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Saturday, July 06, 2002 Where Were You? Just came back from the Jonatha Brooke show and it was a very nice experience. Her band had gotten stuck in LA, because the airport had been closed because some disgruntled ex-employee had come back and shot some people. So she performed solo and I think it was probably better that way. There weren't that many people in the tent, but the people there seemed to know her stuff. And when one guy called out a song title she just went Okay! and played it. We sat on the grass for most of the show and hung out, so that was cool. Before that I was at a stand-up show with three Danish comedians. The last one was Lasse Rimmer, who is the Danish Alex Trebek. Okay, so not exactly, but he is the host of the Danish version of Jeopardy. But he also writes on a sitcom, he does stand-up, and he writes a weblog in Danish. All three comedians were funny, but Rimmer was the most highly anticipated. He did a good job and dealt well with the hecklers. Even when he asked the crowd a question and some guy who formed his answer in the form of a question. He did a bit about deer caught in the headlights of a car, which reminded me of an old Eddie Izzard joke about evil pilotfish, who swim two by two to scare the other fish into thinking there's a car coming at them. It was funny stuff and a nice break from all the music. I found two nice pictures I wanted to share with you: Walter Schriefels (Rival Schools) and Chris Martin (Coldplay) - John Fogde 3:27 PM [+] He's a Complicated Man: I saw Isaac Hayes last night and he's a cool cat. I'm not a big soul fan, but he has a cool-ass voice and every thing he says oozes sex. And he played Theme from Shaft and Chocolate Salty Balls, so that was alright. I've been blogging a lot, but because Blogger was down yesterday I haven't been able to publish until now. It was pretty frustrating, but maybe that'll teach me that it's worth it to shell out a couple of bucks for the Pro version. I have a very loose schedule today, so I'll go see Lasse Rimmer do some stand-up in half an hour and later today I'll go see Jonatha Brooke, Junior Senior, The Calling, Dear, and Superheroes. I have to review The Calling, who I don't really know, but chances are their pretty terrible. But we'll see I guess. And finally here's a snippet of our breakfast conversation the other day:
- John Fogde 12:02 PM [+] Friday, July 05, 2002 Here Comes My Day in the Sun: I just came back from seeing the best Danish live act ever. They're called Love Shop and I've seen them a hundred times and they're always in super form with a couple of new, fun stories they enjoy sharing. They have a truckload of great songs and they're one of those bands that always have people singing along to their stuff. And this time was no different, so it was awesome as ever. My interview with Doves is available now (Modem - ADSL). I thought it went pretty well and we got to talk about both their records and some other stuff. But when I was at their concert a guy from the record label had stopped by and told my editor that the guys thought the interview had been great. Apparently, they hate giving interviews, but they had told the label guy that this had been the best interview they'd given in ages and that it was obvious that I was well prepared. To me that's a big deal. Actually, it's a huge deal. I've done a lot of interviews and I tend to only interview bands that I like. So when I get the impression (or am specifically told) that the artist thought being interviewed was fun and not a boring chore, then that's a big deal to me. I always try to do as much research as possible and hopefully find a couple of questions they haven't been asked a million times before. And if they enjoy being interviewed, then usually the interview becomes more interesting and then everyone is happy. So knowing that they enjoyed it enough to tell their record label people about it means a lot to me. - John Fogde 9:32 PM [+] Here it Comes: I saw No Doubt put on a decent show last night. I liked Tragic Kingdom, when it came out, but I don't know their newer stuff. I hate the two new singles, so I was mainly there to see them and hear Just a Girl and Spiderwebs. I guess if you're a fan then it was a good show, but I was slightly underwhelmed. Like Seinfeld's girlfriend once said about his act: "It all just seemed like a bunch of fluff". I've seen nothing today, but I've interviewed Jez and Andy from Doves and that'll be available later today. Watch out for a couple of choice remarks about Tim Henman and info about upcoming dates. You can also read my review of A (who were shit) and Muse (who were great). Both are in Danish, but if you check out the Muse review you can watch some live clips from the Hulabaloo DVD. I'm off to see Doves now, then some Danish bands, and tonight I'll go see Isaac Hayes. And he better play Theme from Shaft. - John Fogde 4:39 PM [+] Thursday, July 04, 2002 A Maniac, Maniac on the Floor: I saw Muse play today and have established that Matt Bellamy is absolutely nuts. As always he gave it his all and jumped effortless from playing beautiful piano lines to screeching guitar solos to singing in the wildest falsetto ever. Origin of Symmetry is a cracker of an album and the songs work even better live. Muse absolutely rule and if you haven't heard them yet you should give them a chance (they don't even play the dreadful Unintended anymore). Hopefully I'll be able to and some pictures from the concert later. More stuff to check out: Coldplay performing three tracks from their forthcoming album. It's a world premiere and I'm passing it along to you. The entire Jon Spencer Blues Explosion concert (lasts about an hour). My review of Gomez (in Danish). - John Fogde 9:28 PM [+] Pictures of You: We've taken a bunch of pictures already, so I've collected a bunch of links to the best ones:
- John Fogde 4:22 PM [+] I Know You Don't Listen To Me: I got to see both Gomez and Coldplay last night and both were pretty good. I've seen Gomez a couple of times before and as always they were in an extremely good mood. They're a fun bunch and they have some great songs. Unfortunately, the weather was pretty bad, but still they managed to get people excited during the first couple of songs. They played too much new stuff in the middle part of the show, so it died down a bit, but the ending was smashing as they played Here Comes the Breeze, Get Myself Arrested, Ruff Stuff, Revolutionary Kind, and Whipping Piccadilly was the last song. So considering the circumstances the show was actually very enjoyable. Coldplay was the last band to play here last night and they put on a pretty good show. They'd been out to look at the stage early in the morning and had been sure that this would be the worst show they'd ever play. But not surprisingly people had chosen to ignore the mud and had shown up in droves. So the band were really happy that so many had shown up and it showed. Obviously, the feedback on the new stuff weren't that strong, but Shiver, Trouble, and Yellow were well received and so was the new single. I don't know if it was the weather or the fact that Coldplay don't have enough great songs that stopped the concert from being fantastic, but as concerts go it was still pretty good. The Rival Schools interview I did is online now and so is my review of the concert (unfortunately, it's in Danish). - John Fogde 2:25 PM [+] Wednesday, July 03, 2002 Bring It On: We just got permission to stream the Gomez concert, so in 15 minutes you'll be able to go to musik.dk and watch them play live. - John Fogde 8:39 PM [+] I Won't Complain Unless You Want Me To: It's absolutely pouring out and I've had a great day so far. I did an interview Walter Schriefels from Rival Schools, which went really well. I'll link to the interview, when we get it online, but until then you can watch a clip of us talking before the interview. I also saw them play this afternoon and they rocked. The gave shout-outs to Danish model Helena Christensen, the little mermaid, and Danish money because it hasn't been turned into European money yet. The played Good Things and Used For Glue and most of the other songs of the record and although they had a shitty time slot and no one knew them they made the best of it. My friend, Søren, interviewed Jon from Coldplay and that interview is available here in two qualities: ADSL - Modem. He shot some clips from the Turin Brakes and Rival Schools shows: [Turin Brakes - Windows Media: ADSL - Modem] [Turin Brakes - Windows Media: ADSL - Modem] [Rival Schools i Windows Media: ADSL - Modem] [Rival Schools i Windows Media: ADSL - Modem] Check out the clips and check back for more as the John Fogde Blues Explosion continues. - John Fogde 7:12 PM [+] Tuesday, July 02, 2002 Message in a Bottle: My blog is in the shitter right now, so there is no author tag and the comments don't work either. If you have questions about the festival or you have an interesting story or questions for some of the bands feel free to write me at john@warhol.dk or leave me a message in the tagboard in the left column. - John Fogde 10:15 PM [+] Everything in its Right Place: We’ve been down here at the Midtfyns Festival since 1 o’clock and we seem to have everything under control. I’m blogging this from a laptop with a wireless internet connection in the middle of a muddy field with a cup of coffee in front of me and a mouth full of chocolate biscuits. It’s slightly surreal, but a lot of fun. Everyone is in a really good mood although the weather is supremely shitty. There’s mud everywhere, but as long as we can sit here out of the rain it doesn’t really matter. We’ve already gotten a bunch of interviews lined up and apparently we’ve secured a world premiere of some of the tracks from the new Coldplay record, which will be released in August. We’ll make them available online on Thursday, so I’ll add a link as soon as we’ve got them ready. We should also get some stuff from the forthcoming Muse DVD, but more on that later. We have so far been promised interviews with Muse, Coldplay, Doves, and Rival Schools, and I’ve been asked to interview the last two bands, which I’m pretty excited about. We’ll shoot the interviews with a digital video camera and then make them available online as soon as possible. And since I’ll be interviewing in English everybody should be able to understand what’s going on. I have to start preparing some questions for the interviews now, but if you have any questions to the bands or any interesting titbits of information you’d like to share feel free to leave a message in the comments. There seems to be some problems with the author tag on the Blogspot sites, but hopefully it’ll get fixed soon. But it’s still me, John Fogde, who’s writing, and I’ll be adding a lot more about the goings-on here at the festival later. - John Fogde 8:32 PM [+] Monday, July 01, 2002 Good Things Are Coming Our Way: I was at a wedding this weekend and it was a strange, but nice experience. I went to the island of Samsø Friday by myself and ended up at the place we were supposed to stay around 6 PM. It was a place, which is normally used to house schoolchildren visiting the island, so it's like a camp or something. So there were dormitories with bunk beds, which was a little odd, but not that odd, when you're used to travelling and staying in youth hostels. An hour later we went to pick up my friend, who was also invited to the wedding, which made me a lot more comfortable. To explain the situation I'll just mention that the groom started at university with my friend and I and we were the only university friends, who were invited. This also means that I don't know any of his other friends that well. I met a lot of them at the bachelor party, but I don't feel like I really know them. So