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I listened to them live on Radio 1 the other day and they were brilliant and I just downloaded Orpheus performed live off their website. It is great!! There album is out in May - I think I will be buying it. Then I get the beauty of watching them live at Reading - yes!

On another note, I never really noticed the female member of the band but in a true pervy style, she ain't bad ;-) (insert Homer Simpson drooling), but in a 'normal' manner she is an integral part of the band and fits in perfectly with them (hopefully that gets me out of a hole!)

I have to say I am really looking forward to seeing Ash at Reading and maybe before at the Birmingham Carling Academy, not sure if I will go yet - need to check the old bank account!

There latest offering Orpheus is fantastic and after hearing them on the Radio in N. Ireland the other I am well eager to see them play live.

Also at that gig: Franz Ferdinand almost missed their biggest ever gig when their guitars were left in an airport in Paris. But Ash came to the rescue and lent them some instruments. The rising Scottish stars show was one of the highlights of the day. - according to NME.

Ash's latest album was out today and me and Katherine were down to HMV as soon as it was possible (after her exam and going to the pub!). I have to say from the first listen it is great. I already knew how a few of their tracks sounded after listening to them play on the radio recently and their free downloads off live versions off their website - http://www.ash-official.com.

The album is great I can not state this enough. Wow! So far Orpheus is my favourite track but that could have be because I have heard it lots before. If you are an Ash fan or sort of like them then go out and buy this, it is well worth it!

My review of the Crimea's gig at the Birmingham academy has made it on there site! I guess some people out there actually read what I post - shocking ;-). I have to say the Crimea were good on the night and I can't stop listening to their album.

See: http://www.inaudible.co.uk/archives/00000340.html and this page http://www.inaudible.co.uk/crimea/pages/links/links2.html

Let's hope the important people out there, the media, are grabbed by the Crimea.

Now it's time for me to get off to Uni for my first days work on my summer project.

I have to say cleaning is never fun but it definitely is satisfying. I am almost at the point when I feel going into the bathroom is a safe thing todo. After continually bleaching the area I feel that anything that was alive is now dead and after scrubbing hard it is looking almost sanitary.

As for Kerrang, I have to say I love this radio station - especially now I have my radio connected up to my desktop. To listen to it just move that dial to 105.2 FM within the west midlands or so.

Suburbia are this unheard of band it seems and no one believed me that they were an actual band. I was not pleased since their track "Always" is on the FIFA 2004 game. For some reason I never had thought of searching Suburbia and FIFA 2004. They are brilliant, I had only heard Always till tonight and the rest of what I have downloaded is brilliant, shame they broke up. See: http://www.ainslieonline.co.uk/site/music/suburbia.php for more info. I still need to download Always, I am still hunting. If anyone has it or knows where to go tell, me, tell me now! I will probably find it on one of theirs links tomorrow though, am too tired now. I think I have web blindness.

I have been putting getting rid of Kazaa for months well today was the final straw. After downloading an Incubus track 11 times and getting 8 tracks with no music and 3 that do that stupid jumping about thing it was time to say goodbye to Kazaa.

Recently I have been using Xnews and so have been quite satisfied for my musical needs but well today finally took the biscuit! After Katherine's continuing badgering of how good Soul Seek is I decided to give it a try. Well I am impressed. I even added all my music on to it, something I never did with Kazaa as it was full of idiots.

See: http://www.slsknet.org for SoulSeek.

Snow Patrol are one of my favorite bands at the moment and I have to say I was well gutted when they were not on the excellent Reading lineup. Luckily for me they are coming to Birmingham (at the Academy) in November so guess what I just brought tickets to!

Yipee!

At last some of the dodgy music I have not yet deleted has come in handy. Well not so much in handy but some guy on SoulSeek has been looking for this album for years. Glad I can please. Oh the actual album was some album by Louise, don't know who she is? Well she married Jamie Redknapp (former Liverpool legend) and died into obscurity - thank god. Her music wasn't the best. Its not like I ever listen to it now. I might have when I was 14 though. :-)

Here we go my Reading Festival Review. What I will do is post basically what I wrote whilst at the festival and will do it in i think four parts. Here is part I.

Day Zero - or is it really day one, no I will stay with day zero.

