Phono Paul

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 10:23:45 GMT

How come it's only 11am? Why can't it be 12.30 when I'll be in the pub. I'm heartily tired of waiting for stuff to happen... I'm probably not Dr Kildaire then. (Yes, that was an obscure Young Ones reference... is the Young Ones old enough to be deemed obscure?) I'm waiting for the embargo to be lifted on me booking bands (one month and counting), I'm waiting for someone to buy our house... someone showing even a little interest in the house would be nice (also at least a month and counting), and waiting for other even more important stuff to happen, but it's probably best not to mention that in an open post.

Oh actually, aside from the general embargoness, we are doing another Sheepish Showcase free gig type thing on Sunday 28th September. I know this for sure as I've already got one band signed up.

In slightly more random news, Dexter 2 and The Wire 5 are about the only things worth watching on the television these days. Although I'll soon be watching Invasion of Time (less than £9 from dvd.co.uk - bargain!) featuring Tom at his most talking-to-camera mad. I know it'll be dreadful but I haven't seen it in years.

On a whim I grabbed a couple of Sisters compilations out of the flight case on Sunday and stuck them in the car stereo. Given how intimate I am with their material, I haven't actually listened to any (away from the club) in ages. Aside from the retro angle, you start to notice stuff you've either never noticed before or had forgotten. I'm so used to the KM version of Anaconda the original came as quite a surprise... mostly because, if you strip out the vocals but keep the lyrics, it sounds exactly like She Wants Revenge. Freaky.

Finished Lego Indian Jones, since loads of films but none worth writing home about, and currently really looking forward to seeing Dark Knight despite myself.

Oh well, that's 22 minutes closer to the pub. Back to the .Net nightmare.

I have no rational or rhyme or reason for this whatsoever

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 08:50:45 GMT

I hereby decree that today's word of the day is

jiggery-pokery

and I implore you all to employ it in all conversations and posts today.

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 07:56:43 GMT

I feel it would be appropriate if I cross-posted this...

Saturday 26th July

ACTION DIRECTE - LAST GIG EVER!
+ Special Guests ZEITGEIST ZERO

Doors 8pm - late,
'Red Wake' with DJs after bands finish.

£3 Admittance.
Bradford 1 in 12 Club

weekenderer updatererer

Mon, 21 Jul 2008 07:21:34 GMT

This week we've been very busy, although I can't really remember much of it, as usual. We did go to a cheese and wine tasting evening in Brighouse, where we completely failed to fit in. I did get to eat some very lovely butcher's pork pie (that would be the pie that was lovely, not the butcher) and drink what I imagine was the first pint of bitter I've had in around 17 years... and very nice it was too. The cheese was lovely but - surprisingly - the wine wasn't up to much.

On Saturday we decided, on a whim, to investigate the Shipley Glen tramway. It's not very long and frankly there isn't really much to it, but I love anything narrow gauge or old-fashioned in a railway context. I guess it's the small child inside me, as Gary Glitter would say. At the top of the tramway there's an old (and evidently abandoned) bumper car ride, no doubt a legacy of the days when there used to be a whole fairground up there, which amazingly still had it's cars! We had a pod around the glen then stopped for refreshment at the pub before catching the tram back.

In the evening we went to see the Levellers play a free gig in Doncaster city centre, outside the market hall. No matter how bizarre that may sound, the reality was something else. We thought we were running late but fortunately the whole thing was an hour behind schedule! The mostly unlikely thing about it was that while it was very busy - Levs fans, the entire indie kid population of Doncaster (for the other bands), various flotsam and jetsum and seeming half of the city centre's usual Saturday night clientele - they hadn't laid a bar on! Yup, no booze on sale at all. This meant that the gay bar on market square was making a killing on take-outs, although so much so that it took me a good twenty minutes just to get served! (It's a good thing the bands were running late.) Whoever were organising the thing clearly missed out on a moneyspinner.

Anyway, the Levellers look fucking old nowadays, and frankly either the lead vocalist had had quite a few (which did seem likely) or he's finding it increasingly difficult to sing nowadays. Still, it's all singalong stuff and I enjoyed seeing them again... all told it was pleasant evening and there didn't seem to be any trouble despite the great mix of different - and very drunk - people and a minimal, bordering on non-existent police presence.

Sunday we went to my nephews not-christening to become his not-godparents and in the evening Mr Kevver of the TWF joined me on the decks at Black Sheep. It was inevitably on the quiet side, being post-WH, but nevertheless there was quite a lively atmosphere. Oh, and Mr urbancannibal will no doubt be reassured to hear that last night was the night I finally managed to tempt young master Ian onto the dancefloor with Scooter.

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 12:00:20 GMT

I feel the need to repost this from Adam's journal...

Why we should ban the word "Chav"

Admittedly I wouldn't personally advocate "banning" any particular word or words, however I do agree with much of their reasoning.

