Things To Do In England When You're Dead

After almost a month sans-washing machine and now a week without telly I have been told I have a month to move out of my squalid flat and find somewhere better, which please me as I should have done it a long time ago but grew lazy and spent all my money on an MP3 player (But more on that later).

Once again I am calling on the wonderful Daft.ie website to guide me to a new abode, a great site it is to, and I recommend it although it didn't actually help me find anywhere last time... It'll be easier to move this time as all my mini-discs are going home and the CDs are destined for eBay as I have a Sony 20 Gb MP3 player and, although I've not had a chance to put my music on it yet and I'm at the mercy of others peoples less impressive taste, makes me happy (As one would expect after a morning of listening to Wire and MC5).

The only other thing to mention is that while having friends over from England we went to check out the Dracula Bram Stoker Experience. It's a bit out of the city, and street urchins and an IRA Rally seemed determined to stand in our way, but I assure you a great time was had by all and the one person who said she wouldn't scream screamed loudest of all. It's only takes ten mins. to do the scary part, which is what we're interested in, but for the more studios there is a detailed introduction on the life of Bram Stoker for you to read at leisure, and two half hour documentries at the end, for the rest of the revelers there is a pub and air hockey. The centre has loads of other stuff to enjoy, a swimming pool and climbing wall, loads of computer games and that stupid dance machine I attempted once and never again.

It's been a good week.

I've been offered a great job in a five star hotel with loads of benifits:

• Vodka / Brany / Whiskey / Wine training
• Customer service training
• Health benifits (Something very good to have over here)
• Loads of social events
• Complimentry hotel night
• Discount for friends and family

However, I'd have to cut my hair, which I've had long since I was 15.

The great John W. cut his hair last year and now his brother has followed suit, Jon C. to has cut his hair. I can understand seeing it as a symbolic change but doing it for a job, I think I'd be doing it for the wrong reasons.


But such a great job....

For a while I've been into the ambient electronica sounds of Schndier TM, best known for his crackin' John Peel aproved cover of There Is A Light That Never Goes Out. He recently dropped of the musical rader but just had an e-mail telling us loyal fans that "
Schneider visited some jail to work on German gangster-rap with some prisoners". Not sure if this is some sort of German attempt at humour, because as it was once said, "The German sense of humour is no laughing matter".

This is also odd because Mr. TM is actually, I can exclusivly reveal, the secret identity of Beck! Theres heaps of evidence for this crack pot theory:

1. He's signed to Mute North America when he is in fact German
2. Beck is known to have a contract that allows him to relase things on smaller labels
3. Schnider Tm has constant vocal distortion, what's he trying to hide?
4. Few pictures are avaliable of TM, and on ones that are, such as the cover of Zoomer, his face is obscured
5. None of thier tour dates clash
6. C'mon, it's obvious....

Another weird thing about parting with my tall Swedish blonde was that normally when parting with someone it leaves me thinking what traits I'm going to avoid next partner along, where as this time I was definitely left appreciating the advantages of going out with the taller lady. She also left me the remaining condoms, mostly because she didn't want her mother finding them when she moved home, and probably because she believed like me that I wasn't going to meet anyone for a while as I rarely meet new people.

Imagine my surprise last night when I ended up hooking up with a woman of the diminutive height of 5 ft 2". Mind you, when deciding what to avoid I always end up settling for the exact trait, so its no surprise I ended up with the exact opposite.

When going to check out what bars where after staff last night two girls asked me direction to a club, The Viper Rooms, and being the gent that I am, and heading that way, I of course walked them to the doors. Then, for the first time in my life, near random woman bought me drinks, "by jove" I thought to myself, "this is turning into quite the random adventure". This suspicion was confirmed at the end of the night when the shorter of the girls involved gigglingly asked if she could kiss me.

So, looks like I'm moving on better that I thought, maybe I can forget after all...

Yesterday I said goodbye to my tall Swedish blonde.

In parting I managed to tell her I thought she knew nothing about me, mislead me, that I never really trusted her and thought she had no really attachment to me, and that I didn't want to stay in touch, and yet it was still the best parting I've ever had (Admittedly, not hard). I didn't escape totally unharmed, I was told thing fizzled out between us after she met up with her ex, who we all knew she wasn't over, but that didn't really bother me.