The train journey was a complete and utter farce. The train from Uni to town was awful. It was so packed we could hardly fit on to the train. We met up with everyone easily at New Street, good!

The train, as expected, delayed. We then found that coach D, where we had reserved seats did not exist - typical Virgin. We did get seats ok in the end. We even managed to get to Reading on time, shocking! I think my and Carl's conversation (probably about next terms courses) must have bored Melissa (my sister) and Gareth (my to be brother in-law) as they fell asleep when they were sat behind us!

We had a tedious walk to the festival site, especially when one steward said we could go in the red gate when in fact it turned out we could not, great.

After a 20 min walk we managed to get down to the Brown field and found a good site - not too wet but still wet enough to be slightly concerning. We pitched the tents and had a quick relax.

Everywhere is covered in mud, great! Alex then joined us, not too pleased about all the mud but she isn't camping tonight!

We went for a late lunch in Wetherspoons (in Central Reading) and did a shop at Sainsburys - got the beer and bog roll (sorry toilet paper), you know the important stuff for at a festival.

I am now shattered - writing at only 09:39pm {this is when I did it - not now when I am typing it up - am shattered now as well!}

I am to be honest quite pissed off, the camp fires are freaking me out. i hate fire. I am quite scared of it. In such a confined environment it can not be safe. It was like this last year. Some one just set off some fireworks. IDIOT. i hate this aspect of the festival - if this continues it WILL be my last year camping.

Gonna try and get some sleep - more fireworks, argh!

Here we go the second part of my Reading Festival Review.

Day One - Friday.

It rained last night, great! I managed to get disturbed sleep and it was very quite from around 3am. I think this was due to the rain.

This rain has made the campsite worse, much worse.

This morning we went into Reading for brekkie at Wetherspoons - no bloody veggie option! Me and Kat were not pleased. I had a coke, I really needed something, the rest had breakfast.

Since there was no veggie food me and Kat went to Pret for a sarnie and a cup of tea, nice :-)

Katherine's shoes are completely wrecked and she is wearing plastic bags to protect her feet - can not be comfortable, a woman at Boots even commented on this. Luckily Alex brought in some wellies for her. Her are her plastic bag shoes:

I got some long socks as my wellies were rubbing - they aren't now! The woman in the shop looked at my funny! We went to the toilet and like last year there was a huge queue for the mens in the Oracle centre.

We met Alex and we all went back to the camp site. It seemed like a very long back, I am shattered already. We went into the arena and went straight to the main stage to see GLC (Goldie Lookin' Chain - fun website (need flash for most of the fun stuff), there was a huge crowd for the opener - much larger than last year. GLC's Welsh rap went down well. They are quite funny as they are not taking themselves serious and are just taking the piss. They have titles of songs such as "your mothers got a penis" and "guns don't kill people rappers do".

Next we saw The Open in the Radio 1 tent, they were ok, nothing spectacular. Kat then went off to change into the Wellies, I think it is time to throw her shoes in the bin! We watched Ikara Colt, again in the Radio 1 tent, they were not good! Kat go back to se her last minutes, thus qualifying as seeing a band for our band count! (we are not rushing to see loads but if you see 10mins we reckon you get a feel for the set).

The arena is so muddy, it isn't no where near as bad as the campsite but at times the stickiness means you nearly lose your wellies!

We headed back to the main stage to see Hundred Reasons. They were ok, not my thing particular. I stayed with Alex whilst the rest went closer.

Then it was off to see Modest Mouse. The rest came along to have a rest outside. Me and Kat got about halfway into the tent (it was on in the Radio One tent). Lets just say that Modest Mouse are going to be added to my Soul Seek download list and I may even buy an album of theirs - shocking! As you may of guessed I was impressed, they even had two drummers at times!

Off to see the Distillers next on the main stage. They were ok but they remind me too much like Hole (their lead singer is not bad looking though - the Distillers not Hole). Then came The Hives, what can be said? They ROCK. They put on such a great show, they are wonderful showmen. There set was great, I am very pleased as I was really looking forward to seeing them. Everyone seemed to enjoy watching them.

