Zombiethon Day 7 – Faith No More double feature!

Holy crap, only four more days of this fiasco left and I still have  a cryptload of songs to post. Best get cracking so today I’ll cheat a little. Actually only one of today’s songs is specifically zombie-related, the other is more tangential but I’ll explain why I’m using it in a moment…

Today we’re hearing from one of the Greatest Rock Bands Ever, fronted by my favourite demented and multi-talented vocalist. Yup, it’s Faith No More. I’m not the biggest fan of FNM’s first couple of albums – they have some great tunes but Chuck Moseley’s utterly dreadful vocals pretty much ruin them for me. It sounds like he had to be dragged into the studio kicking and screaming and then heavily drugged before he’d contribute anything. Then  they kicked him to the kerb, hired the warped genius that is Mike Patton and everything changed. The Real Thing was an amazing rock album that really captured the zeitgeist, before Mike’s influence started twisting their sound into something darker and altogether more wonderful. Watching a reformed FNM at Austria’s Nova Rock in 2009 (preceded by Gogol Bordello and followed by a thoroughly transcendent Nine Inch Nails) was one of the high points of my gig-going career.

Back to the songs though. First up is “Zombie Eaters”, definitely eligible for the Zombiethon due to the title. The subject matter is more about parasites than zombies – babies to be precise  Yeah, those drooling, barely animate hunks of matter that do precious little but moan and eat. And destroy our braaaaiiiins. Oh, and the bass sound when it kicks in at the 2:00 mark is nothing short of incredible, I need that sound…

The next choice, from the same album, is Surprise, You’re Dead. No mention of zombies in the title BUT it does deal with the undead, more precisely vampires. Let’s take a second to consider the vampire. They’re dead, right? Dead people walking about and craving parts of the living? Just blood instead of brains, yeah? And if they bite you, you get infected and become one of them. Sounds like zombies to me. Just a different diet is all, saying they’re not zombies is like saying vegans aren’t human (okay, I’d argue that that is actually the case but still…). So here, along with some awesomely metaltastic riffs, is Faith No More’s ode to the zombie’s more sartorially elegant cousin.

Before we go, here’s the latest from Daz over at The Dixie Flatline, stealing one I already planned to use (that’s happened twice now), not that I mind. Great song We also have someone else joining the fold, although not strictly playing the same game. Welcome to Alice at Sprinkling Of Alice! Until tomorrow, enjoy the tunes.

Austriaaaargh!

Gah, finally back from a long weekend in Austria at the Nova Rock festival and I feel like I’ve been hit by several ten-ton trucks, had my insides scooped out by a giant JCB and had all the pieces sewn back together by Josef Mengel on crack. It’s the most depressing sign of ageing, the realisation that your body just isn’t going to accept four-day long drinking binges out in the sunshine and deprived of sleep and food without letting you know all about it afterwards.

Had a hellish journey out there involving some kind of problem with every single stage – taxi hit a traffic jam at five fucking a.m, first plane delayed, second plane delayed, told wrong bus stop by bastard Slovakian driver, train delayed, next train delayed. Okay so I tell a lie; the shuttle bus from the final town to the festival site went off without a hitch, but then I tried to call the rest of the guys who were already out there and my phone had gone apeshit. Cue a half-hour battle with Vodafuck customer services trying to sort the fucking thing out (I’m damned if I’m paying a penny for those calls) before I could actually find where I was going.

Never mind though, as soon as I reached our wee campsite everything was sorted. It was blazing sunshine, probably thirty-odd degrees with nary a trace of wind – the kind of heat you can’t escape from cause your in a field bereft of any shade except inside a tent i.e inside an oven. Luckily there were plenty beers to hand, albeit piss-warm ones. Who had the idea to sell black cans at a summer festival?

