Starsailor - Live in Köln (September 27, 2009)

Some years ago when I got interested in britpop they were one of my favourite bands. Of course when you are a teenager you should love these sweet chords and charming vocal. Starsailor: so depressive on the first album Love Is Here, but getting lighter and more positive album by album. I didn't listen to this music for such a long time but seeing they are having a concert near my city couldn't miss this!
Having the new album - All The Plans in my media library, never had time to listen to it (such a shame!). Well, and then I decided: why listen to it! I can enjoy it on the concert! ;)

Unfortunately, I missed the opening band (remember, I was coming from Oktoberfest and hardly managed to get from München to Köln) but oh, the concert itself! First of all it was really indescribable feeling to see a band that is already in the past for me. I wouldn't say that I don't like their music now that's why I never have them in my playlist.. Maybe I grew up for that music.. But now I realize that it's stupid. You can never get too old for Starsailor and they don't even play music especially for teenagers. So, what has happened? Perhaps it's all about new bands: they don't let you get back to the old music. Thinking of it now, I was digging in my library later and, oh my, I found so much old and nice music.. But that's another story :)

Yes, they are not so young any more. I wouldn't say that the new album is more mature. They haven't changed and maybe it's good to see that. Althoug James Walsh isn't that slim any more, that's it :)

After the crazy and stressful week it was really nice to hear something from the past, something familiar, especially when it's live! They played lots of old songs, opening the show with Tie Up My Hands. This was the first song I have ever heard of them! Do I have to mention all the songs they have played? Ohhh, I was really happy to the old ones: Poor Misguided Fool, Alcoholic, Fidelity, Four To The Floor, Love Is Here, Silence Is Easy, In The Crossfire, Keep Us Together.. So much positive even in the most depressive ones. I like also the new album: Boy In Waiting, All The Plans, Change My Mind.. and of course, Tell Me It's Not Over. Never expected them to be so full of positive and making people laugh. Such a contrast with the music and lyrics! Paradox? :)

The venue was nice and full of people: NOT teenagers.. mostly. The crowd was speaking for itself: it's not an adolescent music, although I liked it when I was 15-16. But why likED? I like it now, too. So nice to get back to the favourite music!

Randomly yours,
Gaya

Oktoberfest - Italian Weekend (September 25-27, 2009)

There is this festival of German (especially Bavarian) culture that is so famous all around the world. Yes, Oktoberfest is held in many countries but to feel the real German culture you have to come to München.

So, the most important things to have and take for Oktoberfest:

• Somewhere to stay in München.
• A sleeping bag and a mattress just in case.
• Enough rest on previous days (sleep well and tight).
• Some.. I'm sorry.. MUCH money to spend on transportation, beer, food, souvenirs and other random things.
• Some stereotypes about German culture, Bavaria.
• And your wish to drink lots of good Bavarian beer!

So, traffic jam in Germany is awful. It can make your 6 hours trip even longer. Especially near Frankfurt... pffff... just avoid the highways near Frankfurt!

My first impression about München: it's a dirty stinky city full of weird and drunk people in traditional clothes and many tourists which are being quite rude sometimes. Old metro smelling with high humidity.. (Later I will change my opinion). But nice weather :) It was evening..

Unfortunately I slept only 2 hours. Later I had to regret about that.. Waking up at 5AM to hurry up to the place and reserve a place in the tent.. I have to say that the city was really awful in the morning, too. But they were cleaning it so there was a little hope to walk around in clean München afterwards.

Well it was quite tough. I mean, being surrounded with thousands of people who are pushing you more and more and actually standing in the crowd around 2 hours... In the last minutes I was quite scared that there is not enough air around and that actually I will break something.. arm or leg. But after some extreme 20 minutes of having pressure from everywhere and going along with the crowd we managed to get inside and.. whoooopppaaaa. Now we are in a VERY BIG place. I was told that it could hold around 8000 people and it was totally full! People sitting, standing, walking around.

Beer time! Hmmm, we were wondering if we ever had beer THAT early in the morning :D Being very tired, we decided to act efficiently and not get drunk in the first 1 hour. To-Get-Drunk-Not-Too-Early project was successful!

