Snow

Death Cab at Rock City 15/11 Part Two

When Death Cab for Cutie toured the UK this summer it was easy to see how teen soap endorsement and major label success had engulfed a band with once such indie sensibilities. Lost on a stage at Manchester Apollo was a band that, however gifted, could have been as far away as Orange County.

Tonight, Nottingham’s Rock City, with its dark cave-like walls, a venue usually more Kerrang! than Under the Radar, presents the perfect setting for a more intimate return trip. There’s an eerie silence as the lights go down and the smoke thickens. A fight almost breaks out in the audience, but as Death Cab take to the stage, all is forgotten.

Seemingly more at home on a smaller stage, the band begins the set with a selection of old songs, proving that this time, they’re here to please rather than to promote. The Employment Pages is followed by the beautiful Your Heart is an Empty Room and Transatlanticism opener, The New Year.

Six songs in and Narrow Stairs finally gets its moment. The catchy No Sunlight brings guitarist Chris Walla to the microphone and what seems like a million enthusiastic camera phones are launched into the air.

During Grapevine Fires the crowd sing word for word to a song now widely appreciated as one of the best the band have written, a touching narrative from a band famous for putting as much emphasis on story as melody. As the song reaches its climax the crowd take over and vocalist Ben Gibbard smiles approvingly.

I Will Follow You Into the Dark, a haunting song of death and devotion is followed by the first single from Narrow Stairs, I Will Possess Your Heart, a beautiful yet disturbing tale which builds with almost five minutes of instrumentalism to the opening line: “How I wish you could see the potential/the potential of you and me…”

This time around there’s a much more eclectic setlist. Sure, Narrow Stairs and its breakthrough predecessor Plans get much of the attention, but songs from Transatlanticism, the band’s final release for Barsuk, feature alongside older songs, Company Calls, Technicolor Girls and Why You’d Want to Live Here.

The crowd anticipate an encore but the band keep them waiting until the stamping, clapping and chanting reaches a peak and the venue’s floor vibrates alarmingly. Death Cab reappear, bemused at the crowd’s reaction, and reward them with another four songs.

Fan favourite Expo ’86 becomes, for many of the audience, the evening’s highlight, before the show closes with the slow-burning Transatlanticism. The crowd stand in awe as Gibbard alternates between guitar and keyboard, slowly building to the songs climatic conclusion: “I need you so much closer.”

On a freezing Saturday evening, Death Cab for Cutie stand before me the band I always knew they were. From ten feet away I can see the passion and dedication that has made them the most loved band of their generation. I can even see the shine on Chris Walla’s impeccably kept blonde hair.

All photos are by Lucy Bridger. Visit her blog here.

Death Cab at Rock City 15/11 Part One

Last night Nicola and I saw Death Cab for Cutie for the second time in four months. It was a completely different experience to the rainy July day when we journeyed to Manchester Apollo. On a cold November evening, Rock City was more subtle, more intimate. Like two different bands with one singer.

Setlist

The Employment Pages
Your Heart Is an Empty Room
New Year
Why You’d Want to Live Here
Crooked Teeth
No Sunlight
Grapevine Fires
Summer Skin
Soul Meets Body
I Will Follow You Into the Dark
I Will Possess Your Heart
Cath…
We Looked Like Giants
Company Calls
Long Division
The Sound of Settling

Technicolor Girls
Title and Registration
Expo ‘86
Transatlanticism

World Vegan Month

There was a time when being vegetarian was seen as unusual, but as November's World Vegan Month campaigners are pleased to boast - these days almost 10 per cent of us are following a vegetarian diet.

Ten years ago it was estimated that two million Britons were vegetarian, a number that has since doubled. And this may be down to the current wave of high profile vegetarians in the media.

A whole host of musicians, actors and designers are now proud to be following a meat-free diet.

Actors Gwyneth Paltrow, Pamela Anderson, Natalie Portman and Jude Law are all vegetarians. As well as Gwyneth’s husband Coldplay’s Chris Martin and fellow musicians Moby, Death Cab’s Chris Walla and Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes. Not to mention designers Stella McCartney and Sadie Frost.

Some stars have even decided to make a public stand against the meat industry. Pamela Anderson has developed her own animal friendly fashion range and Stella McCartney’s faux leather boots have been seen on Victoria Beckham.

Animal Rights charity Peta has caught on to this trend, using both Walla and Oberst to front ‘Go Veg’ campaigns through their youth website Peta2. Walla declared, “Factory farming is just disgusting. All you have to do is look at a couple photographs and it’s not that hard to figure out.”

While many people go vegetarian for ethical and compassionate reasons, it’s also becoming known as the healthy option.

