Drones

Did I mention at any point that I'm a Muse fan?  Did I also mention they're working on a new album?  Did I ever say how excited I am by this?!

I mean... hng. 7 string hng.

A reight good neight out

This is what happens to my blogs. I keep up for a while then a post gets long and drawn out, and I lose track, and stop.  I will try harder.  And now back to a post from 2 months ago...  oh good grief, it's last year now! Oh well, might as well post it anyway...

Rather than drag my post for last week out, I figured it would be easier to give a damn good night out the justice of its own post.

A while back, I bought an offer for a booth at Mix Karaoke, they come up cheap on Groupon and Living Social from time to time.  (Karaoke, they all scoff!  There's a snobbery about it, I know.  The stereotypes of the TV talent show wannabe, the drunken tourist somewhere in Asia warbling their way badly through My Way and the pub dj hamming it up, yes they're all there in public karaoke bars.  But a) so what? If they're enjoying their 3 minutes of spotlight and not getting tomatoes thrown at them, good for them, and b) a private party in a karaoke booth isn't really like that.  It's more like having a jukebox full of cheesy songs to belt out, or not, and dance to, or not, as you see fit, and there's only your group who know or care whether you can hit that high note.  It's a blast, really.  Go do it.)  Anyway, I thought that half term would be a good time for most of the people I was going to invite, a group of fellow mums from around Leeds, and some a bit further afield.  Sadly only 4 of us could make it, but by the time I'd got yesses and noes from everyone, one of the further-afields, Yvonne, had booked a hotel and I said I'd go halves with her, so that nailed down the day, which happened to be last Friday.

The only slot I could book the booth for was 7pm, a little bit early, so I aimed to meet Yvonne from her train, check in and grab some quick food.  I thought that somewhere at a food court would be reasonably quick, and the nearest thing to that in Leeds is the Trinity Kitchen, which has a branch of Chicago Rib Shack, among other things.  I figured that would be the best thing for not triggering my gluten intolerance!  And yes, their baby back ribs are gluten-free, hurrah.  They're also very, very messy to eat.  Why I bothered putting make-up on before I ate, I do not know, because I had to wipe half of it off to get rid of the bits of sauce from my face.  And my hands were completely covered, thank goodness for M&S citrus hand wipes that I don't go anywhere without these days!  (They're the best thing for getting diesel smells off your hands.)  Oh, and when they say 'spicy chicken burger' apparently they do mean spicy.

From there it was a quick walk, via a couple of shops to try to get some plasters as I was attempting to break some new shoes in, haha, to the karaoke bar, where Suzanne was waiting for us.  We hung around outside for a little while until Jay turned up, and then went inside... Suzanne and I had been before so we knew that a private booth meant a room, with a door, with its own karaoke machine and big-screen telly.  Jay was expecting a reserved table in the main bar, so the room was a pleasant surprise for her.  I hogged the mic a fair bit, because I do like to sing, and I know others aren't so fussed as me, lol.  We did a fair number of classics, Take On Me and Fat Bottomed Girls being good examples, and had a riotous time with our fizzy wine and nibbles, before being turfed out to finish our drinks in the main bar, where we became backing singers to the guy doing The Great Pretender.

The night was still fairly young when our time was up, so after finishing our drinks in the main bar, doing backing vocals to one of the regulars' rendition of Somebody To Love (I think that's what it was! Memory problems you know) I suggested wandering up to the Belgrave, a super-hip bar and music venue, which has a really nice roof terrace, where we drank ale and cider, and got chatting about geeky stuff with a couple of women from a leaving do at the table next to ours *waves over the interwebs to Hannah and Kirsty* 

All in all, a brilliant night, must do it again.

Unboxing and review: Incongruence by Hank Green

So this arrived today (yesterday by now, obviously):

And so I opened it, eagerly:

check out the Hanklerfish!

and the nerdy spreadsheet!

and the hipster-y posing...  and the Hubble telescope malfunction background image and disc label, courtesy of NASA!

and finally the lyrics booklet.

I do love these fold-out cardboard CD cases, they are as much a thing of beauty as LP sleeves when the details are done well.  My favourite is Frank Turner's England Keep My Bones special edition with its leather-bound-y green goodness.

Anyway, I said I'd let you know what I thought of the music once I'd been able to listen, and while I've been stuck with it playing out of order due to weirdness in the download and my phone's interpretation of it and only having the chance to listen in short-ish bursts in the car, I've really enjoyed the songs.  Catchy tunes, some are familiar to me from the trip up to Glasgow (I feel so sorry for the final year students at Glasgow School of Art, by the way, poor sods!) some not.  Some are quite sweary in this explicit version and some are remarkably clean (Mother Pheasant Plucker.  I'm looking at you.)  I Fucking Love Science does what it says on the tin, for example, but in the workplace-safe version the lyrics have been rewritten, not just bleeped or muted.

So what style is it?  It's punk-ish.  Pop-punk without the polish, bits of reggae, space-y effects and optimistic big-hair rock thrown in, loads of nerdy pop-culture referencing and puns and Shakespeare.  If you're aware of Nerdfighteria you'll already know the songs but you might not have heard them done like this!  I'd love for Hank and The Perfect Strangers to tour the heck out of this, it would be a whole mess of fun, but Hank's work is so diverse that it would be a big commitment to take time away from, so I will content myself with listening to this wee gem of a collection of anthems to geekdom and saying 'Dude, no edge!' at every possible opportunity, and remembering to be awesome.