The Merits of Insomnia

I'm officially nocturnal.

I think I should get some sort of identification card that states this; something like being a junior member of the Spiderman Crime Fighting League (or some such thing) that I can whip out and show people who look at me like I'm just lazy for waking up at 2. Well yesterday/the day before, I didn't get to bed until noon.

I like to think it's ambition-driven insomnia rather than plain old ordinary insomnia. When I finally slept at some point over the last god-knows-how-many-hours, I was dreaming of interview questions.

At some indiscriminate point I transcribed, edited, and formatted the interviews with Pour Habit and the Flatliners. It's funny how memory works: Chris Cresswell interviewed like a pro, but going back over it, he really didn't say much. Especially when I asked if their change of direction was intentional. Don't get me wrong -- I like the band, but the usable content only amounted to about 400 words for 20 minutes.

Pour Habit emerged as the overall winners, and after having gone over their interview again, I really can't say enough good things about them. Colin Walsh was my primary point of contact, but the rest of the band (minus lead singer Chuck) participated as well. Colin was lovely and gave proper answers, which I appreciated to no end, but the transcription with the bands' commentary is comedy gold. I threw out a few pictures in favour of jokes, and it's great fun to read. I'm excited to see it in print.

Which should happen, by the way, sometime next week.

I've been arguing with myself over the importance of paper weight and texture over the past several days/nights.

As I write this, I'm listening to the recent launch of The Death of Chapman Baxter (Where's My Girl) and it's bloody exciting. It's good to know that someone out there is influenced by the same things I am, and I love the way it's all come out. I'm writing an article for Feedback about it for this month, but Punk John is going to do a live review for The Antagonist and I can't wait to read it. They're playing in town in a couple of weeks, and I, for one, am going to make damned sure I'm there.

Quests Aided by Pleasant Weather

I think all healthy people like to be interviewed. Look at those chain emails and the lists of random questions going around facebook. "Favourite day of the year?" "Biggest pet peeve?" It doesn't matter; people like talking about themselves. It begins in elementary school with the very same lists of questions and continues into adulthood with forwarded emails. I don't think there's anything wrong with that. Peoples' willingness to talk about themselves certainly makes my job easier.

It also helps when people are used to be interviewed. Talking to Rat Scabies yesterday was brilliant. He told me all about the Holy Grail and what makes a good quest ("the weather"), what it was like producing the latest Flipron album (Gravity Calling) and what drives his current recordings. Very interesting stuff! He had no end of nice things to say about Flipron as musicians and as people, and although my interview with Jesse Budd leads me to agree with him, it's still nice to hear good things about a band you're a fan of -- it reaffirms your allegiance. It's rubbish when you find out someone you admire is a tosser.

Take the Killers, for example:

In my first year at Uni, me and all of my friends listened to Hot Fuzz on a loop until I headed back to the States for the summer. I got to see them in Minneapolis with Linnea and Jess H as part of an EPIC road trip that involved a great deal of hysteria and Dairy Queen soft serve. We spent most of the 80 miles from Rochester to St Paul trapped in the worst thunder storm of the summer, me in the front seat trying to calm the driver, Linnea, to the point of not killing us, while Jess H took pictures of the storm from the backseat. Once we escaped the rain we hit the Interstate, which was a completely new adventure for Linnea, and needless to say, when we got to the show we were all feeling pretty lucky to be alive.

The opening band was Louis XIV and the sound quality was appalling. We couldn't hear any of the actual music, but they were so pleasant and looked like they were having so much fun that I went out and bought The Best Little Secrets Are Kept which, although it's mercilessly "influenced" by T Rex and the Kinks, remains a dancing-as-I'm-cleaning-the-house favourite.

Sound-wise, the Killers were fantastic, but it was just like listening to the album in an arena with other people. There was something really joyless about Brandon Flowers' performance that I found terribly dissappointing. I know it must be hard touring for weeks and months at a time, but shit! Afterwards I read an interview they did with the Rolling Stone where he was talking about the shows -- they're shorter than most, and he doesn't enjoy them. I think he described it as "paying their dues."

Again, the Killers' sound quality was superb, but when I think of bands that are exciting to watch, I'm going to think of the UK Subs at Milkwood Jam, or Pour Habit who I recently saw opening for NOFX. Again, the sound quality was not fantastic, but man, were they fun! It's a shame I couldn't get a photo of Chuck scaling the stack. Fantastic!

Madina Lake was surprisingly fun to watch in a weird sort of way. None of them were plugged in to facilitate all of their manic bouncing and twirling. The balloons were a nice touch and well-judged for the age and mood of the audience, and I have to commend Nate for surfing a crowd THAT hormone-ridden. Fair play, dude. That would have scared me.

Next for my adventures I'm reviewing the Counting Crows show in Cardiff on Saturday. My inner ten year old is excited. I played August and Everything After to death in 1994/5. Undecided about the more recent stuff, but I'm sure it'll be a good time.

Either way, you'll hear about it.