The Vegetarian Society, the charity responsible for the logos you see on veggie food, classes a vegetarian as someone who does not eat any meat, poultry, game, fish, shellfish or crustacean, or slaughter by-products such as gelatine (which is made from animal bones) or animal fats.

The society argue that there is much scientific evidence to indicate vegetarians may be healthier than meat-eaters – saying a well balanced vegetarian diet can provide all the nutrients your body needs as well as being low in saturated fat and high in the protective minerals and vitamins found in fruit and vegetables.

It is also claimed that statistically vegetarians are thinner than carnivores and tend to lose weight more easily.

However, the Department of Health stress the importance of replacing the nutrients present in meat. A lack of zinc, iron and protein, essential for a healthy immune system, can cause anaemia - especially in women. Seeds, grains and pulses make an excellent alternative.

It is predicted that the number of vegetarians will continue to rise and could triple over the next decade.

As the production of vegetarian food brands increases and with the support of such famous advocates, it is not surprising more and more people are choosing nut roast over beef roast. No wonder Stella McCartney proudly admits, “Nobody cool eats meat anymore.”

Mystic Valley Band in Birmingham

When Conor Oberst announced he was embarking on a solo project his fan base gasped at the prospect. For a man who was essentially already a solo artist under the moniker Bright Eyes, what could be the reason for shelving such an already successful project?

Leaving behind long time friend and collaborator Mike Mogis, Oberst assembled a new band of musicians and headed to Mexico for the two month recording session that would give birth to his debut solo effort, the eponymously titled Conor Oberst.

Just a few short weeks after the albums release Oberst and his ramshackle band of musicians, the Mystic Valley Band (named after the magical Mexican valley where the album was recorded) arrived in Birmingham for what would be the start of their first brief but successful trip to the UK.

Flanked by Bright Eyes instrumentalist Nate Walcott, Maria Taylor’s brother Macey and Taylor Hollingsworth on guitars, and Rilo Kiley’s Jason Boesel on drums, the newly created Mystic Valley Band looked like Oberst’s usual wonderful army of friends and musicians, but this new incarnation possess a greater air of maturity and sophistication

“At the bottom of everything…” pleads one desperate Bright Eyes fan from the crowd at the more intimate than usual Carling Academy 2. But from the moment Oberst steps onstage it’s clear that Bright Eyes is a project most definitely on hiatus and any requests, no matter how desperate, fall on deaf ears.

Album opener Sausalito kicks off the set, followed by Get Well Cards and Moab. Then the band strips it down for the records ballads, Lenders In The Temple and Eagle On A Pole. A uncomfortable silence overcomes the audience while Obersts voice quivers and trails off, a welcome sign that at least one aspect of Bright Eyes turned up for the gig.

No longer the skinny teenager hiding behind his famous fringe, Oberst stands up to the microphone with all the confidence ten years of success has brought him, and as a man no longer intimidated by his own talent. When Oberst announces Birmingham is Hollingsworth’s hometown the crowd cheer approvingly a cheeky smile rolls over the singer’s face. Unbeknown to his audience, Hollingsworth is actually from Birmingham, Alabama, and the once so serious boy from Nebraska has just got them good.

As the set comes to as close it’s clear that this now solo, solo artist has only grown with the experience. Tracks I Don’t Want To Die (In The Hospital) and the single Souled Out!! are performed with a previously unseen ferocity and provide the perfect end to the show. Oberst jumps on an amp and blows kisses into the audience before disappearing backstage, leaving his Mystic Valley Band to say goodnight. Bright Eyes has left the building.

Under Re-construction

Back Soon!

Happy New Year

Thank you to Lizzy from Marching Stars distro for sending me this review, featured in Toronto Zine Library's zine.

Haworth

Last week I went on a family trip to Charlotte Bronte's house in Haworth, Yorkshire.

Edie!

Inspired by the post below, Edie Sedgwick. Ever since I saw the movie my hemlines have been getting shorter and shorter.

Inspiration and Suffocation

There's an almost constant pain just above my right eye. I have an overwhelming desire to be creative, almost to the point of where I want to start destroying things in the hope it will be vaguely artistic.

For months now I've been suffering from 'zine block'. This is much the same as writers block except I can still write, it's just that nothing seems to be coherent or inspiring enough to form something solid, printable. There's no zine, just pages and pages of words that bare no relation to those before or after. It's a literary case of pasta jewellery.