Ash time!I TIme for wonderful Ash. They started with Meltdown with TIm's guitar on fire!! They played some of their classics ("Girl from Mars", "Shinning Light", "Walking Barefoot") and also stuff off the new album ("Orpheus", "Clones", "Renegade Cavalcade", "Out of the blue"). I was going to try and remember the order, no chance! They were excellent, I was a little shocked that they didn't play any of Charlotte's new album ("Grey WIll Fade") or at the very least plug it. I though t they might have played "Summer" as that is a very Ash song. I really enjoyed this set, can I say anything else? NO Ash's music rocks and the quality speaks for itself.

After Ash we came across a huge mud fight, I took some pictures and a movie of this (i'll put this online later) - luckily I didn't get any mud on me whilst doing this. Thanks have to go to Alex and Katherine who just watched and didn't tell me when there was mud approaching!

Time for a break, pizza, a bit of Soulwax (awful website!) - was not impressed with them either. After Soulwax came some shopping with Alex. It didn't last long and shocked and slightly scared! Alex then brought a £4 sarnie (gosh it smelt nice!) and then 20mins of one of my favourite bands at the moment, The Shins!

The Shins were good, for what I saw (Darkness clashed).They played one of my favourtie songs "Girl Inform Me" so I was pleased, thought they didn't have their mics turned up loud enough. I want to see more!!

We went to meet Kat at a rendezvous point as she went to watch the Super Furry Animals. She was late and said that SFA were good and GLC joined them on stage! Whilst we were waiting a bail of hay went up causing flames to go about 40ft in the air. Her are some pictures of it being put out. Was quite perturbing, good that the fire brigade dealt with it fast.

Now then, time for the Darkness. What did they do?

Here we go the third part of my Reading Festival Review.

Day Two - Saturday.

I again slept quite well, in fact only woke up when carl shouted me to ask for train tickets. Yes him and his sister were heading back to Birmingham as she was not at all well.

We all had a beer - we need to get through our stock. We arsed around a little and headed to the arena. After a huge wait we finally got into the arena. Me and Kat then went straight to the Carling stage to see Mohair. Neither of us knew anything about them, but they turned out to be fantastic. Think I will try and buy a CD of their's. They also gave out stickers!

I then headed to see the 5, 6, 7, 8's on the main stage, they were good. They played that annoying Carling advert song. I quickly headed to the Carling tent and caught the end of Tat which was ok, though they seemed very similar (maybe too much) like Hole.

Now onto Bloc Party on the Radio 1 stage, they were ok - chance to have a sit down as I am shattered already.

Back to the Carling Stage to watch Agent Blue. Kat said she thought she knew them, well it turned out she didn't. they were a punk band. It was a great show which included the lead signer jumping into the crowd and singeing right next to me and Kat and them him crowd surfing with him finishing in the mosh pit, it was a great show. (I have some videos of this - I will put them online later)

Onto someone we knew, Razorlight. They did a cracking set getting the crowd well into it, they even threw flowers into the crowd.

Off to the Carling Stage for the 45's. I needed to sit down, so I did!

They were ok, again not who kat thought they were but she protests that there must be more than one 45's. We then met up with, Alex, Melissa and Gareth. We headed to see the New York Doll's who weren't anything fantastic.

I then had a 'great' experience with the toilets. As I waited in the queue they were cleaned so it took ages, plus they moved! I think the toilet was actually sinking in the mud!

We now saw the Ordinary Boys. They had a huge crowd in the Radio 1 tent, it was great. They played most of their album and started off with "Over the counter culture".

Now back to the main stage for Franz Ferdinand - they kicked ass. Great set and some cracking new material.

The mess here is getting worse:

Alex is wearing her hat again, so I stole it and put it on:

The Libertines were not as good as I hoped, but they were missing Pete Doherty - they don't have him for most of their gigs it seems due to his drugs problems.

Morrissey was great! Well he was like a CD, he sang and his band played perfectly. This has its downside though - no real emotion. He did seem overwhelmed though, back on top again. He had his name in flashing lights. He did play some Smiths songs.

Finally, 12 months late, the White Stripes! By this point my feet were killing me. They rocked. It wasn't as good as I had hoped though. They made a hash of a few songs and didn't work the crowd well. It was still fantastic and i was very pleased to see them.

I came back and slept.It is now Sunday morning and I have slept well yet again.

Here we go the fourth part of my Reading Festival Review.

Day Three - Sunday.

Today was probably the day I was looking forward to the least. This is because of two reasons there were not as many bands that I wanted to see playing today and the fact that this evening the camp site will be awful.

