it's a sad time in your life when night rolls around and all you're pumped about for the following day is that fantastic strawberry and blueberry cereal you got from wal-mart the other night. not that i would know. or anything.
so i found basically the most amazing site ever to be created by humans.
in70mm.com
it's a big history of large-format motion picture film. i realise it won't hold the interest of 98% of the people who read this blog but that's cool. i thought i'd share my enthusiasm with all of you because it's my new favourite place and i've geeked out on it for the last two days solid. did you know that star wars' sound team used spare channels in the magnetic soundtrack on their prints to store sub-bass information, therefore providing a more solid "thwack" at the right times in the film? AMAZING. i bet you didn't know that. that's why i asked. how cheeky.
i've developed an unhealthy interest in abnormally long films too. starting with bondarchuk's "voyna i mir" (war and peace), lanzmann's "shoah" and tarr's "sátántangó" i'm gunna try and work my way through obscenely long movies as long as they have merit. no "cinematon" for me (it goes for 150 hours). maybe i'm just going crazy in down time but hell, this is my chance to go nuts on film unhindered by australian download limits.
not much has happened besides these two things over the last few days. i've been listening to common's universal mind control album and it's...incredibly weak compared to his best album, 2000's like water for chocolate. if you doubt hip hop's ability to rule incredibly hard (do these people still exist?) you need to hit that album up. i've been listening to way too much paramore also. there's something about how all the elements of their music come together that really nails it for me. hayley's voice is satisfying as are zach's drums and everything else sits nicely on top of that, like a well made cake. delicious.
catch.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
first visit to wal-mart.
so today i watched halloween (rob zombie's one) and part of devil's rejects. halloween was pretty impressive for what it was. rob zombie knows how to make legitimate horror flicks. he knows how to take the wind out of your sails and his films are uncompromisingly violent and genuinely disturbing. anyway. eventually courtnie and leslie came home and they brought this obscenely massive pizza from hot box. i had 3 slices cause it was too big so i put the rest in the fridge for tomorrow. stoked. we headed to james' house and then went to yoghurt story.
it's kind of like cold rock but with yoghurt, self serve and much cheaper. i got a tub (they only have one size but it's the size of the largest tub you can get at cold rock) and it cost me 6 bucks. 3 different yohurt flavours, fruit, m&ms, syrup etc. amazing. so much stuff. finished that off and then we headed to hastings where i got the 5-disc watchmen ultimate cut (hoowee) and lonesome dove (HOOWEE). then we went to wal-mart and i got some more cereal, 2-disc superbad and some tooth brushing stuff. oh and orange juice. then we headed home and now we're watching it's always sunny in philadelphia. it's good.
that's pretty much it.
it's kind of like cold rock but with yoghurt, self serve and much cheaper. i got a tub (they only have one size but it's the size of the largest tub you can get at cold rock) and it cost me 6 bucks. 3 different yohurt flavours, fruit, m&ms, syrup etc. amazing. so much stuff. finished that off and then we headed to hastings where i got the 5-disc watchmen ultimate cut (hoowee) and lonesome dove (HOOWEE). then we went to wal-mart and i got some more cereal, 2-disc superbad and some tooth brushing stuff. oh and orange juice. then we headed home and now we're watching it's always sunny in philadelphia. it's good.
that's pretty much it.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
still incredibly impressed...
with option paralysis. album has high replay value. i keep finding new bits that i like. there's a LOT of bits on the album.
let's see...last few days, same as usual. sit around, go for walks, watch movies and tv shows...what a world. listen to dylan, read about dylan, read about war. i'm halfway through band of brothers and it continues to rule ever so hard. i watched the 1999 film adaptation of titus with anthony hopkins which was pretty insane. the closing 3 minute shot is already one of my favourite shots i think i've seen in a film. really beautiful, especially with the music. i also watched cronenberg's scanners. pretty intense movie, not as relentlessly gooey as i was expecting though. what happened to michael ironside? that's what i want to know. he killed it in this flick.
been watching a life in pictures about stanley kubrick and getting super duper inspired to do film. he was a real master. i'm still scared to watch 2001 before i watch it because it's got that epic power about it. if you fully embrace the themes it's a hard film to take.
heading into dallas today to do some shopping and such, should be interesting. album is coming along nicely.
let's see...last few days, same as usual. sit around, go for walks, watch movies and tv shows...what a world. listen to dylan, read about dylan, read about war. i'm halfway through band of brothers and it continues to rule ever so hard. i watched the 1999 film adaptation of titus with anthony hopkins which was pretty insane. the closing 3 minute shot is already one of my favourite shots i think i've seen in a film. really beautiful, especially with the music. i also watched cronenberg's scanners. pretty intense movie, not as relentlessly gooey as i was expecting though. what happened to michael ironside? that's what i want to know. he killed it in this flick.
been watching a life in pictures about stanley kubrick and getting super duper inspired to do film. he was a real master. i'm still scared to watch 2001 before i watch it because it's got that epic power about it. if you fully embrace the themes it's a hard film to take.
heading into dallas today to do some shopping and such, should be interesting. album is coming along nicely.
Friday, March 26, 2010
losing track of time.
i forget specific days now. everything is just a mash.
i've been downloading a lot of WW2 documentaries and old films. i'm working my way through bob dylan's discog. i've been watching band of brothers. i've had some pizza. i've talked to people back home. i walk twice a day. olive (a dog) keeps peeing everywhere. my feet are freezing.
told you the next few entries were going to be boring...
i've been downloading a lot of WW2 documentaries and old films. i'm working my way through bob dylan's discog. i've been watching band of brothers. i've had some pizza. i've talked to people back home. i walk twice a day. olive (a dog) keeps peeing everywhere. my feet are freezing.
told you the next few entries were going to be boring...
Thursday, March 25, 2010
holy goodness.
i don't even know how to describe this in a way that does it justice. dillinger outdo themselves again like 10 times over on this disc.
you need it. if you enjoy music and what it can do, you need this.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
the next couple of blogs will probably be really boring.
so we woke up on sunday and no one really knew what was going on. it's alright, we were allowed to be frazzled after SXSW weren't we? mark watched children of men which ruled pretty hard. i'd forgotten how amazing it looked, such a well shot picture. joe played some modern warfare II.
ah-MAZING. after regrouping we worked out we were missing a few select personal items that were at venues in town so after getting ready we hit a few of those spots to try and retrieve those items. one was closed so we had to wait around a while for that. went back to colin's said hi/bye and headed back to the venue to pick up the item. still wasn't open so we went to the driskill and hung for a while before heading back to pick it up again. this time: success!
just to clarify, the sequence of the events mentioned above is dubious. we dilly dallied for a hell of a long time to wait for the venue to open (6pm) and i lost track of what happened before what.
somewhere in our dilly dallying we managed to acquire two dirty thirties (30 can packs of beer) of miller high life (one of which we later donated to lesley & courtney), a bottle of gin (which i recall was thrown out on account of a leaky lid and smelling disgusting) and several boxes worth of fruit juice smoothies (which were incredibly sugary and even the general flavour made us call the taste buds of "healthy" US citizens into question). the drive went for a long time. during it i watched the first episode of band of brothers (killer), the seventh continent (intense michael haneke flick about a family that commits group suicide...yes, it's a sombre film) and started watching black narcissus (really good 40's flick beautifully shot in technicolor...apparently the film that inspired martin scorsese into wanting to make movies for sure). probably listened to some levon helm in there somewhere also. we arrived in denton around midnight and immediately went out with all the d00dz (morgan, lance, lesley, courtney, wes, carly) to waffle house for waffles.