Umh.. prices: well, 1 litre of beer in our tent costed € 8.55. BUT.. there is a big BUT. If you give 10 euros banknote to the waiter, he won't give you a change! "I'm sorry, I don't have coins blabla". He will always have excuses to take a big tip. And if you give him precisely 8.55, he will never approach you again. So let's say, beer costed € 10 by default! :) But it was worthy, believe me! :)

Hmm.. Music was typical Bavarian. When they started to play, everybody was already in mood and singing along and you could hardly listen to the music! And there was this popular "game" of drinking the whole beer at once and everytime people were reacting to this. It was really awesome when somebody drinks beer till the end and other 7999 people are shouting from everywhere! :)))

Ohhhhh, Bavarian dresses. Now I want to have one. But later when I was looking for a dress in the city, the cheapest one I saw costed € 80 :( So nothing came out of it.

About some stereotypes: many people say that Oktoberfest is not interesting for German people, because it's so common and there is nothing extraordinary for them. But what I noticed is that, yes, many Germans are not so interested in Oktoberfest, it's not a big deal for them. But for Bavarian people it's different. They really live it! And almost all of them are dressed in traditional clothes during Oktoberfest weekends. I didn't expect to see so many Germans in the tent!

We went to Oktoberfest during the second weekend of the festival, which means we were attending Italian weekend. Well, first we found out that there are many Italians living in München. And there are many Italians arriving to München just for Oktoberfest. So we can say that after Germans most of the people were Italians (ohhhh, I missed Italian language so much!).

Ok, 12PM.. After 1 litre of really strong beer (and not sleeping well the whole week before) some thoughts about having an energetic drink comes to my mind. But.. what a shock! They don't have any!!! You just have to drink beer! Welcome to German culture, babe! :D (Respect guys, but I was really wasted and needed it!!! :))

Another litre of beer? Yes, if you want to stay in the tent, you HAVE TO order beer. Otherwise you should leave the place because there are lots of people outside that want to have a sitting place. So, let's have another couple of hours here, especially when it was getting more and more interesting in sense of people around. Our table somehow became more German (we lost internationality :D ). Interesting talks, meeting new people (crazy drunk people), some photos, thoughts about new profile pictures with big glass of beer, standing in a line to go to the toilet (sometimes it took more than half an hour!).. and it's 3PM already! What about going out and checking out city center?

OMG, when we went out, the first thing to notice was.. hey, it's afternoon! :D Have you been drunk in the afternoon? Lots of people, walking here and there, dresses, souvenirs, carousels, entertainment. And even if you are drunk, you start to think.. For what is this? It's a huge opportunity for us to spend lots of money, and for them - to earn lots of money. Pfff... I'm realy afraid to count how much our waiter earned that day and how much I spent. It's a huge entertainment/money roller-coaster!

Some fresh air and even if you are so tired, you decide to go to have a walk in the city. Now it seemed cleaner and really beautiful!

Huge city centre with lots of places to see - fountains, buildings, flowers, people.

And there was a really cool band playing. The leader was amazing - he was Italian.. Such a funny guy and cool music!

Spending even more money to get some souvenirs (if you started to spend money then just don't stop!), having a nice time in a park just sitting and chatting, then dinner and at last - sleep..

I slept 8 hours.. It seemed the longest sleep I have ever had!!! In the morning I just packed, went out to say bye-bye to München and go home.

Oktoberfest is a MUST SEE. At least once in your life. Even if you spend so much money, it's a real place to see German culture. And even if you don't get your energetic drink, afterwards you're feeling really cool just to be there and live in it!

Highly recommended!

Yours truly

Gaya

Jet - Live in Cologne (September 14, 2009)

Well, this is the band to see. And just can't explain why. And even YouTube won't help. They are just great live!

Jet, Jet...

So, on September 14th, in the middle of the week, I rushed out of the office and was running like hell to the station to catch the train. Then I was heading to Cologne and.. OOPS! It seems I have the wrong ticket: it's just for a normal train, not ICE. But the girl that was checking was quite kind: she heard what I said and just let me go!!! Yes, there are still nice people in the world, that's true! :)

This was the first time that I had to use public transport in Cologne. And my map was correct this time, so subway, then walking for around 15 minutes and I'm in the place! Well, it reminded me of a club in Rome called Circolo degli Artisti but it was smaller. Well, nice memories about Circolo and nice music for warming up. And of course I couldn't refuse some German beer and.. Jet market! I got a t-shirt with K.I.A. which they didn't play during the show (actually quite strange, huh?).

