Shattered Faith

Don’t you love it when you stumble upon a song you’ve never heard before and it’s the greatest thing ever created? I just did that moments ago:

The song is called “A Different Story” by German singer Peter Schilling. Now I’ve known about good old Peter for awhile, he was the one who did the one hit wonder “Major Tom” which I’ve always loved. I don’t know how I’ve missed this song. In my years of listening and loving 80s music I somehow managed to miss this gem. But now I have it. And I’m listening to it. And all is grand. This shit right here is the reason I love 80s music so much. It’s just way too awesome.

Yes. Finally. My Siouxsie Sioux cherry was popped this past Saturday… and it was fucking EPIC.

I’ve missed my past two chances to see Siouxsie live. The first being a reuinion show of Siouxsie and the Banshees in 2002, while I was in Saudi Arabia. The second being an ‘evening with Siouxsie’ featuring Banshees songs and songs from her side project with her (then) husband Budgie, The Creatures. I had math class that I felt I couldn’t afford to miss. To this day I still can’t tell if my priorities are fantastic or retarded. When I heard that she was touring for her first solo album (at the age of 50!) I emailed Joey and told him he’s going. He had no choice. It was kind of pricey with the ticket master charges tacked on but totally worth every penny. We got to the venue around 8:30 or so since the tickets claimed it started at 9. This ended up not being the case and she didn’t take the stage until 10. It was a relatively long wait and I started getting pissed until this:

It started. The lights dimmed, the screen went up. The band took to their instruments and then eventually she walked out. Good God did she look fantastic. It completely blew my mind. I don’t have many friends that understand my fascination with this woman and her music, but being able to finally see her in the flesh was an experience. Her mic was fucked during the first song, although it got better towards the end of it. Subsequent songs sounded fantastic – she still has it. Even though her voice has dropped considerably. Her new material is more catered to this change, but she played 4 Banshees songs that sounded fantastic. Hong Kong Garden(which she announced is now 30 years old, released as a single in 1978), Night Shift, Nicotine Stain and Dear Prudence (yes, it’s a Beatles cover). Here is a short clip of the Dear Prudence performance:

Here is a video of “About to Happen”. You can see how fabulous she looks. I apologize for the video, as the cameraman decided it would be fun to sing along. Apparently he does this will all his videos after browsing his collection. Regardless – Awesome.

All together, it was amazing. I couldn’t have asked for a better show. I started to get a little teary eyed at one point, and I’m not kidding. I don’t do shit like that, but now I can somewhat understand videos of little girls crying for the Beatles. Well, they went a little overboard. I don’t preach Siouxsie to others, as she’s an acquired taste – but to me it doesn’t get better than this.

My whole weekend was a lot of fun. I went up to the city Friday evening so we could go out for Tim’s Birthday. We ate at some Texas BBQ esque/Whiskey bar place in Brooklyn. Meat, Meat and more Meat. Ribs, Brisket, Pulled Pork, Sausage and baked beans that had more meat chunks than beans. Excellent. Afterwards we went to a bowling alley for some more drinkage. In fact, the majority of my weekend was drinking which is alright with me. The Subway system is absolutely retarded and I missed my original bus on the way home so I had to sit around for 2 hours at Port Authority. Oh well, not enough to bring me down from my high.

Yay.

Alli and I went down to Philly last night to see Assemblage 23 play at some boxing/wrestling venue called The New Alhambra. It was located on a corner in the industrial section of Philly, which I guess was a perk for all the steam punk/cyber goth scenesters that were there. Some of these kids looked absolutely ridiculous, it was kind of embarrassing. That being said, the worst out of the bunch ended up taking the stage as the opening act, called “My Parasites”. We ended up going outside and chilling until they were over with. They kind of, well, sucked. Although they weren’t completely worthless for one amusing reason. You see, these stereotypical goth kids (rivetheads) where ridiculous post apocalyptic future garb. Huge black boots (preferably platforms), black or neon fishnet stalking, chains and random pieces of metal (the future sounds fun!) and best of all, the fucking GOGGLES. They wear these huge goddamn goggles on their head for absolutely no reason at all. Here is a picture for reference:

Rivethead Douchebag Girl

Well the lead singer of the opening band was wearing said goggles, and in between songs someone in the audience yelled out “PUT ON THE GOGGLES!”. The singer eventually obliged, and kind of stood there awkwardly, like he didn’t know what to do once the goggles were on. Ugh. Scenesters.

