Marques's weblog

Hexstatic @ KOKO - 09/13/2008

So I know I should really be blogging about my adventures from the past couple weeks, but I will do that eventually when I get the pics and such on my computer.  In the mean time I figured it would be best to just get something up.  So here is a write up of a show I saw this weekend.

Hexstatic MySpace

So when trying to figure out what to do on a weekend I usually turn towards Timeout.  Sometimes it is really hard to tell how great the show is going to be, but since this show was at KOKO which is a sweet venue and close to boot I figured it would definitely be worth the try.  It was expensive, but then again everything is so whatever.  In addition the KOKO site sold it well too.

I got to the show at like 10, but Hexstatic didn't go on till 12.  The earlier acts were actually all bands and definitely not my style.  In fact they were kind of funky and since I didn't look at Hexstatic beforehand this kind of had me really worried.  I had to get to the show early so that I could get in (there were only like 40 tix left after I got in), but I could reenter so I headed out to waste some time.  Luckily I got in when I did because when the line to get in was huge when I left and I am guessing all the tickets would soon be gone.

I got back near 12 which was when Hexstatic was supposed to go on.  More funk was going when I got in there and this was getting lame.  Luckily it ended before my ears started bleeding.    Then the fun came.

All I can say is that this show was awesome.  They came on and started out with heavy visuals for the first 45 mins of the set.  It gets hard to fully understand what is being done when.  For the show they had some of those transparent screens on the stage with the DJ team behind it.  This meant you could see them setting up everything, but you couldn't see them once they started playing the video.  Obviously the video is preproduced, but it is hard to tell what of the audio is with the video and what the DJs are doing.  Supposedly that was all being sync'd in from them, but no matter what it is pretty amazing production wise.

Here is one of the clips

After that the video onslaught continued, but it became less ambient and more break beats and this is where the dancing really kicked in.  A half an hour lateri s when the mash ups started and this continued for the remainder of the two hour set.  The set ended with a mash up of some Beck song and The Prodigy's Smack My Bitch Up.  This of course will ignite any crowd and accordingly the place went pretty crazy.  Thank god the mash up ended by the time it got to the extended high vocal part of SMBU because that is one of the best parts of a song ever.  After that they sped up the tempo for the rest of the song.  By the time it was done I basically wanted to puke from dancing too hard like from when you run too fast.  This typically happens more at moshing shows, but occasionally at a club too.  If you have never danced that hard then you should probably listen to better music.  Or I don't maybe you are just really fit.

The original video because it is fucking sweet. Why did MTV sensor this again... oh yeah that's right now I remember.

Anyways the show was awesome.  Needless to say I was a sweaty mess when it was all said and done.  I would recommend this show to anyone who likes break beats, dancing or has eyes. 

I stayed for a little bit of the next show, but they were like the JV version of Hexstatic and were sticking with mostly hip hop mash ups.  I left dragging my ass to get some late night food and then headed home.

This one molests your ears

So now that the purchasing dam was broken it was time to brake out the old chip and pin. Amazingly since I have been here I have not bought a CD. That is pretty crazy for someone who moved to a city in order to experience the music he loves so much, right? I mean honestly my ideal walk to work would probably include picking up a piece of fruit and a cd on the walk to work every morning.

The problem is that even thought I walk all over I see very few record shops and when I do they are seldom open. Technically I only attempted to go into one so far and that was at a market. I was rejected because I was eating chinese. I mean you are fucking walk in store in an outdoor market selling what are likely stolen CDs and you are not going to let in someone who has purchased food from one of the 40 booths prior to your store? Come on. Anyways I finally got a store albeit an HMV and picked some up.

To my surprise the aforementioned UNKLE had a new CD out. So I picked that up along with a Verve cd because people out here really seem to hold them in high regard. I don't think I am quite there on them yet. Anyways the UNKLE CD picks up right where the last one left out. Definitely departing from the old stuff. It is titled End Titles: Stories For Film and it is pretty much like it sounds. This is where I see it connected to War Stories. War Stories to me was really great because it was such a visible album and then here the attempt was explicitly stated. This actually has some tracks from War Stories with vocals added in. I still need to listen to it more to get a better feel, but I don't feel like it is strong enough in its emotive qualities and this hurts the visualness. We will see, but right now it is no War Stories. In the end, because of the theme and release proximity, I am guessing these were tracks that didn't make it past the cutting room floor the first time and now are getting to see daylight.

The spending continued or tried to continue at least. I haven't wrote this up yet, but someday I will talk about work and when I do I will mentioned the fact that I work near Kick Ass Kicks Lane. Ok that is not the real name. You got me. Anyways there are so many cool shoe stores and there was one pair in particular I had been coveting since I started working here. Reebok has a line of Voltron shoes (this is actually the second version) and I wanted the green ones. Turns out these are the only fucking shoes in the whole line that do not come in my size. Apparently green patten leather is in short supply. Those people must be building olympic stadiums or something. This is severely disappointing since 2 days prior a guy told me they come in up to 15s. How am I supposed to defend my fucking planet if I can't even wear Voltron shoes. I mean I can't wear my old bed sheets as a cape because my mom finally threw them out. What else have I got? Lame.

