Today, I Blog...

...about everything and nothing.

I met up with Col and the Magic Ship boys for a beer or two last night. Also got to meet and chat with Toby Burton of "Rock Til You Drop". Check out his ever expanding social networking site here). A fun, relaxed time was had by all. The topics of conversation were mostly unrepeatable!

Oh, and coming off a link from the RTYD site, here's Toby's own site. Very neat. Check out his paintings and his band Pocket Rocket's songs!

The subject of blogging came up once or twice and I confessed that really, these days I haven't got much to talk about on here. Oh, admit it, it's true. C'mon! Ever since the end of 2008 and hence the end of 'The Project' I've not had much to say for myself, particularly music-related.

So, what you get today is a series of blurps to give you an insight into what's running around inside my head RIGHT NOW!

First off, before running off to the pub last night I had a go at learning "Thickfreakness" by The Black Keys. It's not a hard song to play by any stretch of the imagination, but it sounds GOOD! There's a link to the tune, here.

For the past few months I've been trying to solidify my 'musical direction' and that-there-song actually gives you a basic idea of what I'm thinking of. It's in A minor and is based around a very simple, but neat bluesy-sounding riff. Moreover, the riff is the rhythm part... not strummed chords... riffing. Okay, you're not getting my point, are you? Take other songs like "Strange Brew" (Cream) and "One Way Out" (Allman Brothers). They don't use a strumming pattern for the rhythm. They use a riff. Let me see if I can find links... hold on...

Here you go: "One Way Out" and "Strange Brew".

"Strange Brew" is probably the better example. It follows a basic blues chord progression but gets the groove going by using riffs. Make sense now? Cool.

That's what both sounds good to my ears and also what gets me off when I'm playing. Bring The Black Keys back in. They're using a similar idea, but with a grungier sound. Me likey-like. Me stealy from them! You wait and see!

What next? Non-music! MY TITS HURT! Why? Well, we've just made it back to the gym for the first couple of times since Mardi Gras (yes, I'm still going on about Mardi Gras! Deal with it!) and it's bloody hard. Just walking down the stairs at work is agony! Going back tonight. Why, why, for Christs sake WHY do we do this to ourselves?

The flip side of getting back to weightlifting is that I'm STARVING all the time. Break body, body needs food to repair! I'm hungry when I wake up. I eat. I'm ravenous again by 11am! What's with that?

This weekend (we've changed subjects again, in case you didn't guess) we have a couple of friends coming in, which probably means we'll be out clubbin' a bit. I don't mind so much. One of the clubs we go to from time to time has The Freemasons dee-jaying. If you like upbeat, big American vocal remixes then you'll love the Freemasons. They basically wrote the soundtrack to not last summer but the summer before and their tracks from 2007 are STILL being played pretty much everywhere. To date I don't think I've heard any new music this year or last that made me run to the dance floor, rip my shirt off and jump on a podium.

Some may say that's a good thing. Like I say, we've not been going to the gym!

Okay, you want links to Freemasons' stuff? Okay, you get the remix of "Beautiful Liar" (Beyonce/Shakira). Picture lasers and a big ol' Boom-Boom room. Fab! You wanna know what that feels like without stepping foot inside a club? Go to Cyberdog in Camden Stables market. I can't go in there on a Saturday afternoon and then not go out dancing.

Anywho, the last time we went to a club where they were guest DJ's it was heaving waaaay before the pubs closed.

Okay, so we've covered music, weighlifting, dance clubs... food... what else? The weather? Forecast says 'light rain'. I think it's going to be SUN, SUN, SUN!!!! It's Easter, after all, the day Jesus ate chocolate and set all the bunnies FREE!

Oh, and that's it! I FORGOT! We got tickets to one of the Placebo warm up gigs before their summer festival run! YYYEEEEEESSSSSS!!!!!!

Does that call for a video embed? Huh? Yes, I think you're right, IT DOES!



AND... AND...!!!!

On Saturday night, top-notch youf guitar genius stroke blues boy, Oli Brown, is bringing his own brand of shuffle to the Half Moon pub in Herne Hill on Saturday night. Check out Pete Feenstra's site for details, here.

The Iceman Go.. eth...

The snow is melting... slowly... in places it's turning into really trecherous ice. Definitely not weather that the scooters will be out in any time soon... well... maybe Friday... We'll see.

The Rockschool piece "X-Blues III" is driving me insane. It's really annoying to listen to, and frustrating to play as I simply can't get it into my brain which call/response to play when. You have to make sure that each time you play the 'call' you end with your fingers in the right place to play the 'response', otherwise you're up the creek without a paddle.

So here's the thing. I'm distracted. Long story short, my Dad's not well right now. He's currently in a lot of pain, and we've been left hanging as to what exactly the doctors are going to do for him. We're no stranger to Dad having self-inflicted wounds. As I was growing up he was nearly severing fingers or severely burning himself on a weekly basis. This is age-related, though, which is something all-new and scary.

I'm not going to dwell on any of that but it's weird having to get on with daily life, Rockschool studies and all that, when we're on tenderhooks. I've completely ignored the fact that I'm supposed to be working on the other Rockschool song, "All Funked Up", as well as the rock/blues piece.

All very strange.

Hey, I even started writing a review of my new amp before the gravity of this stuff hit me. Got as far as where I was going to insert samples to demo the sound, but that all got blown out of the water. It'll come. All in good time, eh?