the waffles at waffle house are surprisingly good, and quite waffley. no ice cream though, minus one point. i had a sausage, egg and cheese biscuit (biscuts are english muffins for all you not-in-the-US-ers) and a hash brown as well. it was a darn tootin' feed. carly put freebird on the jukebox among other country tracks (i use the term country here as loosely as i've been using brackets in this blog entry) and we eventually left. came back to the homestead and watched some king of the hill which has ignited a pretty strong passion for it WITHIN MY SOUL. it's really quite funny. family guy was pretty good too, two episodes of that. i was waiting up for tim and eric but everyone wanted to sleep. soz guys.
woke up kinda late and we all headed out to find joe/jord/ro. we found them at mike's cafe and went to a thai restaurant around the corner to eat and meet. it was solid. from there we met up with morgan and headed to her cousin (i think)'s house to check out the area we were lookin' to record in. it turned out to rule pretty hard which was nice. joe/jord/i played chucked the pigskin around in the back yard for a while while some stuff was loaded into the new "studio" and then we headed back around to lesley/courtney's before dinner was to begin. joe and i (and sometimes morgan & lesley) watched the first 2 episodes of the pacific. it's shaping up to be pretty darn tootin. really got to me and made me want to research war, which is what i've started doing. joe's a war buff as is my friend aaron crawford. maybe one day i can converse with them what i've learned about war...maybe one day.
eventually we headed over to the recording house for a "grill" (bbq for all you non-usa-ers). carly grabbed the dirty 30 on the way out.
we got to ze party and i spent a bit of time on facebook but eventually de-hermitted myself and got food/socialized. had some good conversations with different peeps and the meat was delicious. carly tore it up on the rhodes at one point.
move over herbie hancock!
eventually we got tired/bored and headed back to lesley/courtney's house for king of the hill which was excellent once again. desire to sleep took over and so we indulged. woke up feeling gross but eventually shook it off. jon left back to australia today so we said our goodbyes. i watched kurosawa's rashomon (in honour of the 100th anniversary of his birth) and some of a WW2 doco that had too much music. went for an hour long walk around the burbs and got some tostitos dip and tortilla chips. relaxed again and now i'm working my way through bob dylan's discography. i think we're sussing a family dinner tonight.
catch.
ah-MAZING. after regrouping we worked out we were missing a few select personal items that were at venues in town so after getting ready we hit a few of those spots to try and retrieve those items. one was closed so we had to wait around a while for that. went back to colin's said hi/bye and headed back to the venue to pick up the item. still wasn't open so we went to the driskill and hung for a while before heading back to pick it up again. this time: success!
just to clarify, the sequence of the events mentioned above is dubious. we dilly dallied for a hell of a long time to wait for the venue to open (6pm) and i lost track of what happened before what.
somewhere in our dilly dallying we managed to acquire two dirty thirties (30 can packs of beer) of miller high life (one of which we later donated to lesley & courtney), a bottle of gin (which i recall was thrown out on account of a leaky lid and smelling disgusting) and several boxes worth of fruit juice smoothies (which were incredibly sugary and even the general flavour made us call the taste buds of "healthy" US citizens into question). the drive went for a long time. during it i watched the first episode of band of brothers (killer), the seventh continent (intense michael haneke flick about a family that commits group suicide...yes, it's a sombre film) and started watching black narcissus (really good 40's flick beautifully shot in technicolor...apparently the film that inspired martin scorsese into wanting to make movies for sure). probably listened to some levon helm in there somewhere also. we arrived in denton around midnight and immediately went out with all the d00dz (morgan, lance, lesley, courtney, wes, carly) to waffle house for waffles.
the waffles at waffle house are surprisingly good, and quite waffley. no ice cream though, minus one point. i had a sausage, egg and cheese biscuit (biscuts are english muffins for all you not-in-the-US-ers) and a hash brown as well. it was a darn tootin' feed. carly put freebird on the jukebox among other country tracks (i use the term country here as loosely as i've been using brackets in this blog entry) and we eventually left. came back to the homestead and watched some king of the hill which has ignited a pretty strong passion for it WITHIN MY SOUL. it's really quite funny. family guy was pretty good too, two episodes of that. i was waiting up for tim and eric but everyone wanted to sleep. soz guys.
woke up kinda late and we all headed out to find joe/jord/ro. we found them at mike's cafe and went to a thai restaurant around the corner to eat and meet. it was solid. from there we met up with morgan and headed to her cousin (i think)'s house to check out the area we were lookin' to record in. it turned out to rule pretty hard which was nice. joe/jord/i played chucked the pigskin around in the back yard for a while while some stuff was loaded into the new "studio" and then we headed back around to lesley/courtney's before dinner was to begin. joe and i (and sometimes morgan & lesley) watched the first 2 episodes of the pacific. it's shaping up to be pretty darn tootin. really got to me and made me want to research war, which is what i've started doing. joe's a war buff as is my friend aaron crawford. maybe one day i can converse with them what i've learned about war...maybe one day.
eventually we headed over to the recording house for a "grill" (bbq for all you non-usa-ers). carly grabbed the dirty 30 on the way out.
we got to ze party and i spent a bit of time on facebook but eventually de-hermitted myself and got food/socialized. had some good conversations with different peeps and the meat was delicious. carly tore it up on the rhodes at one point.
move over herbie hancock!
eventually we got tired/bored and headed back to lesley/courtney's house for king of the hill which was excellent once again. desire to sleep took over and so we indulged. woke up feeling gross but eventually shook it off. jon left back to australia today so we said our goodbyes. i watched kurosawa's rashomon (in honour of the 100th anniversary of his birth) and some of a WW2 doco that had too much music. went for an hour long walk around the burbs and got some tostitos dip and tortilla chips. relaxed again and now i'm working my way through bob dylan's discography. i think we're sussing a family dinner tonight.
catch.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
super whammy double day rundown part 2!
for the optimum experience, read the last post (part 1) before reading this one.
woke up in the morning and realised no one was home, i didn't have a phone and we had a show in a few hours. i panicked for a while and eventually jumped on skype, attempting to call rich with my one free skype call but it rang out. sick. i tried to buy some skype credit and the money came out of my account but my skype credit didn't arrive until after rich logged on and i could call him for free anyway. sick. sussed it out, jon eventually came and picked me up. we headed to the convention centre for the KCRW showcase, first show of the day.
this girl named lissie was playing and she is amazing. incredible throaty voice, effortless. real sweetheart. we played and it was a bit of a sterile environment but everyone was chilling out so that was okay. finished, loaded out and headed to the next venue: red eyed fly.
after loading in, joe and i got hot dawgs from some kingly gentleman.
they were okay. did i mention that it was absolutely FREEZING? it felt like it was about 5 degrees. celcius, that is. everything was cold. life was cold. anyway, we played about 4:30 and it was still cold.
it was so cold that rohin introduced the show by saying "hi, we're the middle east and this is going to be hilarious". it reminded of the paste party at galaxy the other day cause a number of things weren't quite right so we were all a little annoyed and played really angrily. which kind of added to the set. it turned into a good thing. NEG VIBE CONVERSION. talked to some cool cats after then loaded out and walked around for a bit. went to a beautiful hotel called the driskill to have some food but we ended up just sitting in the lounge drinking water. i got a little bored of that so i decided to walk around the hotel taking photos.
i must have looked like a real creep snooping around the hotel taking photos. i had to hide my camera a few times which would have looked even more suss, but heck the hotel was so nice i couldn't resist. after that i made my way down to 6th to grab some pizza and find maggie maes to load in for the next show, the aussie bbq. eventually ran into ro and we found everyone in maggie maes. started getting set up while washington soundchecked and then played. i really enjoyed them, the front lady meg has a killer voice and can hit those keys real nice too. dappled cities followed them with a super solid set. i'd never actually seen them live before and i was really impressed. they've got entirely their own vibe going on and i love that.
