Jack Penate

I've been digging Second Minute or Hour. Check him out.

Re-evaluating My Dismissal

I have bitched here (not loudly) about a few female pop stars like Amy Winehouse and Lily Allen. I was about to start commenting on Kate Nash. She’s the Brit "IT" girl of the moment. I downloaded her song Foundations and while I don’t think she’s much of a singer, and the live performance looks boring, her lyrics are funny. The same goes for the other two ladies mentioned as well. And then I started wondering, why am I hating on these chicks when at least they do write music? Maybe I’m just trying to adopt the ways of my new country, or maybe that Britney debacle was a reminder of the definition of talent, I don’t know. –J

Vodafone Live Music Awards

What a great idea! Last night I watched an awards show specifically geared towards the live performance. Amy Winehouse won the best female award. She wasn’t in attendance but the barkeep from her local pub accepted the award for her! Here's a link to the winners.

P.S. Vodafone is one of the main cell phone providers in the UK. Every time I see that word, I start singing it to the tune of Paul Simon’s Kodachrome. --J

Nouvelle Vague

This is quite a departure for me, but I am digging a little French outfit called Nouvelle Vague. They remake 70s/80s punk and new wave hits into loungy bossanova tracks. Check out the remakes of "Dancing With Myself," The Cure's "A Forest" and "Love Will Tear Us Apart." -K

Royal Albert Hall

Yesterday I had the good fortune to attend a meeting in the building next to the Royal Albert Hall in London. It is a stunning venue! Some of you might remember that this is where Cream played their last concert. According to Wikipedia, other historical moments occurred in 1963 when The Beatles and The Rolling Stones played their only gig together, and in 1969 Pink Floyd was banned for life for setting off two cannons during their performance. Who was playing there last night…John Mayer for a second night in a row. It wasn’t sold out and I was tempted to get a ticket just because I wanted to see the inside of the building and also to cure my concert withdrawal symptoms, but just couldn’t bare a whole John Mayer concert. I was secretly hoping to run into him heading into the building for a sound check or something so I could compliment him not on his music but the column that he used to write for Esquire magazine. He’s quite a witty chap. --J

Venus Doom

Today marked the US release of HIM's new album, Venus Doom. Ville Valo prepped us for a heavier, doomier album and he wasn't kidding. Swollen guitar riffs, a diminished keyboard presence, and overbearingly emotional lyrics indeed make this the heaviest and darkest HIM album to date.

When I first gave the cd a listen I was shocked. Resolution and hope are acutely absent in these lyrics. Indeed, on this album the light has been temporarily turned off at the end of the tunnel. As perhaps a subconsious dismissal of bands who intend on saving your life, Ville just refuses to take on the responsibility. On this album, misery is what it is. The emotional quagmire notwithstanding, the music itself is what every HIM fan has been waiting for (or, at least what I've been waiting for): haunting melodies, gorgeous key changes, and at the center, the hypnotic vocals that are thankfully not muffled by overproduction as they were on Dark Light. I predict that with this album there will be a drawdown of the teenage fanbase and an increase in adult listeners. I just don't see the content and style speaking to the former demographic.

The album begins with the strike of a match and an inhalation. Of course it does. Ha! After listening to the album a few times today, I have to agree with a Kerrang! review in which the writer states that this album is the result of the band getting great at what they do. So a complete departure it isn't, but why change a formula when you know it works? Hell, it's worked for the Foo Fighters all these years.

Here are some highlights, in my opinion...