As I dotted the full stop on the final sentence of University (available at all good distros), I was opening the first sentence to the follow-up. In my head at least. Many ideas have swam solar-plexus-like around my head, in and out of my nose, mouth and ears for the past six months, almost relentlessly. Mostly these do not come to fruition. I've hit an idea I thought genius, researched it, created art with it, written a few pages - clicked it to the recycle bin. There's not enough scope for a sizable zine. I've often thought of turning all these useless ideas into a compilation zine of sorts. The thing is, I'm not a fan of this kind of zine. There hasn't been one I've read with the genius to move me. I like novels, I like a concept. I'm a Cursive fan for heavens sake. A concept makes something whole. A tiny package of feelings and hope with two staples piercing its soul.

Yesterday I photocopied what will quite possibly be the last batch of University. I've thought of a follow-up, a sequel of sorts. There's not much else I can write; I only dearly love those people and miss then to madness. I have many more tales and frantic journal entries but neither they nor I would want some of those stories priced at two bucks on zine symposium tables across the world. Not that they have any idea I've immortalised them on photocopied A4 sheets, currently on shelves from Tokyo to Toronto. I try not to imagine the confused looks of horror that would take over their faces.

Inspire me. I'm putting the kettle on.

Ciao, Manhattan

You know you're back in Scotland when, after 5 minutes (okay, three days...) you spy with hungry eyes, Sir Bob of Fairfoull. Oddly however, it wasn't in Edinburgh but Glasgow where I bumped into my favourite Bob smoking outside Topshop on Buchanan Street. He discarded his cigarette and scurried inside where, looking so bored he might throw himself through the window, he followed an unimaginitive looking girl around the t-shirt section for what must have seemed like an eternity.

I haven't updated this blog in a while. I've been super busy (read: super lazy). Here are some things...

After two days of wandering around Edinburgh trying to find a cinema showing the film we wanted to see (because buying a paper would be far too easy!), I went to the 'movies' for the first time since Harry Potter and the (film based on a couple of pages from the novel) Goblet of Fire and saw the much (unneccessarily) hyped Factory Girl. Granted, I was slightly pre-occupied with eating my large tub of ice cream before it melted all over Becky's beloved Balenciaga, but I walked out of the cinema after two rather uneventful hours wondering why I didn't get the point, what the point was, or whether there was even a point at all. My out of date student card got me a 70p discount on a film I should never have paid to see.
I love Edie. As women go, she's at the top of my list for just about every redeeming feature posessed my human-kind. Plus the thigh-high hemlines, ecentric dangly earrings and overall wild insanity - three of my favourite things, all single-handedly invented by pixie-faced-loon Edith Minturn Sedgwick. So I went to the cinema full of expectation and left disappointed. The most obvious culprit? Sienna Miller. She was an actress in a film, I get it... but film is art and they say art imitates life, and Sienna isn't a convincing Edie. Painted eyebrows and brown contact lenses just could not turn the tanned, blue eyed, pointy nosed and freckled blonde Sienna into the pale, large brown eyed and button nosed, natural brunette Edie. Surely someone like Natalie Portman would have been a better choice. Even Winona.
Secondly, the plot. The sub-title The Idiots Guide to Edie Sedgwick would have been appropriate. I guess if you happened to be turning up to this film with no prior knowledge then hey, what a story... but if you've read any of the biographies of Edie published over the past 20 years (I like Jean Stein's Edie: American Girl) you'll notice the gaping holes and lack of explanation make Factory Girl some kind of deformed and incompleted jigsaw. Her story is so much more than nice, innocent girl moves to New York and befriends Andy Warhol, has been apparently sexually abused by her father, cuts off hair, shags Bob Dylan, falls out with Andy, becomes depraved drug addict, returns home to California, dies - I deplore you to discover it.
Still, it was nice to see Edie get some long-overdue credit and I enjoyed the music and cinematography. The ice cream was delicious too.

So, there you have it. - an on the spot and unfathomable review of Factory Girl. And now I've completely forgotten what else I had to write about.

Tea in the garden

The First and Last Make-up Post

I like music more than(almost) anything else, especially if it plays on old-fashioned formats. I also like make-up (yes, really) because it makes me look less like Wednesday Addams and more like the elfin-featured beauty I've always threatened to be- allegedly.
Two of my favourite cosmetics companies have, in their respective laboratories, that look I imagine like the house Hansel and Gretel found - all covered in candy and cake (minus the evil witch), concocted the above products.

Hard Candy's Mix-Tape compacts have three eye shadows and three lip glosses; and come in three different mixes - Workout, Break-up and Party. And in case you're like me and have no idea how to match make-up shades, the colours coordinate so there's no ending up looking like Boy George. Unfortunately, the lure of dressing up like a 80s pop star is all too much for me and I won't be buying one. Well, honestly, there's nothing I like more than dressing as Madonna in Desperately Seeking Susan, but Hard Candy's claim that their compact is "a lot less effort" than making a real mix tape (effort? I ask you...) has me refusing to buy one on principle (not even to empty out the make-up and use to store mints.)