we followed dappled. it was nice playing to some more australians again. not that we don't appreciate the US crowds but there's something about playing to a room full of your own countrymen in another country that's weird and nice. we played a pretty good set i think, it was a bit of a celebration for us because it was the end of the intense grind that was sxsw 2010. met a bunch of cool people at the show including paul and moe, two gentlemen who'd travelled all the way to sxsw from near dallas just to see us cause they'd missed our denton show at the start of the trip. really straight up guys. there were two other guys that travelled to see us too but i forget their names, i feel bad for that. they were really encouraging and had most excellent tattoos.
i wandered off and got some more pizza and checked out the alamo ritz.
it's this beautiful cinema right on E 6th in the heart of austin. there's a few more alamos around austin but this is the original and (apparently) the best. besides being a nice big well designed ornate cinema it also has tables running along the front of every aisle of seats so you can order food before the show and eat it during. it also had a stage so i presume they had music and maybe sometimes theatre in there too. the lady who was running the door was nice enough to let me go in for a few minutes and watch what was playing (a documentary about rural studios which was really interesting) so i could see the cinema. here's a sneak peak of what it was like out on E 6th at around midnight on the last night of sxsw.
after that i headed back upstairs and rich pulled out some more cigars (i'm assuming they were "sxsw is over!" cigars) and we headed downstairs to light them up. i believe it was rich, don, joe, hootie (mel's husband, andrew), rohin and myself. jord popped in a few times too. jordan (TAO) got a good photo of don and i with our respective rolled leaf sticks.
don's a bit of a dude as you can see from this photo.
while finishing up our cigars we started to pack the van. a nice lady named diana was helping keep the cops off our back so we gave her a vinyl (the EP was recently released in the UK on 10") which she appreciated. i talked to her awhile and found out her favourite band was don castillo who i am going to look up. after that we decided to leave but mark and jord went ahead and we lost them so joe, bree, ro and myself went with don and rich to the hilton to have a quiet drink and wait for the van to come back.
don's a hell of a photographer and showed us some great shots. rich helped me get internet but it kept dropping out. thanks anyway rich! eventually the van came back, picked us up and we were outta there after saying goodbyes to don and rich. went back to colin's, found beds, sleep time.
i just woke up. we're driving to dallas today.
speak soon.
woke up in the morning and realised no one was home, i didn't have a phone and we had a show in a few hours. i panicked for a while and eventually jumped on skype, attempting to call rich with my one free skype call but it rang out. sick. i tried to buy some skype credit and the money came out of my account but my skype credit didn't arrive until after rich logged on and i could call him for free anyway. sick. sussed it out, jon eventually came and picked me up. we headed to the convention centre for the KCRW showcase, first show of the day.
this girl named lissie was playing and she is amazing. incredible throaty voice, effortless. real sweetheart. we played and it was a bit of a sterile environment but everyone was chilling out so that was okay. finished, loaded out and headed to the next venue: red eyed fly.
after loading in, joe and i got hot dawgs from some kingly gentleman.
they were okay. did i mention that it was absolutely FREEZING? it felt like it was about 5 degrees. celcius, that is. everything was cold. life was cold. anyway, we played about 4:30 and it was still cold.
it was so cold that rohin introduced the show by saying "hi, we're the middle east and this is going to be hilarious". it reminded of the paste party at galaxy the other day cause a number of things weren't quite right so we were all a little annoyed and played really angrily. which kind of added to the set. it turned into a good thing. NEG VIBE CONVERSION. talked to some cool cats after then loaded out and walked around for a bit. went to a beautiful hotel called the driskill to have some food but we ended up just sitting in the lounge drinking water. i got a little bored of that so i decided to walk around the hotel taking photos.
i must have looked like a real creep snooping around the hotel taking photos. i had to hide my camera a few times which would have looked even more suss, but heck the hotel was so nice i couldn't resist. after that i made my way down to 6th to grab some pizza and find maggie maes to load in for the next show, the aussie bbq. eventually ran into ro and we found everyone in maggie maes. started getting set up while washington soundchecked and then played. i really enjoyed them, the front lady meg has a killer voice and can hit those keys real nice too. dappled cities followed them with a super solid set. i'd never actually seen them live before and i was really impressed. they've got entirely their own vibe going on and i love that.
we followed dappled. it was nice playing to some more australians again. not that we don't appreciate the US crowds but there's something about playing to a room full of your own countrymen in another country that's weird and nice. we played a pretty good set i think, it was a bit of a celebration for us because it was the end of the intense grind that was sxsw 2010. met a bunch of cool people at the show including paul and moe, two gentlemen who'd travelled all the way to sxsw from near dallas just to see us cause they'd missed our denton show at the start of the trip. really straight up guys. there were two other guys that travelled to see us too but i forget their names, i feel bad for that. they were really encouraging and had most excellent tattoos.
i wandered off and got some more pizza and checked out the alamo ritz.
it's this beautiful cinema right on E 6th in the heart of austin. there's a few more alamos around austin but this is the original and (apparently) the best. besides being a nice big well designed ornate cinema it also has tables running along the front of every aisle of seats so you can order food before the show and eat it during. it also had a stage so i presume they had music and maybe sometimes theatre in there too. the lady who was running the door was nice enough to let me go in for a few minutes and watch what was playing (a documentary about rural studios which was really interesting) so i could see the cinema. here's a sneak peak of what it was like out on E 6th at around midnight on the last night of sxsw.
after that i headed back upstairs and rich pulled out some more cigars (i'm assuming they were "sxsw is over!" cigars) and we headed downstairs to light them up. i believe it was rich, don, joe, hootie (mel's husband, andrew), rohin and myself. jord popped in a few times too. jordan (TAO) got a good photo of don and i with our respective rolled leaf sticks.
don's a bit of a dude as you can see from this photo.
while finishing up our cigars we started to pack the van. a nice lady named diana was helping keep the cops off our back so we gave her a vinyl (the EP was recently released in the UK on 10") which she appreciated. i talked to her awhile and found out her favourite band was don castillo who i am going to look up. after that we decided to leave but mark and jord went ahead and we lost them so joe, bree, ro and myself went with don and rich to the hilton to have a quiet drink and wait for the van to come back.
don's a hell of a photographer and showed us some great shots. rich helped me get internet but it kept dropping out. thanks anyway rich! eventually the van came back, picked us up and we were outta there after saying goodbyes to don and rich. went back to colin's, found beds, sleep time.
i just woke up. we're driving to dallas today.
speak soon.