Again we started the day with a beer and the obligatory toilet run when you feel very very ill! The mess by our tents (mostly not from us) is getting bigger,

Me and Kat started the day by seeing, Eastern Lane in the Radio 1 stage, they were quite good - well worth another listen. Then it was the Futureheads - a band I had been looking forward to seeing and they didn't disappoint. They came across a little shouty though - I think they need less harmonies live or maybe turn down the microphones a little. Even the Radio 1 tent roof hasn't escaped the mud:

We spent most of the afternoon in the Radio 1 tent. As next was the Fiery Frunaces, they were interesting. Then the big one of the afternoon really - Dogs Die In Hot Cars. Katherine introduced these to me a while back and I have been looking forward to seeing them for a while. Alex came along and seemed to enjoy it as well. I have to say they were one of my highlights of the day.

Now Alex has been wearing a hat all weekend, you may have already seen me wearing it in my previous post:

Well periodically I have been stealing this and putting it on, normally to the side or backwards. This time i decided (with some protest off alex) that this was the festival hat and so I should put a picture off everyone wearing it online (everyone a part from Kat - i did take one but she will only protest that it is online!)

We watched some of the Drop Kick Murphys but they were on early due to the Rasmus being bottled off stage. I think this was harsh as they are a rock band - just not very good. I have a different opinion over 50 Cent and will come to that later. Kat and Alex went off to watch some other bands while I waited to see the Streets. They were awful after about 15mins I got annoyed and left. Me, Melissa and Gareth had a quick look around the stalls and then went back to see the Lostprophets. I like the Lostprophets but their set was not very good. Apart from a few songs they didn't seem to play well. They also got the crowd to split into half and charge at each other! As Placebo played, not a bad set bit non descript though, the Sunset was beautiful.

Since Alex didn't want to see anyone after Placebo she went home. We are all looking forward to seeing Greenday at the this point. One thing to get out of the way a rapper called 50 Cent, "Mr. i got shot nine times". Kat decided she didn't want to see him get bottled off stage. I did though and didn't have anyone I particularly wanted to see. Him and his boys "g-unit" came out to a barrage of bottles (some i believe with piss in - now that's too far). I don't like his music, he annoys me lots, he is a muppet. To be fair they stood up to it for a while, he managed about 20mins and chucked bottles back at the crowd. We were not to close to the front (didn't want to get piss on us!). I still was able to shout. I can shout louder than expected, I got a "bollocks" shout going all the way to the front, which was brilliant. I then tried to get a "you're mother's got a penis" chant going but everyone started laughing! I lost my voice from shouting. Everyone around the place were shouting and no one I saw wanted him on stage. He eventually left the stage after a camping chair got chucked on to stage - I think it hit him. "mr. I got shot nine times" can't take some bottles and a chair!

Now onto Greenday, the final band of the reading festival. All I can say is wow! They put on an excellent show - nearly 2hours due to the shorter sets done by both 50 Cent and the Rasmus. They got some people on stage to play which was cool. They did a few good covers including "we are the champions" by Queen. They stated the set with "american idiot". I like this song. I have never been a big Greenday fan, but am gonna give them a bit more of a listen to when I am back in Birmingham. They finished the gig well.

We headed back to the tents and saw some tents go up in smoke. I still managed to sleep well after doing some packing. Now time to get ready for the journey home.

From Katherine's blog about agent blue:

Who wants to see, Ash, The Darkness and Har Mar Superstar in a super group I do!!

My mate Jordan suggested song titles such as:

Today was Radio One's: onebigweekend. We (me, Kat and Tom) got tickets to go to this free gig last week. It took place at Perry Park, by the Alexander Stadium - haven't been that way in years. This was the second day of the gig and the lineup was:

Sunday 19 Sept - Bands Day

Main Stage
Lost Prophets
Mouldy Lookin' Stain
Joss Stone
Goldie Lookin’ Chain
Razorlight
Damien Rice
Natasha Bedingfield and Estelle
Broken Dolls

Second Stage
The Music
Kasabian
22-20’s
13 Senses
Skinnyman
The Departure
Exist

Mostly it was quite easy to decide who to see, especially since the two stages didn't finish at the same time. The big one was Kasabian against GLC (Goldie Lookin Chain).

