Sunday Bloody Sunday (for once not)

Turned my TV on after a couple of days at Shamila's and apparently I've got all the Sky Sports channels free for the
week-end.  Not sure who to thank as my (cheap) TV package is with Virgin Media.  So cheers to either/both of disgraced apparently non UK tax paying Aussie media mogul or clean cut British apparently non UK tax paying entrepreneur.

Watched the back end of QPR versus Aston Villa.  It was crap.  Football is just soulless to me nowadays unless Boro are playing.  Now watching  20/20 cricket England versus West Indies.  Although there's something a little upsetting about West Indies cricket team being so shit (apparently their best players are playing in the Indian Premier League),  I still love the watching the game.
 
Anyway, even better is I'm off work next week and Shamila and I are off to London for a few days.  I've left all arrangements to Shamila but  I think we're staying in the Kensington area.  I've been to London loads of times with work and a few times to watch Boro but not very often for a holiday (if you can call it a holiday if you're just going for a few nights).  Whatever, I'm still looking forward to it.

Taking my laptop so I may get chance to post.

Cheers

Update at 20.37 England 46-4 chasing 114.  Clearly a cricket pundit, I aint!

Jeez 88 all out at 21.16.  Maybe I should re-write the post!

Emmy The Great - Georgian Theatre

Emmy The Great was ......  I think I'll just let the photos speak tonight.

As good as a rest

Time for a makeover on my iPod.  My top tunes according  to iTunes, Top of the Pops stylee,

10 – Leslie – King Creosote

9 – The Flying Club Cup – Beirut (album)

8 – Cowardly Custard – King Creosote

7 – Terrible Love – The National

6 – Bright Bright Bright – Dark Dark Dark

5 - Mysore Se Ayi – Raghu Dixit

4 – Smart Flesh – Low Anthem (album)

3 – Sisi – Washington Irving

2 – Abbey Gallup – Washington Irving

1 - Good News – Withered Hand (album)

Washington Irving are simply the best and

 The Low Anthem - Gateshead Old Town Hall

Of course there was much more to my End Of The Road than that.  Such as the wonderful pop sounds of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, the reincarnation of Johnny Cash, Willy Mason and Polka/Sea Shanty/Folk cross over (always a winner for me) Skinny Lister. - What the hell, here's the photos in that order!

Might post some more photos later on (=probably not) but that's it for now.  I loved it, but I always do.
That was my End Of The Road.  And that's how I treat it nowadays.  Like the football season, my season ends with Larmer Tree Gardens and we are now at The Start Of The Road again.  This week-end sees the return of The Kids Are Solid Gold and Treetop Flyers at The Westgarth on Friday and one that got away at EOTR, Emmy The Great at the Georgian Theatre, Stockton on Saturday.  See you at either, both or neither.

Here's to a great 2011-12 season

EOTR 3 - Lets Here It For The Girls!

When I was young I used to adore girls in bands,  Pauline Murray, Debbie Harry, Patti Smith et al and nothing's changed really although I'd like to think it's no longer about lust (honest guv')! 

I've enthused about Allo Darlin a few times on GFTB before after seeing them at EOTR 2010.  I'm pretty sure I've also posted a video on FB and I know I've encouraged TKASG to check them out and they were great again on Saturday afternoon in the Big Top.

Seemingly nervous at first, lovely ukulele playing Aussie, Elizabeth Morris led Allo Darlin' through a euphoric set of songs from their album including Silver Dollars (from Sound It Out fame) plus a few new ones.  Allo Darlin' are simply the best pop band around at the moment.

The Secret Sisters from Alabama were also lovely and they refreshingly played a set of country standards by The Everly Brothers, Hank Williams, Patsy Cline and George Jones as well as a couple of their own which stood up well.  Not sure if it would have been as good if the ratio had been the other way round.

 

As nice as Elizabeth Morris and The Secret Sisters were I got the impression that Beth Jeans Houghton and Caitlin' Rose are not so nice.  Sharp-tongued and quick witted I think they'd chew you up and spit you out if you had the courage to mess with them.

One time Kids Are Solid Gold regular and newly signed to Mute Records, Beth Jeans opened The Garden Stage on Saturday afternoon.  Fresh from an extended visit to LA, Beth looked mean and confident sporting homemade tattoos on the insides of her arm that wouldn't have looked out of place in Berwick Hills.  God bless her for making me feel so at home.

Her sound was much leaner than I remembered and the better for it.  She was confident enough in her new songs not to fall back on her back catalogue and I only recognised I Will Return I Promise.  Really looking forward to her album coming out in January.

I love Caitlin Rose from Nashville.  I wouldn't like to meet her in a back alley or get in a round with her for that matter.  She set her stall out by dismissing a cute little girl stood next to me who shouted out her name was also Caitlin.  She made it clear she didn't give a shit. 

Apparently known for her smoking habit, I'm not sure how much longer her sweet sounding voice will hold out so we'd better enjoy it while we can.  Caitlin, now at the ripe old age of 23 played with confidence bordering on arrogance.  I do like spirit in young people especially when their songs are as good as Caitlin's.

