20-04-09 – Yay, black friends! / *needs your help*

Things are gettin’ hectic up in herre O_O

This week entailed:

- A loltastic gig in Manchester (3/10)
- Another loltastic gig in Burnley (5/10)
- An ace gig in Coventry (6/10)
- Meeting some ace friends there
- Getting my game ready for testing + handing in (I need half an hour of your time to play my game plskthx!)
- Getting my report to 12,000 words (as that is the minimum amount required)
- The Spanish guy not being happy with my tutorial and me not understanding why ><
- Tested the YAWA EP in my car
- Decided it’s about time for another lolKieran

Broken a string, broken a strap, that means it’s time for a freestyle rap!

I’m not gonna lie, Manchester was not the best gig in the world. Apparently there were several other gigs in the local area, all the uni students were home for Easter and on top of that, all the people that did come to see us were turned away at the door, since we were told on the day that it was an 18+ gig. Might’ve mentioned that a bit sooner…

Despite disappointing people who had travelled for hours to come see us and not having the most immense of crowds, it wasn’t a complete waste of time. Fortunately, we still had a good laugh, made some new fans out of the people that were there, got some AWESOME photos courtesy of this really nice camera guy and I made friends with a genuine black rapper! Wow!

Ghost-face Dave

Clearly awake Dave

Gear junkie Dave

Epic laser rockage

Rocking with best budz Dave (Y)

You see, we were supported by a band called the Daywalkers, a Manchesterian band who do big riffs with jungley drum and bass, fronted by a self proclaimed ex-rudeboi doing the rapping. They were actually really tight and cool, but what really impressed me was when the guitarist had to stop playing due to a broken strap, and without the drummer skipping a beat, the rest of the band went into backing the rapper in a freestyle rap. He even managed to flip Kieran’s hood up and tell him how he looked like he should have an ASBO, which was ace. It was just all so smoothly done, and when the guitarist finished being assisted by Kieran, they went straight into the song where they left off.

But yeah, we chatted with them for a good portion of the night and exchanged numbers, promising to do some gig swaps.

Burnley

Again, not the most packed of shows but for some reason I really enjoyed myself. We arrived at the venue and got talking with “Kyra”, the band that supported us at the Canteen in Barrow last week; we invited them to play the gig with us. They’re ace guys, and we got on really well the whole night.

We soundchecked, then grabbed a chinese – we’ve actually had chinese the past 4 gigs we’ve played. It’s become like a YAWA tradition.

Hannah, the drummer’s girlfriend, took some photos during the night, most of which are of everyone a bit on edge since Zak was in a crotch-punchy mood (not than uncommon a mood, I wonder if he is supressing something?) but there were some absolute gems, such as this one of Jamie, which she assures me she hasn’t photoshopped the lips to look smaller:

lolz.

Kyra were great, I have absolutely no idea how a) the guitarist can fling his guitar that far behind his head without damaging his spine or how b) the weedy singer (almost as weedy as me!) can consistantly scream for that length of time.

We went on and actually had an ace time. The people that were there I got dancing and everyone really enjoyed it (they told me so after we played.) I spazzed like a… spazz, rapped epically to a few middle aged women at the back who looked a little terrified, danced with the scene kids who came to see us (They’d seen us back at the babycakes show in Burnley all that time ago, one dude even requested Supernova ), went out on the balcony to scream at some more people… the works ^_^

After the show came more chillaxing with Kyra, I remember the singer said to me something along the lines of “You are the best frontman a band could have.” which really made me smile, however I was already smiling since I enjoyed the gig and just ended up looking like I’d had some weird botox injections or something.

We said our toodle-oos and they promised to get us on a gig up their end next time. Which was nice

Rocking the Kasbah.

Coventry is where both Jamie and Kieran attend and attended (respectively) university. So playing there was a must, since both have a large number of homeslices there. Kieran has done a few favours for the owner of the “Kasbah” club; Thanos, playing acoustic nights with 12 story fall (his acoustic project) in the past, so he was able to ask the guy to give us a decent support slot.

He put us on with a band called “The Ghost Frequency” – a kind of electro/punk vibe going on, so we weren’t entirely out of place on the bill. We unloaded, soundchecked, chatted briefly to TGF (They were nice guys) and went upstairs where we met Thanos, who shook everyone’s hand and upon getting to me asked “Are you the singer who runs around a lot? Will the stage be big enough for you?” Which made me grin. I think I replied with “Don’t worry, I won’t be on the stage very much.”

