When It's All Good
It was a bit of a mini festival over the weekend. Friday night went to Brixton Academy for the NME awards show; while Saturday was The Strokes in Hammersmith (of which more later).
I arrived a bit late for the NME gig, so missed Mystery Jets and We Are Scientists (although i'd seen them recently anyway). Luckily though, I got there in time for Arctic Monkeys, so disaster was averted.
They really are reluctant heroes, and for the first couple of songs looked like they didn't much want to be there. In fact the pressures of fame seem to be weighing heavily on young Alex. He's beginning to look a bit of a tortured soul. I do feel for them, as the press juggernaut seems to be hurtling them to stardom without any involvement by the band... and you get the feeling they don't really want to be the biggest band in the country. At least not yet anyway.
Although I had tickets for downstairs, I decided to watch them from the balcony. Which I think was a good idea. I could jump around and sing along to my hearts content without getting caught up in the screaming melee downstairs. In fact despite being as far from the stage as it was possible to get I had one of the best times i've had at Brixton Academy - a venue I usually despise.
Anyway after a couple of songs I think they started to get into things, probably helped by the fanatical reaction of the audience, and it ended up being a really great show. They seemed to have sorted out their set list so that it doesn't lag in the middle as it has done in the past, and the hairs on your neck just stand up even more when there are 4,000 people singing the beginning of 'Scummy' rather than 200.
I didn't get any decent photos, but here's a couple from the first time I saw them in Oxford that i'm still quite proud of!
How could any band follow the adulation that Arctic Monkeys received? Well fortunately Maximo Park were up next, and far from following the Monkeys as far as I was concerned they absolutely blew them away. If they keep getting this much better every time I see them, i'm quite terrified about what might happen on my next encounter. I just can't think of a better live band right now (maybe Arcade Fire?), and they tore through their set in volcanic fashion.
I found the audience reaction quite strange though. I mean despite the band being incredibly good, from upstairs after each song all i heard was polite applause, and when I went downstairs I was able to get pretty close to the front without much trouble at all. You can see from the pictures I wasn't far away from the stage, yet had enough room to throw my coat on the floor without fear of losing it, do a bit of dancing with a sexy girl, and probably could have entered a cat swinging contest if i'd wanted to.
I'm at a bit of a loss to explain it, however I have noticed more and more over the last year that people at gigs seem unable to make their own minds up about music, and have to rely on what the newspapers and magazines tell them are good. It's not to say the band didn't get a good reaction, it's just there was no comparison with the fervour for Arctic Monkeys, yet they were indisputably far far better.
Oh well. If it wasn't for people i'd have nothing to get annoyed about. And wouldn't life be boring then....?
I've put a few Maximo Park tracks up recently, so here's some Arctic Monkeys. It's quite an entertaining remix of 'When The Sun Goes Down (Scummy)' by Fake ID. It starts off identical to the original, but then the song gets overtaken with breakbeats, filtered guitar loops and general acidic breakbeat nonsense. Great fun!
ARCTIC MONKEYS - WHEN THE SUN GOES DOWN (FAKE ID's SCUMMY MIX)
And just before I go.... if anyone has the Sugababes version of 'I bet you look good on the dancefloor' i'd really appreciate an mp3!
I arrived a bit late for the NME gig, so missed Mystery Jets and We Are Scientists (although i'd seen them recently anyway). Luckily though, I got there in time for Arctic Monkeys, so disaster was averted.
They really are reluctant heroes, and for the first couple of songs looked like they didn't much want to be there. In fact the pressures of fame seem to be weighing heavily on young Alex. He's beginning to look a bit of a tortured soul. I do feel for them, as the press juggernaut seems to be hurtling them to stardom without any involvement by the band... and you get the feeling they don't really want to be the biggest band in the country. At least not yet anyway.
Although I had tickets for downstairs, I decided to watch them from the balcony. Which I think was a good idea. I could jump around and sing along to my hearts content without getting caught up in the screaming melee downstairs. In fact despite being as far from the stage as it was possible to get I had one of the best times i've had at Brixton Academy - a venue I usually despise.
Anyway after a couple of songs I think they started to get into things, probably helped by the fanatical reaction of the audience, and it ended up being a really great show. They seemed to have sorted out their set list so that it doesn't lag in the middle as it has done in the past, and the hairs on your neck just stand up even more when there are 4,000 people singing the beginning of 'Scummy' rather than 200.
I didn't get any decent photos, but here's a couple from the first time I saw them in Oxford that i'm still quite proud of!
How could any band follow the adulation that Arctic Monkeys received? Well fortunately Maximo Park were up next, and far from following the Monkeys as far as I was concerned they absolutely blew them away. If they keep getting this much better every time I see them, i'm quite terrified about what might happen on my next encounter. I just can't think of a better live band right now (maybe Arcade Fire?), and they tore through their set in volcanic fashion.
I found the audience reaction quite strange though. I mean despite the band being incredibly good, from upstairs after each song all i heard was polite applause, and when I went downstairs I was able to get pretty close to the front without much trouble at all. You can see from the pictures I wasn't far away from the stage, yet had enough room to throw my coat on the floor without fear of losing it, do a bit of dancing with a sexy girl, and probably could have entered a cat swinging contest if i'd wanted to.
I'm at a bit of a loss to explain it, however I have noticed more and more over the last year that people at gigs seem unable to make their own minds up about music, and have to rely on what the newspapers and magazines tell them are good. It's not to say the band didn't get a good reaction, it's just there was no comparison with the fervour for Arctic Monkeys, yet they were indisputably far far better.
Oh well. If it wasn't for people i'd have nothing to get annoyed about. And wouldn't life be boring then....?
I've put a few Maximo Park tracks up recently, so here's some Arctic Monkeys. It's quite an entertaining remix of 'When The Sun Goes Down (Scummy)' by Fake ID. It starts off identical to the original, but then the song gets overtaken with breakbeats, filtered guitar loops and general acidic breakbeat nonsense. Great fun!
ARCTIC MONKEYS - WHEN THE SUN GOES DOWN (FAKE ID's SCUMMY MIX)
And just before I go.... if anyone has the Sugababes version of 'I bet you look good on the dancefloor' i'd really appreciate an mp3!
posted by headphonesex @ 5:26 PM