 

Yet more to come.

   



Come In Mr Bell Your Time Is Up!

It's not often I applaud the Daily Mail but they can have this one!

About bloody time.  It will be interesting to hear what the local Labour constituency has to say.  Here's a few from the Evening Gazette 1, 2 and 3  as well.

EOTR 2 - My A Listers

First of all apologies for not replying to comments.  I am having problems posting comments using my Blogger account.  There does seem to be an answer but it looks a bit of a faff.  In the past I've used my old Livejournal account but even that is sometimes creaky.  I'll do my best but don't be surprised if I post some of my replies anonymously.

I've been back 2 days but my thoughts continue to be in North Dorset.  At least I can rest knowing that health permitting I  will definitely be returning next year.  Artists for 2012 won't be booked until the new year and I will be looking forward to see who the headliners are.  Not that the vast majority of the headliners have done it for me really.  The first year was probably the best.  Explosions In The Sky, The Fleet Foxes and The Hold Steady.  Last year I really didn't care for Yo La Tengo, Modest Mouse or Wilco and this year I watched half an hour of Beirut and about 20 minutes each of Mogwai and Joanna Newsom. 

More interesting bands can generally be found further down the bill and this year was no exception.  The band I most wanted to see was Tinariwen.  I'd been tracking them for a couple of years.  I missed them play Middlesbrough in May 2007 (it was at the back end of my 20 year live music abstinence) and they didn't leave me disappointed.

Tinariwen are from Mali, like a lot of my favourite African artists such as Salif Keita and the late Ali Farka Toure. Critically acclaimed and loved by the great and the good of rock (see the Wikipedia link above) and americana (by look of the various EOTR bands grooving back stage on Sunday) they wooed and dare I say surprised the Woods Stage audience on Sunday afternoon with their tuneful

trance like assouf or desert blues.  Perfect for a sunny Sunday afternoon Tinariwen had the crowd swaying, tramping and helping out with the percussion with rhythmic handclapping.  Non-English speaking the band limited their inter song chat to "thank you so much" and "is ok?"  A master stroke by EOTR.

Going back to my Friday night and the Beirut/Fall dilemma - when it came to the crunch it had to be..

and to my surprise they were brilliant.  I haven't heard any of their recent stuff and didn't recognise any of the songs but the music was quite predictably like fast rock'n'roll/rockabilly.  The Guardian reviewer mentioned "Hawkwind tendency" and commented "The Fall had dedicated fans upfront, but behind them the crowd thinned quickly".  Hardly an insight,  actually I was surprised so many stayed for so long.

As a member of "the dedicated fans upfront" and personal I got a birds eye view of Mark Smith's manic orchestrations.  Not just telling the band when to start and finish the songs but fiddling about with the controls of the amps, putting additional microphones in the bass drum and he kept going over to thump on Elena Poulou (his wife)'s keyboard.  He wandered around the stage chewing on his gums like the old 53 year old man he is, kicking and falling over microphone stands like the old drunk he is.  Or is he?  I'm not convinced, maybe it was just a good night but the music was well controlled enough for me.

And here's a photo of the gallant loser's of Friday night's battle of the bands.

EOTR 1

Wow, that was something special.  Early thoughts are that it was easily the best of my 3 EOTR's.  As ever, wonderful setting, great weather, good food and lots of memorable music.  Over the next few posts I'll post some some words and photos to describe my time there. 

I was pretty well organised before I went and gave pretty much everybody a spin before I went and didn't miss much that I planned to see but inevitably there are always regrets about bands you should/could have seen but when I considered what I missed and why I don't think I did too bad.

• Emmy The Great - I wanted to see her but she clashed with one of my must sees, Slow Down Molasses. Anyway she's on The Georgian Theatre on 24 September so I've got another chance to see her and I might just do that.
• Lanterns On The Lake - As above, a 3 way battle from hell.
• Laura Marling - Could have caught some of her show after the wonderful performance by our (almost) very own Leisure Society.
• A couple of the bands I saw said Big Deal (clashed with Tinariwen) and Wild Nothing (clashed with Josh T Pearson) were very good.
• Richard said Best Coast and Timber Timbre were brill and numerous people said
• The Mountaineering Club were excellent but they clashed with Sarabeth Tucker.  Actually I caught them doing  a little improv number with a London poet on the piano stage on Sunday.  More about that later.

And then there were the artists I wished I'd seen a bit more of - The Walkmen - They were one of my naps but I left their set half way through.   I should have either stayed or not gone at all because going to watch them meant I only got to see a couple of songs by She Keeps Bees.

Inexplicably I left the Joanna Newsom show after about  4 songs. In my defence I was cold, wet, too far back to get a decent view and on my 4th night at the festival I didn't have enough energy left to fight my way to the front. 

Don't be feeling too sorry for me mind because I've already bought tickets for next year (yes plural- Shamila's coming!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) and you wusses that aren't up for the 650 mile round trip to Larmer Tree Gardens are welcome to join me and Robin Hood at the new No Direction Home Festival, 8, 9 and 10 June 2012.