I wasn’t. 2 seconds into Navigator and I’d cleared the barrier and begun moshing with some innocent bystanders. But I’m getting ahead of myself – We made our way to the space Thanos had assigned for the bands to chillax, and each band was given a case of beer. SCORE! I do so enjoy beer! By which I mean I made do with a bottle of water from the other case that was provided (yay for the steady unpopularisation of the rock and roll stereotype!)

First on were a kind of progressive indie band which Jamie and Kieran knew the guitarist for… The band name escapes me – “Being Jo”… something. I think. Though that might be completely wrong. They were tight and talented, but it wasn’t my kinda thing. They didn’t try to get the crowd involved much; I can never understand that.

The Ghost Frequency came next, since apparently they had to leave early to get their van back to the lockup or something. This left us with the headline slot, which we were worried might leave us with no crowd after the headlining band had played. But I’ll get to that. They played well, and had some cool electro sections, but that said, I can’t remember any of the songs they played. Again, they didn’t do much to entice the punters.

After they played and left, we went on and I realised that most of the people were there to see us. Looks like the Ghost Frequency didn’t pull as many as they’d hoped, though they still got the payment + rider for the night. But we got an ace show so I wasn’t complaining. By the end of the night there were around 100 people there.

So yes, over the barrier and into the crowd. People were grabbed and faces were screamed in. I managed to keep my energy level up pretty much the whole night, only flagging a bit on Starcadia (our set-ending track), which is better than normal. Especially since I did another Kieran vs. Jamie rave which I joined in on. Jamie won – though his girlfriend was in the crowd so that might have accounted for the piercing scream that tipped the balance at the end of the competition (for those unfamiliar with the competition, they both rave through a song, the crowd judges whoever raves hardest, and cheer at the end for each in turn to show who wins.)

After the show we had a blast. Dancing with Kieran and Jamie’s mates to random tunes in the big 1000+ capacity room (we played the little ~200+ room) when the night suddenly turned from 100 people to over 1000 was fun. Apparently the Coventry clubs pack out after 1am. ’twas mental. During the dancing I was approached by a bunch of people who enjoyed the set (I always keep the labcoat on after a gig so people can recognise me) which was ace – my ego likes a good stroking.

After exhausting ourselves dancing, we retreated upstairs again to the main band’s backstage room and helped ourselves to the rider that they’d left behind after leaving early. Much to Zak’s disappointment the beer was gone (The opening band asked us at that point if we knew what happened to their case of beer. We had no idea, but Jamie seemed mysteriously inebriated.) I felt so rock and roll eating some peaches with a glass of milk and a honey sandwich. I can’t wait ’til we get riders when we play gigs!

After a smidge more dancing, we ended up in the beer garden – a greek themed outdoor place that was really cool. The whole venue had this clean, european theme to it. I liked it. We ended up chatting with the Sound guy (who said we were one of the most brutal sounds he’d heard and that we “destroyed” the other bands. Ego++.) and Thanos again, both of which were really friendly and genuinely good people.

One thing I found out this week is there *are* people who aren’t in bands that have the same passion about music as people that are. Since the majority of people I’m around don’t have the same intense obsession with music I have presumed that I’m in the minority. Well either I’ve found more people who are in that minority or I’ve underestimated how many people share said passion. Either is ace.

Thanos also said that if Enter Shikari allow a local support he’ll do his darndest to make sure it’s us. Kieran has been pushing for this for a while (Shikari are playing there in a month or so I believe) and it’s looking like they’ve got tour support only, but you never know – in any case, it’s worth being in Thanos’ good books, since quite a few big acts play the Kasbah (I’d just as easily like to support Calvin Harris or N-Dubz (The latter being something I actually really want to do for the pure hilarity of it))

But yeah, after all that and getting recognised from off the telly (Ego++ again), heading back to Martin and Trisha’s for a well-deserved good night’s sleep was welcomed. Oh yeah, I should probably explain who Martin and Trisha are.

Ace! More black friends!

This was my lucky week for pigmented people! Martin is Kieran’s friend from university. I actually think Martin found 12 story fall online and made friends with Kieran through that, then they ended up living together when K was at uni. Funny how things work out! But yeah, those two are really close friends.

And yeah, Martin is black. Well, half caste – but if you count his sister Trisha, since I am now friends with them both, they make a whole black friend! Score! BTW- the big deal about having non-caucasian chums is that now I can totally be respected as a rapper. Though martin says I have “picked the worst possible token black guy ever.” He is really emo – I see where Kieran gets it from now xD

In fact, the first time Kieran mentioned Martin to me was on the way to the Leeds gig last year, when he rang him up to prove there was such a thing as a black guy who doesn’t like hip hop. Actually, technically the first time I saw Martin was with Kieran at the acoustic YAWA gig Kieran came to which made him want to join the band. Cool, huh?

Anyway, I said earlier about people with a passion for music. When we met Martin, Kieran straight away started to play him a bunch of songs. Now in my experience, people tend to lose interest after you show them more than a couple of songs of music they haven’t heard before. Kieran was playing song after song and Martin was actually appreciating it all – it was ace! I do have some friends that I can share music with in a similar respect (Scratch, Ogre…) but they all have silly nicknames. Martin had an actual name. Not sure of the relevance of that, but I’m sticking with it.

And I already mentioned Trisha – she’s the mother of Kieran’s godson. She’s also my age. It’s crazy how many people I know that are my age with kids these days. Looking through facebook It seems like 90% of the kids I went to school with are mommies or daddies. I couldn’t imagine having a kid until I had done every selfish thing I want to do in my life, and that’ll take quite a few years – I’ll need to be selfless if I want to be a good parent. My parents did that and I turned out okay. Though they also spawned my sister, so I suppose it’s not an infallible method.

KIDDING I <3 U SIS.

But yeah, Trisha is awesome, she’s similarly open and honest as both Kieran and Martin. It was great with all of us talking late into the night about… stuff. Martin made bacon and tea with 3 sugars. Kieran and I stayed there the two nights we were in Cov and I really enjoyed it.

So yeah! Good week for meeting people!

*Pwns uni work*

I’m now 90% done with my report. over 12,000 words on paper and that’s not including the huge script for the game, the design document or the log book. The only section left is the testing, which I need your help with, quickly!

If you head over to www.boyinaband.com/gametest all the info is there – you just need to play the game for half an hour/ till you complete it, then fill in the questionnaire and send it to me. I need to have all responses in by the end of tuesday 21st so I can type them up, analyse them, then print it off in readiness for hand in on the 22nd!

All today was spent working on the game to get it ready for testing. I’m still not sure if it’s properly balanced, but it’s certainly functioning, which is a good start. The testing will help me to balance it.

After that it’s just the 3D work then I can pretty much forget uni until I have to demo my game to my assessors and hand in that on-line games module I missed this summer as a resit. I’m not even sure that I *have* to do that. As I understand it I can miss out two modules I’ve done this year… if that’s the case then why bother having them?! Crazy.

Uh… Si? ><

Gah, I made the gabba tutorial the spanish guy asked for last week before I started work on anything else, then got an email back saying he felt “decieved” and that I hadn’t done what he asked… looks like there was a mix up in translation. Several emails have been sent back and forth and I’m still no closer to understanding what it is he wants. I hope this can be resolved – paypal took a large amount of the money he sent me so it’s not as simple as refunding him ><

When it comes down to it, I explained that I could make a tutorial for a gabba style kick drum, and in the terms and conditions I sent before he paid I put that there are no refunds if he’s unhappy with what I do. If I did that then anyone could just get me to do the work then claim they are unsatisfied and get a refund. Even Kieran, who speaks Spanish, couldn’t understand what he meant when I got the guy to send a Spanish message ><

Gah, working with people who don’t speak the same language is difficult.

Soundtrack to the Apocalypse

End on a high note – the EP is sounding ace. I showed Zak the artwork and he likes it all except the back cover which he “doesn’t get”. I’m probably gonna have to spend another day designing something new unless I can find a way for him to “get” it. Gah. But yeah, in my car all the tracks sound beefy; way heavier than before. It’s awesome. We’re planning to release the EP on the Wolvo gig on June 5th. So I’ve gotta sort out this artwork pretty soon to get the CD into the printers in time! Jeez, it’ll be nice when it’s out though, I feel like YAWA’s been suffocated with no CD out/itunes presence.

Next Week on Dave’s Blog…

The gigs are over but the work has just begun -

- The FYP is to be handed in,
- the 3D work is to be finished,
- the demo of the game to my assessors will be booked,
- the EP artwork finished and any last adjustments to the music will be made…
- I’ll contact the CD duplicating companies and choose one
- I’ll also have to get the T-shirts done in time for said release – the Wolvo gig will be a money making opportunity YAWA can’t afford to miss!

AND THE BLOGLY QUESTION: What would you put on the back cover of a YAWA CD if you were the designer?