And with money still safely in my purse, there's no excuse not to invest in Benefit's Some Kind-a Gorgeous foundation which, rather excitingly for someone with vinyl-lust, has a record on the lid! It's slightly expensive to be buying just for the packaging, but does claim to be "perfection for your complexion". Whether this is true remains to be seen. I'll let you know.

"Soap"

In a week that saw 15-year-old Amy give birth on the kitchen floor and sexually confused John-Paul and his dysfunctional family visit their first gay bar, Hollyoaks finally got a new opening sequence.
We've reluctantly said goodbye to the days when Kurt Benson charmed the women with his police-chase motorbike antics and the schoolboy Max Cunningham was played by an actor with an abnormally fat face. After 10 years, the blue filmstrip opening featuring many dead and/or date rapist characters has been replaced, and by what?
For perhaps the next decade our week-daily fix of Hollyoakes will begin with a remixed theme tune (quite possibly produced by Kermit the Frog) and selected shots of semi-naked cast members touching themselves provocatively in front of a wind machine. I felt dirty just watching it.
Yet another example of the declining morals of 21st century society.

Monday, Monday...

A sunny everlasting Monday. I'm thinking I got up too early.

The sunshine has forced the daffodils from their leafy cases. The sight of their new yellow petals always gives me a 'first day of the rest of my life' feeling. The newness of spring can be quite inspiring if you're not too busy grumbling to notice it. I get the feeling changes are about to happen.

Monday is a day for thinking and I'm already on my third cup of tea. In keeping with the theme of re-birth, the thought for the day is Idlewild.

Next Monday (I believe) is new album day. I could just direct you here, but that would be cheating and my mind has changed significantly since the last record. It truly is a love/hate affair. Anyway, I haven't heard the album yet. The single, I heard it and I was surprised. Safe to say nothing like I expected but it made me want to twirl around in my very short dress and send the Royal Doulton crashing to the floor. Last time around I was obsessed with the days of 2000 when windows were broken and there were road trips to Orkney. Channel 4 filmed this and made me want to marry Woomble and grow neeps and sip whisky in front of a roaring fire. Now someone else is doing just that and I'm courting a life of spinsterhood. This time I'll be optimistic. He has his solo record to thank for that.

I look forward to hearing the album in its entirety. I might even go as far as ordering it from Amazon because I know I wont get a free copy - the only bands I ever seem to get for review are American groups I've never heard of (and one else ever should.) On a more romantic note, I have an eccentricity about holding the records of those I love in my hands and feeling the grain of the paper inlay on my fingertips. Ritual.

We'll see.

Liebe Nadiah

Sometimes the postman can restore your faith in humanity. Or rather he gets to take the credit for gifts collected and mailed two seasons and thousands of miles away that restore your faith in humanity. We do little to appreciate our worldwide postal service.
I just wanted to say thank you for my mail, Miss Nadiah.

North West Zine Works

University now has a review by the lovely Caroline Tigeress at North West Zine Works. Click here to read and vote till your hearts desire. (You can do this once every 24 hours!)

Distros

University is now available at Parcell Press and Brass Buttons. Give them your money because both are run by beautiful, lovely, dedicated boys.

One hell of a week

One week ago I was at a Propagandi gig in Derby. The building was somewhere I spent a considerable amount of time when I was younger. Around me were all the people I spent that time with. My heart still feels like it's encased in bubble wrap.

When I turned the laptop on this morning, there was nothing. No pictures, no documents, no iTunes and most importantly, no un-submitted yet finished 2006 review article. You know, the one I spent the last two weeks obsessing over. I had an almost uncontrollable urge to leap out of the nearest window. Instead I wandered to the train station and joined the Christmas shoppers on an expedition into the big city. Here I met my oldest friend Nicola for lunch. It's a bit like Sex and the City, I suppose. Except with a few minor alterations. Firstly, you would have to replace New York with a middle-English shit-city, then the trendy Manhattan eatery with our dingy local Starbucks and of course, the four stylish, successful thirty-something women with two unsuccessful twenty-somethings who look like they got dressed in the dark. So, not much like Sex and the City at all really... As for the laptop, a conversation with the man on the helpline two years ago and my obsession with notebooks proved quite useful once I managed to calm down.

New things

Dark red tights from Topshop.

Grey and black top from UO worn as a dress because it's long and I'm short.