Eh ? What ? Pardon ?
Apr. 25th, 2003 07:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ventaHmm. All co-ordination appeared to have deserted me about 5pm yesterday. So I walked into the door of my office, scraped the side of my car reversing up the drive (not badly, and fortunately in the same place some bugger keyed it), bounced mugs off cupboards while trying to make tea, bounced my phone off the concrete outside, walked into the side of my car sufficiently violently that by mid-evening I was seriously wondering if I'd fractured my wrist (I'm figuring I haven't; I can type :)...
Better luck today.
Tuesday Wednesday night, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
wimble and I visited a small shoal of pubs.
We set off to go to The Perch for a meal. We found it - which was surprising, since neither of us actually knew where it was - but they'd had a bit of a rush on (nice day, and all that) and run out of food. However, a ludicrously well-spoken barmaid apologised profusely, and told us that just 15 minutes walk up the river was The Trout. Her behaviour alone pre-disposes me to like The Perch - she seemed genuinely sorry, and genuinely eager to help out.
The walk up the river bank was nearly very nice. It was a pleasant evening, a pretty river, a wide selection of animals (duck, geese, cows, rabbits - nowt desperately exciting, but good to see them there...) . There was a lock or two, and the ruins Godstow nunnery to look at. However, it unfortunately also had the highest concentration of midges I've ever seen. I hate midges. They love me :(
The Trout was also heaving, but was willing to serve us food, and pretty good food at that. Last time I was there, the meals were rather inferior - either they've picked up, or it's just that last time I was there I was with Felix and thus everything went to pot, as it usually does near him.
We had to do the river walk in the other direction to get back to the car, which was entertaining in the dark. Having grown up in a town, I could never understand, when reading historical/fantasy novels, why people made such a fuss about walking about in the dark. It takes actually doing something like that to remind you how damn difficult it is - rabbit holes, small rises in the ground, rivers, etc become major dangers.
And, of course, the ludicroulsy well-spoken bar maid of earlier hadn't warned us that they locked The Perch's gate at closing time. So we had to walk the long way round into Binsey, get slightly lost, make an educated guess, get it wrong, retrace our steps, dither, then realise we were next to the carpark anyway. Dangerous stuff, darkness.
I can't hear a thing. However, this is really my own fault:
Last night,metame and I pottered down to the Zodiac to hear the Buzzcocks. (Non-Oxford people: the Zodiac is a small and rather seedy club in Oxford, with a sound system arguably made out of old tin cans. However, it is also pretty much the only place (barring the out-of-town Brookes' University union) which puts on bands.)
Having had a swift pint (Pintwatch: reasonable Brakspears, uncertain of price as I was buying a round) in the Hobgoblin with the Very Broken Housemate[*],metame and I went and got our hands stamped by the friendly bouncer outside the Zodiac. He must have been friendly - he took it remarkably well when I unthinkingly told him his stamp was rubbish; turns out it's actually very funky indeed, being UV-reactive ink. We left the VBH to totter home and cosset himself with Ibuprofen.
On the way upstairs, I worried slightly. When you still haven't gone through the double doors into the main room, and you're already thinking it's a bit loud, it's probably a good sign you're past it.
We arrived just in time to hear the first support band, The Moonies. And... well. I think this is the first time in years I've been really, really impressed by a support act. They're a guitar-led band whose name begins with 'The', but with edges of Ash and Green Day[**]. Add sharp-pointed collars, round-necked jumpers and scissors kicks, and you more or less know what they sound like :) Just guitar, bass and drums, they have a very tight sound and the bass player does a good line in vocal harmony as well. Proper guitar-wank solos, and also capable of producing a 200bpm 90s blast. Towards the end of their set, I went to so far as to put my pint on the floor (Pintwatch: inferior electric John Smiths, £2.60) so I could clap the better.
I bought their single. I'll let you know if it's anything like.
Bonus marks to them, as well, for putting the drums in the middle of the stage - for once I actually have a clue what drummer looks like, and he didn't appear to be some kind of poor relation.
