Monday

Busy weekend. No progress on The Project, though. Visits with friends, riding the bikes all over London, mostly out east to Greenwich, the Thames Barrier, O2 Centre etc. Saw Batman: The Dark Knight, which was much better than I expected. Lots of twists and turns. I actually thought the movie was over a couple of times before the end, but The Joker just kept on getting the better of the Caped Crusader. Heath Ledger steals the show, much as Mr Jack did in Tim Burton's feature. Definitely a real shame that Heath's gone. I can only imagine the franchise would have gone from strength to strength if he were still around.

Saturday saw us out at Shunt Lounge again. Every week it's a different place! Saturday night was very focused on live music. First off we watched a weird 4 piece from California (I believe)... violin, bass, drums and a unicycling guitarist. Style? Kind of peasant folk-musicy... ish? Lots of fun. After that they had a band called Le Pico onstage, playing cranked up Spanish rock... ish! Their first couple of songs were really good. Not so into the remainder of the set, but they were definitely different and worth watching, especially as they were playing dressed in white suits and wrapped up in fairy lights! Too weird an effect!

Sunday came around pretty quick and I managed to knacker my right arm at the gym, throwing off plans to have another stab at recording (still-working-title) "Summer Strum". We'll see how it feels tonight. Might have a go at it then, or at least spend a few hours working on the lead guitar part... anything that doesn't require me to strum. That motion kinda hurts right now!

Grabbed a couple of cheap CDs at Greenwich market, too. Random stuff... did I mention they were cheap? Ray LaMontagne's second album "Till The Sun Turns Black", "The Best Of Little Feat" (replacing my old copy) aaaand... what else... Oh, Ben Harper & The Innocent Criminals "Lifeline". We'll see how they work out. I actually thought I was buying Ray LaMontagne's first album, the one with "I've been saaaaaved... by a woman" on it. Oops. He really does have a great rootsy voice and the musical arrangement is deceptively simple. Very stripped back yet with atmosphere. He plays the silences, as it were. I've been meaning to check out Duffy's CD, "Rockferry". I keep hearing "Mercy" everywhere I go, which sounds really retro-cool. Didn't manage to find a bargain-bucket copy this weekend, though, so that'un will remain on the wish-list.

Update: As I munched on my lunchtime sandwich I realised that I'd never bothered to check on Amazon marketplace for discounted new/used copied of Duffy's album... ended up ordering a few more discs, as follows:

Duffy, "Rockferry"
Scrapomatic, "Sidewalk Caesars"
Rhett Miller, "The Instigator"
Old 97's, "Fight Songs"

A couple of random alt-country selections there at the bottom. We'll see how they pan out! I've been in the mood for some more more melodic stuff, so... Oh, and Scrapomatic is the side-project of the Derek Trucks Band singer, Mike Mattison. Their previous CD, Aligator Love Cry was a fantasic back-to-basics country blues/folk album, recorded from the gutter, looking up. You could feel the dirt between your toes as you listened to it. Haven't heard much about "Sidewalk Caesars" but it's got to be worth a go, eh?