Tales from Scotland...

cleaningoffthestone asked: WE SHOUDL GO TO PORTUGAL!
I dont know why but Portugal seems liek a place where writers should hide from the world.
ANYWAY HOW ARE THINGS? they're bloody weird here, I can tell you. XD

I’ll need to get me a passport then!

I’m good. Tired and bored of this now 5-day headache, but I’m good.  I’m here if you need me.  xx

Look what arrived in the post!

Yep!  I’m excited!

I did get a bit miffed at the £2.50 postage charge and did say that for that price I wanted it tied with ribbon and delivered by owl, but hey… it arrived!

I’m really looking forward to the gig.  I get to spend the day with Lieke (who’s coming down from Aberdeen for it) - we’re going to spend the day seeing Glasgow.  I have a few ideas of where to go.  The Kelvingrove is on my list, as is G.o.M.A… any other suggestions would be fab!  I think we might have dinner at King Tut’s. We’ll decide then, I guess!It also falls on the day before the 14th anniversary since my Mum died.  It means I don’t have to pretend.  What I mean is sometimes I feel more than a little low on the 30th June.  If ther gig was just a day later, I’m not sure I would be able to enjoy it… I might be able to put on a brave face and look like it, but I don’t think it’d be the same.  With the gig being the day before, it’s something positive to look forward to.

The last summer…

Wow, that sounds a little over-dramatic!

Yesterday I realised something awful.  This summer is the last summer of my 20’s.  Yeah, that’s right. THE LAST ONE.  Crap.

This means that I need to do SOMETHING awesome this summer.  I have no idea what, though.  I thought about going off by myself and seeing more of Scotland, but I can’t afford that…  Any ideas would be greatly appreciated though…

I do get to see Charlie Simpson at King Tut’s next month, and Aerials Up (amongst others), also at King Tut’s in July.  Actually, you know what? That can be part of my summer mission.  Ok, I’ll explain.  There’s a series of gigs at King Tut’s this summer, and a few of my favourite local bands are playing. Miniature Dinosaurs, Aerials Up, Endor and Cancel The Astronauts.  I just checked out the whole line-up.  I want to go to them all!  Music!  GIVE. ME. MUSIC! 

A friend said yesterday that Scotland is “killing it” right now in music, and she’s right.  Biffy, Twin Atlantic, Frightened Rabbit… Glasvegas.  And there’s 15 gigs at King Tut’s, one after the other, between 14th and 28th.  A gig per night, with an amazing line-up!  Not to mention the acoustic sets they’ve got planned. 

I WANT TO GO TO THEM ALL!  Anyone got a spare £40…?!

Weekend of Awesome - Part 3 (10th April)

Ok, so I’m way behind on all of this. Ooops.  Anyway, this is the third part of the three-day London Adventure.

Sunday was a nice, very warm and sunny day. Ace! Not so ace is waking up with hayfever. Boo.  Clare and I decided to get out and enjoy the sunshine anyway.  We met up with Alex and wandered around the wee market literally 2 minutes away.  I had fun avoiding people/resisting the urge to punch people whilst Clare had fun buying stuff.  She got some really pretty bangles, actually.  The dude on the stall tried to get me to buy sunglasses.  I explained that they’re not really needed in Glasgow (although Glasgow has been positively glorious the last few days, which I have thoroughly enjoyed!).

Then we went to another, much cooler, but much more busy (and expensive, actually) market.  It’s was lovely, though.  Clare kept picking things up that I knew I could make!  I think I annoyed her a teeny bit by saying, “Yeah, but you could make that!” every time she picked something up that was potentially make-able.  Her response was “no, YOU can make it. I can’t.”  And there followed a discussion on Clare’s creative abilities.  She has them, she just doesn’t use them or hasn’t really discovered what they are yet.  She’s ace at baking and cooking, though.  One of these days I will get to snarf her cakes!

Then we (Clare, Alex and I) headed for the venue… for grub and drinks and a lounge-about in the sunshine.  Trina and her friend (I can NEVER remember her name despite the fact I’ve met her a few times now) arrived and I was finishing off the “chick with an umbrella” cross stitch that I’d started on the coach down to London on the Friday. I made it a bit of a mission to do and get done before I left on the Monday.  And I did it.  Woop!  I’ll see if I can find it at some point and take a photo to show you later.