Saturday, March 20, 2010
super whammy double day rundown part 1! (this one is long..also: photos!)
okay so if memory serves, we left off with us hanging out at colin's house waiting to go out for dinner. let's pick up from there.
we ended up going to a place called wholefoods which was a food court styled eatery with a big supermarket kinda section as well. all natural awesome foods. we met up with morgan and colin (carly and lauren were also there but we met them upstairs) and made our way around to find some food. i got an intensely awesome burrito and a berry smoothie (legit). upstairs there was a stage and a real sweet neo-soul/reggae band playing. we sat and ate and were merry. after that we got some beer and headed to our hotel to hang out for a while. it got late, we got tired so some stayed and slept and the others went home and slept.
the next day we had to get up real early for a photo shoot with NME.
we shot some photos in an archway and a bunch of other places like a little stream and such. rich had some cigars so some of us used them in some of the photos. they were prettttty nice cigars. rich enjoyed them so much he decided to smoke two at once.
after that we headed to the IFC studio downtown to do another taping.
it was a weird vibe, felt extremely studio. the people were super nice though. food was great, amazing breakfast burritos. i was pumped about those. they had a ps3 with the new AvP game on it too. the best. i asked the IFC guy if he knew anything about IFC picking up gaspar noe's enter the void and he said he didn't know. i said that's cool. i guess i'll see it at some point in my life. after that i missed the van with my bag in it so i walked up to the hotel to get it but couldn't. on my way down to 6th i had the insanely good fortune to find an horse doing an acoustic thing on the side of the road.
after that i tried to find the myspace gifting/interview. took me a while but i eventually found it. missed the gifting pretty solidly (i got a tee shirt) but i might try and go back today. apparently they had cowboy boots. nuts. interview was really informal and sweet. i didn't talk most of the time but at the end i piped up a little. i mentioned that i wanted questlove to produce a middle east album but not before he produces the dillinger escape plan. good times. after that we headed down to an old power plant to do a taping for MTVu.
and my personal favourite:
looks like mark is a deity and has disciples gathered around him. best lucky shot ever.
after that we went exploring for a little while and found this massive underground room and started doing gregorian styled chants and chamber choir stuff in it.
sorry about me laughing and singing badly so much. i wish i'd let it go, it really sounded incredible in there. amazing. we played some american football for a while after that.
then we headed to the convention centre to get some shoes and other stuff. toms shoes. they're real nice, good american airport shoes we're told. you have to take your shoes off when you go through x-ray which is a real pain in the arse. thankyou tom for your shoes. they are gah-rate. after that we headed off to a lovely dinner with TAO (rich, don and jordan), mel (AU/NZ manager, she's a sweetie) and tre (from billions, our US booking agent) and all of us tme-ers. it was a rad mexican restaurant.
sorry the photo ain't so great. there's only so much my phone camera will do.
after that we all kind of split up. jack and bree went to see she & him and surfer blood, jordan (TAO, not TME) and i went to try and get into muse and the others hung out in the city or went home. jordan and i had no luck cause the passes we got were no good past a certain time so we went and met up with gary (he runs TAO, our management) and rich (yay rich you got a mention! actually i've mentioned you like 50 times already but...) for a small bite to eat and drinks. gary's got a lot of good stories. a LOT. really killer dude. from there we headed to a little bar which happened to have a rad view of muse so we caught the last 2 songs.
jordan and i hung out a while then started walking around aimlessly so he decided to go sleep and i decided to also do the same.
we headed to the hilton to pick up my bag and i got in line to wait for a taxi. after 45 minutes of waiting this limo service car pulls up and is all like "yeah man, only 10 bucks more than a cab". alright, sick. get in, drive back to colin's (the house we're at), all good. time to pay...$40. US dollars. the taxi would have been $10. i mean, the car was nice but i don't have that kind of money to just get home. oh well, had to pay and did. i got out and opened the door of what i thought was colin's house. walked up the stairs, headed for the lounge then realised the house was decorated entirely different to colin's. i heard girl's voices as i was walking up the stairs and they stopped when i was nearly at the lounge. i realised my error and simply turned around, walked down the stairs and left the house as soon as i could. NICE ONE MATE. entered the correct house, found a room, internetted for a bit and then crashed.
we ended up going to a place called wholefoods which was a food court styled eatery with a big supermarket kinda section as well. all natural awesome foods. we met up with morgan and colin (carly and lauren were also there but we met them upstairs) and made our way around to find some food. i got an intensely awesome burrito and a berry smoothie (legit). upstairs there was a stage and a real sweet neo-soul/reggae band playing. we sat and ate and were merry. after that we got some beer and headed to our hotel to hang out for a while. it got late, we got tired so some stayed and slept and the others went home and slept.
the next day we had to get up real early for a photo shoot with NME.
we shot some photos in an archway and a bunch of other places like a little stream and such. rich had some cigars so some of us used them in some of the photos. they were prettttty nice cigars. rich enjoyed them so much he decided to smoke two at once.
after that we headed to the IFC studio downtown to do another taping.
it was a weird vibe, felt extremely studio. the people were super nice though. food was great, amazing breakfast burritos. i was pumped about those. they had a ps3 with the new AvP game on it too. the best. i asked the IFC guy if he knew anything about IFC picking up gaspar noe's enter the void and he said he didn't know. i said that's cool. i guess i'll see it at some point in my life. after that i missed the van with my bag in it so i walked up to the hotel to get it but couldn't. on my way down to 6th i had the insanely good fortune to find an horse doing an acoustic thing on the side of the road.
after that i tried to find the myspace gifting/interview. took me a while but i eventually found it. missed the gifting pretty solidly (i got a tee shirt) but i might try and go back today. apparently they had cowboy boots. nuts. interview was really informal and sweet. i didn't talk most of the time but at the end i piped up a little. i mentioned that i wanted questlove to produce a middle east album but not before he produces the dillinger escape plan. good times. after that we headed down to an old power plant to do a taping for MTVu.
and my personal favourite:
looks like mark is a deity and has disciples gathered around him. best lucky shot ever.
after that we went exploring for a little while and found this massive underground room and started doing gregorian styled chants and chamber choir stuff in it.
sorry about me laughing and singing badly so much. i wish i'd let it go, it really sounded incredible in there. amazing. we played some american football for a while after that.
then we headed to the convention centre to get some shoes and other stuff. toms shoes. they're real nice, good american airport shoes we're told. you have to take your shoes off when you go through x-ray which is a real pain in the arse. thankyou tom for your shoes. they are gah-rate. after that we headed off to a lovely dinner with TAO (rich, don and jordan), mel (AU/NZ manager, she's a sweetie) and tre (from billions, our US booking agent) and all of us tme-ers. it was a rad mexican restaurant.
sorry the photo ain't so great. there's only so much my phone camera will do.
after that we all kind of split up. jack and bree went to see she & him and surfer blood, jordan (TAO, not TME) and i went to try and get into muse and the others hung out in the city or went home. jordan and i had no luck cause the passes we got were no good past a certain time so we went and met up with gary (he runs TAO, our management) and rich (yay rich you got a mention! actually i've mentioned you like 50 times already but...) for a small bite to eat and drinks. gary's got a lot of good stories. a LOT. really killer dude. from there we headed to a little bar which happened to have a rad view of muse so we caught the last 2 songs.
jordan and i hung out a while then started walking around aimlessly so he decided to go sleep and i decided to also do the same.
we headed to the hilton to pick up my bag and i got in line to wait for a taxi. after 45 minutes of waiting this limo service car pulls up and is all like "yeah man, only 10 bucks more than a cab". alright, sick. get in, drive back to colin's (the house we're at), all good. time to pay...$40. US dollars. the taxi would have been $10. i mean, the car was nice but i don't have that kind of money to just get home. oh well, had to pay and did. i got out and opened the door of what i thought was colin's house. walked up the stairs, headed for the lounge then realised the house was decorated entirely different to colin's. i heard girl's voices as i was walking up the stairs and they stopped when i was nearly at the lounge. i realised my error and simply turned around, walked down the stairs and left the house as soon as i could. NICE ONE MATE. entered the correct house, found a room, internetted for a bit and then crashed.
