My 2010 in review - Part 2. July and August

July

I had planned to go and see Florence and the machine at Somerset House, but I managed to get a ticket to 6 Day Riot's "On This Island" Album Pre-Launch which conflicted with the FATM gig, so decided to go and see 6 Day Riot instead, it was a shame the gigs conflicted as I really want to see Florence live, but the pre-launch gig was very special, 6 Day Riot were going to play an acoustic set of their new album live to just 40 people.

The venue for the pre-launch was a small room in the downstairs of The Drunken Monkey pub in Shoreditch.

I decided to take my 550D DSLR along to this one,  I'm glad I did, although the venue was small, the lighting was quite dark and shadowy, so I doubt my LX-3 would have coped well, I even had to resort to using flash, something I wouldn't normally do, thankfully the band didn't mind.

It was fantastic to hear 6 Day Riot in such a intimate venue, they sound even better playing acoustically than they do normally.

I even got to chat to all the members of 6 Day Riot before and after the gig. :)

This is my joint favourite gig of 2010, the other being Nerina Pallot's Christmas Party.  I enjoyed myself so much that I went back into London the next evening to see them live again at The Remedy at Tooting Tram and Social, a live music evening presented by XFM's John Kennedy.

This was a much larger gig with a couple hundred people there at least, the sound system at Tooting Tram and Social could be better and the layout isn't perfect (having the door to the toilets by the side of the stage is quite distracting with people walking past all the time), but you get a great crowd there, and it's very lively with most people dancing near the front of the stage.  So despite its shortcomings, i'd recommend checking the venue out, it's a lot of fun.

August

I decided to go and see Braxton Hix (Now known as The Chain) live at The Pelican Acoustic, Notting Hill.  This was a lovely little gig at a tiny pub in Notting Hill. Took some pics and even a little video this time, and got to chat to Kate and Ben from Braxton Hix for a little while.

I attended Eastbourne Airshow this year,  I've been quite a few times before, it's well worth a visit.

A few of my best pics from the airshow:

I decided to go along to Richard Branson's attempt to kitesurf across the english channel at Dungeness, it was quite an experience, a lot of press there, and a few famous people, including Princess Beatrice, but I didn't know it was her at the time, doh!

I arrived at the site quite early, but due to the weather conditions, Richard and his team of kitesurfers had already set off :(, but the weather deteriorated and the support boats could not keep up with the kitesurfers, so they aborted the attempt. Which meant that I got to see them return and even got to chat with Richard Branson! I've wanted to meet him for a long time as my Father cut some of his early vinyl releases. 

The kitesurfers even put on a little show for the crowd:

London Electronic Dance Music Festival

This was a lot of fun, I love dance/electronic music and the lineup was a dream come true... Leftfield were headlining!!! And Annie Mac played a DJ set too. And got to meet up with Grace, friend of mine from Glasto, and Matt, a friend of her's.

My only complaint was that it finished too early, the venue curfew was at 11PM :(. 

I spent the final day of August at Port Lympne Animal Park, the first time I'd been there in 20 years! Really enjoyed it, it's improved a lot since I was last there.

Well, this was going to be the last part of my review of 2010, but I've run out of time, so I'll upload this now and make it a 3 parter.

Part 3 coming soon...

My 2010 in review - January to June

Yes, hell has finally frozen over... I've finally decided to start a blog for 2011!

I haven't written any blog posts in about 6 or 7 years, and my english skills have become a little sloppy lately, so please be gentle with your feedback! I promise I'll try to improve.

I didn't have time to write a short post, so I wrote a long one instead. Please accept my apologies in advance.

2010 has been a pretty good year for me, I've had plenty of fun times and unique experiences, there have been disappointments and some frustrating times too, but overall I'll be quite sad to see the end of 2010.  It's the first year in a while that I haven't thought "I wish I'd done more with my time".

I'm looking forward to trying to make 2011 even better! :)

Winter

January was quite a cold and stressful month, and the disruption caused by the snow made getting to work very challenging, but also made for some nice experiences.  The most memorable of which was a 7.5 mile walk in the snow between Capel(near Folkestone) and Hythe.  The bus home had become stuck and all bus services were cancelled,  and the roads were closed because of there were so many abandoned cars, trucks and buses blocking the roads.  