Mike was turning up later, so we headed downstairs early.  Clare wanted to use the time to try and set up for photographs.  She’d tried it upstairs in the pub but then figured the light would be different downstairs and it would be silly to try and sort it out before… Meh. I haven’t done any kind of serious photography for years.  It’s something I’d like to do again, but I haven’t got the right kit yet.  I haven’t even got a camera.  Not even a wee compact thing.  Lame.

I made a point of standing near to the door and made sure I knew a way of getting out quickly if needed!  The previous nights it got so damn hot down there I worried about passing out (something I almost did that first night), so I formed some sort of escape plan!  (There actually were a couple of moments that I feared I would actually pass out/panic/throw up… and my escape plan failed. Boo.) With that sorted, it was time to hear their new material!  I was so excited!  The first time I ever heard them was live, so it was quite fitting really.  I’d made a point of not hearing the demos beforehand.  I wanted to hear them live first.  The first time I heard the band EVER was in Norwich, back in May 2005 when they were opening for Fightstar.  I was bloody lucky to hear them, too.  Friends and I had met in a pub near to the venue, but we arrived at The Waterfront later than I would have liked.  They were almost at the end of their set when I got inside, but it was enough.  I don’t think it would have made that much difference if I’d heard the demos before the gig, but I thought I’d wait and hear it live and then make my mind up about it.  My view on demos seems to differ from most people.  I’m firmly of the opinion that if a song it good enough it’ll show regardless of the quality of the demo.  That said, (not that it would have spoiled the gig) I also believe that the best way to hear music is live.  If a band can hack it live, you (and they) are onto a winner!  Too many bands sound great in the studio but are absolutely dreadful in a live setting.  Thankfully, Brigade don’t have this problem.

Oh my goodness!  The new stuff is incredible and I for one cannot wait to get my wee paws on the album!  I know some of you may find this hard to believe (or perhaps see me as being biased…  I’ll explain this in another post, too.  You’re wrong, by the way) but this really is their best work so far, and I am absolutely convinced that this could well be the album that really sees them making some serious waves in British music.  It’s a far more confident record from the sounds of it, and they’ve kind of shifted the boundaries a little, whilst still retaining that Brigade sound.  It’s a bold move, but I believe it’s been the right move.  Will has certainly grown in confidence with his singing.  It’s been a long time coming, if I’m honest.  I knew all along he could do it, he just didn’t have the confidence.  There were times over the years where he did have the confidence and he did nail it, but then a few months later it would be missing.  That’s not to say their performances have been shoddy - far from it, but there was always that sense that if only Will could realise that he COULD do it, it would be amazing. 

There was one gig where I did actually break down in tears because of it.  It was back in 2007 (?  I think…) when they were supporting Fightstar.  It was the Manchester gig.  I’d seen them the night before in Stoke and, again, Brigade killed it!  It was perfect!  Manchester was a whole other story though.  I don’t know what the hell happened in 24hrs, but something had.  Musically, it was fine, but Will’s vocals were all over the place.  It dodn’t take me long to figure out that his problem was a combination of a lack of confidence and a lack of concentration.  Something else was clearly in his head and it was affecting his performance.  I’ve seen Will give some of the best performances so I know damn well he CAN do it.  All I could do was cry. 

Anyway… Back to the point. Sunday 10th April.  I noticed, oddly, that he was far more confident when he didn’t have his guitar.  You’d expect it to be other way around, using the guitar to kind of hide behind, but not this time!  Just amazing!

I really do hope they finally do it this time, they really do deserve it.  They’ve worked so hard and come through some really challenging times.  And they’re good.  If I didn’t truly believe they could do it (and they will do it), I wouldn’t bother.  I could go on, but I won’t.  I’d rather let the music speak for itself, to be honest.

Weekend of Awesome - Part 2 (9th April)

So, here’s part 2.  The account (as best as I remember it, that is) of the Weekend of Awesome.

