Well it seems with diskant being broke recently the usual tardiness of most bloggers has not improved and so I figured I’d try to buck the trend and actually post something. A week ago today I moved to London to start my new job at Southern Records and it was some week. Three gigs (The Apes, Nina Nastasia and Billy Mahonie) later and lots of effort trying to work out what my new job actually involves has left me a little frayed around the edges but hey it’s been fun. Of the three gigs I have to say Billy Mahonie were the best. They debuted their new line up (kev & Hywell have left) one bass guitar being replaced by a normal guitar and some new songs. I was a little worried how they’d be live after Hywell left but these fears were unfounded ‘cos they were excellent and the new songs bode well for the future of the band. Apart from that I’ve not much to add aside to say I’m missing the diskant list’s inane chatter and my computer/stereo/records. If you are one of the nice people that check out the diskant gig guide then I apologise for the lack of updates between now and the new year but Marceline will be doing her best to keep things as up to date as possible!!! So for now then all I have to say is if I’m not back before Christmas then a hope a good time is had by all and keep your eyes peeled in the new year for a new Errol website and errol-y release including the stunning Reynolds album. Egg nog all round then…

Last week saw a vertual plethora of gigs in Bristol and one in Oxford. The Nought/Noxagt/Giddy Motors show mentioned below on Tuesday; Cat on Form in Bristol on Wednesday; Jackie O’Motherfucker (or something like that) on Thursday and then on Friday Fugazi and also Oceansize. Yet even though I’m the diskant events handler I only managed to get to the Friday gigs. How crap is that? Anyhow first time I’d seen fugazi and they were great. Everything I expected plus they played most of the songs I wanted to hear and the bonus was they finished by about 9.30 (excluding encore) and so I had time to nip over to see Oceansize. Who were a little disappointing really. Lots of new songs but they don’t seem to have too many ideas. Lots of big hairy riffs and loudness though which matched my mood for the evening. So 5 gigs over 4 nights and I only manage to make 2 of them. Crap, huh. I really wish I’d have got to the Nought show as it sounded ace. I did however get to the cinema to see ‘The Road to Perdition’ and I really liked it. Beatifully shot and well acted, but the plot had some holes and I’m not sure Tom Hanks was the person to cast in the lead role. The kid was wicked though. ‘Donnie Darko’ next week which from every review I’ve seen should be fab and so that’s something to look forward to. Plus I have a job interview next week so fingers crossed everyone….Thanks….

Well it’s been a while again but I do have excuses. Besides considering I’m sitting in an internet cafe in Crete writing this I feel that any previous non-blogging action should be forgiven. Last night I spent the early hours half cut sitting on my balcony and enjoying the Hot Snakes; Explosions in the Sky; Tarentel; Codeine and Jet Johnson. It was shall we say as close to heaven as it was possible to get. Anyhow with a veritable glut of tours coming up like Explosions in the Sky for example and also Fugazi things are looking pretty rosy. Plus Audioscope in Oxford sometime in early September looks good and with many diskant staff turning out iyt should be a laugh. Anyhow got to go buy some nail clippers before another day on the beach. Ahhhhhhh…

Christ knows what I’m gunna do now but I am finding that I have an inordinate amount of time to potter about achieving very little. Anyhow good stuff I’ve been listening to recently includes albums from The Van Pelt; Eastern Youth; Biblical Proof of UFOs; The Art of Fighting; Appleseed Cast and Mineral. I still have piles of stuff to get through but it’s not a bad life, I suppose. Aside from that I’m off to see the new Star Wars film tonight with a bunch of geeks. Woo!!

Friday

– arrived in plenty of time to see Shellac. They were ok, but kept slowing down songs which was a bit frustrating. Was pretty drunk by the time Oxes started but again they disappointed a little. Entertaining but a bit crap musically. Was completely twatted by the time Dianogah started and got distrated by talking to big shouldered man from Jullander and Luke Younger. Still managed to see most of them though and they were great, very humble too, singer guy said he couldn’t believe so many people turned up to a festival with the bands on the bill. Then upstairs for more beer and Blonde Redhead which didn’t inspire me but I have to admit my attention span was beginning to be affected by the alcohol. So downstairs quick smart for Shipping News who were the best thing I saw all weekend. They were incredible and sounded very little like anything on their two LPs. Like I said they were just damn lovely. In all honesty we couldn’t be arsed about going up stairs for the Breeders in our condition so we just headed for the pub before catching some of Low. Got bored during them and so went back to pub. Now I think I remember seeing Dave, Ady, Paul Ackroyd and some others and even buying them all a drink before deciding I should really go and talk to Marcy and co. So off I went chalet number in hand. Now the chalet ended up being just opposite ours but you’d not have gussed that considering I wandered about for ages trying to find it and ended up in a field at one point. Anyhow found them in the end and drunkenly greated ’em all. Now it wasn’t me who broke that stereo by the way. I think anyway:)

