Mid-June Musings.

Hey June!
June seems to have flown by. I think it must be down to the fact that I’ve not only been very busy in terms of work, but I’ve also had a fairly hectic social calendar too. Speaking of which, those looking for a good online/computer calendar solution should check out the relatively new Google Calendar. I’ve been using it for a couple of months and it’s great – very useful, always available wherever you’re online and you can even intergrate your calendar with those of your nearest and dearest so that their appoitments show up next to yours – very clever!

World Cup Fever
Since I last blogged about what I’ve been doing the World Cup has started. I’ve done my best to watch as much as possible and BBC News’ online coverage has been very useful indeed – I can watch games streamed live while working….why has it taken this long for this to happen! Companies should embrace this and cut their staff sickness levels during the world cup by letting people watch the matches…it makes sense I tell you! I’m lucky enough to not have to worry about my boss catching me watching the football!

While it’s not been the most exciting world cup tournament in terms of England performance, we’re in the quarters finals and that’s what counts! So far I’ve watched a couple of games at home, one in the pub and yesterday’s game against Ecuador at Steph’s house, followed by some delicious homemade curry!

Foo Fighting and Scissor Sistering
Things have been busy on the music front as ever, the week before last i aw the Foo Fighters twice in a week. Steph and I saw them at the Apollo Victoria theatre for a rare acoustic show, which was really special. I’m so glad we went – it was wel worth the ticket price and having to spend 50p on binoculars so we could actually see some detail. It sounded great and was brilliant to see a band I’ve seen so many times doing something different. That was the Wednesday, the following Saturday Steph, Stat, Dicko, Dave and I all went to Hyde Park for a completely different Foo Fighters show.

The biggest Foo Fighters show date was something else! The line up included Juliet & The Licks (better than I expected), Angels & Airwaves (worst than expected), Queens Of The Stone Age (on great form) and Motorhead (louder than hell itself) oh and the Foo Fighters. After spending all day spluttering in the sun due to the double-whammy of hayfever and a bad cold I finally started feeling human shortly before the Foos took to the stage. As ever, they didn’t dissapoint!

The set was similar to when I saw them last December (essentially greatest hits), with a couple of special surprises thrown in. Lemmy (of Motorhead) made a guest appearance and on ‘Shake Your Blood’ the track he lent his vocals too on Dave Grohl’s ‘Probot’ album. And the encore began with drummer Taylor Hawkins introducing Brian May and Roger Taylor of Queen before the Foo Fighters/Queen super band played ‘We Will Rock You’ and ‘Tie Your Mother Down’ with Taylor dedicating the gig to Freddie Mercury.

The night inevitabely ended with what many consider to be the Foo Fighters finaest moment – ‘Everlong’. It began with Dave playing solo out on a walkway into the crowd, and finished with the entire band playing the last chorus.

I counted how many times I’ve seen the Foo Fighters the other day and it comes to 9. That’s 9 times in 11 years…not band going considering they’re not even a British band! They are without a doubt the most consistent live band I’ve ever seen (and there are some other bands I’ve seen 9 times) and Dave Grohl is witout a doubt one of the greatest (if not the greatest) frontmen to grace a stage. He’s up there with Bono. The Foo’s lighting show at Hyde Park was the best I’ve seen next to U2 as well.

The following week I was back in London (the 3rd time in a week) this time for a 10am meeting. I was meeting with Scissor Sister’s bass player ‘Babydaddy’ (aka Scott) to discuss the posibility of maintaining the band’s website. We’ll have to see what comes of it, but fingers crossed and all that. He was a really nice guy and seemed interested in what I had to say despite the early hour (not very rock ‘n’ roll!) and having played a surprise gig at The Scala the night before (very rock ‘n’ roll). Little did he know I’d been up since 6am in order to get the train down to London for the meeting, after only being told about it at 5pm the previous evening!

The past week has been reasonably calm, although Scrat rehearsal was nothing but calm. We’ve been working on some new covers which are coming together very nicely. We’re hoping to *maybe* do another gig some time around Christmas, schedules/bass player availability permitting!

And that’s it for now, other that a few round ups:

Currently listening too: Jellyfish, Pearl Jam, Minus The Bear, Foo Fighters, Neil Young, Head Automatica and Rocco Deluca & The Burden.

Currently watching: The World Cup…Saxondale…and eagerly awaiting Lost Season 2 and 24 season 5 on DVD!