The night before flying to Berlin, we saw a show up at Kings Cross called The Electric Hotel. It was… strange. At the very least, it was unlike any show that I’ve seen in the past. Here’s how the show’s website summarises it:

Electric Hotel is a uniquely designed outdoor spectacle, a fly-by-night hotel brought vividly to life through dance and sound blah blah blah.

(Note: The blah blah part wasn’t actually on their website, but that’s about when the description lost my interest.)

Basically, we all sat down in an open air theatre, and when the show started at 9:45 PM (which is effectively when dusk is these days), everyone popped on a pair of wireless headphones. Some fairly chilled house music kicked things off, then one by one, the blinds of the hotel all rolled up, revealing a glass-fronted building with actors playing out a different storyline in every room.

As it turns out, it was actually only one storyline, and we were watching it over different time periods, all at once. Or at least, that’s what I think was happening. The actors were kind-of on repeat, and the story seemed to play out about four times, changing slightly on each run through. Even though there was something going on in almost every room, we could only hear the sound from one room at a time through our headphones, and on each run through, the rooms that we could hear were different, so we were always hearing a different piece of the puzzle.

There was barely any dialogue though; instead, the music which started the show off played throughout, driving the show forward. This meant we had to do our best to work out what was going on based on what we could see and the movement of the actors between the rooms, all cued by whichever room’s sound we were hearing.

It was a cool concept, it was well implemented, but I walked away feeling very confused by it all. I wish we’d have had a narrative to explain the storyline a bit before seeing it, but even then I don’t think I would have fully understood what was happening. Still, it was a fun experience, and the hotel looked fantastic in the light of dusk, against the backdrop of Kings Cross.

When I heard that Pearl Jam were playing at the Hard Rock Calling festival, I immediately bought tickets without caring much for the rest of the line up. To be fair, the other bands we saw put on a great show – Expatriate (who I suspect was Stacey’s favourite), Gaslight Anthem (who I’d never heard of but was well impressed with), The Hives (who replaced Wolfmother after they pulled out due to sickness) and Ben Harper (Mr Charismatic). But for me, it was always about seeing Pearl Jam!

I was quite impressed with their set list, which I felt was a great mix of older and newer songs. Most impressively, they played for over two hours, which is huge for a festival. We started off the show somewhere in the middle of the crowd, until Aubain, Wes and I tried to bury ourselves in a bit deeper. We managed to make it maybe 30 metres further in, but the wall of people eventually became too difficult to penetrate, so we settled in and enjoyed the rest of the show. Yes, the days of fighting the crowds to get to the front are well and truly over, but I’m ok with that!

Given that Ben Harper had played right before Pearl Jam, I was somewhat expecting a guest appearance during PJ’s set. And, given that Eddie had come out to perform a cover of Under Pressure with Ben Harper during his set, I was even more confident that the favour would be return. And I wasn’t disappointed! Ben Harper waltzed onto the stage to join the band in playing Red Mosquito – and if there was ever a Pearl Jam song made for Ben Harper’s slide guitar, this has got to be it!

Anyway – here’s a short video of two panoramas from within the crowd (from our first spot and then our second). There’s an outside chance that it includes some awesome singing on my part, too.

View the Hard Rock Calling photo album on Picasa.

Wow, it’s been a busy week! On Thursday night, Al and I headed up to the HMV Forum in Kentish Town to see Coheed and Cambria, who are touring off the back of their new album.

We came in part way through the opening act, whose name I missed (as usual) though on reflection I think it may have had “Monster” in it. I wasn’t a fan (too screamy, with no melody) but Al didn’t mind it.

Coheed came on around 9 PM and played a fantastic set of about four songs from their new album, plus loads of tracks from their back catalogue. They didn’t say much between songs, and even though I would have liked them to talk a bit more, this is typical of their style so I wasn’t too surprised.

Unfortunately, I forgot to take my earplugs, and it was loud in there; my ears were suffering afterwards.

Coheed and Cambria are definitely not a band that everyone will love, but they’re easily one of my favourites and I’d snap up any opportunity to see them play live. The journey back from Kentish Town to Chiswick was long and boring, but it was totally worth it!

It’s a good thing that Powderfinger put on such a good show on Saturday night, because prior to rocking up to the concert, Julian, Shelley and I had been enjoying an amazing BBQ at Nick and Suzie’s place! It had absolutely every ingredient for a successful afternoon – loads of delicious food, awesome people, amazing sunshine, an unexpected quiz (including an Australian themed tin-foil sculpture round), awesome people (did I mention that one already?), and most importantly, table football!