The bands that night were fantastic – thankfully so as they were more or less the only ones I saw all festival. I’d arrived just in time to catch Gogol Bordello and was so glad I did – a stage full of vibrant, energetic gypsies singing eastern European folk-punk with truly reckless abandon. Bizarrely the crowd was incredibly sparse which meant we were afforded a fantastic view, centre stage and probably only a couple of dozen yards from the front. Many photos were taken and will be linked as soon as I can access them tonight. As wonderful as the Bordello’s stage show was, my lasting memory was Stevie’s constant muckle grin and proclamations after damn near every song that this is his new favourite band; another convert won.

Gogol Bordello at Nova Rock 2009

The whole reason we’d kicked off this insane expedition was for Faith No More, newly reformed and back on the road. They were playing much closer to home at the Download festival but tickets alone cost more than tickets and transport for Nova Rock. Seemed to be full of the blasted English as well. Anyway they didn’t disappoint, taking to a bright orange stage with a fantastic sense of self-mocking humour but also incredible energy. The crowd had grown by this point (still much smaller than I would have guessed) and were roaring along to every classic from what was pretty much the finest greatest hits selection they could have conjured up. Songs cropped up from every era from the cheesey crowd-pleaser ‘Easy’ to insanely heavy versions of  ‘Gentle Art Of Making Enemies’ and ‘Caffeine’, always two of my favourite FNM numbers. Mike Patton was in fine form, sporting a bizarre red suit and a walking stick – bizarrely he used the cane for support half the time but was a whirling dervish the rest, still no idea if it’s a genuine injury or just a cool Willy Wonka-esque prop.

Mike Patton of Faith No More resplendent in red leisure suit

Winner for the night was Nine Inch Nails though. As I mentioned we’d come for Faith  No More and anything else was just a bonus but NIN pulled an absolute blinder and absolutely owned that stage. There wasn’t a single thing I could fault about the gig: the sound was son incredibly clear and loud that it felt like a jackhammer constantly pummeling your chest; the light show was so intense it was like atomic bombs bursting over the stage; and Trent Reznor was so intense, aggressive and strangely charismatic that I genuinely don’t think I looked at any other band members for the whole hour and a half. As with FNM the setlist was utterly flawless, pretty much every single one of my favourite songs from albums spanning their whole career – The Hand That Feeds in particular being burned into my brain ever since. As an added effect we were treated to spectacular waterworks to round the show off – the heavens opened about twenty minutes before the end of the set, perfectly topping off the picture of post-apocalyptic chaos they’d crafted. The one downside was that they overran their set time by a few minutes so the power was cut in the middle of their last song – rumour has it that renowned fuckwits Metallica were responsible for this as they were playing the other stage at the time. Can’t get confirmation of this but I’m tempted to believe it.

Trent Reznor and Nine Inch Nails - smell the intensity...

Once NIN had left the stage the rain lost its dramatic appeal and it was time to bolt back to the tent. I’d planned to catch the last half of Metallica’s set but common sense one and it was back to shelter.

Common sense didn’t win for long…

Next day the true chaos started as we awoke to find it still battering down with no respite in sight. At that point,  waking alone in the tent to the sound of the barrage of raindrops and howling wind I seriously considered spending the rest of the festival shut in there with a couple of books but thankfully I saw sense and wandered outside during a brief and rare respite. Spirits were in a similar state across the camp, the shock of the weather and the incipient hangovers combining to drape us all in a blanket of cold misery. The first sign of more raindrops after this had us in a panic – was it going to be like this all day?

We decided to mull it over in a handily vacated gazebo just yards from our camp while we downed the few remaining beers and formulated a plan – the shelter even had a picnic bench, it was perfect. After half an hour of bumbling about and moaning the owners returned, an Austrian and two Germans, so we made our apologies and prepared to shuffle back into our tiny tents. They were having none of it though and immediately offered us beers from their exceptional supplies. Win. And when those beers were gone they offered more. And then more. And then more.

This gazebo saved our lives (and destroyed our livers)

Eventually we stopped being lazy and made our run to the beer shop, returning with three crates and, later, three more. All told we bought 150 beers between the five of us that day, not one of which made it to the next morning – and that’s on top of the beers from our new friends, the whisky-spiked tea (surprisingly delicious and warming) and the various other spirits thrown at us.