The second band on were Miss Machine. The points based scale says:
Gain points for having a female bassist: unusual. Further points because she played bass left-handed: also unusual.
Lose them all again because she had to look at the fingerboard while playing [***].
Gain points for having a guitarist wearing a Ghostbusters t-shirt.
Lose some of them because he took it off three songs in, and it wasn't a particularly pretty sight.
Lose more for exccess posturing with guitar.
Gain points for having a singer who had all the proper punk accountremente - bi-coloured black/blonde hair, ripped dress, good voice, ability to hurl herself about in a slightly-drunk-but-would-rather-be-committing -suicide way.
However... they were what I expected of a support band. They were physically present, they didn't suck. I will be able to live without seeing them again. Kind of competent, in a 50% early-nineties-Seattle, 50% high school wannabes kind of way.
And the Buzzcocks. Last time they played in Oxford, I stayed away, out of vague principles about not encouraging reformed has-been punk bands. Friends went, and told me I'd missed a treat. Similarly, I stayed away from a Stiff Little Fingers gig, and was told that had very much been the wrong decision.
They kicked off with Boredom - given that I heard an interview with Shelley in the early 90s where he was grumbling that people "only wanted to hear old stuff like Boredom", I wondered if this was either a wry dig, or an attempt to get it over with quickly. They followed on with Fast Cars and I Don't Mind - then I remembered that I've spoilt a few gigs by trying to remember setlists, and stopped :)
Are they reformed has-beens ? No, I don't think so. Not quite. The drummer is, well, a drummer at the back of the stage, more or less ignored by the band. The bassist manages to be punked up to the eyeballs, whilst having the stage presence of a haddock past it's sell-by. Shelley does look a little jaded - a middle aged ex-punk trotting out old songs for the old fans. However, it's all saved by Diggle, who just looks so damn happy to be there, is full of energy and is patently having a whale of a time.
Musically, it's actually a little hard to tell - the Zodiac's system isn't the greatest, and the volume was cranked way over what I think it can comfortably handle. They were half way into Noise Annoys before I even identified the song, and a lot of stuff just sounded like a muddy mess of guitar nosie.
However, even amid all that, they still rocked, and I'm still glad I went. I can't claim 100% familiarity with the Buzzcocks back-catalogue, so I'm unsure if the songs I didn't manage to recognise were new or old. However, it does appear that they have a new album[****] out this year, so I should listen to that before I make my mind up totally... certainly, I'd regard the fact that they've released one as a good sign.
Last year I managed to achieve one of my personal musical ambitions, which was hearing The Bible's Honey be Good played live.. So, tonight, I grabbed my chance, decided my neck would have to live with it, and joined the mosh pit for Orgasm Addict. I have a stuffed knee, and a long scrape down one shoulder, and wrneched muscle in the middle of my back to show for it, but I shall carve the notch on my CD rack. On the plus side, my neck coped much better than it did at the last gig I went to. Must be getting better at long last - hurray :)
And on the way home, the open-ludicrous-hours butchers[*****] was open (at 11.05pm). So I bought me and the VBH giant sausage rolls. Lovely.
And I managed to buy a series of small badges with the words "WHAT", "DO", "I" and "GET" one on each of them[*******].
[*] That'll be Andy, then. It seems he's jealous of the "I've got whiplash" club formed by Samantha and I, and arranged for someone to run into his back-end this evening. And he had a bad neck anyway...
[**] Yeah, I know it's a bit antisocial always to compare bands to other bands. But when I read a review of a band described as speed-freak-acid-garage it means nothing to me - tell me who they sound like, and I know where I am.
[***] Fingerboard? Fretboard? What the hell do you call it on a guitar anyway ?
[****] Called Buzzcocks. Which is bizarre, really... most people release eponymous albums very early in their careers.
[*****] They asked me not to tell anyone they were open. So I won't say which butchers. But I figure most East Oxford people will know :)
[******] No real footnote here, I'm just kind of enjoying the long lines of asterisks.