I have to say, it's not really fun to go to the concerts alone.. And it's really sad to see Jet so underrated. When you say to others that you are going to see them live, first they wonder who the hell Jet is! And then they remember "what was that song? Ah... something like.. Do you want to be my girl?". Not even many of them remember the correct title of the song. Whatever! It's not the band of one song. It's really a great band deserving much more appreciation than maybe most of the bands that exist now.

Now from the sad things to optimistic ones. I was in the first row!!! Ahahahaha, I would say it was quite dangerous because of the crazy fans jumping up with every beat but it was quite fun. Then you totally forget you came all alone :P

First, of course, the warming up. Glowing Elephant.

Let's say, it was quite a strange band.. I mean, almost all their songs were about galleries (unsuccessful painters? boh!). Some kind of psychadelic stuff, with some dance punk elements. I think the guys haven't decided yet about their final sound. Anyway, the music was... warming up :) And the vocalist was hillarious! At least for me. The bassist reminded me of a friend of mine - Davo, with his curly hair. The drummer was cool! Davo, especially for you, the photo of the bass player ;)

Then it comes a loooooong break (with strange but chilling music) when everybody takes out their instruments, packing them, then the technicians coming and setting up all the equipment, checking them. Then the crew putting the bottles and towels and.. beers of course all around the stage! So 30 minutes of waiting.. and HERE THEY ARE!

Comparing with the opening band, the first sounds from Jet were quite loud and powerful. I guess it was Get What You Need. The whole crowd went just crazy! Several times Chris Cester - the drummer, had to calm down the people convincing them to be more cool. But how can you just stand still and not push everybody around and jumb high when it's one of the best hard rock/garage rock bands are playing just in a few meters away from you! It was totally crazy, awesome and rocking atmosphere.

Although the tour was called Shaka Rock but it was like a return of Get Born. Actually they didn't play so many things from the new album. I expected them to play Times Like This but they didn't. Pfffff, but it was actually even better they played Get Born mostly because it's my favourite one, I know all the songs by heart because every song I LIKE! It was such a blast!

Well, just a thing I noticed. Does anybody remember Mark Wilson THIS thin? I was shocked. He looked.. well.. really cute ^^

I can't even express how they were live. I watched so much live stuff from them but never could imagine they could be THAT great. With humour, friendly, fun guys. And really nice music..

If they come around (again) to your town, don't miss them EVER! They are worthy to see live, I promise! ;)

Still in the mood
Yours truly
Gaya

PS. And again I was riding my bike without any lights in Bonn when I was going home. :P

What next? My crazy week has just started!

Hey-ho, indiez! How are you doing? Classes? Exams? Conferences? Work? :)
It's been 2 wonderful week since Indie Libertines blog is back to normal, and I would say, it feels just wonderful! We have 5 active contributors and 2 more to join in October! Who's next? Hehe :)

By the way, if you want to join us, just drop a comment to this post ;)

So what's going on in the team now? Well, we are listening to music.. lots of music, believe me. And most of us are stuck on the new album of Muse! Yes, The Resistance is really a wonderful one, isn't it? By the way, soon you will find a review on it in our blog.

As for me personally, I just want to share my plans for this week. It's going to be awesome and so f**king exciting! First, I am going to see Jet live in Köln tomorrow already.

Then I'm off to Oktoberfest in Münich, whohoooo!!!

And finally my rocking week ends with a concert of an awesome band from UK. They were my favourites a few years ago and I still listen to their music and I really like them: it's Starsailor!

So, 3 great events this week, but no time to write about it, because the next week I'm off to a conference!!! ahahahahah.. Maybe I will give you some short updates or photo reports, but the full reviews will be available on the blog in 2 weeks. And yeah, I still owe you a review of a WONDERFUL concert of The Notwist and Andromeda Mega Express Orchestra.

