Some days

Some days, They don't go so well..

Spent the morning preparing the shelves for the living room, they are made of recycled IKEA Besta units, but with any luck won't look it by the time I am through. (the units themselves had seemed like a good idea - they weren't)

So later had to start drilling numerous holes in the wall at which point my Makita drill, which is 13 months old strips it's gearbox and is now just so much plastic *and Nickel Cadmium* junk.

I found to my surprise what REALLY p*'d me off was not the fact I'd have to buy another after only 13 months (though god knows that's bad enough) but it was the idea of the materials and energy that had gone into making the thing were now totally wasted. I have no idea when I started turning into some sort of born again greenie but it does seem to have happened.

It seems the gearboxes on the things are *plastic*. Any 5 year old would tell you that's fine for Fisher Price but on a butch power tool that is NOT going to last and so must have been planned that way.

It really is time thinking like this was stopped. I figure if the EU wanted to do something really useful it would require that items which use dangerous materials last for a minimum of 5 years. That would be a good start. And I know it would cost more, fine, in the end it would end up costing a lot less.

I've ordered a DeWalt. The gearboxes are all metal, they don't cost *that* much more, they are beloved of builders the country over and are *yellow* :-)

The Makita batteries I shall advertise for free to anyone that would find them of use - well you didn't think I'd buy another of theirs did you?!

Neon Bible by Arcade Fire arrived. Bigger, showier more bombastic then Funeral, it's very much them. Wildly outrageously defiantly beautiful, You feel you've finally been told the truth and it'll change your life.

There is very little that makes me feel like that, some Killers and of course all of MUSE, that's about it. I am glad I've finally been let into the secret..

If you watch the video above be warned, you'll thrill to the music but the footage is cut from *that* scene from Sergei Eisensteins Battleship Potemkin..

Monica's Closet

Todays MUSE video isn't from the Big Day Out in Auckland, seems very few were actually filming, but instead having too good a time and what there is are frankly terrible quality.

But this is the official video for The Resistance single. And as I said on youtube, it's a European gig *perfectly* summed up in 5 minutes.

The picture though IS from Auckland. MUSE are having fun, they really like doing these stripped down outdoor gigs and they seemed to knock the Kiwi's for six. Heavy, tight and with an incredible show, they should try a full on Euro set then :-)

Today I thought I'd bite the bullet and show you my room. Now everyone thinks what a nice tidy person I am though if they get to see that they might change their minds. This is my 'Monica's Closet' and no matter what I do or how often I do it it always ends up looking like this. But I guess everyone needs a space to show their other side LOL.

Dominated by my retro hi fi, this is the one I use most of all, not the smart (not quite as retro - but definitely more up market) one in the living room.

What I most want now is a Revox A77 reel to reel recorder, I'd never use it but I have always wanted one and it would increase my pile of junk most impressively :-)

Though the bag of what looks like rubbish between the speakers are actually the tiles for the upper hall - they have to be kept warm & dry so maybe it's not *that* bad.

No, I was right first time - it's a tip.

What are the chances

How many times have you bought an album by an unfamiliar artist only to find the only track worth listening to is the one heard on the radio? Then you wish you had just bought the track from iTunes and saved the cash. Hindsight and all that.

So what's the chances of buying three albums (my latest Amazon haul) and every single one is an absolute killer? It almost never happens.

First, Funeral by Arcade Fire. Released in 2005 I have no idea how this one slipped below my radar, I'm actually embarrassed to admit that it did but I guess better 'late adopter' then never.

Kind of like the secret that everyone knows but no one told you, I have no idea how to classify them, sort of indie alternative folk rock I suppose. Whatever it is, it's a work of stunning accomplishment, searing and utterly triumphantly beautiful. You can't pick anything out of it, or pigeon-hole it, Funeral shows just what can be done, it's exquisite.

While I know it's a different beast I immediately ordered Neon Bible their follow up (and only) other album.

The second was Sounds of the Universe by Depeche Mode. Of course they have been around utterly forever, one of the backgrounds to my late teens/twenties. To be honest they always left me rather cold, never having acquired the taste for (what seemed to me) their rather sterile electro synth-pop... Anyway I was a fan of the original - Gary Numan.

But having got into Editors, and they seem to be determined to turn into Depeche Mode anyway it's time to retry the born again originals.

Still stunningly slick but warmer, more human, and, well, older, this is a brilliant album. Try Wrong (with a terrific video) or Fragile Tension and you might find like me that after 30 years they finally get through.

The third, was a real scary gamble (OK I know no one is going to die if I buy an album I don't like, but I hate wasting music budget) Anyway this was A brief History of Love from The Big Pink.

They had won NME (or somebodies) best newcomer award and were supporting MUSE here in the UK.

And were (sorry guys) utterly hideous.

Just a dreadful noise, every song sounding the same and with staging ideas limited to a stage filled with CO2 and 'lit' by banks of white strobes, by the second song even I was feeling nauseous. Night one I went to the loo then decided the rest of their set was much better spent out on the concourse drinking beer, night two I didn't even bother to go in till they had finished, preferring a veggie burger, more beer and chatting to a couple of friendly MUSE girls.

But like many things they kind of stuck in your head, and surely someone must have seen some worth if they were supporting MUSE?

You listen to Brief history of love and suddenly all makes sense. It's good, VERY good. Way more melodic and 'hook-y' then such bands usually are they have this way of taking noise, feedback and distortion, feeding it all through a Phil Spektor wall of sound and twisting and binding it all together into this smooth rope flowing through their music.