Saturday’s a usually good days. They weren’t on this particular Saturday.  This particular Saturday saw me wake up in pain.  I came to the conclusion that 10hr bus rides, a rather silly amount of alcohol and too much dancing is never a good combination. I honestly have no desire to repeat this experience ever again.  The only reason I got up was because I couldn’t relax enough/get comfortable to go back to sleep.  Instead, I got up, and started knitting.  Clare thought this was funny when she eventually woke up.

The day is good one though, because 1) it’s sunny outside, 2) We’re meeting Alex at the venue for lunch/drinks/fun before the gig and 3) it’s another night of Brigade-related awesomeness.  Need to kick the slight hangover though… It’s not like it’s a major hangover, but it’s there, annoying me. Because it can.

Clare and I spent most of the morning mooching around the hotel room and watching bad day-time TV for a while.  I don’t have a TV at home, so getting to watch TV every now and then is quite exciting.  We watched Poirot in the end, which was cool.  Clare made arrangements with Alex that we’d meet her at the hotel for about 2.30pm, aiming to get to the venue by 3pm… for lunch and drinks and fun.  It wasn’t at warm as Friday, but it was nice outside.  Mike joined us at the venue at about 6-ish (having already started drinking!) and after a brief catch-up, we all mooched downstairs for the gig. 

It was nice down there at first, but I knew all too soon it would get stupidly hot.  It was an awesome show regardless.  Of the two albums they’ve done, CMWF is probably my favourite.  As much as I love Lights (I always seem to forget just how much I love it, because I don’t listen to it that much), CMWF is a far more confident record.  Lights is an album that often gets forgotten in my house.  I listen to it once every couple of months and then wonder why I don’t do it more often… listen to it a couple of more times and then it gets forgotten again. Until the next time.

For about 2 weeks prior to these shows, my stereo decided to have a slight meltdown and would only play Brigade CDs. It was amusing at first, but as I like A LOT of other music it got slightly irritating after a while.  So I’d listened to a lot of Brigade.  For the most part, I enjoyed this fact because I really do like them, but nothing beats a live show. And they didn’t disappoint.

I’m still a little confused at how I ended up in the tiny gap batween a speaker and Will’s mic stand, though, because I started the night a fair way back (but still at the front, helping Clare while she took photos.  I only noticed when Will’s guitar got a little too close to my head for my liking.  When a photographer decided to step between Clare and I, I shifted slightly so I would keep my balance… and almost fell onto the speaker in front of me.  Classy.  It’s probably captured on film somewhere. Nice.  They better edit that shit down, seriously!

Part 3 to follow… when I’ve done it!

Weekend of Awesome - Part 1 (8th April)

Clare and I made the ridiculous journey to London from Glasgow. Why? Because Brigade were playing. Actually, no.  Not just because of that - although that’s a huge part of it!  Yes, initially we thought we’d do it because Brigade are fucking awesome and there was no way we were going to miss it.  I had a slightly different reason for it by the time it came around, though. 

For the last few weeks and months I have been here, there and everywhere talking to a LOT of people!  Clare and I are trying to start our own business, see.  I have spoken to so many people I had a good 3 weeks or so where I didn’t actually know if I was coming or going!  Confusion doesn’t quite cover it, really.  As well as all that, I’ve had a load of research to do (and after the last course I did with Business Gateway, I learned I had so much more to do!) and trying to organise my thoughts and ideas and try to make sense of it… and to put it in a way that other people would be able to understand them too.  Everyone I’ve spoken to recently (apart from maybe 2 people) has been super positive and they’ve loved my ideas (which is always good!) but they’re in the creative industry - they get it.  But other people might not get it at all.  With at least 2 or 3 more courses coming up and a load more to book my place for, I really needed a break!  Hence the trip to London for 3 days.  It was good, but I can’t say my head is all clear…!

On Friday, I got up at 1am (after not really sleeping when I went to bed at 11pm the night before), and dyed my hair.  Yeah, you read that right.  The colour it had faded to was awful (and it wasn’t how I wanted it the first time I coloured it anyway), so I got straight to it to try and fix it.  With what looked like strawberry sauce on my head, I set about making sure I had everything in my suitcase and bag, promptly ‘losing’ my keys. Clever. Of course, they were where I’d left them. But I didn’t realise this for at least another 2 hours.  Idiot.