The show was a lot of fun, but the sound at the venue was absolutely awful. You could tell A23 were at the top of their game, but you could hardly hear the synths at all – they were drowned out by this loud bass and the drums. There was also an awful echo on Tom Shear’s vocals – when he would talk inbetween songs you couldn’t understand a word he said. It was a real shame, and I blame it on the venue and the retarded sound guy who just randomly walked around whilst texting on his cell phone. It was still enjoyable, and I look forward to getting to see them again – hopefully at a better venue next time.

Wow it’s been a long time since I updated. I’m sorry :\

I saw Blaqk Audio a few weeks ago in NYC. Blaqk Audio is the electronic side project from the lead singer and guitarist of AFI. Another enjoyable show, but the tickets were thirty-something dollars, and the show was not worth thirty-something dollars. Considering they only have 1 album out. With 10 tracks. And not all of them are stellar. I still had a good time in New York though, as always. Andrea attended with me which was nice.

I was supposed to see Bjork, but it fell through. Procrastination. I’ll have to catch her next time, regardless of the price.

I’ve been really busy with school lately. Every class seems to start giving tests at the same exact time, and it’s kind of annoying. Calculus isn’t going too bad, I can usually get semi correct answers by going through the motions (I have no idea why I’m doing what I’m doing, or how.. but I don’t care). My first test in that class is Thursday, so we’ll see how that goes. My economics teacher is a complete douche and his class sucks, but I have a B at the moment. Everything else is going relatively smoothly. Hopefully I can take some less demanding classes next semester.

I wish I had exciting things to write about. Like riding around in helicopters that rain hellfire and smite evildoers. Putting myself in the line of fire to pull out a wounded buddy. Creeping up to an enemy bunker on my elbows and knees prepared to kill all inside with just my trusty knife and lucky rabbits foot.

Of course I would not enjoy doing any of this in the slightest so I think it’s all for the best, no?

So instead I’ll tell you what I’ve actually been doing. I go to work, which for the past couple weeks had been Captain-less and pure bliss. We and the other guys on my shift watch and participate in Jeopardy, The Daily Show and then The Colbert Report. Sometimes we watch a movie afterwards, otherwise we just bullshit on the computer and talk shit to each other. Sometimes we sing 80s songs, usually in a falsetto. I think I’m to blame for this one. Brandon and I played the shit out of some ping pong today. It was nice to play that game with someone else of my skill level. One who isn’t good enough to slam the thing and actually have it hit the opponents side of the table, but one who is good enough to keep up a somewhat challenging volley. I wish we had tennis courts here. Although if I was sweating during ping pong, I can only assume how horrid a tennis game would be.

About two days ago it officially got ungodly hot here. Walking from my room to the bus stop results in beads of perspiration on my brow. This land is forsaken, I’m telling you. I’m reading a book about Alexander’s conquering of the area, and his Persian eunuch describes this land fondly. Sure, I bet Babylon was great. All gold and shiny and stuff. But I’m sure this place sucked just as much ass back then as now, albeit without air conditioning (GOOD GOD). Your ’sweet winds’ feel like a damn hairdryer blasting in your face on high. The smell of your ‘Persian spices’ is just the B.O. from the nationals that clean the showers, or the tantalizing odor when the shit truck sucks out the excrement from the port-a-potty. Screw Iraq.

I got the new Tori Amos album the other day, American Doll Posse. It’s another concept album that I can’t be bothered with understanding this concept, but her past albums have been like that for me. I’m happy to say that it’s not underwhelming like The Beekeeper. She’s still doing the whole rock band sound which I wish would stop. What happened to the girl with a piano from Little Earthquakes? Or playing on harpsichords and other interesting instruments. It’s not a bad album by any means, and this makes me happy. But I wish she would go back to her roots that gave her such a huge following to begin with. Get your shit together, girl. The new Bjork is on the way and I’m looking forward to that one!

The new layout is still a work in progress, so keep Christopher Robin company for a little while longer. Thanks.