Taylor Swift

It is interesting how music can draw out mood. I was having quite a good evening today, chicken burgers and hash browns for dinner, last few episodes of The Wire ( I am about to get to THE last one ever soon), jumped on the computer to check the emails and blog. My new favourite website is Spotify, the genius is that I can check out anything I want to listen to knowing it is a) free and b) not going to mess up my computer if I listen to it free. So today in Y10 media we were talking music and the name Taylor Swift came up. I had heard of her before but not actually listened.....Seriously, I love my country music but this is damn depressing. The most depressing this is that such a young girl is so unhappy. Country music is meant to be sung by old men who have had too much whiskey too many times, broken too many hearts and lost jobs too many ways, or my women who have been jilted, jolted or knocked around. It is not meant to be sung by girls who aren't even old enough to buy a drink in thier own country.....

When you walk through the garden, you better watch your back.

This whole world is stressy and annoying. By this world, I used to mean the one we live in most of the time. The blogopsphere is meant to be a place where we can chill. Where is all this hate coming from? So and so said this, so and so called the other this. Has blogger become Baghdag or Compton or East Hook, Brooklyn? I always saw it as somewhere nice like Malibu, San Diego or at worst Coventry. Stop the hate guys, this place is elite and bully free. Hugs not hits. Comments not confrontations.

Trust. Peace.

Shrine Post: The King Blues

Let's start with a rewind: 1998 (how old was everyone then?). Portsmouth Pyramids centre. It I was my first concert: Bush supported by Flyscreen (God knows who they were.) I can remember it like it was yesterday, I was feeling ill, I had been off school that day but for some reason my parents let me go to the concert anyway. I went with Chris Gore (now two kids, flat in Basingstoke, last spoke to 1 year ago), Chrissie Ingleson (apparent ex-herion addict, last spoke to 8 years ago) and Ian Fergusson (engaged, last spoke to last week). I can't remember which songs they played, but I remember the aura, the emotion and the atmosphere of being in a smokey, sweaty room. More than anything it was magic, it was special more than anything. To know me is to know how I feel about music. It is not just entertainment or time passing to me, it is the most important thing in the world (discounting friends and family), it has the ability to change moods, shift ideals and shape lives. To be at my first concert was truely spiritual.

Since then I have been to so many concert. I have been to hippy rock fests in Cleveland, Ohio, rap gigs in the Czech Republic in the pouring rain, outdoor ska knees-ups in kid playground, Reading festival 9 times... the list continues. I have seen some of the greatest performers ever, hung out with punk legends on tour buses, hung out with a band because I was one of 5 people to turn up to a sold out gig because the advertising posters were mis-dated. Throughout all of this I have not become jaded yet by the moment, the excitement of a coming gig. Last week was not an exception, I was about to see 3 of the best bands around, one I had seen once before I really knew them, one I had not seen but loved on cd and another that are truely one of the most important bands I have discovered. It was "stoked" as they say. Then, on Wednesday night I recieved an email to say that the third band (Anti-Flag) had pulled out of the gig because they had injured themselves. I was gutted, it was truely shaping up to the be one of the best shows ever, now this great band were being replaced by a band called The King Blues.

I needed to know who these cats were so I logged onto Spotify (seriously, check this site out) and listened to some of their music. They were good, actually on cd they were very good. I hoped that it wasn't going to be as bad as I had thought....

Fast forward. Friday night, Camdem town, the Roundhouse (what a venue.) The lights dimmed at 7.30pm and onto the stage came The King Blues.....

From the first note I was blown away. They were how every band should sound. A mixture of reaggae and true punk, they were a proper reflection of the best things in British music from the last 40 years. The lead singer took the stage with such force and power that it was impossible not to watch his every move. In many ways he reminded me of Mike Skinner from the Streets crossed with a Durecell bunny. Half singing, half rapping he told his stories of growing up in London and discovering what the world was like. As a band they had everything, music that was fast, bouncy and in ya face; musicians that played so fast that it was hard to keep up. It was obvious that from the start the audience expected them to prove who they were, within two songs we were all sold. More than anything they had an urgency to thier motives that made them so relevant. When they dedicated a song to the anti-fascist, anti-BNP movement I knew I had truly discovered my new favourite band. If I could have been born at any other time in history it would be so that I could have gone and seen The Clash (as if often said, the only band that really matter), The King Blues were so much like The Clash that it hurt. Joe Strummer would have been skanking in his grave if he could have heard Camdem town jump that night.

The rest of the bill was equally special, but knowing that I had made acquaintance with a new band was the greatest feeling ever. It was like I was 15 again.

This is my Shrine Post because is anyone can make a 26 year old feel like this over music still, there is hope for the world.