Thursday, March 18, 2010
hectic + party mode + locked out + etc.
after having some wind down time at home last night we headed into town to get the show sussed. it was in a little outdoor tent thingo near the centre of the city and it was packed which made it fun to get through to set up our stuff. the band before us (here we go magic) were uh-mazing. really solid. drummer was super tight and had a rock solid groove. one of those bands you watch and don't want to play after. after they'd finished we set up: for the un-initiated, our setups tend to take 25-35 minutes most times to get everything right. we figured it's better to have everything sussed and play a better show than inevitably sucking due to how many gears there are in the tme machine. too much can go wrong.
anyway, we got set up and played the show. it went pretty good. jack's bass cut out at the end of blood which was kinda funny, we all just played on and extended the ending. i put everything i had into the closing moments of the song and was stumbling around for a while afterward. we loaded out (surprisingly stress free given the venue/situation) and stood around out the front meeting people we've been speaking to forever but haven't met yet. i finally met gary (he runs TAO, our management company), jordan (he's the TAO web guy), don (helps manage us at TAO), will (works for chess club who put out the EP as a 10" in the UK), james (susses radio for us in the UK) and trey (our booking agent at billions agency). i'm sure i met a few other people but they're all i can remember, it was a bit to take in all at once.
trey is super cool. we talked music and such for a while. turns out he used to play for pedro the lion and starflyer 59 and a band that used to be on tooth and nail. he came up through that whole scene. blew my mind! super sweet guy. from there we headed to a place called stubbs where some band was playing that we caught the end of. spoon were playing in the other room and apparently broke up on stage that night. might just be a vicious rumour though. morgan and i tried to get in but we got denied. whooooopzzz. i talked to gary for a while about film and that was a most excellent talk. we discussed scorsese, fincher, nolan...the man knew his films. we both had "lean back and raise voice out of sheer excitement and passion about discussed subect" moments about different films we each brought up. it was killer. talked to trey again for a while and a few others. morgan/carly/lauren were there too which ruled.
we decided we were hungry so we went from there to try and find somewhere to eat. the girls knew about some apparently killer place which took us about a half hour to find even though we were right near it the whole time. WHEEEEEEE. waited there for a while. lance/colin/etc. all showed up hoping to have a sweet big meal with our crew but we decided to bail cause we had to wait ages and it was approaching 3am. we headed back to the house we're staying at to find it locked. we called the girls and sussed where they were staying, turns out it was this MASSIVE (and i mean massive) house which seemed to be occupied by mad austin longhorn fans (they're a college football team from austin). it was really something. we kept walking through it and it just kept going! they had a massive hall/room with TWO TABLE TENNIS TABLES. TWO. who has one let alone two? gosh. we sat around for a bit and then slept.
AWAKE at 8:45am, woohoo. headed into town and found some mexican to eat for breakfast. nothing like eggs scrambled with red onion, tomato, beans and other deliciousness. i got pretty pumped about it. we picked ro up and headed to the tequila mockingbird studios where we did the KCRW session (suss it at http://www.kcrw.com/media-player/mediaPlayer2.html?type=audio&id=mb100318the_middle_east if you feel so inclined...mix ain't great though). after that we went to the next show to load in our gear. this rad band who's name i forget was playing even though i asked the drummer like 4 times. sorry guy. up next after them was a band called the low anthem from rhode island...i don't think i've seen a band that good in a long time. check them out, stat. it was like tom waits' backing band got bob dylan for a singer. the set opened pretty quiet with double bass, clarinet, pump organ and a notable instance of the singer whistling into two mobiles phones calling each other on speakerphone creating an amazing swampy insect sound...so good. the set finished with the band-esque loud gospel type singing dirty blues country excellent.
as you can tell, i was impressed.
the day was running late so we had to cut our set short after setting up. we ended up playing 4 songs finishing with western which is our loudest one. it got REALLY loud. probably the most rock n roll the middle east have ever been and ever will get. it was rad, definitely stoked on the show. after that we hung out for a bit then loaded out and packed the van while the main guys did an interview for NME. they later said it was the vest interview they've ever done. the interviewer was real sweet. keen to see if it gets printed. back home we go (where i am now) to chill for a bit before we head in to have dinner where we tried to have dinner at 3am this morning.
i think this is my longest entry yet!
speak soon.
anyway, we got set up and played the show. it went pretty good. jack's bass cut out at the end of blood which was kinda funny, we all just played on and extended the ending. i put everything i had into the closing moments of the song and was stumbling around for a while afterward. we loaded out (surprisingly stress free given the venue/situation) and stood around out the front meeting people we've been speaking to forever but haven't met yet. i finally met gary (he runs TAO, our management company), jordan (he's the TAO web guy), don (helps manage us at TAO), will (works for chess club who put out the EP as a 10" in the UK), james (susses radio for us in the UK) and trey (our booking agent at billions agency). i'm sure i met a few other people but they're all i can remember, it was a bit to take in all at once.
trey is super cool. we talked music and such for a while. turns out he used to play for pedro the lion and starflyer 59 and a band that used to be on tooth and nail. he came up through that whole scene. blew my mind! super sweet guy. from there we headed to a place called stubbs where some band was playing that we caught the end of. spoon were playing in the other room and apparently broke up on stage that night. might just be a vicious rumour though. morgan and i tried to get in but we got denied. whooooopzzz. i talked to gary for a while about film and that was a most excellent talk. we discussed scorsese, fincher, nolan...the man knew his films. we both had "lean back and raise voice out of sheer excitement and passion about discussed subect" moments about different films we each brought up. it was killer. talked to trey again for a while and a few others. morgan/carly/lauren were there too which ruled.
we decided we were hungry so we went from there to try and find somewhere to eat. the girls knew about some apparently killer place which took us about a half hour to find even though we were right near it the whole time. WHEEEEEEE. waited there for a while. lance/colin/etc. all showed up hoping to have a sweet big meal with our crew but we decided to bail cause we had to wait ages and it was approaching 3am. we headed back to the house we're staying at to find it locked. we called the girls and sussed where they were staying, turns out it was this MASSIVE (and i mean massive) house which seemed to be occupied by mad austin longhorn fans (they're a college football team from austin). it was really something. we kept walking through it and it just kept going! they had a massive hall/room with TWO TABLE TENNIS TABLES. TWO. who has one let alone two? gosh. we sat around for a bit and then slept.
AWAKE at 8:45am, woohoo. headed into town and found some mexican to eat for breakfast. nothing like eggs scrambled with red onion, tomato, beans and other deliciousness. i got pretty pumped about it. we picked ro up and headed to the tequila mockingbird studios where we did the KCRW session (suss it at http://www.kcrw.com/media-player/mediaPlayer2.html?type=audio&id=mb100318the_middle_east if you feel so inclined...mix ain't great though). after that we went to the next show to load in our gear. this rad band who's name i forget was playing even though i asked the drummer like 4 times. sorry guy. up next after them was a band called the low anthem from rhode island...i don't think i've seen a band that good in a long time. check them out, stat. it was like tom waits' backing band got bob dylan for a singer. the set opened pretty quiet with double bass, clarinet, pump organ and a notable instance of the singer whistling into two mobiles phones calling each other on speakerphone creating an amazing swampy insect sound...so good. the set finished with the band-esque loud gospel type singing dirty blues country excellent.
as you can tell, i was impressed.
the day was running late so we had to cut our set short after setting up. we ended up playing 4 songs finishing with western which is our loudest one. it got REALLY loud. probably the most rock n roll the middle east have ever been and ever will get. it was rad, definitely stoked on the show. after that we hung out for a bit then loaded out and packed the van while the main guys did an interview for NME. they later said it was the vest interview they've ever done. the interviewer was real sweet. keen to see if it gets printed. back home we go (where i am now) to chill for a bit before we head in to have dinner where we tried to have dinner at 3am this morning.
i think this is my longest entry yet!
speak soon.
