18-05-09 – Rocking the Kasbah… again / Attack of the FingermeltOR

Hi-Ho there folks! This week entailed…

- Recovering from my illness! (Mostly!)
- A fun-tastic Coventry YAWA show (6/10)
- Sleeping over at Martin and Tricia’s again in Cov
- An interesting Amersham YAWA show (5/10)
- Recording Jamie’s mate Zlat’s ridiculously metal final year project piece of music
- My sister coming home
- Having a lovely time with Kieran the day after
- Making a new Boyinaband video tutorial
- Recieving the final YAWA EP and sending off for the large run of them!
- lolcat time.

Phlegm, yay!

Yeah, I just wanted an excuse to spell Phlegm – it’s one of those words that is more fun in terms of language than in terms of what it actually means. But yes, it’s slowly packing its bags and leaving. My immune system is finally taking the hint and doing a bit of work. So all I’m left with is a nasty cough that comes up whenever I try to speak too loudly (Though fortunately enough not on stage) and my Catarrh which seems to show up after every cold I get. Like Zak shows up 3 hours after you expect him, then needs a lift home half an hour later. I realise that’s not a very good metaphor, but I’m pretty irritated with Zak atm.

Coventry Show

Alrighty! So I drove down to Coventry on my own, since Eamon was off galavanting up to Dundee to see his lady friend Siobhan (AWWWWWWW), and Zak had decided to get a lift up with Liv. Arriving in the pouring rain, Kieran greeted me and we embraced in the downpour. It was romantic.

After catching up, Jamie arrived and jumped on us. We all embraced in the hall of the kasbah (it was also romantic) and loaded in for the soundcheck. I like the sound guy there – and he likes us. He really enjoyed the show we put on last time so he’s just really friendly when setting up. The Kasbah is starting to feel like a venue that’ll pop up quite often.

After Zak arrived, we did our soundcheck, then Kieran drove us to his friends’ Tricia and Martin’s place to pick them up, then we headed of to Birmingham where he was going to pick up his guitar wireless system that he left there the week before. A crazy car journey through the winding streets of brum later, we stopped there, found the wireless and headed back.

When we got back the second band was on stage. They were very happy. “Everything’s okay” music. Think the scene in an 80s movie where the protagonist has an epiphany that allows them to accomplish what was holding them back from their dreams. The music for that.

Then we were on. Glow sticks were thrown out, raving and hip hopping commenced. I managed to get the crowd of uni students moving a bit (I supposed they weren’t really feeling it since they were 90% indie kids). I tried, at Jamie’s suggestion, not running up to people and screaming in their faces quite so much – apparently his friends had not appreciated it that much at the previous gig.

When we finished, a load of people were telling me how much they enjoyed it. I really smiled when one dude asked for a picture, I said my usual “Only if you do a gangstuh pose.” and he replied “Oh, like a Crunk pose?” They are learning

Martin also asked me why I didn’t run up to people quite so much – I told him to fight it out with Jamie.

To the House Devonish!

After the show, we headed over to Martin and Tricia’s to crash for the night. They had actually bought us pillows and shizz especially, which was way nice of them. After spending a half an hour pumping up an air matress for Kieran and I to sleep on (top and tail…) We stayed up late watching this film about a chick with a gun for a leg. It was great. And also disgusting.

Zak had gone home to Telford instead, in order to go to work for the following morning, and now told us that he had not got the money to come back up to coventry on the train so we could take him to the gig in Amersham. When we questioned him about why this was, he eventually revealed that he’d bought a new iPhone with a pricey monthly contract. When we pressed him further he actually said the words “My phone is more important than the band”. Which is actually ridiculous.

So it was that I had to drive to Telford to pick him up and take him down to Amersham – essentially, I had paid the petrol so he could go to work. I am not happy with this and he doesn’t understand why he’s in the wrong. Frustration much? If I hadn’t he said “We’d just have to cancel the gig”. Kieran and Jamie both organised WELL in advance to make sure they were free for the gig. Kieran even took the day off work and he’s running low on money – there’s dedication.

Off to Amersham.

So anyway, I drove Zak to Amersham. The gig there was strange. After soundchecking we grabbed some food at the local Tescos, then got back in time to see the finale of the first band’s set. No joke – it was some kid hitting a bunch of cymbols in the middle of the stage for about a minute. The curtains closed and no-one applauded. It was very surreal.

Incidentally, while wandering around the venue I kept seeing the headline band’s frontman and having that thing where you can’t quite place someone. But yeah, we headed backstage for the second band, who sounded like a college band of some sort. We took the time to survey our surroundings – the venue was some sort of hall where kids were educated – an “A-Z” poster adorned the wall, claiming “X” was for “Taxi”, which challenged the foundations of our education to the core. I suppose they hadn’t heard of Xylophones in Amersham.

Anyway, we went on and spazzed out suitably. I did a massive jump off the PA (I haven’t done any huge jumps in a while so that was fun. I also jumped clean over the heads of the girls in the front row, which was pretty funny since they looked horrified as I ran up xD

It was hard work getting them to move, but again, I did it. Techno dancing was performed, crunk bouncing, and Kieran got one chick to proclaim “I’m IN dis club” which made it all worthwhile.