"Love in Cold Blood" opens with the lyrics "Serpentine love's thighs wrap around me in search for death…" Quite a metaphor. There is something Queen-like in the chorus, though I can't put my finger on it. It totally works for me.
"Passion's Killing Floor" KILLS live. I just love the lyric "In my arms you won't sleep safely…." Let's not analyze.
"Kiss of Dawn" is a favorite on the album. I think that there is nothing safe about the lyrics in that it is steeped in melancholia, but the structure and the haunting melody makes it hit-worthy.
An epic, 10 minute-long song called "Sleepwalking Past Hope" opens with a beautiful piano introduction that very soon explodes into a meandering choral and instrumental melody that is very identifiably HIM. Another favorite. A little proggy at times, but really not too much.
"Dead Lovers' Lane" is a pop/classic rock gem that is a throwback to the Love Metal era. This song also kills live.
Standout "Song or Suicide" is a short, intimate, raw acoustic recording of a poem set to music. It's so raw that you hear Ville shift in his chair. It's a nice turning point in the album.
"Bleed Well" is a fantastic hair metal song. You know, it's sort of metal, but then chicks can dance to it. Oh, and this also kills live. A throwback to Razorblade Romance.
"Cyanide Sun" is quintessential HIM. It's all melody drowning in a minor key. It's definitely a favorite, though this lyric is so dramatic it made me chuckle a little the first time I heard it: "We've sailed the seas of grief on a raft built with our tears."

While I was kind of concerned that the heavy lyrics would be too much, I love it. I give it an UNEXPECTED. -K

M.I.A. - Kala

K first introduced me to M.I.A. when she lent me her last record, Arular. I loved it! This one, not so much. When K and I drove up to Chicago last week to visit the British Consulate, I put on Kala. We never turned it up, played a song again, or even commented on a single track. I don’t think our conversation was that exciting that we couldn’t have been torn away for an innovative musical moment. While M.I.A. has a more global sound than most semi-mainstream artists, this record is pales in comparison to Arular. --J

He's Mad at MTV

I was shirking off responsibility today. Instead of grabbing a paintbrush and helping out on my last full day in the States, I got rather obsessed with Kanye West’s appearance on the Ellen Degeneres show today. So obsessed, that I actually used my handy TiVo to transcribe as best as I could his explanation of his tantrum about MTV. This is what Mr. West had to say:

Let me do the politically correct disclaimer and say that MTV has a lot for me over the years and it’s been thank you, you’re welcome moments back to back. Now last year uh Golddigger didn’t get nominated for video of the year nor Touch the Sky and also lost in the hip hop category to My Humps, which I like My Humps and everything but I think Golddigger was a bigger song and video. This year it got nominated for video of the year. Umbrella won video of the year and other things but it didn’t win for best collaboration to Beautiful Liar where Beyonce was in the audience to win that award, so Beyonce okay you’re not a performer but come to our awards show here’s your award. I just figured you must be spreading the wealth, I guarantee they’re going to give me one of these five nominations. They had me doing this suite which I didn’t really want to do, I wanted to perform Stronger and open the show with Stronger, but okay I’ll do the suite if that’s what you want me to do. I won't bring up the fact Golddigger wasn’t even nominated and then I didn’t win anything and Umbrella won best video because it was the bigger song. Well, if that’s the case, then Golddigger should’ve won because it was the bigger song the previous year so I figure like the rules just kept changing. And then Justin, I love Justin and he’s I feel like he’s my biggest competition, they gave Justin a suite and I begged to perform in the theatre, but they also let Justin close the show performing in the theatre, and I felt at that point oh it’s unfair you’re not giving me the opportunity, my main thing I was mad about is you didn’t give me the opportunity to rock the way I wanted to rock. They didn’t let me perform Stronger the way I knew I could and make this moment in history the way I wanted along with the slap in the face with the five nominations…

On one hand, he sounds like a total baby, but on the other hand, he’s just being honest. All of the performers probably think in the same way but don’t say it. Also, is it all so fixed that they would just give Beyonce an award to get her to come?

When asked about Britney’s performance he said the following:

That performance if it had been pulled off perfectly still wouldn’t have been up to par to start of an MTV awards. There are only a couple of important things in music this year, Umbrella, Amy Winehouse. Britney Spears is not important in music.

I totally agree with him on the last point. --J

Schadenfreude - [shahd-n-froi-duh]

dictionary.com defines this word as: satisfaction or pleasure felt at someone else's misfortune. As I read the reviews of Britney's performance, schadenfreude summarized the comments.

I’m probably not as nice as K is. When the pre-show began, it was 1:00 in the morning for me. There’s nothing I love more than sleep so goddamnit you better entertain me. The thing about Britney is that it is obvious that she surrounds herself with people that have no sense. Britney is a beautiful woman. I would think it would be a heck of a lot easier to put her in flattering clothes and make her look pretty but instead, someone went in another direction, making her look like she had a beer gut and greasy hair. While I feel somewhat sorry for her, I’m glad that FINALLY, there’s a sucky performance (there have been many over the years)that people are actually saying sucked! Did anyone really think that bullshit performance with Madonna and Christina Aguilera a few years ago was any good? Of course it wasn’t but we had to hear how cutting edge it was.

Does anyone care at all about Kid Rock and Tommy Lee? I think they totally staged that to get some needed publicity. I could hear the cell phone conversation before the show:

Tommy Lee calling Kid: Dude! You know how neither one of us have had a hit in years?
Kid Rock: Uh,yeah
Tommy Lee: Let’s fake fight at the VMAs so we can keep getting free drinks in Vegas.
Kid Rock: Sure.
Tommy Lee: Rad!

My favourite moments:

1. Beyonce getting the no cheek when she went to kiss 50 Cent after she won her award.

2. After John Norris saying to Dave Grohl that he was the musical leader for the night, he responded laughingly with “Yeah and I’m a high school dropout!”

3. Justin Timberlake jumping up and down like a kid after he won an award.

I am sure there are lots of good moments we missed in the fantasy suites, however, we got stock in the main room with the bullshit. --J

Fighting Jetlag and LOL'ing, Judakris watches the 2007 VMAs

I will not be one of the many that makes fun of Britney after her VMAs opening last night. I realize she's fucked herself over the past few years, but I couldn't help but feel kind of sorry for her. I was totally annoyed that MTV agreed to let her open because they knew viewers would tune in to see the train wreck. Of course she agreed to do it, she would probably have done anything to get herself back on stage and in front of that audience. I don't care how damaged she is, I don't like watching a person basically self-destruct onstage. (By the way, who in the hell made the decision to open with a close-up of her hair extensions?) To me it was just too easy and unnecessary. With TMZ and Perez coming on the air, I guess MTV felt that they needed to jump on the bandwagon and feed the public's hunger to shoot a celeb while they're down.

Listen, while I was annoyed with MTV, I can't defend Britney. I may feel sorry for her, but she just needs to buck up. J told me she heard talk that Britney missed rehearsals for personal reasons (in other words, she had been partying too hard, which is indeed totally unprofessional). As a result she seemed comepletely stressed during the performance, forgetting lyrics and steps. Regardless, my beef is still with the channel I have loved my whole life. Any class MTV had seemed to go out the door along with all the music videos they used to play. It's just sad.

To be honest, while J and I agreed that the editing of the live performances were quick and wonderfully devoid of boring commentary, I felt as though the opening performance cast a dark cloud over the entire show and thereafter nothing seemed quite balanced. Despite this, there were two things that cracked me up: 1. anyone else notice that Beyonce's boob was on its way out? As she walked up onstage that boob seemed determined to say thank you as well.

Check out Kanye's face.

And, 2. Travis McCoy was totally loaded at some point. Not really able to say thank you since members of Fall Out Boy and other suite folks screamed and crowded around the band when it was announced that Gym Class Heroes won Best New Artist, Travis decided to chug his drink. Good boy. Actually, a lot of people seemed to be in a festive mood. Maybe it was Vegas, maybe it was to forget the opening.

I have a question. Who dresses Alicia Keys? The woman is talented and gorgeous, but that ensemble she had on during her performance was so unfortunate. I think J described the lower body section resembling "sausages." Very true.

I LOVE that Kid Rock and Tommy Lee got into a scuffle. That's so rock n roll. I've heard that Kid Rock gave it to Tommy pretty good.


I also love that Justin kept taking every opportunity to tell MTV they needed to play more videos- even in front of some girls from The Hills. Right on, JT.

I dug that Rihanna opened Shut Up and Drive by jumping on the bed in a Hot Topic-like outfit. So cute.

Thankfully, the Foo Fighters rocked it out. Someone needed to. I wish we could have heard more of the Cee-Lo/FF cover of Darling Nicky.

I have no clue who Peter, Bjorn, and John are.