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
modern warfare 2, gibson and delicious soda/tacos.
stayed up awhile last night. joe finished modern warfare 2. i am still impressed by that. i downloaded a bunch of public domain flicks and some tv shows. might have to get onto torrenting the pacific soon. I LOVE THAT AMERICA DOESN'T HAVE DOWNLOAD LIMITS.
slept for what felt like ages only to wake up and find i'd slept 5 hours. i had hectic dreams so i guess that made it seem longer than it was. i slept a little more, got up, got ready, put my boots on and headed out the door with the others for the first item on the agenda for sxsw: KEXP studio taping at the gibson showroom. jon had already gone ahead and loaded the gear in/set some of it up. whattaguy. got comfortable, found an amazing all-natural passionfruit soda (glass bottles, baby...the way, the truth, the light...i love the US so far if only for this) and tried to find internet (couldn't find internet).
cause it was the gibson showroom we had to tape over any guitar logo that wasn't gibson. fender amps/gweets were taped up and instruments were swapped for gibson ones. bit weird. i got to play a slingerland kit with gene krupa's initials on the front. really cool. 26x16 kick too. hoo mama, that's a man's kit. it sounded just great. i fiddled around while everyone got ready with their respective 'struments. soundcheck, got ready then the taping happened around 1:30pm. we did okay, cameras didn't seem to throw us off or anything. i thought i was gunna be terrified. i think it'll be on kexp.org soon for anyone who's interested. the room was super quiet, i accidently hit my hatrick a few times. couple of stray jingles can really make you feel awkward when it's silent.
packed up and headed to some food. joe, jack and i got tacos from jack in the box. 2 for 99c. that's pretty amazing, no? i enjoyed them. like pineapple a LOT. got some OJ and banana chips from ze superb-market and we headed back to the homestead where i am now. don't have to be in the city for a little while, just been internetting and listening to the new dillinger album (stream it from their myspace: myspace.com/dillingerescapeplan) with some paramore thrown in for good measure.
speak soon.
slept for what felt like ages only to wake up and find i'd slept 5 hours. i had hectic dreams so i guess that made it seem longer than it was. i slept a little more, got up, got ready, put my boots on and headed out the door with the others for the first item on the agenda for sxsw: KEXP studio taping at the gibson showroom. jon had already gone ahead and loaded the gear in/set some of it up. whattaguy. got comfortable, found an amazing all-natural passionfruit soda (glass bottles, baby...the way, the truth, the light...i love the US so far if only for this) and tried to find internet (couldn't find internet).
cause it was the gibson showroom we had to tape over any guitar logo that wasn't gibson. fender amps/gweets were taped up and instruments were swapped for gibson ones. bit weird. i got to play a slingerland kit with gene krupa's initials on the front. really cool. 26x16 kick too. hoo mama, that's a man's kit. it sounded just great. i fiddled around while everyone got ready with their respective 'struments. soundcheck, got ready then the taping happened around 1:30pm. we did okay, cameras didn't seem to throw us off or anything. i thought i was gunna be terrified. i think it'll be on kexp.org soon for anyone who's interested. the room was super quiet, i accidently hit my hatrick a few times. couple of stray jingles can really make you feel awkward when it's silent.
packed up and headed to some food. joe, jack and i got tacos from jack in the box. 2 for 99c. that's pretty amazing, no? i enjoyed them. like pineapple a LOT. got some OJ and banana chips from ze superb-market and we headed back to the homestead where i am now. don't have to be in the city for a little while, just been internetting and listening to the new dillinger album (stream it from their myspace: myspace.com/dillingerescapeplan) with some paramore thrown in for good measure.
speak soon.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
gotta stop staying up until like 5:30am.
when i tongue my front teeth they feel shiny and clean. this is how i judge whether or not i've eaten badly on any given day. fun fact.
also: from now on i'll be putting in brackets some info about random names i may mention to give you context. if there's any names you want to know about that i forget to do this for, leave a comment and i'll hop to it.
i went to bed too late and woke up at about 2pm. rohin had woken me a little earlier to see if i wanted to go play pool in a "real texas pool hall". i was keen but i fell back asleep. after eating nothing for breakfast we (rohin, jack and i) headed into town to meet claire (she's a music promoter and manages art vs. science) and once we'd done that we started walking toward the thrift/vintage shops to find boots and coats. it took ages to get there, we must have walked for a half hour. we stopped at a cafe and i got an orange juice and some yoghurt with granola. we exchanged "unfortunate accidents involving stray object trajectory and placement" stories.
claire had her phone fall out of her pocket while walking down the street once and into a bucket of water that just happened to be there. i told them about powys' phone flying out of his pocket as he jumped for joy on the street after he, ben and i had our application for bruce approved. his phone flew out of his pocket and got run over by an 18 wheeler. i was the only one who saw it (in the rear vision mirror), i had to tell him he'd done it when he got to the car with ben and i inside. the phone still worked. incredible! then rohin told us that two weeks ago in townsville someone was mowing their lawn with a big heavy duty mower. one of the blades came loose, flew out of the mower and about 30m across the street cutting a woman's head clean off. the blade continued on for about 50m after that. people walked up cause they'd seen something weird to find a body and a head lying a few metres away. this actually happened. what a world huh.
claire looked up some stores on her blackberry so we started making our way around. first place we went was allen's boots. they had more boots than i have ever before seen in my life. i found one pair for $1200. i found a pair of sea turtle (yuck) boots for $500. the boots i wanted were around $300. toooo much. we moved on. at a st vincent de paul i bought a mid-length brown leather jacket (double breasted) for about $50. would have been hundreds new and at least $150 at a vintage store in australia. insane. jack got some boots from there also. we found a vintage store that had a ping pong table in it. ro and i had a few games. definitely going back there.
we ended up at a store called new bohemia where i found my boots. they fit like a glove. dark red (almost black). called deep oxblood. sounds nice and southern huh? bought those suckers, snatched them right up. from there we checked out a few other places before ending up at an organic grocery. jack got some coke, i got carbonated grapefruit juice & a bottle of water and claire got carbonated apple juice. we enjoyed those drinks until jon and the rest of the guys came and picked us up to go register for our SXSW passes. after a bit of parking confusion we finally registered and went for a walk to meet rich (our US/world manager) and then go say hi to aaron (he runs spunk). after saying hi to aaron we all (minus claire and jord) walked back to the van and came home where i had some tomato soup with some rice & adzuki bean chips. nice. also jon/joe cooked some fajitas so i had some of them too. i am now full.
tomorrow...begins hell.
speak soon.
also: from now on i'll be putting in brackets some info about random names i may mention to give you context. if there's any names you want to know about that i forget to do this for, leave a comment and i'll hop to it.
i went to bed too late and woke up at about 2pm. rohin had woken me a little earlier to see if i wanted to go play pool in a "real texas pool hall". i was keen but i fell back asleep. after eating nothing for breakfast we (rohin, jack and i) headed into town to meet claire (she's a music promoter and manages art vs. science) and once we'd done that we started walking toward the thrift/vintage shops to find boots and coats. it took ages to get there, we must have walked for a half hour. we stopped at a cafe and i got an orange juice and some yoghurt with granola. we exchanged "unfortunate accidents involving stray object trajectory and placement" stories.
claire had her phone fall out of her pocket while walking down the street once and into a bucket of water that just happened to be there. i told them about powys' phone flying out of his pocket as he jumped for joy on the street after he, ben and i had our application for bruce approved. his phone flew out of his pocket and got run over by an 18 wheeler. i was the only one who saw it (in the rear vision mirror), i had to tell him he'd done it when he got to the car with ben and i inside. the phone still worked. incredible! then rohin told us that two weeks ago in townsville someone was mowing their lawn with a big heavy duty mower. one of the blades came loose, flew out of the mower and about 30m across the street cutting a woman's head clean off. the blade continued on for about 50m after that. people walked up cause they'd seen something weird to find a body and a head lying a few metres away. this actually happened. what a world huh.