I also told her I never got the two things I wanted out of the relationship, to know the score and to know the last time we where doing things. I don't know how she took all this so well, might of been the Gin & Tonics, but it might have been balancing these comments out with comments on how many unexpected things I learnt, and how I'll always think of her when eating cheese on toast.

She did make some brutally honest statements, such as that despite having much in common there was no real link between us, and that if she wasn't going now we'd of only lasted a few more months. Joke was on her, I would have been breaking up with her there and then.

I was really surprised when she said she was going to miss me, I don't think she'd ever said anything that emotive to me, it was a whole new side of her.

We parted at The Pie Dish on Harcourt Street, I told her I didn't want the last time I ever saw her to be in work, and I'm so thankful that it wasn't. The last words she said to me where "Take care of yourself, ___" (She always used my name a lot).

I couldn't believe how well it went, but I can believe now that if we'd of just spoken about this stuff sooner we'd of made much more of the last week and The Electric Picnic (Despite parting yesterday I'm sure she laughed more than she had all weekend).

It went so well that now I'm genuinely sad that she's gone. But, it was known all along that she'd go and I'd decided we'd just let it be, rather then faffing about with contact details and letting things just fizzle out. It's sore but I think it's the right choice.

I really do wish her all the best in life and thank her for being a central part in all the best times I've had in Dublin.

"It was high and wild and free and you should've seen us" -I Can't Forget, L. Cohen

And now Kanye West has rocketed up the charts, 600,00 units ahead of the number 2 album (Whoever that is)

How is it that Kanye West's outburst during a benifit program for the victims of Katrina have gone almost without a mention?

He was talking with Mike Myers, and he suddenly starts accusing the whole American media of being racist:

Myers: The landscape of the city has changed dramatically, tragically and perhaps irreversibly. There is now over 25 feet of water where there was once city streets and thriving neighborhoods.

West: I hate the way they portray us in the media. You see a black family, it says, "They're looting." You see a white family, it says, "They're looking for food." And, you know, it's been five days [waiting for federal help] because most of the people are black. And even for me to complain about it, I would be a hypocrite because I've tried to turn away from the TV because it's too hard to watch. I've even been shopping before even giving a donation, so now I'm calling my business manager right now to see what is the biggest amount I can give, and just to imagine if I was down there, and those are my people down there. So anybody out there that wants to do anything that we can help -- with the way America is set up to help the poor, the black people, the less well-off, as slow as possible. I mean, the Red Cross is doing everything they can. We already realize a lot of people that could help are at war right now, fighting another way -- and they've given them permission to go down and shoot us!

Myers: And subtle, but in many ways even more profoundly devastating, is the lasting damage to the survivors' will to rebuild and remain in the area. The destruction of the spirit of the people of southern Louisiana and Mississippi may end up being the most tragic loss of all.

West: George Bush doesn't care about black people!

Officials responded that they didn't know West was not following script and so did not remove his outbusrt for the live feed.

Jay Z has also voiced his support for his statments

Great to hear that Antony and the Johnsons won the mercury Music Award this year, I've been talking about them all year and caught him in Dublin a bit back. Some criticism about him being practically American and the album having been made in New York, but once again a British Passport has provided a strong defense (All Americans envy the British Passport and its EU Powers).

This injustive was also mentioned in the Iirish Press, I think it was in yesterdays Irish Examiner. Not that the irish press is consevative and prone to vilification, they felt it necesrry, in a very short article, to mention that Antony has appeard on stage and collaborated with Japaneese hermaphrodite, albino mathematician, Dr Julia Yasuda (I really wish I could find a picture of her...)

Great sour grapes award to the Kaiser Chiefs who described his mere presence on the shortlist as a "technicality". God knows how they feel now after the bookies favourite lost. Their fans aren't happy either.

This news also mentioned in NME and The Guardian


Finally, here's a good article on Anthony and the Johnsons for earlier this year while they where jsut rasing thier not obviously at all wigged heads.

I keep getting William Shatners version of Common People stuck in my head, so I'm saving this link to the long version with chior. It amuses me, and I'm sure it can amuse you to

Spent the weekend at Electric Picnic, in lovely Laois, the sixth Irish country I've visited.

As festivals go it was a small affair, only 20,000 tickets and they didn't even sell out, but everybody was having a good time and seemed to be enjoying a relaxing end to the summer. I thought it was ambitious to go camping in Ireland in September, but sunny weekend all round.