And of course without it all going onto a backing track you can't do it live, you just end up with noise, feedback* and distortion (and there is NO excuse for the strobes!)

Try the video above, I hope you get what I mean.

Oh and today's MUSE Resistance tour video? They are having the day off playing cricket on the beach with Lilly Allen in New Zealand (these showbiz types!) But they are at Big Day out on the 15th.

*And I *like* feedback, Diamond Dogs is in my top 5 :-)

Friends

Yesterday, in spite of all the dire warnings it held off showing *just* long enough for me to get to Swansea, see my oldest friend, totally OD on caffeine in Starbucks *and* get back home. It was incredibly cold but something was smiling on me. Frozen I can deal with, but snowed in in Starbucks may not be as good as it sounds at ..

What to say about meeting your oldest best friend for the first time in years? We're both older, though possibly no wiser and I still have a little difficulty in reconciling this 'grown up' sitting opposite me with the guy I've known since 11.

But he IS the same guy I've always known I'm glad to say, a hug, another hug and another for luck and we were away like we had never lost touch.

I'd like to say just as if we'd seen each other yesterday and from ease and understanding it was, but there was WAY too much to catch up on. Probably much to the annoyance and certainly fascination of the other customers on surrounding tables.. EEK!

We talked for two solid hours and since then I have been thinking of all the stuff we never got around to, all that I didn't ask or tell. However he's back again in a couple of weeks and in the meantime there's Facebook, but it's really not the same..

But maybe now I can see a point to these 'social networking' sites.

I'm on twitter now too (yeah I know, but if you've given in too I'm MUSEmunkey, say hello)

I've been keeping up with the Japanese leg of the Resistance tour as it happens and have just found that for the encore at Budokan Dom (drummer) was wearing a costume of Gachapin (I thought it was a baby Godzilla, but what do I know?) that everyone has been talking about. Turns out given to him by my friend Snow and her friend on a 'meet and greet'. Now you have to admit that is pretty cool..

Though it does *slightly* detract from the solemnity of the overture of the Exogenesis symphony... :-)

another of those days

Today I've made a whole pile of new friends in Nagoya, Osaka and Tokyo. realised what happens when MUSE obsessives main forum server dies (not a lot aside from ridicule by peers and alienation - I may have made that up) and talked to my oldest friend on the phone.

And if they are wrong about the snow and blizzards expected overnight (and no one would faint with surprise over that) We'll meet tomorrow for coffee and catch up on the last decade.

All the things I should have done remain undone.

Hmmm...

Yesterday, I was going to do all sorts of stuff, mostly in the garage. But it was freezing cold. So I didn't. Which was just as well. As I spent most of the day on the net trying to find out how the MUSE gig in Osaka was going.

Supposed to start at 18:00 local time, MUSE actually came on at 19:00. (those Japanese guys really like their gigs early, and I thought we had it bad here with our 23:00 curfew!) They don't have any support band, frankly I wish they'd ditch the support here too, well Lady Gaga (allegedly) excepted..

Now as I've said this was Japan, home of the most switched on technologically advanced gizmo obsessed people on the planet. If it it doesn't have a lithium ion battery and WiFi they are not interested.

Or so we have always been told.

My friends I think we have yet again been fed a line. To what end I am not sure, except maybe to make us gobble as much technojunk as possible in order to try and 'keep up'.

Before the gig I found one picture of roadies (sorry technical/physical support crew) and a couple of tweets saying MUSE were on their way)

Then that was it. Myself and the other MUSE obsessives on the forum were, just like watching big brother in the early hours, sitting there waiting *in case* something, anything should happen. 50 minutes in, not a word. An hour, 90 mins, nothing.

There is always someone giving constant tweet updates from their iPhone/Nokia/Samsung and uploading grainy pictures as they happen. But this is *Japan* I was expecting perfect live action video streamed direct to youtube in real time at the *very* least!

Nope.

Please don't think I am criticizing the people in any way, I sure as hell wouldn't be messing about with gizmo's while MUSE were on, I want to give them my whole and full attention, but there are always people who will (judge by all the little LED screens you can constantly see in any audience) and the techno expectations were therefore dialled up to the max.

But I am criticizing whatever agencies have been responsible for feeding us this load of tosh over the years. That is the one thing about 't'interweb, sooner or later your sins do find you out :-)

My new friend Ichu has since given a very full and detailed account, but even today there are no more then 5 videos on youtube and frankly not of the best technical quality. Quite like the output of cameras we have been persuaded to throw away years ago..

I was really surprised that again it is the stripped down basic staging, again I was expecting it to be dialled *up*. And the Japanese seem to prefer MUSE's mellow quiet songs.

Looks like someone at least knows the reality, Hmmmm

Old friends

I know this is a few days old bit figure you were fed up with MUSE, but what the hell it's my blog :-)

This is at Seoul on the 6th, an ultra stripped down set, with no towers or lifts, circular stage or truckloads of awesome Showgun lights. Not even Matt's beloved custom Kawai 'grand' piano. But like at Teignmouth, and almost uniquely these days they don't need it, they can do it anyway.

This is Butterflies and Hurricanes, a lot of the fans really have their knickers in a twist as this is the first time it has aired on this tour.

Next, Jo Hall Osaka, *tonight* or if I am right about midday GMT. Time zones are a b****

Facebook, who says it doesn't work? Well I always thought it was rather pointless but, wrong! Yesterday out of the blue I had a friend request. I had to mentally add a few years, but it was my oldest and best friend, we have known each other since we were kids but as things happen lost touch a few years ago.

He's living in London right now but still has his house in Swansea. We're going to meet up next week for coffee. I can't wait.