claire looked up some stores on her blackberry so we started making our way around. first place we went was allen's boots. they had more boots than i have ever before seen in my life. i found one pair for $1200. i found a pair of sea turtle (yuck) boots for $500. the boots i wanted were around $300. toooo much. we moved on. at a st vincent de paul i bought a mid-length brown leather jacket (double breasted) for about $50. would have been hundreds new and at least $150 at a vintage store in australia. insane. jack got some boots from there also. we found a vintage store that had a ping pong table in it. ro and i had a few games. definitely going back there.
we ended up at a store called new bohemia where i found my boots. they fit like a glove. dark red (almost black). called deep oxblood. sounds nice and southern huh? bought those suckers, snatched them right up. from there we checked out a few other places before ending up at an organic grocery. jack got some coke, i got carbonated grapefruit juice & a bottle of water and claire got carbonated apple juice. we enjoyed those drinks until jon and the rest of the guys came and picked us up to go register for our SXSW passes. after a bit of parking confusion we finally registered and went for a walk to meet rich (our US/world manager) and then go say hi to aaron (he runs spunk). after saying hi to aaron we all (minus claire and jord) walked back to the van and came home where i had some tomato soup with some rice & adzuki bean chips. nice. also jon/joe cooked some fajitas so i had some of them too. i am now full.
tomorrow...begins hell.
speak soon.
failed to enter the void.
i ran down the street in the rain...got right to the ticket box in line...sold out. next screening is the same time as one of our sets. sigh. looks like i'll have to wait until it gets released which could be a while. boo hoo right?
Monday, March 15, 2010
hangs and driving.
so after the show we went and got some hot box pizza. it's this franchise pizza outlet that have a pretty rad one going on denton. a bunch of our friends work there and so they gave us a lot of free pizza. hellooo money saver. after that we headed back to leslie and courtney's house for a bit of a party. apparently shiner bock was the beer we definitely had to try, and so we did. it was pretty sweet. also had some millers high life which wasn't as good, but canned beer is rarely as good as bottled anyway. had some interesting conversations with wes and lance about ayn rand, politics in our native countries and architecture. also leslie/courtney told me a whole bunch of stories about living in the south like how leslie's dad would wake her up at night when she was a kid to "hold thuh torch while ah shoot surm armadillas", and how she was the prom queen and the song they danced to was "freebird" by lynyrd skynrd. in-credible.
we settled down around 4am then leslie/coutney caught me before i went to bed reminding me they were going to introduce me to metalocalypse, so we watched that for the next couple of hours and talked about metal before i went to bed. after a few hours sleep we all got up and went to breakfast at some place, the name of which i forget. then we all went into the square (centre of denton) and looked at all the thrift stores and boutiques. i bought the great gatsby on lance's recommendation which i'll begin after i finish all the books i brought over in the first place. i found some amazing snakeskin boots but the toecap was coming loose and digging into my toes. didn't stop joe from swooping in not long after and buying them. sigh. i bought a sweet leather vest.
we went and had some more hotbox which was delicious and said goodbyes (or "we'll see you in austin"s) before picking up the nord from UPS and heading on our way to austin. we stopped at a home depot (which is basically a bunnings warehouse) and got a power inverter so we could laptop for the rest of the trip. i torrented the oscars the other night and tried watching it but the second half of the file was broken. lame. we carried on and now we're in austin. i'm trying to get to the screening of enter the void at midnight but it's not looking good. sigh.
speak soon.
we settled down around 4am then leslie/coutney caught me before i went to bed reminding me they were going to introduce me to metalocalypse, so we watched that for the next couple of hours and talked about metal before i went to bed. after a few hours sleep we all got up and went to breakfast at some place, the name of which i forget. then we all went into the square (centre of denton) and looked at all the thrift stores and boutiques. i bought the great gatsby on lance's recommendation which i'll begin after i finish all the books i brought over in the first place. i found some amazing snakeskin boots but the toecap was coming loose and digging into my toes. didn't stop joe from swooping in not long after and buying them. sigh. i bought a sweet leather vest.
we went and had some more hotbox which was delicious and said goodbyes (or "we'll see you in austin"s) before picking up the nord from UPS and heading on our way to austin. we stopped at a home depot (which is basically a bunnings warehouse) and got a power inverter so we could laptop for the rest of the trip. i torrented the oscars the other night and tried watching it but the second half of the file was broken. lame. we carried on and now we're in austin. i'm trying to get to the screening of enter the void at midnight but it's not looking good. sigh.
speak soon.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
just finished first US show...
...and it went surprisingly well :)
we played alright, sound was pretty good and the crowd seemed to dig it. maybe just because we're australian, not sure yet. some guy said we were better than the flaming lips but i think he was drunk. sorry guy, we aren't better. have you even SEEN the flaming lips?! dudes have orange EVERYTHING and massive inflatable balls and everything. we have a banjo. no competition.
i think we're getting pizza from this place called hot box. they do that thing that nandos in australia do where they use all this sexual innuendo on their shirts like "want what's in my box?" and junk like that. ugh. solid pies though.
speak soon.
we played alright, sound was pretty good and the crowd seemed to dig it. maybe just because we're australian, not sure yet. some guy said we were better than the flaming lips but i think he was drunk. sorry guy, we aren't better. have you even SEEN the flaming lips?! dudes have orange EVERYTHING and massive inflatable balls and everything. we have a banjo. no competition.
i think we're getting pizza from this place called hot box. they do that thing that nandos in australia do where they use all this sexual innuendo on their shirts like "want what's in my box?" and junk like that. ugh. solid pies though.
speak soon.
show tonight.
i'm at the venue we're playing at tonight, it's called dan's silverleaf. from memory, the last post ended when we were at house of blues?
we practiced at the house of blues in dallas. it was really something. dan acknroyd knows how to run a classy joint. after that we went to the apartment where our manager rich was staying which was pretty rad. from there we went to the mavs/knicks game at the american airways arena. i wasn't expecting how huge the arena was...it was the size of rod laver arena in melbourne, maybe a tiny bit smaller. just for basketball! amazing. i had a "grilled cheese sandwich" which was a burger bun with a piece of chicken in it, no salads or sauces. not quite what i was expecting...
from there we headed back to the house we're staying at after dropping by to pick up the rest of the guys from the apartment. when we got back to the house they had the makings of a party so we hung out for a bit and then retreated into the loungeroom to set up for sleeping. we watched knocked up for a while too, weird US edited television version. bleeps and everything. overdubbed lines over the cussing. amazing! i went to sleep about 4am and woke up around 12:45pm. we lost an hour due to some daylight savings styled thing which was weird but oh well.
from there we went to a studio run by a gentleman named eric who plays in a killer band called midlake. he let us practice there awhile and then we packed, eric came, locked up, and then we left. eric said he'd make it to the show tonight, we said rad. i hope he can make it, he ruled. we went to the venue which was just down the road and unloaded. rich, joe, jack and i went and got some traditional ice cream from this ice cream parlour in the centre of denton. it was super kickarse. i had butter ice cream and i felt my teeth melt as i ate. from there we went to get dinner for everyone else, salads and these things called po-boys. joe got a gator one. it tasted like popcorn chicken.
i just managed to fix my mouse pointer and now i'm sitting outside at dan's silverleaf, the bar we're playing tonight. the opening band playing now came all the way from dublin to play! i guess they're doing sxsw as well. also i learned we might be in austin in time for me to go to the midnight screening of enter the void (gaspar noe's new flick) at the film fest. i'm super excited.
