Wonder Stuff. Carter USM, EMF, vileevils and Ned's Atomic Dustbin are all up again soon, as well as a probable repeat of Ladytron. I'm also strongly considering a trip to Glasgow to see Slayer, as both nights they're playing in London I'm busy! Mixing travel with music always seems like a good idea to me.

I'm also off to see two bands this week, both with guys I know from bands I've played with since I got here. I've seen one of them three times so far, I like them a lot.

As for my own music, it's not been the best of times. Of the two bands I was in at the beginning of the year, I'm now in none. The first one I decided to leave for various reasons, the other one split up rather unexpectedly a couple of weeks after our first gig. This really bummed me out for quite a while as I genuinely loved that band and we were coming up with some fantastic music, but it wasn't meant to be. I've been on the lookout for something similar since, but so far nothing has really grabbed me. I'm auditioning for a new band in a few weeks, we'll see how that goes.

I can't really think of much else now, to be honest. I'm sure there's loads more I've been doing, but I think that covers most bases. See you again in nine months for the next update!