Finally, thank CHRIST J is back in town, if only for a week! -K

Gerard Way Gets Hitched

Yes, that's right! On the last night of Projekt Revolution Gerard Way married Lyn-Z from Mindless Self Indulgence. Judakris sends congrats their way! -K

The ceremony...


The happy couple and a toothy person...


Incidentally, the new bride and her band are scheduled to perform at Pops on September 7.

Projekt Revolution, Pt. 2, Tinley Park, IL

When we got to Tinley Park it was sunny and hotter. The main stage was not yet open, but that gave us a chance to hear and watch some of the bands at the Revolution stage. We sat on a grassy knoll that was inhabited by all the other adults looking for any patch of shade next to the stage.





Once the main stage opened up we looked for our seats and then walked up the hill to watch Julien-K perform. The lead singer was at a wedding, so Chester Bennington performed in his place. We got some sun while waiting for 6:00 to hit. Once it did, we headed down to our seats to catch HIM's performance for the second time in 24 hours.

The setlist was the same, so I could sit back, enjoy the show and take a hundred pictures.



I kept thinking to myself, "why am I so obsessed with taking a thousand pictures of this band?" Seriously, you take one, you've taken them all. I guess I was feeling kind of "ME! This is MY moment! I'm going to take a hundred pictures that I won't be able to distinguish later when I download them and post them online!" These photos are so slightly distinguishable from each other, that if I were to be able to flip through them quickly it would be like watching the silent film version of a HIM show.

Here are a handful of those pictures.

Ville looking to his right and smiling- bless him

Ville adjusting the microphone stand

Ville's still not happy with the stand

Ville shifting to the right

Ville smoking and singing

Ville putting a little oomph into it

Ville taking a sip of water

At some point I looked around and saw that I was the only one mouthing the words. Who gives a shit. This was a moment, damn it!

Random Tinley happenings:
I feel as though I saw Madina Lake's Matthew Leone everywhere at Tinley. He drove by us driving a golf cart, walking around saying hello, and may have served me my $6.00 lemonade for all I know.

Speaking of which, C and I were so admiring our lemonade at one point that we did not notice two members of Linkin Park walking next to us. It wasn't until people screamed towards us that we figured out what just happened. Good thing we were alert, eh?

We watched Placebo walk to the stage in between civilians and though they smiled and were congenial, none of the teenage girls noticed at all, poor boys. C and I should have screamed their names just for the helluvit.

Saosin's Justin Shekowski walking around wearing a conical Vietnamese hat.

The acrobatic bassist from Mindless Self Indulgence stood about ten feet away from us. Jimmy Urine from the same band was quickly surrounded by fans at Tinley. I caught some of their set and was impressed with their swagger on stage. The music had a lot of these 80s video game bleeps.

The jumbotrons displayed text messages from concertgoers. Messages like "Cardinals!" would result in boos, "Cubs!" would results in screams. Then there were messages that read "Bam is in the house!" and "Marry me Bam." C and I figured Bam was indeed in the house after the fifth tm came up on the screen. Very cool.

I saw Gerard Way on his cell phone walking by the buses cutting quite the figure in his usual black attire.

The MCR performance was even better up close. The setlist didn't change at Tinley, so I'll just add some of the pics I took. (edit: I need to apologize because I stupidly resized these pics before linking them. I'll upload them in their normal size soon.)
Chicagoan Bob Bryar on a rotating drumkit

Explosive

Bombastic

Gerard in the center, striking a classic pose

More of the show

More shirtless boys… This guy looks like he is not sure if what he's doing could be considered gay.

One of the highlights was in the end of "Mama" when the music turns to a waltz beat. C and I grabbed onto each other and swayed back and forth singing our hearts out. When "Cancer" ended and the lights dimmed, I looked over at C who was wiping tears from her eyes. The trip was coming to a close and we both just stood staring at the stage wishing for more.

