Thursday, August 28

Are You Missing Japan? No... I'm watching Comedy

Here's my first of a new series of blogs ("oooh exciting, he takes this so seriously") called, "Are You Missing Japan...". Why? Because people keep asking me, and the answers 'no'.

No, because I've been busy. No, because it's been like what? A fucking week! No, because I'm still alive, I have my life ahead of me and no one died, Japan is still there, in my heart of hearts, in my memories, in the smile of every young child... just fucking no! I have time for self indulgence (obviously, I'm blogging to an audience of one), but I have no time for self-pity.

Anyway... this one's called "Are You Missing Japan? No... I'm Watching Comedy." Because, I went to see some comedy tonight! In Holland Park! The poshes place I've ever been to! The houses along the road before we arrived at the theater were huge, pristine white and fricking huge! The event was sponsored by Pimms and called SummerFest and was great. But instead of wittering on about it, I've gone to Youtube and found videos of the comics we saw.

Russel Kane, our compere. There are better clips on youtube, which weren't filmed on camer-phones, but this one is short and has a few of the jokes he told tonight.



Jason Bryne, talked about the strange things that turns his wife on, masturbation, hotel pornography, alcohol fueled debauchery with the misses and other such things. In this clip, he does some magic with a kid... he has range.



Andrew Lawrence, my favourite by a mile. No decent clips on Youtube I'm afraid, but there is this montage from his website, folow this link.

Richard Herring, for me the over enthusiasm of the compere killed this guys act. The compere needed, in my amateurish opinion, to tone it down before this guys acts and not go in full throttle. Still, I did laugh... but I laughed more at this clip of Richard being irritated by a heckler.



Doug Stanhope, made the posh upper middle class audience really very uncomfortable. Many of them left, others just watched in shocked disbelief... I fucking wet myself. This guy's act was soooooooooo offensive, but really funny. I recommend seeing this guy, but don't take your grandmother. Here's a clip.

Sunday, August 24

Summer Sonic: Best to Worst


Summer Sonic was good. Different from the year before, natch, I mean it had a different line up and a whole 12 months had passed in between. But what was most notable was the absence of Marion and Patrick, both of whom swore they would return for more drunken revelry and 'mutual' music education (I'm a music Nazi who demands that everyone see, appreciate and applaud who ever I drag them to see).

This time around my party partners were Liz and Julia, with a few special guest appearances from Patrick Maher, Claire Cassidy, Kate Nottidge and Ellie 'Smile' Lawley, all of whom are good company.

Now onto the important stuff, who did I saw and what did I think of them. OK, let's list them from best to 'not the best'.

  • Hot Chip
  • Alicia Keys
  • Biffy Clyro
  • Los Campesinos
  • Vampire Weekend
  • The Verve
  • The Subways
  • The Prodidgy
  • Bedouin Soundclash
  • Xavier Rudd
  • The Kills
  • Fatboy Slim


Yep, Hot Chip are the best and Fatboy Slim is the worst, the guy came on stage with a banana and pressed play on his CD player and then stood looking toward the crowd for approval... Fatboy, you're the worst!

No Summer Sonic next year, but maybe some Reading Festival, or maybe V Festival, or maybe Glastonbury, maybe Creamfields, maybe Sonnar, maybe Benicasiam, maybe...

Friday, August 8

Summer Sonic: Who To See?

It's always a struggle deciding upon who makes the cut and who gets cut out of your personal festival schedule. Here's my thinking about Summer Sonic 08.

So, Saturday morning is a no brainer, it's The Wombats followed by Vampire Weekend. Dance dance dance! Whoop! This means I'll miss The Ting Tings but I will probably get to see Polysic as long as they're not on at the same time as Biffy Clyro.




After Biffy it gets trickier, because seeing The Kooks doesn't appeal to me, nor Radwimps, I'm not familiar with Boom Boom Satellites or Devo and have never fully committed to Super Fury Animals.



Then of course the last act again is a no brainer... let the suckers go and see Coldplay, I'll be seeing Fatboy Slim, thank you very much.

Now we're onto Sunday and there's some gold playing today. Again, nice and early for Los Campesinos, followed by Santogold and We Smoke Fags. That should leave time for The Subways, The Fratellis or more likely Hot Chip, a bit of The Prodigy and to finish...



It's a choice between The Verve, Sex Pistols, Paul Weller or Pendulum. It's a difficult choice to make, and far more frustrating than choosing between Justice and Fatboy Slim on Saturday. I have a feeling I will be seeing Pendulum... but only time will tell.

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