Drinks and Musics
Jan. 30th, 2005 03:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kingandySpent a lot more than I meant to yesterday. I wandered into town with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
stsquad to hang out with folks at the beer festival, which I figured would be quite cheap since I don't drink beer. (I was assured there would be non-beer alternatives, such as vodkas and such. They had all run out by the time we arrived - 1pm, day two - but there was mead so I was happy.) It would have been cheap enough, except that when the beer festival ran out of beer (7.30pm, day two) we proceeded to a chinese meal (£20) and thence to a club. Mmm, entrance fee, cloakroom fee, expensive drinks.
Still, it was an enjoyable evening; it was nice to see Lynz andfoul_temptress again, and Marcus's workmate (minion) was entertainingly wasted following the beer festival. (Luckily he's an affectionate drunk, so he was easy to control with an arm around the shoulder, to which he frequently responded with hugs. For more detail on this particular escapade, see this related story.)
I mentioned on Friday that I purchased some CDs. I will now share my opinions.
The primary purchase of the day was of two albums by the band "A", information about which is disgustingly hard to track down on the interwebs. One of these, Hi-Fi Serious, hardly counts as a new purchase because I've had it on MP3 for a while, but I liked it so much I thought I'd register my approval. Besides, it was the special re-release with "DVD Serious", and it's the first time I've seen anything by A on sale anywhere, so I thought what the hell.
A's music is an energetic combination of heavy guitars and bouncy electronica. When I went to see them play live at last year's Leeds Festival[1], I was expecting something a lot more simple, without the benefit of post-production; it turns out most of it is produced live on stage by a fellow with an electrical keyboard. Not all of the tracks have as large a degree of synth as their single "Nothing" (from a couple of years back), though, there's a good variety of tone and composition. I particularly enjoy the choral harmonies and the guitars, which are hard and strong and DUN DUN DUN without actually being harsh. The percussion's also to my taste, being heavy on the snare and often rapid and staccato. I can listen to this album all day, and frequently did in my old place of work.
So, as I mention, my enjoyment of HFS inspired me also to pick up the five-years-older, excellently-titled How Ace Are Buildings. My initial impression was not great, as it opens with what sounds like a whiny indie three-piece[2]. Thankfully this only lasts for one track, after which they return to pump-rock form with perhaps less emphasis on the keyboards. (In fact, now I listen again, there are distinct Offspring influences.) I think my top tracks from this one are "Cheeky Monkey" - an insanely upbeat number which features the band shrieking the track title in high-pitched voices, though I can see it getting old quite fast - and "Sing-A-Long", which is about remaining single as all your friends get engaged and married ("The same age as me, and they're husbands-to-be..."). Yes, there's empathy there, but it helps that it's a great tune.
Overall it's another high-powered, sing-along, bounce-along album, but it's not quite up to the standard of HFS.
The other CD I picked up was "A Present For Everyone" by Busted, which I picked up to celebrate the band's demise, and because it was dirt cheap. (Yes, I now own a grand total of 2 CDs by this group.) Obviously anything I say about the quality of the writing is going to fall on deaf ears[3], but I'd say there's a vague sort of improvement and maturity since their previous outing, notably an increase in the number of more acoustic tracks. The lyrics often dip into the "rhyming dictionary" school of songwriting, and the tunes are usually simplistic, but they're usually quite easy on theeye ear. It's no-risk music, by turns arrogant, romantic and whistful, and this may be due to my basic trusting nature, but it often sounds as though it's from the heart. I'm enjoying it, and I don't care.
That is all[4].
[1] It could perhaps be noted that I was already planning to see this band by myself if nobody else was interested, sogowhonker's efforts to convince me to strike out by myself by abandoning me with Greenday were entirely unneccessary. But I would never be so petty as to bring it up after so long.
[2] That's not to say I think all indie three-pieces are whiny. Just that I could hear two guitars and a drummer, and there was distinct whining. And ... indie.