So, what I need upcoming days is:

• A good camera
• Lots of cool people around
• And TIME, please :D

Have a nice week and stay tuned for updates!!! :)

Yours truly

Gaya

Coldplay - Viva La Vida Or Death And All His Friends (June 11, 2008)

Coldplay is one of those bands that are meant to create definitely winning songs and definitely you're not gonna be able to resist them no matter whether you are listening to any kind of rock, pop, or jazz. They are irresistibly melodic, unbelievably soft and deep and are usually totally approved by musical critiques and fans. Seems this can only happen when you talk about a pop band. But what they have common with a pop band is their perfect ability to keep up with the current mood and musical preferences. In the meantime they remain unique and experimental, not primitive which is again justified by their latest album Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends. And of course Chris's velvet vocal has far not an insignificant role in all this success. Another reason for remembering this brilliant band is their recent "Strawberry Swing" wonderful innovative clip release on September 14.
The red line in their new album is historical spirit present in all of the songs both in terms of the music and lyrics: there is some pattern of majesty and "British Highness" in most of the songs. This is probably reasoned by Chris Martins' intensive reading of Dickens during the creation of the songs. There is also an evident influence of eastern culture on many songs such as Lovers in Japan, Yes. Yes has eastern solo parts performed by a violin that add an inner spice to the song besides you can feel Chris Martin's vocal change from high falsetto to sighing mumbling which is no less attractive and beautiful though. The song has a very different "whispering" outro. Death and all his friends is a really "chameleon" song that changes so often that in case you listened it part by part you would never guess these were parts of the same song. It is a very nice and despite the name positively sounding song with very surrealistic lyrics "I don't want to cycle or recycle revenge I don't want to follow death and all his friends".
There comes sweet, sunny, lovable, romantic flowery and ...Strawberry Swing. This song is so pure just like the source pouring in a green fine meadow bringing you the real feeling of a perfection and harmony. The guitar solo is so beautiful and all the song is so wonderful that in case i never heard Coldplay before i would ADORE them due to only this song.

Violet Hill, the "darkest" (if one can say so) in this album both in terms of the philosophical lyrics and "heavier" music is a song-masterpiece: a very strong and expressive, in terms of visual associations that are quite emphasized in this song particularly. Lost! is a very "dancy" with the African style drums and organ sound unusual combination. A very catchy song with again wonderful lyrics making you think and rethink...
Lovers in Japan is another oriental song with interesting effect of a "badly tuned" instrument's sound. The song suddenly stops in the middle and flows into a gentle piano solo.
42 has a changing nature as well: it starts in a rather Coldplay style manner: with a traditional piano playing softly in the background. Then it turns into a more aggressive instrumental solo and changes totally with Chris singing ironic "You didn't get to heaven but you made it close" managing to change back to the beginning part motives at the very end. Cemeteries of London sounds very similar to the "House of the rising sun" melody and to me it's the least appealing song in the album yet it is a great song taken as separate. Life in technicolor II is a very motivating, inspiring song with a cute video having the band members as puppets playing for the kids. It makes you feel a rush of thousands of imaginary colors penetrating in you together with the song's sounds...
Viva la Vida is very corresponding to it's name and being the first single totally transfers the album general mood. It has a "big" sound and medieval spirit with its chimes and orchestral swells it describes the tragedy of a person thrown out of a throne.
In general this album is very positive, optimistic and upraising having more "active" and less "sleepy, cold" songs as usually Coldplay albums do and is much more visual. It is a real proof of Coldplay's ability of always staying interesting, new and wonderful making their songs worth saying Long Life Coldplay, a.k.a. Viva Coldplay!

Tracklsit:
1. "Life in Technicolor"
2. "Cemeteries of London"
3. "Lost!"
4. "42"
5. "Lovers in Japan/Reign of Love"
6. "Yes" (includes hidden track "Chinese Sleep Chant")
7. "Viva la Vida"
8. "Violet Hill"
9. "Strawberry Swing"
10. "Death and All His Friends"

And don't forget to fall into a fairy tale of Strawberry Swing ...

Subsonica - L'eclissi (2007)

Well, I understand, that most of you don’t know anything about Subsonica and you are surprised about this. But wait a minute! We are going to talk about a very special band and it will be right to say “Fasten your seatbelts!”: Oops, you say you prefer music in English? Hmmm… It’s a bad day for you then because we are all in Italiano mood tonight, ladies and gentlemen!

