Soooo, first post in over a month. Not doing too well at keeping on top of this, am I? Ah well. Let's kick off this week's post with the classic all-girl punk rock group The Runaways. Y'know, Joan Jett, Lita Ford, Cherrie Curry? General awesomeness. Here's their brilliant Cherry Bomb.
Next up, British alt-metallers earthtone9. They're in the process of recording a new album, their first in about a decade. You can still donate to their PledgeMusic campaign HERE. For now, check out recent single Tide of Ambition.
Finally, indie-noir/dark cabaret duo Bitter Ruin. Deliciously dark, quirky and amazingly energetic. All of their material is available on their Bandcamp page, but for tasters, let's have the Hung, Drawn & Quartered EP/mini-album.
Only three today, that;ll do, right? Check it out and pass it on.
OK, so my plan to get this blog back to some sort of proper schedule seems to have failed epically. In good news, I still have a lovely long list of bands to write about so there's still hope. For now though, I intend to squee over Emilie Autumn's just-released new album. Hurray hurray.
Where do I start? Well, Fight Like A Girl is a great mix of styles blending the best bits of previous albums, faery-inspired Enchant and the more industrial Opheliac. It's important also to note that this is very much a concept album, regarding The Asylum, previously covered in her semi-autobiographical novel The Asylum for Wayward Victorian Girls. It's dark (Take The Pill), slightly sick (Girls! Girls! Girls!) and sometimes downright creepy (Scavenger). Opening with the call to arms of title track Fight Like A Girl, the album descends into the depths of hell that is The Asylum, touching on the sinister goings-on of the resurrection men as it does (Scavenger again). All that darkness aside, the album finally ends on something of a lighter note, with the march of One Foot In Front Of The Other and in amongst the heavy beats there are softer, if rather sad moments, with the beautiful Gaslight. All in all, the album has shaped up to be, potentially, Autumn's best yet. It certainly lends itself to the theatrical style of her live shows and who knows, maybe she'll manage to fulfil her plan to write a musical.
Stand out tracks include the typically EA-style (if I'm going down, you're coming with me) If I Burn, the haunting Gaslight, the carnival atmosphere of Girls! Girls! Girls! and the creepily slow drone of Scavenger. And now I'm going to shut up, because I have a horrible urge to squee and gush about every single track. Go look it up HERE where you can also listen to samples of tracks.
Soooo, might possibly have not posted for months. For anyone who does actually pay attention to and like my blog, apologies. On the plus side, I have an absolutely enormous list of bands to write about, so hopefully we'll get a few more posts out of me before I start forgetting again. Here goes.
First up, Canadian electro-rockers The Birthday Massacre. Delightfully creepy at times with excellent female vocals. Yum. Check out the video for Blue below and then go check out some more of their awesomeness.
Next, we have Taiwanese black/symphonic metal band Chthonic. So, OK, I can't decipher the lyrics to most of their songs, but the music itself is pretty brilliant. Have a listen to Takao from latest album Takasago Army.
Then we'll have a bit of Sonata Arctica. Power/symphonic metal from Finland. Check out recent single I Have A Right below.
Some Brit stuff now - metalcore in the shape of Sheffield natives While She Sleeps. At least, I'm pretty sure they're from Sheffield. Should probably check that... Anyhoos, their debut album This Is The Six is being released at the beginning of August, so for now check out the title track and then go have a listen to some more of their lovely stuff.
And finally, the loveliness that is InMe. Alternative rock/metal. Well worth checking out. Think we'll have Single Of The Weak.
No, not me. I'm unfit and have always sucked at running. My friend Lizzie, on the other hand, is being completely awesome and runnning the British 10K on July 8th for Women's Aid. The charity essentially works with victims of domestic abuse and is as such lovely. Now, I know that I personally am always loathe to donate to people I don't know, but I assure you that Women's Aid is worth it. Sooooo, if anyone is willing to donate a few pennies, you can check out Lizzie's JustGiving page HERE. I'm sure she'll really appreciate any support and obviously it's all for a good cause.
In unrelated news, Band of the Week will be back soon. Exams are over so hopefully I can get back to a regular schedule.
Why hello thar, lovelies. Sorry Band of the Week's been a bit AWOL the last few weeks - blame revision and my parents' poor internet connection. To make up for it, let's have a nice big BotW feature, shall we?
Let's kick off with some doom metal in the form of Canadian band Sleepbringer. Check out the only music I've been able to find by them, Compendium:
Next up,Texas-based hard rockers Silver Loves Mercury. Wonderfully dirty, female fronted sleaze. Just a Facebook link for these guys - HERE. Well, there's some videos too, but they're not the best quality, so that'll have to do.