[3] I am given to understand they did in fact write their own stuff, and TBH the generally low quality of lyrics lends more credence to that than otherwise. To skeptics I say you can mock the lyrics or claim that they did not write them, but not both.
[4] Except for the footnotes.
stsquad to hang out with folks at the beer festival, which I figured would be quite cheap since I don't drink beer. (I was assured there would be non-beer alternatives, such as vodkas and such. They had all run out by the time we arrived - 1pm, day two - but there was mead so I was happy.) It would have been cheap enough, except that when the beer festival ran out of beer (7.30pm, day two) we proceeded to a chinese meal (£20) and thence to a club. Mmm, entrance fee, cloakroom fee, expensive drinks.Still, it was an enjoyable evening; it was nice to see Lynz and
foul_temptress again, and Marcus's workmate (minion) was entertainingly wasted following the beer festival. (Luckily he's an affectionate drunk, so he was easy to control with an arm around the shoulder, to which he frequently responded with hugs. For more detail on this particular escapade, see this related story.)I mentioned on Friday that I purchased some CDs. I will now share my opinions.
The primary purchase of the day was of two albums by the band "A", information about which is disgustingly hard to track down on the interwebs. One of these, Hi-Fi Serious, hardly counts as a new purchase because I've had it on MP3 for a while, but I liked it so much I thought I'd register my approval. Besides, it was the special re-release with "DVD Serious", and it's the first time I've seen anything by A on sale anywhere, so I thought what the hell.
A's music is an energetic combination of heavy guitars and bouncy electronica. When I went to see them play live at last year's Leeds Festival[1], I was expecting something a lot more simple, without the benefit of post-production; it turns out most of it is produced live on stage by a fellow with an electrical keyboard. Not all of the tracks have as large a degree of synth as their single "Nothing" (from a couple of years back), though, there's a good variety of tone and composition. I particularly enjoy the choral harmonies and the guitars, which are hard and strong and DUN DUN DUN without actually being harsh. The percussion's also to my taste, being heavy on the snare and often rapid and staccato. I can listen to this album all day, and frequently did in my old place of work.
So, as I mention, my enjoyment of HFS inspired me also to pick up the five-years-older, excellently-titled How Ace Are Buildings. My initial impression was not great, as it opens with what sounds like a whiny indie three-piece[2]. Thankfully this only lasts for one track, after which they return to pump-rock form with perhaps less emphasis on the keyboards. (In fact, now I listen again, there are distinct Offspring influences.) I think my top tracks from this one are "Cheeky Monkey" - an insanely upbeat number which features the band shrieking the track title in high-pitched voices, though I can see it getting old quite fast - and "Sing-A-Long", which is about remaining single as all your friends get engaged and married ("The same age as me, and they're husbands-to-be..."). Yes, there's empathy there, but it helps that it's a great tune.
Overall it's another high-powered, sing-along, bounce-along album, but it's not quite up to the standard of HFS.
The other CD I picked up was "A Present For Everyone" by Busted, which I picked up to celebrate the band's demise, and because it was dirt cheap. (Yes, I now own a grand total of 2 CDs by this group.) Obviously anything I say about the quality of the writing is going to fall on deaf ears[3], but I'd say there's a vague sort of improvement and maturity since their previous outing, notably an increase in the number of more acoustic tracks. The lyrics often dip into the "rhyming dictionary" school of songwriting, and the tunes are usually simplistic, but they're usually quite easy on the
That is all[4].
[1] It could perhaps be noted that I was already planning to see this band by myself if nobody else was interested, so
gowhonker's efforts to convince me to strike out by myself by abandoning me with Greenday were entirely unneccessary. But I would never be so petty as to bring it up after so long.[2] That's not to say I think all indie three-pieces are whiny. Just that I could hear two guitars and a drummer, and there was distinct whining. And ... indie.
[3] I am given to understand they did in fact write their own stuff, and TBH the generally low quality of lyrics lends more credence to that than otherwise. To skeptics I say you can mock the lyrics or claim that they did not write them, but not both.
[4] Except for the footnotes.