i better go set up.
speak soon.
we practiced at the house of blues in dallas. it was really something. dan acknroyd knows how to run a classy joint. after that we went to the apartment where our manager rich was staying which was pretty rad. from there we went to the mavs/knicks game at the american airways arena. i wasn't expecting how huge the arena was...it was the size of rod laver arena in melbourne, maybe a tiny bit smaller. just for basketball! amazing. i had a "grilled cheese sandwich" which was a burger bun with a piece of chicken in it, no salads or sauces. not quite what i was expecting...
from there we headed back to the house we're staying at after dropping by to pick up the rest of the guys from the apartment. when we got back to the house they had the makings of a party so we hung out for a bit and then retreated into the loungeroom to set up for sleeping. we watched knocked up for a while too, weird US edited television version. bleeps and everything. overdubbed lines over the cussing. amazing! i went to sleep about 4am and woke up around 12:45pm. we lost an hour due to some daylight savings styled thing which was weird but oh well.
from there we went to a studio run by a gentleman named eric who plays in a killer band called midlake. he let us practice there awhile and then we packed, eric came, locked up, and then we left. eric said he'd make it to the show tonight, we said rad. i hope he can make it, he ruled. we went to the venue which was just down the road and unloaded. rich, joe, jack and i went and got some traditional ice cream from this ice cream parlour in the centre of denton. it was super kickarse. i had butter ice cream and i felt my teeth melt as i ate. from there we went to get dinner for everyone else, salads and these things called po-boys. joe got a gator one. it tasted like popcorn chicken.
i just managed to fix my mouse pointer and now i'm sitting outside at dan's silverleaf, the bar we're playing tonight. the opening band playing now came all the way from dublin to play! i guess they're doing sxsw as well. also i learned we might be in austin in time for me to go to the midnight screening of enter the void (gaspar noe's new flick) at the film fest. i'm super excited.
i better go set up.
speak soon.
Saturday, March 13, 2010
also:
american food is TERRIBLE. everything is greasy. buns in burgers disintergrate from the grease. doves cry from the grease. it is the worst. will not eat here.
first few days in the you ess of aye.
ben nicely drove me to brisbane airport on the 11th. we hugged, i went inside and re-packed half of my stuff into the accordian and cymbal cases. some nice virgin blue lady seemed fascinated by this and offered to move me up to an earlier flight so that's what happened. i left at 3:30pm instead of 4pm. i passed katie and adrian as i was rushing to the gate. hi and bye.
flight was fine, finished michael clayton and started cheyenne autumn. got to sydney, found my way to international. made final calls to people, got a bit of US monies. i spent the last of my AU change on a chocolate bunny that somehow found its' way into my sinuses and i spent the rest of the trip with a tissue jammed up one nostril. SEXY. the flight was surprisingly solid. i watched jennifer's body (not that great), precious (intense and great), mad max (excellent) and the men who stare at goats (not bad but not really good). the food was alright too.
we got to LA, a bit disoriented but that's alright. found our way to the american airways terminal, checked in, got on our flight to dallas. we arrived at around 12:30am on the 12th of march. that's disorienting. we found the shuttle to our hotel and headed there with allllll our gear (lots). after picking rooms jord, joe, mark, jon and i walked up the road to the service station. i had a chicken burger from whataburger (not very nice) and a whole lot of water which ruled. came back, slept.
we woke up at 12:10pm on the 12th. we were supposed to check out at midday, oops. jon and mark were driving around dallas a bit lost so we took everything downstairs and took over the foyer for a while after checking out. then we went to guitar centre and bought nothing. then we went to another guitar centre and bought...wait for it...
...a 1966 ludwig kit, silver sparkle. 2 12" rack toms, 16" floor and 22" kick. AMAZING kit. it's actually ridiculous. broke the bank a little but it's...wow. amazing. we also splashed out and bought a 1970 ludwig snare, white pearl. such an insane snare. i was in drum gear heaven. also jord bought a gibson J45. do you realise how insanely good of a guitar that is? wow. seriously. amazing. we got bags and hardware for the drums too and decided then was a good time to leave.
we then went to this place called jason's deli and had dinner. it was real nice. they gave us free stuff because we torked funny. then we drove to denton and met up with morgan who is this rad girl we're staying/not staying with (some are staying there, others at another house). we hung for a while with her and her housemates lauren and carly. i think i got their names wrong except for morgan. we headed off to the party which was at this sweet old house on a street with all these massive plantation houses. pretty much the coolest street ever.
we hung out there, had pretty sweet pizza and pretty average light beer and then went back to the houses to sleep. i slept by the door on the floor with a little blanket and it was freezing. i was freezing. it was cold. freezing. i was cold. brrrr.
woke up this morning, started reading the fountainhead by ayn rand, got 26 pages in before getting picked up by the van with everyone else. then we got really lost for like 2 hours and showed up at the house of blues late for rehearsal. we set up, rehearsed, packed up and now i'm sitting here.
tonight is mavs vs. knicks. it will be amazing and i cannot wait.
more soon.
flight was fine, finished michael clayton and started cheyenne autumn. got to sydney, found my way to international. made final calls to people, got a bit of US monies. i spent the last of my AU change on a chocolate bunny that somehow found its' way into my sinuses and i spent the rest of the trip with a tissue jammed up one nostril. SEXY. the flight was surprisingly solid. i watched jennifer's body (not that great), precious (intense and great), mad max (excellent) and the men who stare at goats (not bad but not really good). the food was alright too.
we got to LA, a bit disoriented but that's alright. found our way to the american airways terminal, checked in, got on our flight to dallas. we arrived at around 12:30am on the 12th of march. that's disorienting. we found the shuttle to our hotel and headed there with allllll our gear (lots). after picking rooms jord, joe, mark, jon and i walked up the road to the service station. i had a chicken burger from whataburger (not very nice) and a whole lot of water which ruled. came back, slept.
we woke up at 12:10pm on the 12th. we were supposed to check out at midday, oops. jon and mark were driving around dallas a bit lost so we took everything downstairs and took over the foyer for a while after checking out. then we went to guitar centre and bought nothing. then we went to another guitar centre and bought...wait for it...
...a 1966 ludwig kit, silver sparkle. 2 12" rack toms, 16" floor and 22" kick. AMAZING kit. it's actually ridiculous. broke the bank a little but it's...wow. amazing. we also splashed out and bought a 1970 ludwig snare, white pearl. such an insane snare. i was in drum gear heaven. also jord bought a gibson J45. do you realise how insanely good of a guitar that is? wow. seriously. amazing. we got bags and hardware for the drums too and decided then was a good time to leave.
we then went to this place called jason's deli and had dinner. it was real nice. they gave us free stuff because we torked funny. then we drove to denton and met up with morgan who is this rad girl we're staying/not staying with (some are staying there, others at another house). we hung for a while with her and her housemates lauren and carly. i think i got their names wrong except for morgan. we headed off to the party which was at this sweet old house on a street with all these massive plantation houses. pretty much the coolest street ever.
we hung out there, had pretty sweet pizza and pretty average light beer and then went back to the houses to sleep. i slept by the door on the floor with a little blanket and it was freezing. i was freezing. it was cold. freezing. i was cold. brrrr.
woke up this morning, started reading the fountainhead by ayn rand, got 26 pages in before getting picked up by the van with everyone else. then we got really lost for like 2 hours and showed up at the house of blues late for rehearsal. we set up, rehearsed, packed up and now i'm sitting here.
tonight is mavs vs. knicks. it will be amazing and i cannot wait.
more soon.
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