Then, because I finally got round to looking them up a few weeks back, let's have the delicious Alice In Chains. Grungy goodness. Streams of some tracks can be found on their site HERE. Let's also have a video. Here's Would? from the album Dirt.
Following on, Ivyrise - pop rock loveliness from the main support band on McFly's recent UK tour. Here's latest single Line Up The Stars from their self-titled debut album.
And finally, the most awesome With Knives, a new(ish) project from Josh Newton (of numerous bands, including Every Time I Die) and Joe Trohman (yes, that dude from Fall Out Boy). Stoner rock? Probably. Not an area I'm overly familiar with, but I've just seen a comparison (from a trusted dude) to QOTSA and Baroness. I'm going to take that as a good sign. Here's their just-released debut EP, Schadenfreude:
Will that do, or would we like more scrumminess? More?
One more. Not exactly a band, but this is from the guys at Hat Films who do gaming videos on YouTube. They make pretty much all of the music for their vids and this materialised out of a recent Minecraft video.
Hopefully Band of the Week should go back to being regular now I have a decent net connection again.
McFly at Norwich UEA, 3/4/12 (support from Lost? and Ivyrise)
First off, I feel the need to point out that I'm still pissed that the early access I should have had as a member of McFly's SuperCity never materialised. Either I was being blind/stupid or it was very poorly organised/non-existent. Not impressed. I spent an hour standing in the pouring rain to get into this gig. Now, I don't mind rain, but I was informed early access would be half an hour before everyone else. Was it? Apparently not. Ugh.
Say hello to the queue!
Rant over. On with the review!
Kicking off the night's proceedings were local band Lost?, who won the opening slot in a "Battle Of The Bands" style thingumiwotsit on McFly's website. Their brand of pop-punk is pretty generic, but they seemed to be enjoying themselves and it went down well with the audience, so it's all good there. I'm struggling, though, to form a solid opinion of them given that their set was a grand total of 3 songs long. Three songs isn't really much ground to form a decent opinion. And I'm slightly concerned I've inadvertently offended them by calling them bland on Twitter...
Moving on from random worrying about who may or may not have taken offence at what, Ivyrise took to the stage as main support. Again, fairly generic pop rock, but good, catchy, sing-along-able stuff. Strangely, one of the heavier points of their set was a rather awesome cover of Adele's Set Fire To The Rain. One moment, I'll see if I can find a decent video, because it really does warrant checking out.
OK, so it's not a "live" live version, but it'll do. It's better than a poor quality version from one of the shows. Anyhoos, great set from Ivyrise - highly recommend checking them out. I believe they have an upcoming headline tour - dates are HERE.
And so finally, we come to the headliners. McFly. And oh how I love them. Where to start? Well, I was particularly happy that their set had a good mix of old and new, especially since I'm really not keen on most recent album Above The Noise. There were a few new songs thrown in - Do What You Want, Red and Touch The Rain - all of which sounded pretty good, especially Red. Stand outs among a set of fan favourites were Everybody Knows and its descent into a medley of covers and the set finale of debut single Five Colours In Her Hair which ended in a wonderfully funky outro. Given that Five Colours turned 8 years old a couple of weeks ago, this seemed pretty appropriate. However, my personal favourite part of the set had to be the medley of POV (intro only), She Falls Asleep and Down Goes Another One. This is largely because Down Goes Another One is my favourite McFly track. It's a beautiful song and I was so happy it was included.
There was also plenty of banter. The only other time I've seen McFly live was on their first ever tour with Busted back in 2004, so it was great to see how confident they are onstage now. Plenty of humour, although I'm not sure some of the parents present would have approved, what with the talk of teabagging and numerous mentions of cock. It's also hilarious to see how they encourage the fandom of slash pairings revolving around the band. I've rarely seen a band so (apparently) aware of what goes on in the more... mature... corners of their fanbase. All in all, a great gig and McFly certainly lived up to my expectations. My inner teenage fangirl is incredibly happy.
McFly setlist:
Nowhere Left To Run
One For The Radio
Star Girl
I Wanna Hold You
Transylvania (first verse only)
Do What You Want (new song)
Broccoli
Lies
Red (new song)
Sorry's Not Good Enough
POV/She Falls Asleep/Down Goes Another One (medley)
Obviously
All About You
No Worries
Touch The Rain (new song)
Everybody Knows + cover medley (Livin' On A Prayer/We Found Love/What Makes You Beautiful/I Wanna Dance With Somebody)
Five Colours In Her Hair