We stayed the night with a mutual friend of J's and mine, M. She had wine and food waiting for us and we were able to wind down in the quiet and the comfort of the Chicago suburbs. M was wonderful to see again and she and C got along like old friends. When we collapsed into sleep, I felt extremely lucky that the weekend had gone by with no issue. We hadn't been late, my car wasn't broken into (like it has happened before at a Go-Go's concert in Atlanta), and C and I had our very first road trip under our belts. Though I had no personal encounters with my beautiful creatures, I had least didn't have the inevitable fear that I had made an ass of myself.

When we left, C said to me that she wanted to keep going to concerts with me. I had been worried the whole time that as type-a as I was when it came to this trip that she would be more stressed out and/or bored rather than happy to be there with me. I guess I shouldn't have worried. That night she IM'ed me and wanted me to download the HIM and MCR songs setlists. She's even going to get us tickets to the St. Louis HIM show in October. Hey, maybe it will be cancelled, but at least for now it's something to look forward to. UNBELIEVABLE UNBELIEVABLE UNBELIEVABLE-K

Projekt Revolution, Pt. 1, Noblesville, IN

As C and I hurried to collect some coins for the 294 toll booths headed out of Chicago yesterday, I could tell that something was welling up inside. It was a kind of hopelessness you feel when you suddenly hate what you are rocketing towards: life, reality, home. All I could think about was the cavernous apartment I call home that is surely infested with ants once again, the fact that I am a few weeks from moving and I haven't saved enough, and that J should have been with us on this trip. It wasn't so much the fact that my life truly sucks. It doesn't. What I was suffering from was the inevitable crash from the euphoria of the last 36 hours. It was an incredible weekend. So let me tell you about my weekend at Projekt Revolution.

Last Friday morning I picked up C and we headed towards Indianapolis. I felt the need to prepare C for the weekend. I explained that "I will probably do a lot of scouting" and "if by sheer luck I happened to be standing in front of Gerard Way or Ville Valo I may need you to take over the camera". Being uninvested in these two creatures, she should feel free to request that Ville stand closer to me or whatever, blah blah. Ever the trouper, she assured me that this would not be a problem. I tried not to bore her, but I couldn't help telling her about the first time J and I took a road trip together, how Gerard Way sat a few feet away from us, and how on the Red Bull-fueled overnight drive back to St. Louis we were sandwiched in between the convoy of buses taking a plethora of bands to the St. Louis Warped. Of course, this convoy included MCR's bus, so it was pretty much "life changing." I mentioned that I had no idea what MCR's set would be like, that it would more than likely be bigger than anything I had seen them do, and that seeing HIM again, well, they were basically the main reason I had purchased these tickets. I went on to describe how I seemed to have terrible luck when it came to HIM (cue more stories including a cancelled meet and greet, cancelled tour, etc.), but that I was looking forward to see a recently rehabbed Ville. As soon as I finished blabbering my phone rang. It was J calling from London. My heart pounding from excitement to hear her voice (it was the first time since she left), I listened as she seemed to fight back tears declaring that she so wished to be on this trip. It was not the first time J would be present that weekend. Not in person, of course, but in spirit.

We sailed into the venue with no issue. When we arrived around 4:30 PM, the Revolution stage had already finished with its up and coming bands like Madina Lake and Mindless Self Indulgence. The temperature outside was in the 80s and sunny. Perfect. I grabbed C's hand and rushed her to the lawn as smoke began pouring out from the side of the main stage. We grabbed a program and saw that HIM was scheduled to perform at 6:00 and MCR was on at 8:00, so we had time to wade through the crowd and find the optimal spot on the lawn. Julien-K was just beginning their set and so we decided to get up and scope up the grounds.

We stood on a small hill with a few other HIM fans that overlooked the buses hoping to catch a glimpse of our boys walking around off the clock. Why is that so fascinating? Seeing a various amount of security guards, roadies, and lucky fans being herded into the area to meet one of the bands, we decided to head back to the lawn. It was time for Placebo after all, and I'd never seen them before. The lawn was an interesting place. Besides the ever present scent of pot, which we endured throughout the evening since we sat next to a group of very brave kids who smoked continuously, there were a lot of drunks. Uch, even though it was not as hot as it had been for the last week, I felt sick at the idea of being drunk while being baked in the sun. A fight broke out by us, we saw an amazing amount of ass crack and passed out drunks were awoken and kindly escorted out.

