The Music Issue

This month we've managed to see two gigs! In a single month! Two! (Gone are the days of two a week ...)

First was Asobi Seksu. Two or three nondescript guys (who looked surprisingly young, but then nearly everyone in these new bands is younger than I am), and one tiny Japanese woman who totally ran the show. They hit us with a wall of noise which brought back blissful memories of gigs in the 90s, and of many of the bands I listened to (obvious MBV influence). But I have to admit that they weren't exactly tight. The singer's voice is pretty but not especially powerful and kind of got lost in the mix a bit - though that could just be a bad sound guy, too. And the guitarist's backing vocals were pretty ragged. They ran through their songs from Citrus, and played a serviceable cover of a Mazzy Star song. It was fun, and loud, and I've got a lifelong soft spot for dreamy overlapping guitars. But it didn't blow me away.

I've rhapsodized about giant 11-member bands and what a great show they put on (Arcade Fire, Broken Social Scene, Godspeed You Black Emperor). But I like the other extreme just as much - the super tight two-piece or three-piece. I remember seeing Black Rebel Motorcycle Club a few years ago (with Bridget, if I recall correctly), and I was blown away by how much noise three people could make. Fantastic noise - the kind that hits you in the chest with the first pounding bassline. The Raveonettes were like that on Friday night. We never managed to make any of the shows they played in Toronto, but here we got to see them in a really small venue (don't Oxford students go to gigs?). They have a crisp live sound, are effortlessly cool, made lots of noise (duelling feedback!), and yea verily, it was good. I think every guy in the place (Jeff included) fell for Sharin, who looks looks like a cross between Nico and Debbie Harry. Totally stunning. Guys were yelling inane things like 'I love your shoes!' to her between songs. And Sune looks like a cross between A-ha and one of the Jesus and Mary Chain (which, come to think of it, would be a brilliant combination). After they played they came out and set up a table to sell their own merchandise. As soon as Sharin's peroxided head appeared there was a stampede of late twenty and thirtysomething indie guys (it was a slightly older crowd - we were definitely about the average age), while their girlfriends/wives stood back in groups with wryly amused expressions. All this and we still made it home by 11, since we are old and need our rest.

It's beginning to look like Christmas, in Oxford ...

... and London.

Not long before we'll be landing in Toronto. Can't wait!

November Spawned A Monster

I don't know about you, but I've spent far too much time enjoying this in November: shoes, endless pictures of shoes! That and working my tail off so I can use up the rest of my holiday days and lieu days before going home for Christmas (irony, no?).

One of the most exciting things that has happened to me lately is this:


(I've cut off the part with the incriminating stuff on it.) I haven't been this excited since getting my Metro Toronto Zoo Littlefoot Club card all those years ago. (My gym card doesn't quite bring such joy, redolent as it is of sweat, pain and tears.) Doesn't come close to matching the crazy but awesome giant LFC tattoo my friend just got, but now I'm at least an official fan. So yep, we're gonna put our names in the hat for tickets to another match this year. Fingers crossed! Not that the team has been performing well, but hey, you can't beat the experience of a match at Anfield. Especially when they win ... mind-blowing stuff.

We had a great long weekend in Wales while Jeff's parents were here. And except for the foul-mouthed, madly-gesticulating drivers I fell in love with the place. And wondered all over again why I don't just spend all my days rambling over hill and dale in the Brecon Beacons. While we were there I read, with envy, an article about a young couple who'd given up a hectic life in London City, and moved out to Wales to start a mail-order outdoor gear company. I'm torn between wanting to live in a place where you have endless green outside your door, and a place where you have a Second Cup and a Sephora close at hand. (Among other essential amenities.) But while I deliberate further, here are some photos from Southeastern Wales.

The ruins of Llanthony Priory, with a newer (but still quite old!) cottage built into them.

Hay-on-Wye.

Brecon Beacons (those are the ruins of an Iron Age fort in the foreground).

Tintern Abbey, of the Wordsworth poem.


What else? Ah, yes, the Tudors. We visited Hampton Court Palace recently and got our fill of Henry VIII trivia, so I was stoked to watch The Tudors on TV. Except, except ... what possessed them to cast the unlikeable Jonathan Rhys Meyers as a man meant to have been ginger-haired, strong, well over six feet tall and handsome (in his youth, at least)? And why use an actress with an LA fake tan, collagen lips and implants as a medieval princess? Not to mention the amusing departures from historical record and the video-game graphics when they show Whitehall in London. (That last part bothers Jeff more than it bothers me.) Oh well, that's entertainment! At least until we can get more episodes of 30 Rock.

Monthly progress report:
Number of slugs found in the bathtub: 1 (um, gross?!)
Number of Portugal travel guides purchased: 2
Number of frivolous magazines purchased: 3 (*hangs head*)
Number of mince tarts consumed: 4
Number of days I spent hobbling about in agony after an overzealous session on the leg press at the gym: 5
Number of days before I had handily reinjured myself at football: 1
Number of weeks I plan to stretch out this excuse for inactivity: 6! At least until New Year's Resolution time, heh.