The day started with a bright an early start at 8am and then the bus journey to the site, not too bad - quite easy. The first thing to do once we were inside was to go to the toilets!

Toilets: excellent. They were clean, could flush them and even had stuff in them to clean your hand with. Excellent. I could not believe it. :-)

Exist: I had not heard anything by them before today and I was very impressed. They played well and their songs seemed catchy and well written. I have to say how professional they were as they had loads of technical problems. This started with what seemed like resonance on a speaker (from the action the techincians putting a sheet underneath it). This continued with the drummer nearly getting knocked over by the back stage curtain. They then had various problems with the lead singers guitar connection to the speakers. They were good though, well worth a second listen to.

The Departure: Again I have never heard anything by this band and like Exist they played excellently. They did a great set. Very enjoyable. I think I would like to see them play again, they had some catchy tunes. They were wearing a mismatch of clothing but it seemed to work. Their lead singer was wearing a rather smart suit with a neckerchief like thing. His mannerisms reminded me of Morrissey - especially since he wasn't playing an instrument as well. There base player was wearing a vest like sweater of the top of a T-shirt and hardly moved through out the whole set. A different matter entirely for what I think was their lead guitarist who was jumping around all over the place in pink socks, bit of a punk feel to his outfit and he looks like Ant (I think the right one) out of Ant & Dec!

Natasha Bedingfield: Awful. Only saw the end of her "set" which involved 3 songs and a cover of "This Love" by Maroon 5 with "I can't sing at all" Estelle. I actually like this song, I don't think I can listen to it now without her useless little noises. Thank god it was short. Oh yeah the reason we even went over was so we could get a good place for the next act, Razorlight!

Razorlight: This is the second time I have seen them play, they played excellently at Reading (see http://www.krioma.net/blog/archives/2004_09_07.html). Again they did a cracking set, but the atmosphere wasn't right. Katherine said she thought it would be like this because of the "radio one crowd". There set was very enjoyable really rocking hard to "golden touch" - the only song most people seemed to know. They were definitely worth seeing but I really wasn't liking the atmosphere in the main stage.

13 Senses: We caught the last 3 or so songs from their set. I actually even knew 2 of them. They were excellent, I think I may buy their album. Yes you heard me - buy not download! When I got to the tent I initially thought what the hell is Ashton Kutcher on stage singing for! From a distance their keyboardists / singer looks like him (maybe not be it was dark!).

22-20’s: I caught a few of their tracks at Reading, at the time I wasn't impressed. On a second listen I was a bit more impressed but still not over the moon. They are good but not sure if I enjoy them. I guess if I listened to them at home my opinion my be different. Better get that album when it comes out I guess.

Kasabian: Excellent. Well the songs I know / like were the rest I just found a little strange and no edge. Musically they were good but spent too much time arsing around with effects. LSF was good. Gonna give their album a listen to and I shall see what I think of the rest of their music in a bit more detail.

The Music: I find these boring. We listened to a few songs and then left. Problem was we then headed over to the main stage were Joss Stone was playing.

Joss Stone: BITCH!!! Sorry I will calm down now. I have one major problem (apart from the fact that she is shite!) - she ruined "Fell in love with a girl" by the White Stripes. She covered this - changed the title to "Fell in love with a boy", put a stupid beat on, slowed it down and did lots of irrelevant noises with her voice to give over the impression she can sing. I can remember thinking where the heck are the bottles I want to throw one at her! The really awful thing is that the White Stripes actually like it being played slower and so do this live, thus killing a once great song. Idiots. Oh the only reason we saw her was so we could get a better spot for the next few bands.

Mouldy Lookin' Stain: Ummm, not sure what to think. I was expecting a proper tribute like band. No we got bloody Chris Moyles. They did on song "Guns don't kill people rabbits do" a piss take of a piss take by GLC's (Goldie Lookin Chain's) "Guns don't kill people rabbits do". It was ok but annoying and meant we had to wait for the the lostprophets.

Lostprophets: Wicked! They did an excellent set. At times, especially for songs that you didn't know (in my case only 1), the vocals could not be heard well. Like always they put on an excellent show. Telling people there was not enough energy and making everyone jump for "Last Train Home". This was excellent. But it went from good to bloody excellent. Not the word bloody.