Better luck today.
wimble and I visited a small shoal of pubs.We set off to go to The Perch for a meal. We found it - which was surprising, since neither of us actually knew where it was - but they'd had a bit of a rush on (nice day, and all that) and run out of food. However, a ludicrously well-spoken barmaid apologised profusely, and told us that just 15 minutes walk up the river was The Trout. Her behaviour alone pre-disposes me to like The Perch - she seemed genuinely sorry, and genuinely eager to help out.
The walk up the river bank was nearly very nice. It was a pleasant evening, a pretty river, a wide selection of animals (duck, geese, cows, rabbits - nowt desperately exciting, but good to see them there...) . There was a lock or two, and the ruins Godstow nunnery to look at. However, it unfortunately also had the highest concentration of midges I've ever seen. I hate midges. They love me :(
The Trout was also heaving, but was willing to serve us food, and pretty good food at that. Last time I was there, the meals were rather inferior - either they've picked up, or it's just that last time I was there I was with Felix and thus everything went to pot, as it usually does near him.
We had to do the river walk in the other direction to get back to the car, which was entertaining in the dark. Having grown up in a town, I could never understand, when reading historical/fantasy novels, why people made such a fuss about walking about in the dark. It takes actually doing something like that to remind you how damn difficult it is - rabbit holes, small rises in the ground, rivers, etc become major dangers.
And, of course, the ludicroulsy well-spoken bar maid of earlier hadn't warned us that they locked The Perch's gate at closing time. So we had to walk the long way round into Binsey, get slightly lost, make an educated guess, get it wrong, retrace our steps, dither, then realise we were next to the carpark anyway. Dangerous stuff, darkness.
I can't hear a thing. However, this is really my own fault:
Last night,
metame and I pottered down to the Zodiac to hear the Buzzcocks. (Non-Oxford people: the Zodiac is a small and rather seedy club in Oxford, with a sound system arguably made out of old tin cans. However, it is also pretty much the only place (barring the out-of-town Brookes' University union) which puts on bands.)Having had a swift pint (Pintwatch: reasonable Brakspears, uncertain of price as I was buying a round) in the Hobgoblin with the Very Broken Housemate[*],
metame and I went and got our hands stamped by the friendly bouncer outside the Zodiac. He must have been friendly - he took it remarkably well when I unthinkingly told him his stamp was rubbish; turns out it's actually very funky indeed, being UV-reactive ink. We left the VBH to totter home and cosset himself with Ibuprofen.On the way upstairs, I worried slightly. When you still haven't gone through the double doors into the main room, and you're already thinking it's a bit loud, it's probably a good sign you're past it.
We arrived just in time to hear the first support band, The Moonies. And... well. I think this is the first time in years I've been really, really impressed by a support act. They're a guitar-led band whose name begins with 'The', but with edges of Ash and Green Day[**]. Add sharp-pointed collars, round-necked jumpers and scissors kicks, and you more or less know what they sound like :) Just guitar, bass and drums, they have a very tight sound and the bass player does a good line in vocal harmony as well. Proper guitar-wank solos, and also capable of producing a 200bpm 90s blast. Towards the end of their set, I went to so far as to put my pint on the floor (Pintwatch: inferior electric John Smiths, £2.60) so I could clap the better.
I bought their single. I'll let you know if it's anything like.
Bonus marks to them, as well, for putting the drums in the middle of the stage - for once I actually have a clue what drummer looks like, and he didn't appear to be some kind of poor relation.
The second band on were Miss Machine. The points based scale says:
Gain points for having a female bassist: unusual. Further points because she played bass left-handed: also unusual.
Lose them all again because she had to look at the fingerboard while playing [***].
Gain points for having a guitarist wearing a Ghostbusters t-shirt.
Lose some of them because he took it off three songs in, and it wasn't a particularly pretty sight.
Lose more for exccess posturing with guitar.
