overlap

Every once in a while something comes up that has me wondering how I missed it for so long. Thinking about it on the way home, I'm sure the video for Summertime Girls was shown on No Limits twenty-odd years ago, but that never really grabbed my attention. But I did listen a bit harder when Bruce Dicko played Forever on his Radio2 show a few weeks ago, partly because I was aware this gig was scheduled. Other than that, I've no recollection of ever knowingly listening to Y&T except that in my archives I have a tape of them live at Reading in 1982, which I must have listened to at the time and not got desperately enthused by. Last week I turned the tracks on that tape to mp3s, listened to them a few times, and having missed out on the Firefest tickets, plumped for the Y&T gig instead. This afternoon I had a good scout around youtube to see what else I could find, but still set off to the gig in the fairly novel position of not really knowing what I was expecting. Half an hour of Tigertailz' support slot was about right, and for various reasons I'm unsure where they go from here. I've always enjoyed their humour, and the fact they come from somewhere that isn't London, California or New York but somewhere all their own. I'll leave it at saying that I wish them well. When a band comes on stage and the bass player looks like an Easter Island statue in Steve Harris' haircut, with nothing above the waist but a velvet waistcoat and jewellery, you know exactly where you stand. And it's possibly not somewhere especially fashionable, but it's also somewhere that fashionable doesn't really matter. They open fire with, er, Open Fire, move on to Hungry For Rock and it's all roaring vocal and shred heaven from there on. Dave Meniketti combines lead guitar and lead vocal, which is something you really don't see very often, and it's great to watch the seamless way he switches between both without the need for hot and cold running vocal coaches anointing his vocal cords with soothing honey concoctions. I take that to be a sign of someone who's more than paid his dues, and knows exactly what he's doing. The bit where the audience get to choose a couple of songs brings us Go For The Throat and This Time, and there's something both unpredictable and reassuring about how Dave drags the band through stuff that hadn't been rehearsed and wasn't on the setlist. Of the six tracks from 1982 on that tape, Y&T played all six. And more or less everything else you could ever want. Ninety minutes in and we still hadn't had Rescue Me, I Believe In You or Forever - that's value for money, and then some. Top night out, and I've got some shopping to do! But if they're passing your way, I can heartily recommend checking it out.

Labels: gigs, Meniketti, rock, Y and T

The brief change in routine was just starting to get to me, so it's as well that today was the first day of back to normal-ish. On the other hand, the predicted money "saved" has now disappeared into various tills. I had been planning on something else entirely, but as is frequently the case, what websites claim to offer and what the racks actually have can differ. Which meant that lunchtime spending was limited to enjoying the dubious irony of someone with a mortgage and a pension plan buying an album of Crass songs, prompted entirely by this review, not that I'm in any way suggestible. Not being suggestible I then took my search for shopping out in the car for a couple of hours, and again came up against the same website <> in stock issue. And having drawn another blank headed somewhere a little closer to home to find I couldn't find what I'd hoped to find there either. However something else did catch my eye, and I found what I needed to make it work, albeit in a slightly different way to how Myleene models it! * Just nobody draw too much attention to the email I've had this evening to return for a refund my ticket for a gig which has now been cancelled. That's definitely being re-absorbed into the fuel budget. * asked nicely I might just email a link of what that looks like

Labels: gigs, shopping

Hmm, in between some other stuff, I've left it too late to buy a ticket for two different things I had in my plans. In one case I would definitely have gone, in the other it was always a question of justifying the highest sum I'd have paid for a gig in ages, and that's without the petrol bill. The difficulty of juggling things around has become significantly clearer, and it's not like there aren't a dozen tickets already in hand for various shows over the next few months anyway. On the other hand, it seals a decision for something else I was half-wondering whether I would not bother with, but now will be going to. And especially in the light of a few days' working from home where such things as normal office dress code don't exist, I'm also facing how to deal with the temptation to spend what now represents itself as a windfall, even though it is nothing of the kind, on clothes I'll never get the full wear out of, and highly impractical shoes. I dare say I'll live, but that won't stop me also hoping for another band (that I now won't be seeing) to get the reformation fever thing, that turns one gig into the odd few!