Rob, Clare’s partner picked me up from my flat and dropped us off at the bus station.  This was at about 3.50am.  Our bus arrived at about 4am.  I was surprisingly awake for a while, until we hit Preston.  And it was hot.  Well, for most of the journey.  For some reason or other the heating was broken, and was therefore on permanently.  The driver couldn’t turn it off, but it took 3 people complaining about the heat for him to turn the air conditioning on.  It wasn’t so bad at first but when the sun came out,  my goodness it was warm!  Poor Clare was right next to it.  When we (finally) stopped at Watford Gap, the driver opened the sky-light-thing and it was so much better!  Why the heck couldn’t you have done that before, you silly boy?!  I would have slept for some of the journey, and I did try to, but it’s a bit hard to sleep when you’re so aware of people, and the heat, and everything…!  I think in total I slept for maybe 30 minutes.  Nice. 

We arrived in London at 2pm and made our way to the hotel.  I was so tempted to have a wee nap but I knew if I did, I’d not be going to the gig!  We got in, un-long-journeyed ourselves and made tea/coffee.  We needed it!  And then we headed for the venue.  I’ve been to London a fair bit, but I’ve only ever really seen it in darkness.  It’s actually a really beautiful city (once you get past the people, and the seriously yucky bits) and I found myself quite liking it.  When we got there, I pretty much fell asleep at the table. Ooops.  We were hoping to meet with Erin, Laura and Claire… but when Clare (yeah, that can sometimes get confusing!) sent a text to one of them (I forget who…) they weren’t going to be there until at least 8pm.  Oh well.  We killed time chatting to various people and I gave a bag of stuff to Emma - the Book of Hen, a bag of buttons from the Glasgow Craft show and a box of craft things for her daughter, Jessica.  She seemed to like the Book of Hen I’d made for her, so that was cool!  The Book of Hen is like a wee scrapbook, but for the Hen Night.  I thought it’d be a nice keepsake.  Here it is! (modelled by the lovely Emma herself…)

I then tried to wake myself up by having coffee.  It didn’t work. Neither did the cider or the lager.  Oh dear.  My brain didn’t pop on Friday night like I expected it to, which was nice, though I was ridiculously tired. 

The gig (obviously that’s the important bit!) was amazing!  I think I’ve probably heard the entire album at various shows here and there over the last (almost) 6yrs, but it was great to here it in its entirety.  I did get a *little* drunk. Ooops.  Also, I bumped into an old friend (who I met at a Brigade gig nearly 5 years ago), Mike.  I’d not seen him since Brigade played at The Luminaire with Sucioperro (I forget when that was, but I was still at uni then) so it was great to see him again.  I got even more excited when he said he was doing all 3 gigs that weekend!  Yay!  I spent the night dancing, drinking and being hit in the face with a camera.  Oh yeah…!

Apparently it was being filmed for some documentary or something.  I forget what it was for now, but when Clare and I were chatting to Emma, some guy asked us if we’d do some kind of vox pop thing for it.  Apparently they wanted to speak to us because we’d come down from Glasgow.  I think I got asked every night (by the same person!) to do it, but nothing came of it.  Oh well…  Anyway, there was this woman in front of me with a huge video camera.  I know she was doing her job and everything, but I’m pretty sure hitting people in the face with the camera and standing on them wasn’t in her job description.  I was feeling pretty monstrous that weekend (largely due to extreme tiredness) so I was very tempted to knock her over or take her legs out.  I didn’t though.  I figured it wouldn’t go down very well.  I should probably use this opportunity to apologise to anyone if I said or did anything out-of-character or if I upset people.  It didn’t even occur to me until I got back to Scotland feeling like I wanted to break stuff.  Ooops.  I’m sorry! xx

Clare and I finally got outside (my God, it was hot down there!) and I was in quite a bit of pain already (10hr coach journeys + alcohol + dancing is never a good combo) and said Hi/well done/general stuff to James whilst we were waiting for Alex, and Bob shoved a piece of paper at me - which I thought was odd.  It turned out to be a setlist (which is now on my Wall of Random on my house).  Ah, bless him!  Thanks, Bob!  xx  We made it back to the hotel in one piece, thanks to Alex - it was ace catching up with her too!  We had to take a bit of detour on the way back but it was fun.

Part 2 to follow at… er… some point!