After our show we chatted to people again (Kieran and I tend to be the ones that enjoy that the most) This one bunch of people really liked it and this random girl actually complimented me on my rapping skillz! Which made me happy.

The headline band came on and I remembered where I’d seen them. About 2 years ago on myspace I’d found them – A band called “Shellshock” – a Drum & Bass / Grime / Nu Metal act that I thought was pretty cool. They were very heavy, though the performance was let down by the lack of an audible guitar. The drum and bass bits were sweet though, as were some of the more brutal breakdowns, which warranted approving nods between me and Jamie.

Chatting to the frontman afterwards was fun – I mentioned we’d messaged his band years ago asking to support, like starting out bands do, and it was a massive co-incidence that we were playing the same gig without realising. He was a really nice guy, seemed genuinely happy to be talking about his band – I could tell why he was (I think) the only original member of the band still there – he had the drive for it. He also said they were sorting a tour out later this year and hadn’t yet got support acts and to get in touch on myspace later. I think Zak has done this but I’m not certain – I’ll have to check after this blog!

After the 2 and a half hour journey home with Zak, I arrived home at 2:30am and started playing Civilization IV to keep me awake while I waited for Kieran to get back. It was about 4am when he arrived, as he had to drop Jamie off and charge his sat-nav while he was there. I let him in, and we watched some family guy, then collapsed.

Sleep is awesome.

Zlat and the FINGERMELTOR.

The next day was metal. Jamie was driven up to mine by his friend Zlat – I’d agreed earlier in the week to record Zlat’s piece of music for his university assignment. I hadn’t actually recorded a piece of music by someone that wasn’t me that had anything spectacularly complex in it, so I figured it would be a learning experience.

Zlat’s piece of music was 6 and a half minutes of crazy guitar. He is pretty much a Bosnian clone of Jamie. They were both metalling it up. I transposed the drums and piano (there was some piano too – interspersed between the chugs and pings.) onto soft synths, then we started recording the guitar. It took about 3 hours. Which actually was quite impressive – he was able to read the sheet music from his laptop and pretty much play it note perfect for most riffs.

For other riffs, my expertise with making do with my less-than-incredible guitar skills came in handy. Play the riff at half speed and speed it up – sounds so much crisper than you could ever get it with genuine talent

If he ever uploads it I’ll put a link to it in a future blog – it’s ridiculously metal.

Oh yeah, and since he hadn’t come up with a name for it we decided to call it FingermeltOR. In my mind it’s some sort of guitar-playing supervillain.

The dream duo re-united.

When Zlat and Jamie left, face-meltingly metal mp3 in hand (or rather in usb stick), Kieran and I were left to our own devices. I can’t actually remember what happened to lead up to it, but we found ourselves watching the film “Pop Star” at the recommendation of my sister. It is actually the most unintentionally hilarious film I have ever seen – I would completely recommend watching it to anyone with a sense of humour that finds bad things hilarious.

Quotes such as “I can’t go to school, I’m a celebrity!” from lead man Aaron Carter (Oh yes.) just make it special. His acting is… incredible.

The following day, though, Kieran and I ended up shopping in Primark again (didn’t take long, did it?) with him buying a 13yr old kids’ hoodie for £2. Nothing but the best for the YAWA boys. It was a fun day out and we ate loads and put on no weight. Which is always fun.

Kieran’s departure market the end of the 4 solid days of intense stuff-doing-ness. Phew! Now I have time to reflect and think about the next stuff-doing I will be…uh… doing.

Hard Trance.

It’s not like A-level synth production (lololol), it’s a cool genre of music – Trance music that’s more intense than normal trance. Perfect for me. So I both made a boyinaband tutorial for how to make a hard trance arpeggiated bassline and found a gorgeous hard trance song on youtube. Check them out:

I really want to write something that powerful with guitars for YAWA. That’s my next plan. Though I do have a tonne of songs to finish off… I’ll save those for when I have no inspiration. That makes sense Or for when band practice logic dictates that finishing a song once in a while is probably a good idea…

EP Updatery!

I got the fixed EP design – It’s looking ace. I’ve just paid for the final run of the EPs so they should be with me in time for the June 5th gig. Well looking forward to hearing what everyone thinks of it.

Also got the final quotes for the T-shirts through – I’ll probably make some sort of T-shirt and EP package deal available. The new T-shirts are ace

Next week on Dave’s Blog

Well this coming week will involve

- Hopefully my last ever encounter with Uni in the form of a presentation about my placement year
- Placing the orders for the T-shirts and confirming the placed order for the EP
- Setting out a weekly timetable and sticking to it (with some siblingly assistance)
- Mayhaps a free sojourn into the local Gym thanks to an invitation from my homegirl Kirstie! (I’ve actually never been to a Gym before)
- Mayhaps finding more about this potential october tour from Shellshock!

So that should be a nice change of pace from the hectic giggery that’s been going on the past few weeks! Though I would love to just gig solidly for weeks… Just to see what it’s like.

AND THE BLOGLY QUESTION: Is there a song that gives you goosebumps when you listen to it because it’s so beautiful (as opposed to being related to a good memory)? Which song is it?