First day of music was quite, only acts I really wanted to see where The Flaming Lips and Kraftwerk and what you know, they clashed, raising many questions about the competency of the organizers. Caught the end of Royksopp, with just enough time to realized I'd missed a good show, and that they dressed as Kraftwerk.

There was a big crowd waiting for The 'Werk, although some tried to catch some of The Flaming Lips before heading over, there loss, as they may have seen The Lips cover Radioactivity adn Robots, but they missed kraftwerk doing Autobahn and The Model. They sound identical as to on the new live album, the excellent Minimum-Maximum, and did all the best tunes, Vitamin, Tour De France, Autobahn,The Model, everything you could ask for (Well, short of Pocket Calculator). I never really figured out why it took four old people to play the music that seemed to be running of a concealed iPod, a point proven when they played Robots. Well, they didn't, robots did, and they seemed to do very little. I was under the impression that they actually played the keyboards instead of spinning around like broken car assembly machines, another dream shattered...

The best thing to do of an evening was the Silent Disco. It was great people bopping away to silence, and better still to take part, I think the technology would make a great gig. Of course, people where trying to steal the headphones, the friend I went with told me it was the only time she'd ever heard me condone stealing, that's how much I liked the Silent Disco. Adding to the confussion, they also had two DJs playing simulatiously, which allows people to dance as badly as they like and just pretend they're listening to the other DJ. Really, check it out.

Second day was wicked, line up messed about so got to see a cool Danish band, Who Made Who when looking for Husky Rescue, who turned out to be rubbish anyway. Who Made Who however where a trio who just had that Scandiavian comedy look about them, odd clothes and moustaches that don't qite fit thier image or the decade. They have that electro-disco sound the kids like these days and it got people in and got me dancing, definitely a favourite of the weekend, although I can track down absolutely nothing about them other than that they're signed to Gomma Records). Must find thier album (Cheaply)

Guilty pleasure of the weekend was seeing Human Leauge, as although I only wanted to hear the hit (You know the one I mean, biggest selling single of 1981). Of course it was the final song they played so I stayed all set, but by jovi did I know a lot more of thier stuff than I thought, and hell, it was a festival so i wasn't going to inhibit myself, 80's dancing it was!

Mr. Scruff, what a legend, played for three hours. To my shame it was the first time I ever saw him live, a terrible smudge on my claim to Mancunianity...

Elbow, Soulwax / 2 Many DJs, Mercury Rev, Doves, so many good bands on the second day that I could only take the pace with the help of wheatgrass and menthol crystals, that, and half a litre of Lucozade. Lemon Jelly where wicked, clearly talented people and having a good time. I thought the visuals weren't living up to expectations but then they did Nice Weather For Ducks and that shut me up.

Nick Cave was the final act, but I'll save that for another time as I've already ran out of creative juices and Neighbours is on

Last night I was most definitely in the right place at the right time, that is lurking around the RDS arena just as Iron Maiden started playing their set of classic material of the first four albums (A period marking the peak, the certain sound or entire output of many a band). I used to be fairly classic rock, back in the day, that being 2000 when I last saw Iron Maiden from the back of the MEN Arena, and althought I still have yearnings for them, they didn't justify the 60 Euro ticket price so I was counting on a tout.

But there where no touts, so I thought I'd have a walk around the walls to find somewhere with good acoustics and settled by the backstage gate. There where some skater Goth girls who must have only been there for the support act, Mr. Manson, but they seemed to dig what was going on, and they where certainly delighted when somebody came out and started giving away complimentary tickets.


I got in just as they started Run For The Hills, and despite my initial skepticism about seeing The Maiden, I got into it dam quick and was soon singing loudly and badly, headbanging, playing air guitar and doing the devil horn thing, 100% involved in the theatrics. I was glad I was there alone so no one could see me giveing into this guilty pleasure.

I didn't plan staying long, as was proven with Spinal Tap 2, the heavy metal joke only stretches so far, I only wanted to hear two more songs before going and they played them back to back, Number of the Beast and Hallowed Be Thy Name. And oh how I rocked out and got involved with the "Scream for me Dublin" shenanigans!

And all for free...


But wot, no Eddy?



Eddy, sadly missed