The only song from Placebo I recognized was their opening song "Without You I'm Nothing". Placebo put on an energetic show, but it was obvious that they were not performing to their audience. They seemed to come and go with not much notice. I was shocked at how efficiently and quickly one band's set was broken down and the next band's erected. Perhaps showing our age, C and I often noted this and nodded in approval.

The well-known heartagram symbol appeared onstage and the crowd screamed. The letters H I M were written over the symbol which for some reason cracked me up. I guess since HIM is not that well known over here the usual lone symbol wasn't enough for people to know who they were. I kept thinking "this must be their away backdrop" (you know, like team uniforms).



We couldn't see shit from the lawn, but the jumbotrons helped, which is why my collection of photos from Indi are mostly of jumbotrons. They will make good wallpapers, I will say that.



Around us people were making out and C got her first taste of the effect this band's music has on some people. As an old friend once said "HIM is sex." Before beginning the last song "Kiss of Dawn", Ville thanked the street team for working so hard to spread the word and introduced the mother of his friend who committed suicide last year, about whom he wrote the song.



There's not much to say about the live show because they are always so inanimate onstage. Nothing outrageous happens, they just play their music. This they did extremely well. Ville hit every note and sounded great. After that set, I, along with a lot of people around me, lit up a cigarette to bask in the afterglow.

Setlist:
Passions Killing Floor (new)
Wings of a Butterfly
Your Sweet 666
Vampire Heart
Dead Lovers Lane (new)
Killing Loneliness
Drown in This Love (leading into a short dedication to The Stooges' TV-Eye)
Wicked Game
Kiss of Dawn (new)

The band left the stage and in two snaps the stage was ready for Taking Back Sunday. This performance was a little underwhelming. The band put a lot of energy into the set, but the audience around us seemed kind of indifferent like us.

Next was MCR. By the sonic screams that you heard when the black and white backdrop came up you would have thought that the band was already performing. When the lights went down and the band did come out, C and I took notice. No one was sitting by the time Gerard marched onstage with a look on his face that told you were about to be blown away whether you liked it or not. The band opened with "How I Disappear" and as soon as the guitars exploded C was hooked. I saw a potential conversion in the making with her movements and smiles. It's not often that you walk into a show and come out a fan, but that's what happened with her. She commented on how the band seemed to put everything they had into the performance. "That's MCR", I said sentimentally. But I'm getting ahead of myself...



I've always liked how Gerard yells at you to "get the fuck up" and before you even have time to react you're doing it.



We are far from the days of the minimal sets from Warped and the first headlining tour of 2005. Accompanying the set were pyrotechnics, a rotating drum kit, and fireworks.

This looks so much better in its normal size, I swear.

Gerard donned a feather boa for "You Know What They Do to Guys Like Us in Prison", before which he told the men in the audience to take off their shirts and swing them in the air for the song's duration. Wouldn't you know it, the guys did it



Gerard has gotten a bit more risqué. At one point he simulated masturbation on stage and put his hand down the front of his pants. C and I were pleased by this, hahaha. Gerard ended the set with a solo performance of "Cancer." This was a surprise because after such an energetic set I didn't expect such a sad song, but it worked. He sounded great as well. When they left the stage C and I couldn't stop smiling. As J said, I came for HIM, but in the end it was MCR that satisfied me.



Setlist:
How I Disappear
The Sharpest Lives
I'm Not Okay
Famous Last Words
House of Wolves
Give 'Em Hell, Kid!
Dead
Mama
Welcome to the Black Parade
You Know What They Do To Guys like Us in Prison
Teenagers
Helena
Cancer

We took off before Linkin Park came on and headed to our hotel in Indianapolis. We reflected on the day's events and drifted off, mentally preparing to do the same thing in Chicago the next day... -K

I'm Not In the U.S.A. Anymore

For the past three years, actually longer, I have never had trouble getting tickets to a show that I wanted to see. This weekend, I tried to buy tickets for two shows, both sold out in London without me getting a ticket. I obviously need to be a little quicker on the draw when I see an announcement. Sigh. --J