Turns out all cool shoes stop at 13s and as a result I still have money saved up for retirement. Maybe my feet will have shrunken by then so I can buy some sweet orthopedic loafers. In any case I need new shoes. My old ones are worn out from all the walking. Won't Tim be surprised when 20 pairs show up in a couple weeks.

Then I went on to shirt shopping. I was mildly more successful at that. I have yet to figure out the quality of the shirts, but since everyone in London dresses up all the time you can get reasonably nice dress shirts that meet my style requirements fairly easily. I found a store called NEXT which is right by work and I am pretty excited about the ease of shopping there. Of course this is for dress shirts where it is easy to find my size. I am pretty much fucked everywhere else. Don't be surprised if you see a picture of me next year with a really nice shirt and tattered clothes everywhere else.

Day 11: Yeah yeah, chorus, yeah yeah

So once again i am on wierd keyboard.  i guess this is a french thing so hoppefully it ends after today  this was the last day at pinkpop  and after an awesome too l perfomance the night before, the bands i was most looking forward to are Morrissey, Flaming Lips, Editors and deftones.  unfoortunately deftones and editors were at the same time so i chose editors since i had not seen them before.

The editors were good, but not spetacular... maybe should have saw deftones.  flaming lips was the same entertaining show as usual  lots of crazy shit dancing around like aliens and santa claus  lots of baloons bouncing around, camera tricks and whatnot.  it was entertaining and the crowd was not that big so it was more enjoyable than coachella a couple years back  they ended with a cover of warpig  dresden dolls also covered this song  someone should have told the flaming lips  their cover was more accurate but dresden dolls was better because they onkly two people and it inckuded an awesome piano solo

finally for me was morrissey  this was the second largest reason i was going to this  the smiths would be number one on my bands to still see live and this is really as close as that will get to happening  the crowd was mostly people older than me and you could tell they were there fore the same reasons  everyone still knew all the newer stuff too though so that was good  he opened zth panic and the crowd went crazy  the second to last song was how soon is now  once again the crowd went nuts  this one fguy jumped the barrier and got half way up the stage when a guard dived off and tackled him  then more started jumping morrissey came down and started shaking their hands as they were being carried out  it was really cool of morrissey to do

the night ended with red hot chili peppers  like in woodstock i was not super interested  like in woodstock ppeople started fires  unlike in woodstock they were mostly out of jest and wezre put out

i ended the night trying to sleep as the tent next to me played nirvana songs on their guitar and sang a long   incidentily nirvana was probably the best represented by band tshirts outside of the performers and probably in the top 2 or 3 for non-new shirts  it is kind of funny because it is hard to understand when english is your native language so for them it had to be near impossible  they usually just used a filler for the lyrics like yeah  eventually i nodded off

i could go into a hundred good things about this concertt but i dont hqve the time or patience with this keyboard

Day 09,10: Survival at PinkPop

So I am at PinkPop and surprising I am still alive.  It hasn't really rained yet, but it was quite cold last night.  I had to put on socks, my coat and fully zip of my fleece bag in the middle of the night because my body was so cold.  I had counted on just passing out and sleeping through the cold, but it doesn't really work like that when people play music from their tents during all hours, but like 5 in the morning. 

The festival overall is awesome and well run.  You can bring pretty much everything in the camping ground except hard drugs.  I expected the weed, but to watch 10 people walk in each with their own 18 pack it was pretty sweet and a little frightening.  The food here is cheaper than in Amsterdam so even though you can bring stuff in, it really isn't that much cheaper elsewhere.  A can of beer in like 1.75 in the camper villiage... not too shabby.  Of course all this led to there being piles of beer cans sitting next to tents by the early afternoon, but hey you got to get rid of the 18 pack before it gets cold right?

I made it in time for the Dresden Doll show which was pretty sweet although they didn't play "Perfect Fit" which would be my favorite song.  I probably should have known this, but there are only two dolls from Dresden, the female lead singer/pianist and the drummer boy.  Kaiser Cheifs were later on and they also were very good as well.

This of course all led up to the Placebo show.  It started out a little slow because they played mostly new songs and I am not sure how well they plan in an outdoor festival.  The vocals drowned out the rest of the band so it was a slow go at the start.  However once they moved into the older stuff the crowd was really into it.  The encore was super sweet and they opened with their cover of "Running up that hill" which is a Kate Bush song.  This is one of my favorite covers of theirs and I was very impressed that pretty much everyone in the crowd knew it was going to be that song from the short sampled played while the band was off stage.  They ended with Nancy Boy and I don't think I had heard that live before because in SF Brian said that the song was dog shit or something like it, but of course he was super drunk at the time.

A funny note for those people who have never been to a concert outside of the NA, but it is funny when you hit a sing a long part in the song and it sounds wierd because all the people singing the english song have a foreign (or in actuallity native) english accent.  The through me off the first time it happened.

Afterwards there was a big dance party.  I was pretty tired though so I took a shower, walked around a bit and then made an attempt at sleep.

Today I tried to go to Maastricht, but once I got there the bikes were sold out so I just walked around and then came back for the Bloodhound Gang.  The show was good, but I am not sure how well recieved because they just kept calling eachother homos the whole time.  They did speak quite a bit of dutch which I hadn't heard from a band yet.

Well off to Tool.