Labels: clothes, gigs, shoes

Just got home from seeing Wolverhampton's own Timothy Taylor, better known as Tyla of Dogs d'Amour (in)fame. While I've only been there the once before, I'm already aware it's a funny venue, in a too residential location that involves some complicated one way system shenanigans, but all the same there's really no reason to rush to get there early. Where I live is somewhere I'm pretty comfortable with, and I like such variety of accents as exist, but walking in the door and taking three goes to understand an accent so thick that a vat of molten tar would thin it out nicely is always a questionable start. Finding out the venue part of the place is not yet open, and it's a wait in the bar job means I was right not to rush, and I can sit trying to work out who is meant to be who in the rock stars mural opposite the bar. The distinctive Gene Simmons make up is clearly identifiable, Marilyn Manson's eyes are clearly identifiable, Axl's bandana is clearly identifiable but when the guy stood behind me comments that the "Jimi Hendrix" looks more like Viv Anderson, he's not wrong and that's not the only example. Eventually we get into the gig, and the support is Johnny Trashed, a slightly rockabilly flavoured, heavily Johnny Cash influenced band who do barnstorming versions of Folsom Prison Blues, Boy Named Sue and Jackson to finish, along with a handful of other similar stuff, including Ghost Riders In The Sky. Unlikely to change the world, but good fun, party stuff. Tyla's on stage about eleven, and it's fantastic to hear Drunk Like Me for the first time in years. It's not the first time I've seen some of a crowd talking among itself, but it is the first time I've seen someone rewrite a verse on the hoof to have a go at someone shouting in her mate's ear, which would be less obvious if they weren't stood smack in the middle of the dozen people in front of the stage. Empty World is still Satellite Kid's little brother due to the remarkable similarity, Heroine and a couple of newer ones pass the time till How Come It Never Rains and then it's all too quickly time to go, and on the stroke of midnight I'm already pulling into Tesco. A couple of fantastic old songs and all the hanging about doesn't really make for a great night, and I'm glad it was hardly a big journey to get there. For the price of admission it was ok, but rather than enthused about the gig, I'm still tickled at hearing from Tracey Beehive. Which tells its own story.

Labels: gigs, rock, Tyla

The modern world of technology makes all sorts of things easier than they otherwise might be, and the impossible possible. Which is how, to cut a long story short, last night I came across a means of getting in touch, and shot off a quick message to say how much I'd enjoyed the last time I had the privilege of seeing her band. And how this morning I woke up to find a very sweet message from Tracey Beehive waiting for me. Sure, I'm easily impressed by even the briefest brush with musicians, and I guess that's what makes me still a fan after all this time. You can see Tracey singing and playing guitar here. You can't see me, though I was there when this was filmed, but you can see that she, Missy and the rest of the band were having just as a great time as we were. One day all bands will be this good, though I'm not holding my breath. What I am doing is being glad to find that people are as personable and friendly as I might like to think the music tells me.

Labels: gigs, Voice Of The Beehive

Despite what I said the other week, I bit the bullet and joined the facebook revolution. I haven't played this much Scrabble in a long, long time and the combination of working on the lesser visited parts of my vocabulary and picking up a game-playing strategy means I'm getting a bit of a mental workout that's possibly a little overdue. While I'm not about to start playing in normal working hours, I'm happy to play in the evenings and at weekends for the fun of playing, so if you fancy a game just let me know and I'll tell you how to find me.

Maybe it's the time of year, the change in temperatures and hours of daylight and so on, but I seem to have been remarkably busy with practical things. If it's not working on my bike, it's having work done on the car. And on that note, fans of round numbers, symmetry, fresh starts or other themes that having something to do with circles being completed may understand why the car needs work despite being, er, brand new*! Fortunately we hit that point on a deserted country road and not halfway up the motorway, or I wouldn't have been stopping to take photos. * + 18 years It's been suggested that eighteen years is a long time to take to hit 100,000 miles, but there's a reason for that. I have a full set of MOT certificates which show an average of about 4,000 miles a year for the first fifteen years. And you don't need to be Carol Vorderman (or even someone good at sums) to work out how hard I've worked it for the last three of those. Unless there's an evening game or a midweek gig, it barely moves beyond a few miles to the supermarket from monday to friday, so we're pretty familiar with most motorways south of the M62!

No email inviting me* to go and see Led Zeppelin then. Never mind, I could do without spending quite that much money for one night, though if it had come up I'm sure it would have been well worth it. I've seen Plant and Page, and Plant on his own recently in memorable circumstances, so I can't say I feel all that deprived. Although if anyone out there does have a spare and needs a partner in rock, do let me know! * and 20,000,000 others