They did a cover of "cry me a river" by Justin Timberlake and then it was onto the wall of death. They did this at Reading and I was annoyed I missed out. I didn't think they would do it at a Radio 1 gig, especially since on the tickets it says no moshing. The basic idea with this is that the crowd are split into two halves - Shinobi and Dragon Ninja. We were Dragon Ninja. The crowd is then split into two halves. The smaller / more fragile people I told to get out of the way. At this point me and Katherine were a long way from the gap. Then we are told when this song kicks in (the song being Shinobi vs Dragon Ninja) to have a battle. Shinobi go to your left, Dragon Ninja your right. The guitars starts then, bang. THe drums come in and it goes! Everyone pushes and a wall of death is started. Me and Katherine (she following behind me - guess I make a good battering ram) move about 30foot in a few seconds. It is hectic. Then all of a sudden the music stops. A big pile up has occurred. The instructions the band gave before was to help each other out. This obviously failed. They then called people to show their injures and there was quite a few people with blooded arms. Then they asked do you want to go again? Of course we did. They spilt us in half, this time I was a few people from the gap. Of it went again. Loads of fun. They finished on "Burn Burn". During this song I launched 3 people up to crowd surf out of their and had about 5 people go over my head one kicking me by accident. I have a headache now! There was a huge mosh pit form. It was excellent fun. But so damn hot.

After a quick pit stop it was back to Tom's as he was being nice and giving us a lift home. On the way I got a Kerrang Radio sweatband and band. Excellent. Cheeky people grabbing us on the way out. Not that I am gonna complain. Good marketing tactic by them really. "you just went to a radio 1 gig but we are giving you free sweatbands!".

Finally we came up with a new anti-social dance today. Flarting. You do a ska dance but make contact with each others shins, like so:

Tonight I went with Alex and Katherine to see Agent Blue and the others play at the Jug of Ale in Moseley. This was the first time I have been there and although Katherine said it only had the capacity of about 100 people I was not expecting it to be quite so small - it couldn't have been longer than the length of my house and not much wider either! This meant it was a nice intimate environment.

On first were Agent Blue, a band I have become a big fan of since mine and Katherine's freak discovery of them at Reading. To be honest eventhough they were the support band I went to see them. They did not disappoint. Sex, Drugs and Rocks through your window is probably my favourite song by them and well they played it excellently. Since there was no barrier they did not come out as rebellious as they did at Reading. I think this along with the fact that I know their music meant that musically they were excellent. I don't think they worked the crowd as well but with such a small audience it must be hard to. Though they didn't work the crowd as expected it was definitely and brilliant set..... I want more is what I was thinking when they ended the set.

I also got a free patch (time to get Alex to sew that on something!) off them and brought a t-shirt. It turns out that the largest size didn't fit me so I have given it to Alex who seemed very pleased.

The Others. They are a band I think I know a few songs by (in fact I do but at the time wasn't sure). Like Agent Blue they did an excellent set. I very much enjoyed their music. They got the crowd bouncing from the start with the audience jumping around them at the start. Was cool that you could get on to the stage. I think I even ended up in the mosh pit during the last two songs with the lead singer of Agent Blue! Oh the Others singer climbed up the speakers a little which was kinda strange.

I also took this photo which I really like the way the streetlight have come out in a cool green colour:

Good old William Shatner is back this time not to boldy go where no man has gone before (well maybe a little) but now to cover a classic by Pulp. The classic track being Common People. Shatner does a great job with his spoken word version of it. I have to say it aint a bad cover and is actually quite good. Keep it up Shatner! I also remember a clip in Futurama where he does a spoke word version of "I'm the real slim shady" by Eminem. Wicked!

In fact he has an album out titled "Has Been" - I might have to get this one, could be interesting.

See: http://www.nme.com/features/110018.htm for more.

Today I finally got around to completely listening to Thirteen Senses' ablum - The Invitation. It is good. It is a bit a slow to be honest but if I want to just chill then this will be one to get out. I do think they are good. I saw them play at the Radio One: One Big weekend in Birmingham (see http://www.krioma.net/blog/archives/2004_09_20.html#000399). They were good then and so would definitely recommend anyone who can giving them a listen to or going to see them. I think by far my favourite tracks on the album are "Into the Fire", which they have released as a single, and "Gone".