At that point everything goes into a blur. I remember seeing Trivium (excellent live act), Dimmu Borgir (horsehit), missing Placebo and everyone else I was interested in, and generally behaving in a manner of which my mother and my ex would both be so proud. To wit:

• Attempting (often successfully) to convince everyone we talked to and even passed by that the traditional manner of greeting someone in Scotland is “Bawbag!” Trust me, there’s no feeling quite like getting double high-fived by a security guard shouting about scrotums.
• Starting conga lines of utterly ridiculous dancing behind unsuspecting members in the crowd, so outlandish that we were eventually attracting total strangers to join in uninvited. Most victims took it well while some, erm, didn’t.
• Balancing fruit, chairs, beer, inflatable hands and genitalia on the heads of those unfortunate enough to pass out early. Thank god I always make it back to wherever I’m sleeping before I pass out…
• Some of the most emotional and heartfelt air-guitaring and singing along to System Of A Down CDs you’ve ever seen (although one of our German friends won the award for that one)
• Holding a conversation entirely based on video-game quotes with a Slovakian out of his mind on homebrewed vodka whose English vocabulary was limited to the phrases “fire in the hole!” and “medic!”.
• Stevie’s wonderful song based on Thomas ‘Dunblane’ Hamilton (“Thomas Hamilton shot some kids, shot some kids, shot some kids, Thomas Hamilton shot some kids and then he shot himself”)

Mature, intellectual pursuits

So yeah, it was a good ‘un. The journey back was hell, the extended exhaustion unbelievable, but I already miss it and the guys we met – Russ, Graeme, Joel, Marcus, all the rest. Ach well – Saturday is Thailand time so mustn’t grumble

Good days, bad days (Part 2)

Well I left the last post on something of a downer, and now it’s time to remedy that.  You see, Friday was a Good Day and it has paved the way for many Good Days to come.

On Friday the sale of the flat was finally completed, eleven months of nail-biting, tortuous waiting finally came to a close and the last tie between me and the ex has been severed. I think they call it ‘closure’ in the land of Ally McBeal. On top of that a massive sum of money has winged its way into my bank account and has opened all kinds of doors for me. By massive I don’t mean like an MP’s salary or anything like that – in fact the total sum was  just £1000 more than I invested in the flat three and a half years ago – kick in the teeth or what?  But it’s certainly enough for me to kick back and do some Good Things for a change.

First on the list – it’s holiday time. I honestly can’t remember the last time I had a holiday aside from visiting the ex-in-laws up in Gamrie so it’s time to go overboard and spoil myself a bit. First up is a three day trip to Amsterdam to see Suicidal Tendencies with Jon. We both thought we were going to miss their tour this year, which would have been gutting as we’ve previously travelled to Brussels, Paris and Milan to catch them – it’s simply the most entertainingly violent show you can see. So it’s going to be three days of kilts, beer, food at the Klos and insane metal (no pot though, a previous Amsterdam trip involving hallucinations of hedgehog terrorists put me off it for life…)

A day after I return it’ll be time to head to the continent yet again for th3e Nova Rock festival in Austria. There’s a bunch of us heading out, mostly just to see the newly-reformed Faith No More, but also enjoying the added bonuses of the likes of Nine Inch Nails, Gogol Bordello and Placebo. Never been to Austria before and I’m going to be mighty disappointed if I’m not faced with the finest sausages known to man.

When I get back from that trip I’ll have a mere four days left at my current job before jetting off to Thailand with Marty for two weeks of Muay Thai training and a week afterwards to lie on a beach and lick our wounds. Unfortunately my shoulder and ribs still haven’t fully healed so I’ve done no Muay Thai and very little in the way of weights for nigh-on two months. I’d hoped to be in peak  fitness for this but it’s fated not to be – no worries though, I’ll happily sit out the afternoon sessions and watch Marty get pummelled instead

After that I’ll have a couple of things to sort out – one being a tenant for the flat which I’ll hopefully own by then. I may not have made much money on the old place but at least it means I can buy low as well and hopefully claw some back a few years down the line. I’ll also need to arrange a travel visa for the final part of the globe-trotting extravaganza…

But in the middle of all that there’s another trip lined up. Doc and I had planned to cycle from John O’ Groats down to Edinburgh but instead we’ve decided to head to Belgium and do a brewery tour along the canal networks, also taking in the Festival Of 100 Beers (as mentioned in a previous post). As fate would have it, my physio is from Belgium and has recommended a few good places too check out while we’re over there.