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 10:33:21 GMT

In other news, we're probably going to this tonight, and tomorrow it's Transmission which has - surprise suprise - a facebook event thingy here.

Yes, Transmission Transmission Transmission. You get the idea.

you were always on my mind

Thu, 10 Jul 2008 08:14:30 GMT

blame Ms Woo...

View Poll: Transmission

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 22:00:09 GMT

Slightly mad Doctor Who -related spoilers here.

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 06:18:42 GMT

The last Tyler one I'll do...

Tue, 08 Jul 2008 07:33:40 GMT

It's Transmission spam week, but sadly some things don't always make the grade. Here's one of my failures, I couldn't find a good picture, the Judoon don't quite speak like that and, maybe most critically, the reference is probably way too obscure for a lot of people to get.

You're dangerous, I'm lovin' it

Mon, 07 Jul 2008 11:41:20 GMT

I'd best kick off by saying that it's Leeds Secret Goth Night this Saturday. Although it's rather snuck up on me, it actually seems like ages since the last one. No bands this month, just me and the man from Carpe playing phat toons and gay disco.

Anyway, weekender, go out, have a good time, etc...

Friday we caught up with Ollie and went shopping for Nephew-related goodies. I managed to get all the way to the checkout in Toysrus without picking up any 'Who related goodies, but alas failed at the final hurdle. I now own yet another police box. Mind you, it really doesn't help when people come up flaunting their boxes on a Sunday night. (In retrospect that sentence does actually sound a lot worse that I intended.)

Saturday we braved the mad weather and visited my brother's family in York. It was lovely to spend quality time with my nephew (and play with his toys!), not to mention my nieces... it's possibly the first time I've read a child a bedtime story, although it's arguable who was actually reading to who. We also got to chat with my old mate Dave who, wedding aside, I haven't seen for years.

Got home in the early hours, watched 'Who (where to begin eh?) and somehow managed to provisionally book a gig for August at the same time, all despite being somewhat inebriated.

Sunday brought a visit to the farmers market to stock up on healthy fresh local provisions, which in this case amounted to four bottles of red wine. Later Black Sheep wasn't quite as busy as last week, but pleasant enough nonetheless. Frustratingly I'm still waiting to find out what I can (and can't) book for the rest of the year though.

Finally, and despite my better judgement, I'm now "properly" on Facebook. Any suggestions as to have I can now exploit this fact for the good of Black Sheep/Transmission are very much encouraged. No, seriously.

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 13:10:20 GMT

I've been feeling a little run down and irritated with the world this week, so ended up taking today off. Completely forgot that it was 4th July so I'll have to find myself a stars and stripes to relieve myself on and/or wipe my ass with later. Probably not at the same time.

In other news I was thinking of booking a band or two for next month's Transmission, but have failed due to lack of inspiration. The trouble is I expect next month to be quiet due to the students being away and the proximity of Infest, so I don't really want to risk dragging a band halfway across the country if there's a danger it won't be worth their while. I suspect the clock may well run out on this one.

Incidentally I will be sorting out the rest of the year soon (yes I know I said that last week, I'm still waiting for certain... stuff to get sorted) so this is where I start canvassing for suggestions of bands people think I should try to book, ideally ones that haven't already played Leeds this year.

Finally I'm only really posting so I can plug the fact that a number of close personal friends will be in Bradford tomorrow night (see flyer below)... alas we'll be in York dining with my brother (yes, that is indeed twice in the same year) and discussing pseudo-christening related business, but that doesn't stop any of you lot going. I'll be back for Black Sheep, have no fear.

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 14:22:55 GMT

View Poll: #1217115

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 13:22:08 GMT

In lieu of any content, I offer you this gem from Mad Larry who eloquently sums up why some taboos should not be broken.

"Pyramids of Mars" (Rewritten According to "Forest of the Dead")

SUTEKH: I shall shred your nervous system, fibre by fibre. Then I shall be released from this prison, and the universe shall be as dust before me. All shall know the vengeance of Sutekh.

THE DOCTOR: Do you know who I am?

SUTEKH [checks database]: Oh... 'bye, then.

THE DOCTOR: 'Bye.

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 10:28:09 GMT

In other news, the lovely Debbie will be staying with us this weekend and we'll probably all be at the Trashcanmann ( http://www.myspace.com/trashcanmann ) gig at the Primrose tomorrow (Saturday) night. You should all come, they were really good last time they played (although I imagine they won't be playing the Atrium again any time soon). Oh, and I shall be DJing at Black Sheep this Sunday, for what seems like the first time in ages!

I am the new way to go, I am the way of the future

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 08:06:36 GMT

Ah, the awful sound of the crunching of gears.

I wrote a lovely long post about future plans yesterday, and then the goalposts moved before I could actually post it. So here is the somewhat condensed version.

July
No gigs but Black Sheep and The Secret Goth Night as normal.

August
I'm not adverse to running a pre-Trans gig in August if the right band(s) came along, but I'm not actively looking, if you know what I mean. