Two weeks on the new job of playing with a digital camera for a living and it's going quite well, only downside that it takes me nearly an hour and twenty minutes going to and from work, at least I'm working with people in my own fucking age group.
Saturday: Got down the Tap, John gives me a flyer for ZOO8, find out that there are only two bands I want to see quite early on the last day, might do what I did for Download last year and leave Sunday night. Picked up a three inch CDR version of the Lakes split with Zettasaur at the merch table (I've heard rumours of such a thing but not until mine eyes perceived it did I know it existed).
The Dead Formats: Something about them really irked me, it could have been that they were all dressed really trendy (I know that's really shallow of me but when I see a band for the first time that I wasn't previously aware of, image is the first thing that hits me) or that they needlessly had two singers, one doing gruff vocals, the other melodic (there are very few bands that can pull that off, give me the first two Cave In albums any day of the week), then a couple of songs into their set it hit me; this is like Hardcore aimed at people who watch MTV2.
Lakes: About fucking time these lot played with Gallows, what with them having two members of Winter In June and Gallows having the old bass player "this is the first time Gallows have watched us play so I hope we're good enough for you Rock Stars" I've had trouble thinking of how I would describe Lakes to someone else other than Spazzy Post-Hardcore but how's this; Swing Kids meets At The Drive-In, that sound like a fair comparison, I think so. They managed to turn the intro of Da Ting into mini Jazz session and revealed that they've got an album on the way "as soon as Ben (Phillips, The Guillaume Seam, Square Of Black, City Of Dis studio) gets off his arse and mixes it."
Gallows: Had a chat with Chris before they went on, he told me his booked a couple of support bands for Fucked Up, I won't be a cunt and blab but I will say this, it's going to be a fucking good show. When Gallows start the crowd surges to the front, Chris has to play stage hand and stops the monitors from being pushed forward. I manage to position myself at the side of the stage behind the PA, I get a lot of good photos and a couple of mediocre videos. They went through all the songs you'd expect and much to everyone delight a hand full of new ones, the got Chris to sing with them when they did the Hot Snakes cover from the split with November Coming Fire, tried to film it but I realised that two minutes of Chris' back wouldn't make good viewing. By the time they got to Orchestra Of Wolves all the mics onstage were fucked, so Frank just got everyone to sing, kind of like Ian MacKaye in old videos of Minor Threat when he lost the mic to the crowd. It felt like it all ended too soon, maybe because I was properly enjoying myself and not surrounded by cunts like when I saw them at the Astoria.
Please take pity on poor Chris Pritchard
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5dqxn_gallows-i-dread-the-night-new-song_music
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5dqvx_gallows-graves-new-song-tap-n-tin-c_music
Had a chat with John then I walked round Tap a couple time before realising there's hardly anybody I knew there (fucking shitty Radio 1 festival in Maidstone). Made sure my wristband for Gallows would get me back in, ran straight into Steve Mills and Mike then went down to Postie, found Ollie and a couple of others and hung around with them and went back up to Tap, it wasn't all that great but after watching Gallows I was too fucking amped to go home, eventually gave up about half one and got chips and a taxi home.
Saturday: Got down the Tap, John gives me a flyer for ZOO8, find out that there are only two bands I want to see quite early on the last day, might do what I did for Download last year and leave Sunday night. Picked up a three inch CDR version of the Lakes split with Zettasaur at the merch table (I've heard rumours of such a thing but not until mine eyes perceived it did I know it existed).
The Dead Formats: Something about them really irked me, it could have been that they were all dressed really trendy (I know that's really shallow of me but when I see a band for the first time that I wasn't previously aware of, image is the first thing that hits me) or that they needlessly had two singers, one doing gruff vocals, the other melodic (there are very few bands that can pull that off, give me the first two Cave In albums any day of the week), then a couple of songs into their set it hit me; this is like Hardcore aimed at people who watch MTV2.
Lakes: About fucking time these lot played with Gallows, what with them having two members of Winter In June and Gallows having the old bass player "this is the first time Gallows have watched us play so I hope we're good enough for you Rock Stars" I've had trouble thinking of how I would describe Lakes to someone else other than Spazzy Post-Hardcore but how's this; Swing Kids meets At The Drive-In, that sound like a fair comparison, I think so. They managed to turn the intro of Da Ting into mini Jazz session and revealed that they've got an album on the way "as soon as Ben (Phillips, The Guillaume Seam, Square Of Black, City Of Dis studio) gets off his arse and mixes it."
Gallows: Had a chat with Chris before they went on, he told me his booked a couple of support bands for Fucked Up, I won't be a cunt and blab but I will say this, it's going to be a fucking good show. When Gallows start the crowd surges to the front, Chris has to play stage hand and stops the monitors from being pushed forward. I manage to position myself at the side of the stage behind the PA, I get a lot of good photos and a couple of mediocre videos. They went through all the songs you'd expect and much to everyone delight a hand full of new ones, the got Chris to sing with them when they did the Hot Snakes cover from the split with November Coming Fire, tried to film it but I realised that two minutes of Chris' back wouldn't make good viewing. By the time they got to Orchestra Of Wolves all the mics onstage were fucked, so Frank just got everyone to sing, kind of like Ian MacKaye in old videos of Minor Threat when he lost the mic to the crowd. It felt like it all ended too soon, maybe because I was properly enjoying myself and not surrounded by cunts like when I saw them at the Astoria.
Please take pity on poor Chris Pritchard
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5dqxn_gallows-i-dread-the-night-new-song_music
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5dqvx_gallows-graves-new-song-tap-n-tin-c_music
Had a chat with John then I walked round Tap a couple time before realising there's hardly anybody I knew there (fucking shitty Radio 1 festival in Maidstone). Made sure my wristband for Gallows would get me back in, ran straight into Steve Mills and Mike then went down to Postie, found Ollie and a couple of others and hung around with them and went back up to Tap, it wasn't all that great but after watching Gallows I was too fucking amped to go home, eventually gave up about half one and got chips and a taxi home.