The walk home was beautiful! Walking along the sea wall, looking at the stars over the sea, and the snow on the beach with just the sound of the waves, the wind and the snow falling. It took me nearly 3 hours to get home, but the walk was so lovely that I didn't care.

During my walk I saw a lovely sight on the beach in Hythe: someone had drawn a huge love heart in the snow (at least 10m across) with "I Love You" written inside, so romantic! Wish I'd taken my camera with me, I tried to take a pic on my iPhone, but there just wasn't enough light.

And yes, seeing that made me wish a little that I wasn't single.

February brought more snow and disruption, but also my 1st gig of the year!  Nerina Pallot at The Pigalle in London, A very nice intimate underground venue, which allegedly was an adult cinema in it's previous life.  I didn't managed to get the best seat, and was quite far away from the stage. but I really enjoyed it anyway.  

Nerina was wonderful, she intended it to be a gig for the loyal fans so played a few new songs, including one that she'd written less than 34 hours before. Video below. (not recorded by me)



Nerina played a lot of her classics too.  She found the time between some of the songs to talk about what the song was about.  If you know Nerina's music well, you'll know that a lot of her songs are about experiences in her life, and they have a lot of emotional content in them.  Some of them are really sad, but beautiful too. My Last Tango is a good example of this.

Spring

March was wonderful, 2nd gig of the year, Editors at the Leas Cliff Hall!  Great gig, Tom Smith has an amazing voice live. The gig was chaotic though, there were a few people just there to cause trouble, a mosh pit started in the crowd, people were being thrown over the security barrier, drinks were being randomly thrown at the crowd, drinks hit members of the band and their gear.  People invading the stage. At one point they even had to stop the gig.

I emerged from that gig a bit battered,bruised and drenched in beer, but I didn't care, still had an amazing time!  And after the gig I met up with a friend of mine that I hadn't seen in ages. :)

April was another fun month, I bought a Canon EOS 550D SLR (my first SLR!), and attended my 2nd Nerina Pallot gig of the year.  Nerina's 2nd gig was a much grander affair than The Pigalle, This one was held at the Union Chapel in London, a lovely venue with breathtaking acoustics.

This was a very memorable gig for a few reasons:  

1. I discovered the brilliant Braxton Hix here (they were supporting Nerina Pallot.)  

Kate & Ben had great voices and their harmonies were near-perfect.  I liked them so much I bought their EP at the show, which was a CDR with a photo in front of it, which made it feel quite special compared to a pressed CD.

2. Nerina Pallot performing with an string section, brass section and a choir was just amazing.

3. Diana Vickers was a secret guest of Nerina!  

4. I got to meet Nerina for the 1st time :)

5. It was the day before my Birthday :)

Fast forward to June (Not much happened in May)

Summer

I can sum this up in one word... Glastonbury!

Attending the Glastonbury festival was one of the best, most life enriching experiences I've ever had. If you've never been, GO!!!  I cannot recommend it enough.

I met many new friends, discovered many new bands, had some wonderful food and was frankly overwhelmed by quite how nice people can be to each other when participating in a shared event like Glastonbury.

5 pieces of advice if you do go:

1. Get there on the Wednesday and start exploring as soon as you can, the main stages may not start until the Friday, but there is so much more to discover.

2. You could make a plan and rush around trying to see all the big acts, but it's much more fun during the day to just wander around investigating all the random goings on.

3. Make sure you visit the Brother's Cider bar at least one night,  it is a truly surreal experience, the music isn't great, but the ambience of everyone chatting around makeshift campfires made up of cider carrier cartons and flaming torches has to be experienced at least once.

4. There can be quite a few secret gigs at Glastonbury, keep your ears open. Learn the route to the park stage early, quite a few of the secret gigs tend to be held at the stage, but there isn't much space, so you have to get there early.

5. Long drops tend to be much nicer than portaloos.

Apologies again for the length of this post.

Part 2 coming soon.