Archive for the 'Gigs' Category

So, yesterday, my computer stopped posting. It was showing the same symptoms as when I’d been overclocking it, and I’d bumped the FSB up without bringing the CPU voltage up with it - there was no response from the screen and the drives weren’t spinning up, just the old system beep. So, I reset the CMOS as one does in such a situation, but it wasn’t having any of it.

After giving up and leaving it unplugged, I went off to Chilton to play at the small festival they had there, with Leila, Alex and Farrar. We had a good time, and we salute the 20 or so brave souls who actually stood outside and watched, despite the gale force winds and blisteringly cold temperatures.

After that, we took advantage of our free drinks, and I drained the pub’s supply of Guinness. Then, Crash Records talked to us about recording a couple of tracks. The problem is we really do need to change our name to something that’s going to be more easily memorable, and stand out. Take for example our myspace - ‘grkloveyou’. That’s not memorable. Annoyingly I just bought the domain to go with that, but never mind. Any suggestions?

So, I got home and got drunk with my dad, and watched Lucky Number Slevin, which I didn’t think was gonna be that good, but really surprised me - it was a brilliant film.

Anyway, back to the post title - I plugged my computer in, hoping it might work after having some time to think about what it was doing, and flipped the switch on the power supply. Bang! And the PSU is fried!

I have a laptop thank god, but I won’t be online nearly as much as I was this term. God knows, I might even get some work done.

Oh, oh my days.

Last night was by far the best gig we have EVER played, and it was most definitely down to the support we got from the crowd. It’s kind of a cliché to say that the audience made all the difference, but until you have an opportunity to play a gig or concert or whatever, you don’t realise quite how true it is. I wanna thank everyone who came to watch us last night and added to the amazing atmosphere around our tiny stage (but not the sound engineers - they just added smoke to the atmosphere, I stink now).

I had a hell of a good time, but I think it’s a shame not enough people stayed around to see Sirenide after we finished our set - they are a fantastic band, with a musical style and attitude that was easily better than most of the main stage bands. If you haven’t heard them, check them out on their MySpace page. Besides, they didn’t scream once …

UNLIKE SOME! I think it’s always a shame when melody gets sacrificed for constant screaming. We can safely say bye bye to Ash’s vocal chords. Anyway, that’s just my opinion. I had a great time last night, and I was on an adrenaline high for about 3 hours after our set finished, and every penny we received from tickets and merchandise goes towards the future of the band, whether it’s buying new equipment to improve our sound, or towards maybe hiring a recording studio some way down the line.

Thank you all for coming, it was a brilliant experience for me, as well as the rest of the band, and your continued support across the last year has made it all the better.

Shout out to Dave for helping me set up, to Alex for being our roadie, everyone who took photos (send them to me), and to anyone else who deserves a mention that I’ve forgotten because my head hurts. However, I wanna say to Ignoble that if they ever desecrate System of a Down’s Toxicity again, I’ll poo in their eyes while they sleep.

• GRK Website
• GRK on MySpace
• Sirenide on MySpace

Photographs © 2006 Caley MacKinnon

What can I say? They did a hell of a gig! I’ve always been a fan of ska music, but these guys rocked harder than any other band of that style that I’ve ever seen. They had a superb way with the crowd, and we were all skanking the night away.

Me and Caley got there about 15 minutes before the doors opened, and there was already a huge queue to get in. So, we went over to where Will and co. were standing, and not far from Caley’s brother Luke, who I met for the first time. I think I passed the first test with him, he didn’t growl at me as I was warned might happen, so things must be going well on that front. Getting in was nice and smooth, no frisking or time wasted checking the tickets over, and we were straight downstairs (me, Caley and Dodge) to the cloakroom.

Next stop: bar. Unfortunately, none of us had a (fake) ID on us, so we went over to where there was already a pretty big crowd built up around the stage, and met Luke again. It couldn’t have been more than 2 minutes before the first band (Fandangle) were on, who absolutely rocked. They were much of a muchness to Reel Big Fish, but much less well-known, as they don’t seem to have an album out yet. They certainly got the crowd going: near-full pints were going everywhere even in the first song they played.

After Fandangle, I managed to get Becci to pull Dodge in exchange for writing on my whiteboard shirt. It didn’t last long, 30 seconds in the middle of the crowd and it got rubbed off. Oh well!

The second band on (after a visit to the bar for much-needed drink) were Zebrahead, who were a lot heavier than Fandangle, but still had a ska feel to their music, with a one-man brass section as well as an off-beat bounce. The only difference was they had solid guitar riffs and short rap sections (dare I say it, reminiscent of Linkin Park). They were damned good!

After a pretty long wait, Reel Big Fish were on, and although me and Caley started off pretty near the front, once the crowd got going we got slowly pushed towards the back, but it didn’t matter - the music was still brilliant (happy, despite the number of emo kids in the crowd). Farrar ended up giving me a shirt which I thought was Dodge’s, so I held onto it, turns out it wasn’t. If anybody lost a greeny-grey shirt last night, I gave it to the people behind the bar (sorry)! was.

The rest of the gig, however, was superb, and I spent most of the remaining time skanking with some pro skankers near the back, and generally looking like a tit, but having a good time. All in all, a great night!

It doesn’t matter what music you like, ska will always make you happy, so if you haven’t already, I urge you to buy these albums - they kick the ass!