Yes, founded in 1996, this band is originally from Italy, Turin (somewhere there in the north). They are presenting the most bright, active, noisy and beautiful sides of their city habitants. This band is as far from any known standards as possible. They make much noise with their music but avoid from any kind of rumours and scandals (but if you dig deeper, you’ll see they have quite interesting biographies and are quite interesting figures), they live with their music we can say. Five members of the band are quite old, the youngest is only 35 years old, but oh yes, they are more than competitive with any young project/band! Even more further.. much further!

Presenting electronic, alternative rock, electrofunk.. but how relevant they are to these styles, YOU should decide listening to their latest album – L’eclissi, released in 2007.

Personally me first time heard them without understanding any single word, but believe me, these guys worked it out so well that I was jumping up to the ceiling! And then guided by a natural interest, I tried to figure out at least the meanings of the song titles.

So,

L’eclissi – Eclipses

1. Veleno – poison

2. Ali Scure – Dark Wing

3. La Glaciazione – Glaciations (by the way, the first single from the album)

4. L’ultima Risposta – The Last Answer

5. Il centro Della Fiamma – In The Centre Of The Flame

6. Nei Nostri Luoghi – At our places

7. Quattrodieci – Fourteen

8. Piombo – Plumb

9. Alta Voracita – High Voracity

10. Alibi – Alibi

11. Cananero –Black Dog

12. Stagno – Tin

Quite rhythmic and loaded album. Talking about each and every song separately would be useless. Just need to listen and meanwhile you cannot just stand still, it makes you move and waking different feelings. For example, some of you might be so excited that can take painting colours (the most important thing is that there should be lots of colours), run outside and throw it with the energy on people :D (can happen while listening to Quattrodieci).. Not obligatory, but should be fun!

About sound: I can say they broke the border of alternative rock and electronic music. Too many and different sounds. Maybe that’s why they are not fit just in indie rock.. Hmm.. wouldn’t come out because before gathering they did lots of stuff connected with other styles, starting from reggae finishing with metal!

Saying that this album of the band should be enough to like or understand them, would be difficult, because every album is unique and not having them in your media library is a crime!

Since 1997 they produced 5 albums: Subsonica, Microchip Emozionale, Amorematico, Terrestre and L’eclissi: So, you have a wide choice just in case L’eclissi is not enough! Stay in positive!

Alla prossima volta;)

Gayane411

thenewno2 - You Are Here (August 1, 2008)

I believe I'm not the only person who started listening to thenewno2 just because one of the Beatles juniors was said to be involved in it. Back then the project had only a promo EP released, which consisted of four beautiful tracks and immediately found its place in my playlist for months. It was a real revelation for me - discovering that George Harrison's son wouldn't go playing some outdated old-fashioned music as many would have expected, especially after hearing what two sons of another late Beatle used to play. On the contrary, Dhani Harrison surprised me with contemporary sound and wonderfully up-to-date musical trends that may have been originally based on what his father has invented, but eventually evolved into techniques that mark the indie rock as we know it today.

But let's be fair though: thenewno2 is a project of two, not just Dhani. Oliver Hecks is a multi-instrumentalist who's also done all the art-works and designs for the project, came up with concepts for videos and had them filmed. Also, band's first album You Are Here was based on demos written by both Oli and Dhani. Several songs from the album were available as a free download on the Rock Band music video game series, the rest of them were sold via iTunes. One of the most remarkable tracks from the album is, undoubtedly, Another John Doe, which brings up social issues and would've been something late George Harrison would approve. This topic goes throughout the whole LP just like a thin red line, sometimes almost invisibly, but yet it's still possible to sense it on some level, while the visible one is full of casual words about love and relationship. Yomp, for instance, is one like that: 

I would also mark out Crazy Tuesday and Wind Up Dead as memorable songs, although the album is mostly written in the same style which makes it hard to pick out songs. However, I'd strongly advise to listen to the bonus tracks, too, with People being my personal favorite. And it's a real pity Choose What You're Watching never made it to the album, for it would perfectly fit into You Are Here. I do expect it to be included into thenewno2's next LP, hoping the latter will be released someday soon. But before that - there's a whole album to savour, so - let's! 

thenewno2 links: Official site | Myspace | Twitter | Facebook