Saturday

– Feeling a little (read as utterly) atrocious the following morning I felt shellac came too early for me. So I lurked in the chalet for a few extra hours eating pasta. I did see High Dependency Unit and was impressed. So ended up buying most of their stuff. Missed everyone else that afternoon as thought it would be a good idea to drink again. It wasn’t. Did see smog though, well two songs until we decided he wasn’t going to play with his band and also that it was crap, so we left. But still somehow missed the rachels. Did meet mister summerlin in the mechandise stall though which was some consolation. Do Make Say think I thought were excellant and I also got bored with Godspeed. Had to leave early though because I had the chalet key and two of my mates were dead drunk and I had to go let them in. One of ’em was at one point trying to kick the chalet door in and cut his foot pretty badly. So was sitting in chalet at 3am on Sunday morning cleaning his foot up and improvising a bandage until the morning. Fun. Did get a Sunnyvale demo though and the contract isn’t binding. I asked our label legal council Gunther the Badger, you forgot to make me sign it.

Sunday

– Again I didn’t see many bands but this time it was mostly because I was on a stall selling me records to lots and lots of lovely lovely people. We had to put up with some friendly heckling from mister summerlin about being up at 11am to sell records but it went great. I actually sold everything I took. Met some other lovely people too. It was the whole community/firendly feeling about the afternoon, swopping stuff with the other labels and talking to people like Efrim Godspeed and stuff. Anyhow this was when I turned down the pie. Now I was offered what looked like a slice of very lovely if a little burnt cherry pie. Very kind and everything but hating cherries whether in a pie or out meant that there was no blinking way I was gunna eat that pie. Steak and Kindey? Different story. I did turn it down very nicely though I thought. Anyhow sorry for not eating the pie. I would not have enjoyed it, it would have been wasted and wasting pie should not happen, like, ever. Did see Mission of Burma who I liked lots and also Cheap Trick who I just damn loved. They were so funny and also oddly proud that their bassist had invented the 12 string bass. Plus the plectrum tricks were worth it alone. They were taped all over the mic stands and at one point the guitarist played a chord, threw the plectrum in the air and caught it in his mouth, while taking a new plectrum and playing a bit more before throwing that one into the crowd, spitting the one in his mouth in the air, catching it and playing with that one for a few chords. It was shall we say damn great to watch. plus the whole stadium rock stuff has always made me smile. The Upper Crust were sooooooooo bad it wasn’t funny. As were Silkworm earlier on but they barely even deserve a mention. Anyway the last band were the fall and they sucked by any serious consideration. But I just thought it was entertaining tht it seemed like he’d just asked the three band members the other day if they’d play the gig and then basically ignored them when on the stage. Entertaining overall I suppose. Was only an hour however so didn’t last too long anyway.

Good things I’ve not mentioned:

– the absolutely amazing general atmosphere. So friendly and open.

– meeting tons of random people and getting demos like that one off Marcy I nicked.

– the sunday record stall. I loved those 6 hours. Yes loved. Best thing all weekend.

– amazing situation of diskant and errol chalets with all the waving fun that ensued. Didn’t speak much though:(

Bad things I’ve not mentioned:

– sun burning neck on sunday afternoon

– not meeting people like Greg Kitten, Rob Strong, Kirstie, Neph etc etc

– Lack of oven gloves. Cooking stuff in grill very dangerous without them and I have the burnt fingers to prove it.

– only seeing Shellac play once and on the worst day, the friday.

Basically however I’m not sure how you could fail to have a great time. So many lovely people. So much to do. I loved it, every minute apart from first thing saturday morning when I realised that so much Kronenburg is not meant to be consumed. I did not feel too chipper shall we say. Anyhow GREAT weekend.

I saw The Redneck Manifesto last night for the second time in a fortnight and they were fucking ace again. They had been on tour round Europe for two weeks and well to be honest they were a bit smelly. But the tour was pretty eventful. They wrote off a car and had to buy a lovely sporty 10 year old VW estate in a dubious shade of brown to finish the tour in. The was in between playing to 4 people in hamburg (3 of whom were tramps) and 200 people at a festival in belgium. Still must have made for an intesting time. The gig last night though had 4 bands playing in a dark, gloomy rehearsal room in a part of Manchester you’d not end up in out of choice. Dunno who the fist band was so we’ll skip past them but the second band were ace. Called Green Acre and from Grimsby or somewhere they managed to be more math rock and disjointed than Geiger Counter while throwing in some shouty vocals. They were great. Then it was Bilge Pump of Gringo fame who did their slightly odd mumbled word thing while fighting against a variety of technical hitches. Richie Redneck actually managed to sleep through part of the set which considering the noise emanating from the stage was some considerable achievement. Then came the Rednecks. No soundcheck they just ambled onstage and launched into it. As I said even dead tired they still managed to pull off a great show.