And finally we reach the end – I’ll be upping sticks and heading out of the country long term to finally put my TEFL training to some use. At the moment the destination of choice is Japan, with Thailand a very close second. I hear that the competition for jobs in Japan is pretty fierce so I’m under no illusions that it’ll be easy but I have age and experience on my side, not to mention the fact that this is something I want to do long-term rather than just being a kid on a gap year before starting Uni. It should be a little easier in Thailand and I’ve already started arranging meeting with potential employers while I’m over on holiday, but the lure of the Japanese salary and frankly insane culture is just too much right now.

So that’s what happens when I have a Good Day. I’m all too aware that the more plans you have – and the more complex and ambitious they are – the more likely things are to go wrong. But hell with it, I’m done worrying. I’m off for a meal with 14 good friends to celebrate the sale of the flat, followed by some beers on the beach and probably a new layer of sunburn to add to yesterday’s.

Yay for Good Days.

These are today’s Good Things

Muay Thai - yeah, that's so what I look like :p

First off I got back to Muay Thai tonight after my ten days of self-imposed exercise embargo while the wrist and toe properly healed. Glad to say I don’t seem to have picked up any new injuries and although the wrist is twinging a little I think it’ll be fine. On Thursday nights the class is run by a fella called Gordon who fills in while Alex takes his class up at Meggetland. This is another Good Thing because Gordon likes to blast out Soulfly and similar music during his classes, unlike Alex’s predilection for chart pop and associated crimes against music. Brazilian tribal metal was designed to fight to, it’s just a natural fit

Next Good Thing on our list is running-related. I picked up my new shoes the other day and gave them a proper test run last night, just a quick blast around Arthur’s Seat to make sure they were a proper fit and to see how badly my fitness had dropped since the toe fracture. It was a bonus night on both counts, the shoes fit as though I’m not wearing any at all and I made it round the course in a decent time, hampered only by strong winds on the uphill section and a stitch halfway round. I’m aiming for 8k tomorrow and 10k on Sunday so fingers crossed the half marathon may still be on!

Moving on, we reach something I didn’t think I’d ever be happy about again – money. I’ve managed to save enough cash for the trip to Thailand and it’s all safely in a savings account now so I can’t spend it. On top of that my dad is sending me some money which was ostensibly for the trip but which will now be put towards Good Thing #4, more of which shortly. To complete the cash trifecta I’m meeting my mum tomorrow lunchtime to pick up a mysterious and as yet undisclosed sum of money. Apparently when my great aunt May died some time back she left some money to my gran, who then decided to pass it on to my mum and her three siblings. My mum, in turn, decided to share some with my brother and I so I’m picking up my third-hand share of the inheritance. Intrigued, will keep you posted on what transpires tomorrow, along with a bit of info on great aunt May since she was a truly awesome person.

Faith No More reformed! Woo!

Final Good Thing before I fall asleep. On the 19th of June I, along with Gaz, Jon, Doc and Stevie, will be setting sail (metaphorically) to Austria for the Nova Rock festival, specifically to see the newly reformed Faith No More, one of my all time favourite bands. As an added bonus they’ll be performing alongside the likes of Nine Inch Nails, Placebo, Gogol Bordello, Mastodon and The Living End. This Good Thing (at least festival tickets and flights) is already as good as paid for thank to my old man, all that remains is to squirrel away some beer and sausage money. Bring the carnage!

For now though I’m exhausted. Long day of work, first time back at Muay Thai, almost asleep. Time to go read Transmetropolitan, watch an episode of The Wire and crash out.

Hope y’all have sweet dreams about Good Things.