after my friend got settled we ditched the others and went to get dinner and beer. When we got back we sat in the sofas in the dining room, while the others sat in the kitchen. Some drifted back and forth and talked to us, but mainly we were just the two of us. I don't think we intentionally wanted to be asocial, but we felt comfortable just being the two of us and not sitting in the kitchen, where people were smoking and playing cards. So we sat around drinking beer and listened to The Pixies, Manu Chao (a big hit with this crowd), and New Order until around 2 AM, when it was time to hit the sack. Saturday morning was spent getting ready and watching a bit of Wimbledon before leaving for the wedding. My friend and I wore similar shirts by Danish designer Mads Nørgaard that are reversed in colour. So mine is white with light-blue ruffles and his is the opposite. We didn't wear jackets, so people thought we were a bit strange. Everyone else wore suits you could as easily have worn at a funeral (except the best man who wore a beige jacket and clown pants. Honest!), so we thought we'd do something different. A girl, who by the way wore a completely see-trough dress, mentioned that we looked like those two guys from Dumb & Dumber and realizing she'd just called us dumb pointed out that she meant because of the shirts. Ha ha! Very funny. At least my underwear wasn't showing. We walked to the church, which was located on the top of a hill with a very picturesque view of the island. It was quite windy, but other than that it was a nice day and the setting for the wedding couldn’t have been better. Inside were about 60 people and after a few minutes the bride arrived dressed in peach coloured dress. The actual wedding lasted 35 minutes, which I thought was extremely swift. We sang three hymns and there was an exchange of vows and rings, but what took up most of the time was the sermon. The priest had known the bride’s family for a long time, so he was able to add a personal touch, which was nice. But the gist of the speech reminded me of a cross between John Donne’s No Man is an Island and Hedwig’s The Origin of Love just to give you an idea of my frame of reference. After the ceremony and having waited for the newlyweds to drive away we wandered down to the restaurant. My friend and I have travelled together quite a bit, so at this point we should know that we are disorganized idiots. Everybody else drove, but we wandered into the town only to realize we had no idea what the restaurant was called or where it was located. We walked by two restaurants we were sure weren't the right ones, then wandered back a bit only to change our minds and wander back the other way again. We finally noticed the priest drive by us and followed him until we found the restaurant. This led us to champagne, hors d’oeuvres, and watching the happy couple unpack a barrage of presents. The rest of the evening consisted of fantastic food and wine, a lot of songs and even more speeches, and drinking until 6 in the morning. I won’t go into details about what happened at the party, but I have to mention this old guy, who made the remark of the evening. I’d noticed him early on, because he had a cigar hanging on his lower lip like a dopey Clint Eastwood. But it was the hearing aids, which really made me notice him. They were huge and grey with big plastic things going into his ears. Now I don’t want to make fun of the disabled, but I thought it was funny that he had those bad boys turned up so loud that the feedback they created distracted the chef twice, while he was presenting the menu. I didn’t sit near him, but I was later told that he had rambled incoherently throughout most of the night not even stopping while people were giving their speeches. But he really through in a zinger as the sister of the groom was rapping up her speech and people were getting on their feet to toast the happy couple. She said that she’d end her speech with asking people to join her in a toast and in a second of complete silence the old guy says “Thankfully! Now we don’t have to listen to more of her babble!”. The women next to him grabbed his arm and undoubtfully told him to can it, while the rest of us made the toast. And immediately after dinner he was escorted out and driven home. It was pretty embarrasing, but also really funny. Sunday we had brunch in the bride’s parents’ summer house, where we also watched the World Cup final. I didn’t feel too hung over, but in the car down to the ferry and especially standing in line I got a bit queasy and the foul stench of seaweed didn’t make things any better. But I made it home alright and spent the rest of the night in front of the television. To wrap this wedding thing up I’d like to add that I thought we had an excellent time this weekend. The party was arranged to perfection and I got to talk to a lot of nice people. I was fun telling the groom’s parents about some of the things we’d done together and it was nice to see the bride and groom so happy. It was a unique experience and something I won’t forget for a long time. Today has been spent sleeping, watching Henman fumble his way through his fourth game, and packing. I’m leaving for the festival tomorrow at 8 in the morning, so I need to get all my gear ready. I’ve been listening to Rival Schools all night and I’m really looking forward to seeing them on Wednesday. I have no idea what we’re going to be doing at the festival yet, but I guess we’ll have a meeting tomorrow to sort things out. I’ll do my best to update about my musical adventures and maybe I’ll even be able to link to some photos and interviews. I’m sure it’ll be an awesome week. Good things are indeed coming our way. - John Fogde 11:35 PM [+] |
Pavement: Slanted & Enchanted
Ben Folds: Ben Folds Live
Supergrass: Life on Other Planets
Ryan Adams: Demolition
Beck: Sea Change
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