palmer_eldritch

Crooked Still were bloody good. Banjo player particularly fantastic. Amazing arrangements of the their tunes. They played together wonderfully, giving plenty of room to breathe for solos. The most subtle of string parts always added to the whole texture of the song.

An accordion player joined them for a couple of tunes as well. Btw, I've still got those books if you need to pick them up.

First time I'd seen them and I was impressed. Tight for a 7-piece band too, especially seeing as a violin player was drafted in on the night. Excellent harmonies too.

Yeah it was a good gig. Thought Smokin' Catfish were excellent. Not sure how you couldn't think much of them o_O

I hate freshers week. Whats with all the luminous tutus and leg warmers that people were having to wear? I just can't stand the wackyness. Never before have I seen so many people blowing whistles while juggling on roller skates. At what point does a student decide he needs to look ridiculous, and adopt a wacky persona? Being a student myself, I have to witness all the nonsense first-hand. Almost every day, no matter what the weather, I'll see students in shorts and sandals. I don't fucking get it. o_O

I'm in a prog rock band. Need I say anything else?

I'm flattered, but I swapped with Kyle. Hah! Manoeuvre that one.

I don't know but I think one of the events should be "who can tidy up the bar quickest when everyone is gone". That'll cut an hour off my duties

Here's a couple. One of them is along the same lines as the Shining trailor.

Cheers for that, Alan. Shall check those out. Another band nobody has mentioned - Aphrodite's Child. The 666 album is fantastic.

Having recently acquired a vast prog/jazz collection, I've discovered a few albums I had not heard before. Strawbs - Grave New World is a fantastic album. It seems to have bits of everything, from raga, folk, acapella, psych and prog. Although there are LOADS more cds for me to work my way through, a few of the good ones I've found are Fruup, Terry Riley, Greenslade, Samurai, and Spirit. The few albums in that collection that I already own are going to be donated to the Moorings Juke Box, much to the annoyance of my co-workers and customers.

Surprisingly nobody has mentioned the Kinks?

This made me laugh. It's when Peter Gabriel kicks in. . .

I remember one dream where I was attending a Beatles concert. They were only the support band though. The headliners were none other than Saddam Hussein's electro pop band. . . Analyse that, Dr. Freud!

I actually wonder why ghosts have to be so fucking mysterious the whole time. Why can't they just wave and say "hello"? None of this throwing stuff, disappearing into thin air, groaning in the night bollocks. Whether or not this ghost (or ghosts) is intending to frighten, I'm not sure. I do know that if I was a ghost I'd probably get a little bored, and thus want to start having a little fun with the living (maybe that's why they are so mysterious?).

Also, I thought I may have been imagining it, but several other staff members also pointed out that they constantly think they see someone on the stairs down to the cellar while working. The stairs creep me out a little.

One night, some time ago, it was just me and Flash left at the bar. We were talking for some time before I needed to go to the toilet. When I went in, I discovered that one of the taps had been jammed down, and the sink was just about to overflow. Not thinking too much of it, I tugged at the tap to stop it pouring. About half an hour or so later when I went back in again, the tap had been jammed down again, and the sink once again was seconds from overflowing. Nobody else was in the building, and nobody had been in the toilet other than myself. On another occassion, more recently, Angie and myself were on a night shift. It was a Monday so the bar was pretty dead. We were chatting away when all of a sudden we heard a thud behind us, and some of the keys that were hanging up were left swaying. We looked around to see if someone had maybe thrown something. This was not the case. Later that evening, after everything had been cleared up and we turned off the lights to leave, all of a sudden we heard a humming coming from the stage area. Walking towards the stage I began to realise it was the smoke machine that had been turned on. It had not been on all night. We also realised then that we had forgotten to turn the amps off. The amps are kept in a cupboard by the stage with the smoke machine. Perhaps this was a friendly reminder? I've witnessed a few other creepy things. Mainly BLATANT footsteps across the bar after closing.

Philip K. Dick's "Ubik". Huge fan of his work, and so far this one hasn't let me down. It can be a head fuck at times though o_O

I have a couple of their albums. Don't really listen to them anymore though. They seem to steal too many bits and pieces of other prog bands out there IMO. Saw them live last year and though they were enjoyable, Wilson did seem to me to be a little bit pretentious.

Birds of Fire is my personal favourite album. Inner Mountain Flame is another good one. System 7 are fantastic. It doesn't surprise me that they could be a bit of a pain in the arse for anyone working for them though. At Wickerman Festival a coupe of years ago, I approached Mr Hillage in a tent while he was playing with Mirror System. He shook my hand but not without a look of disgust. I could tell he was thinking "what a dirty hippy". Indeed I was a "dirty hippy" though, so I didn't hold it against him. We saw him a few times later walking around the festival site. We would start chants of "Stevo, Stevo, Stevo". Needless to say he avoided us like the plague and pretended not to notice us. Good times.

Right. Here we go. Steve Hillage would have to be the ultimate prog hero for me. Fish Rising is a work of genius. Saw him play at the Gong Unconvention in Amsterdam a couple of years back. He played the entire album. T'was brilliant. I believe he's doing his solo stuff at Glasto this year. I doubt they'll show footage of it unfortunately Who's going to Edinburgh in November to see Gong play with Hillage and Giraudy? Never really been keen on the newer prog stuff out there. Porcuine Tree are okay, but seem to steal too many pieces of other prog stuff out there. The likes of Dream Theater just piss me off. Too much wankery and any musical melody just gets lost in what sounds like technical exercises. The singer is crap and the lyrics are often dreadful. That "where do we go when we die?" song is awful. It raises philisophical issues using the poetic ability of a primary school pupil. Other bands worth a mention are Hidria Spacefolk, Amon Duul II, Ashra, Acid Mothers Temple, and i guess Mahavishnu Orchestra (who are one of my favourite bands at the moment. The Robert Fripp solo stuff seems to be hard to get hold of. What I've heard if good though. Love the Fripp and Eno stuff.

Plastic packaging on various products. The packaging on electronic goods is awful. You have to ruin perfectly good scissors to get into the damn thing. Is the shop likely to accept a return on a faulty product when you had to rip all the plastic to get into it? What about the packaging on food products like bacon? The little peel section is the cause of great stress for me. Try and pull it, it just tears off. Try another corner? Same thing. FFS!

That was ace! San Toy were awesome. I knew they were good but their live performance was to perfection. Check them out everybody.

Absolute scumbags. I can only hope the dog is ok and will turn up soon

Very tempted to join this expedition. It is my post-exam period after all and the weather has been so nice to us. . . What harm can a few nice refreshing, half-pint-sized beers do?