Things I like at the moment:
Shouty shellac type rock stuff. Especially a 7″ by Candian band Blake.
Bowyers pork and beef sausages – they’re like the holy grail, can’t find em anywhere no more, which is a shame ‘cos I got a hankering
Natalie Imbruglia (she’s sooooooooooo lovely)

Things I don’t like at the moment:
Arrogant people.
my bank balance
choc chip cookies

Ollie why were Cursive cack? I love their recorded stuff…

The stupid thing is they did the same thing a few years back. Highlighting Jade Tree and Jets to Brazil et al. It’s just more of that lazy fucking journalism that seems rife these days. They even interview The Mars Volta who the NME say are making a concerted effort to distance themselves from the EMO label and in the same section they go on to say that the band have taken emo on an interstellar journey. The band are obviously not EMO yet they must be because the NME says so. Made me laugh too that they are pushing Pedro the Lion as one of the next wave. They’ve been around for fucking years, for christ sake. EMO to me was always bands like Mineral, Christie Front Drive, Jawbreaker, Texas is the Reason, maybe Braid and The Van Pelt, most of these bands have now split and members have gone off to form other bands. Yet there’s no credit given to the fact that these bands and the bands that came before them have been releasing albums for years and touring their asses off, rather suddenly NME should be getting some credit for ‘discovering’ them. Same goes for the labels like DeSoto, Jade Tree, Crank!, Caulfield who were putting out 7″s from Jimmy Eat World and Mineral for example years ago. On a slightly diferent tack I was a bit disappointed with Careless Talk Costs Lives too. Great idea but pritty annoying the way it was written. Anyway it’s an improvement on the NME so can’t complain too much…

Sorry this struck a nerve…

Now once again it’s been a while. But the main reason for this is that I haven’t doing anything sufficiently exciting to blog. However last Saturday I went to see Check Engine. Purported to be a poppier Sweep the Leg Jonny I was a little dubious as I wasn’t sure what that would be like. Anyhow went along and was amazed. Firstly by a solo chellist who was the only support act going by the name Mrs Pilgrimm. She managed to create this whole sound with various effect pedals and loops with a kinda odd vocal. Not quite haunting but definitely unusual. After that Check Engine wander on the stage and start up with a disjointed shouty number with a noodley sax playing over the top of two guitars, a bass and some great drumming. While one of the guitar amp’s packed up, this continued all the way through the set. Ending up sounding a bit like a poppier Sweep the Leg Jonny. Anyhow go see them if you get the chance, come on you know you want to, besides you should trust me I am the event handler after;)

this not gunna be a long blog but I just wanted to convey to you what happened to me on Monday when I was just trying to do something nice. I went to give blood. I’ve done this regularly since I was 18, about 10 times and never had a problem. This time however I did. As I lay down waiting for the nures to stick me I took a few deep breaths ‘cos it hurts to begin with. However I wasn’t prepared for the bloody butcher they had working that day. After being jabbed, she muttered ‘mmm…missed the vein’ and proceeded to wiggle the fucking needle about under the skin trying to find the vein. After 20 seconds of this she admitted defeat pulled out the needle then without warning stuck me again. The dozy bitch still couldn’t ‘find the vein’ but by now I had a fast spreading bruise where she’d been poking the needle. Deciding I’d not been mutilated sufficiently she thought it best to release the pressure of the bruise by using the needle to pierce the skin once again. I resisted the urge to strangle the bitch shouting I’m not a fucking pin cushion but another nurse wandered over and said ‘ah… sorry about that why don’t you get yourself a cup of tea and come back in a few weeks’. The temerity of the woman! Suffice to say I’m not going back their anytime soon although I’ll still give blood ‘cos it’s a good thing to do. Anyhow I’m off to hand in my essay and I’ll be back blogging again soon, once I’ve recovered from my ordeal. Toodle pip…

Rock. If you don’t know me I’m the events hadler. Or gig boy. Anyhow might as well let you all know that I’ve been doing some serious events research recently. Last Thusday (27th Oct) was Coventry with the glorius Souvaris. I thought they were great they thought they were crap. Typical huh? If you not familiar with them they have six members and play long instrumental sound scapes that meander a bit, lurch a bit and just generally make you feel all warm and fuzzy. Sunday (30th Oct) was Portsmouth and an all dayer with Hirameka Hi-Fi, Caretaker, Escanna and disoma among others. Caretaker were very late and while I was drunk I just wasn’t impressed. Hirameka were ace however, played some new stuff too all of which sounded wonderful. Escanna were the best I’d ever seen them play and disoma just plain rocked. Anyhow Bristol yesterday for Les Savy Fav, Enon, Kiska and Mountain Men Anonymous. MMA did their heavy instrumental thing well; Kiska did a groovier instrumental thing; Enon were just plain ace and Les Savy Fav were Les Savy Fav. If you’ve not seen them yet you must. Arty-Punk stuff. They even played Paradise City by Guns ‘n’ Roses during a fuck up with the guitarists gear, glorious. Next is Oxford on Monday for Billy Mahonie and Jullander. It’s tough working for Marceline but the job does have it’s good parts. Be back soon and sorry for the shit descriptions and reviews but that ain’t my job. Bye Bye…