Gain points for having a singer who had all the proper punk accountremente - bi-coloured black/blonde hair, ripped dress, good voice, ability to hurl herself about in a slightly-drunk-but-would-rather-be-committing -suicide way.
However... they were what I expected of a support band. They were physically present, they didn't suck. I will be able to live without seeing them again. Kind of competent, in a 50% early-nineties-Seattle, 50% high school wannabes kind of way.
And the Buzzcocks. Last time they played in Oxford, I stayed away, out of vague principles about not encouraging reformed has-been punk bands. Friends went, and told me I'd missed a treat. Similarly, I stayed away from a Stiff Little Fingers gig, and was told that had very much been the wrong decision.
They kicked off with Boredom - given that I heard an interview with Shelley in the early 90s where he was grumbling that people "only wanted to hear old stuff like Boredom", I wondered if this was either a wry dig, or an attempt to get it over with quickly. They followed on with Fast Cars and I Don't Mind - then I remembered that I've spoilt a few gigs by trying to remember setlists, and stopped :)
Are they reformed has-beens ? No, I don't think so. Not quite. The drummer is, well, a drummer at the back of the stage, more or less ignored by the band. The bassist manages to be punked up to the eyeballs, whilst having the stage presence of a haddock past it's sell-by. Shelley does look a little jaded - a middle aged ex-punk trotting out old songs for the old fans. However, it's all saved by Diggle, who just looks so damn happy to be there, is full of energy and is patently having a whale of a time.
Musically, it's actually a little hard to tell - the Zodiac's system isn't the greatest, and the volume was cranked way over what I think it can comfortably handle. They were half way into Noise Annoys before I even identified the song, and a lot of stuff just sounded like a muddy mess of guitar nosie.
However, even amid all that, they still rocked, and I'm still glad I went. I can't claim 100% familiarity with the Buzzcocks back-catalogue, so I'm unsure if the songs I didn't manage to recognise were new or old. However, it does appear that they have a new album[****] out this year, so I should listen to that before I make my mind up totally... certainly, I'd regard the fact that they've released one as a good sign.
Last year I managed to achieve one of my personal musical ambitions, which was hearing The Bible's Honey be Good played live.. So, tonight, I grabbed my chance, decided my neck would have to live with it, and joined the mosh pit for Orgasm Addict. I have a stuffed knee, and a long scrape down one shoulder, and wrneched muscle in the middle of my back to show for it, but I shall carve the notch on my CD rack. On the plus side, my neck coped much better than it did at the last gig I went to. Must be getting better at long last - hurray :)
And on the way home, the open-ludicrous-hours butchers[*****] was open (at 11.05pm). So I bought me and the VBH giant sausage rolls. Lovely.
And I managed to buy a series of small badges with the words "WHAT", "DO", "I" and "GET" one on each of them[*******].
[*] That'll be Andy, then. It seems he's jealous of the "I've got whiplash" club formed by Samantha and I, and arranged for someone to run into his back-end this evening. And he had a bad neck anyway...
[**] Yeah, I know it's a bit antisocial always to compare bands to other bands. But when I read a review of a band described as speed-freak-acid-garage it means nothing to me - tell me who they sound like, and I know where I am.
[***] Fingerboard? Fretboard? What the hell do you call it on a guitar anyway ?
[****] Called Buzzcocks. Which is bizarre, really... most people release eponymous albums very early in their careers.
[*****] They asked me not to tell anyone they were open. So I won't say which butchers. But I figure most East Oxford people will know :)
[******] No real footnote here, I'm just kind of enjoying the long lines of asterisks.
no subject
Date: 2003-04-25 04:13 am (UTC)Much sympathy about the *long* walk back to Binsey - I've also been caught by that one once, and its not fun.
Wandering around Port Meadow in the dark is fun though, there was a time when I and some of my less reputable mates thought about setting up a new age coven - to convene on Port Meadow on moonlit nights - I seem to recall that Sainsbury's organic chicken nuggets were supposed to figure prominently as the sacrificial component... but maybe you just had to be there.