When the invite said “come round at 2 PM” I had thought it would have given us loads of time to enjoy the afternoon with everyone, but before I knew it, it was 8 PM and time to leave! I could have more than happily stayed there until the wee small hours with everyone; I’m wondering what time the tequila and jenga would have inevitably come out?

Anyway – a massive thanks to Nick and Suzie for their awesome hosting skills; it was such a great afternoon, and it really felt like the start of summer. Fingers crossed for more weekends like that!

View the BBQ at Nick and Suzie’s gallery on Picasa or Facebook.

Depending on what timezone you’re in, today (Friday, 11th June 2010) is the three year anniversary of our move from New York to London. And what an amazing three years it has been! There’s no easy way to summarise everything we’ve done in that time, but one thing is for sure: I’m really, really glad I kept the blog (mostly) up to date. It’s so awesome to be able to look back on what we’ve done, where we’ve been, who we were with, etc. Good times!

After three years in London, I can definitely say this: if you want a good espresso, find an Australian (trained) barista. Loads of people know this to be true; Taylor St Baristas (which conveniently is right near my work) even use it as their biggest drawcard! But shops (and signs) like this are few and far between, and when you’re always on the lookout for good coffee, this isn’t an ideal situation. Unfortunately, there’s really only two things we can do to remedy this -

1. Go into the cafe business and become a barista for a living; or
2. Move to a place where practically every barista is Australian trained

And, though I’ve always thought that I’d enjoy going for option (a), we’ve decided instead that we’ll go for option (b).

Yep, you read that correctly: we’re moving home. It’s the end of an era.

Why?

Well, for two reasons, really.

Firstly, as already explained, it’s for the coffee. I guess the other option would have been to move to Italy – we’ve certainly been there enough this year! – but frankly, I’m not impressed at the way they look down on you simply because you enjoy a little bit of milk in your afternoon brew. That, and we can’t speak Italian. And we don’t have visas. OK, Italy would have been a rubbish choice!

But, perhaps a slightly more important reason, is because Kristy is pregnant, and we’re expecting the first baby Thomas in late September! And, as much as we love being in London (seriously; I could live here forever), we always knew that when it was time to deliver a baby, we’d be doing it in Australia. Say what you will about Australia’s public health system – we’d take it any day, over the NHS.

And obviously, given that the entirety of our immediate family is back in Oz, we have a much broader support network available at our beck and call. (Not to mention all the free babysitting!)

Where?

Back in the second-half of last year, we kept our wonderful parents busy running around Brisbane, looking for a new place for us to live. After loads of false starts, Mom and Dad came upon a private sale at Everton Hills which ticked all of the boxes. Everyone who checked the place out came back with positive reports – including the building and pest inspectors – and so we put in an offer. And after an arduous loan application, many late nights calling Westpac in Adelaide, and a settlement period that didn’t seem to want to end – it all finally went through at the beginning of January.

Our new home! We can’t wait to get back and see it for ourselves – as well as go on a crazy shopping spree to fill it up with furniture!

When?

It was tough to decide when we could move back with “time to spare” (before Kristy’s due date), and yet still have enough time here to feel satisfied when we left. Eventually we decided on finishing up work in July, then moving back in early August – dependant of course on the doctors giving us the “all clear” for Kristy to fly. So far we’ve been very lucky, fingers crossed it all stays that way.

That only leaves us about seven weeks in the UK. Seven weeks! Eeeeekk!!!

As you may recall, we were supposed to go and see Powderfinger play in April this year, but they had to reschedule their concerts due to the volcanic ash cloud. The shows were rescheduled for the Friday and Saturday night just gone, so for the last two evenings, my home away from home has been my favourite concert venue, Brixton Academy.

The support act was Bob Evans, who Louise informed us before the show is actually Kevin Mitchell, the lead singer from Jebediah. I wasn’t all that familiar with his music, but he sounded quite good on stage – though given that he’s one man on acoustic guitar, he had a bit of trouble filling the entire venue with sound.

On both nights, Powderfinger came on around 9:30 PM, and both times opened with Burn Your Name. This was one of only a few tracks that they played from Golden Rule; overall, these were definitely “Greatest Hits” concerts, with tracks like Already Gone, Thrilloilogy, Sunsets, On My Mind, Lost and Running, Nobody Sees, Bless My Soul, Waiting For The Sun, My Happiness, Passenger, Don’t Wanna Be Left Out, and My Kind Of Scene.

The band seemed a lot more relaxed on the second night, and focused on just having a good time up on stage. The set list was mainly the same as the first night, but they had a few substitutions – I was stoked to hear them play Love Your Way, which is another one of my favourites. They also put a “tag” in the middle of On My Mind by cutting to a few verses of Piano Man Paint It, Black by The Rolling Stones, before cutting back to finish the song.

Another highlight from night two was Pick You Up. They had played it on the first night, with the disclaimer from Darren (one of the guitarists) that “heaps of you probably won’t know this song, because it’s so old” – but of course, everyone did know it! On the second night, Bernard talked about how supportive everyone around the world had been of the band, but that (outside of Australia) they always had received the best reception from the crowds in London. It’s probably because there’s so many Aussies here! They dedicated the song to “all those people that have come from the other side of the world”. Bernard gave everyone a knowing look when he sang the line, “When you are far from home” – which of course was received with loads of applause.

Both nights they did two encores, and each night they finished with “These Days”. It seemed a fitting way to say goodbye to London; after 20 years together, there’s no doubt that things turned out nothing like they’d planned.

I meant to take more video of the concert last night, but unfortunately I forgot to charge my camera battery, so I only got the last minute of These Days before the battery died.

On Tuesday night after work, I headed up to Camden with Lea and Dean to see Birds of Tokyo play at Barfly (for only £6.50 a ticket!). We grabbed a few Red Stripes (or cider in Lea’s case) before heading upstairs to see the second warm-up band – Mujeres de Barcelona. They were an absolutely crazy Japanese three piece, with the tiniest female bass player that I’ve ever seen (as opposed to the gigantic female bassists in most of the other bands I see?). She can’t have been more than 5 foot high, and the bass guitar looked massive in her hands!

(Apologies for the photo quality; I only had my phone camera with me, and it doesn’t do a great job in low light.)

Credit where credit’s due; she was great, lead guitarist/vocalist was freaking amazing – though I had no idea if he was “singing” in English or Japanese. It was such a weird experience.

Birds came on around 10 PM (!!), which unfortunately meant they only played for an hour and a bit. They didn’t play my favourite song (The Baker’s Son), but their overall setlists was quite solid, and included at least four tracks from their forthcoming album. It sounds like it’s going to be their best album to date; I’ll be buying it as soon as I can get hold of it! Unsurprisingly, most of the crowd were Australians, and most people seemed quite chuffed with the band’s performance.

Barfly was a great venue too – it was a little bit too loud for such a tiny room, but there can’t have been more than two metres between me and the main stage, then Andrew Goddard walked straight past us after coming off stage! Cool!

Where by “Peas” I mean “girls”, and by “Pod” I mean “blanket”.

Can you tell they’re related?

London is about to lose another Aussie, and whilst the BNP may believe this is a good thing, we’re certainly not on board with their thinking.

We first met T-Pants on our crazy jaunt to Paris, and it’s amazing how good a friend you can become with someone simply by being stuck next to them in a car for 30 hours. At the very least, we knew he wasn’t a psychopath, and that’s always the first criteria we use for selecting friends!

Todd and I share a very similar taste in music, was always great when bands that either of us liked were touring, as it meant that we always had someone to go see them with! Unfortunately – and due mainly to his addiction to travel – Todd has missed more concerts than he has bought tickets for than anyone I know. In fact, I’d guess that he has probably seen less than half the concerts that he had tickets for – and he’s probably missing one right now, as I type!

Anyway, we’ve had an awesome time getting to know Todd over the last three years, and we’re very sad to see him going. We look forward to catching up again with him when we’re all living happily back in the Great Southern Land. Happy travels, dude!

I’ve been trying unsuccessfully to get to sleep for the last half-hour, but so far, nothing.

My mind is racing – and not even thinking about anything worthwhile; like, “What would happen if you mixed Milo in with a chocolate breaka?”, and then, “Do breakas even exist anymore?”.

The traffic outside our window is also really noisy tonight; or maybe it’s not any noisier than other nights, but for some reason I’m noticing it more. I think it’s because it’s rained (which surprisingly it hasn’t done for ages) – so the road is wet, hence making the noise of the car tyres louder.

Blah. Maybe a few minutes of pointless web surfing will help.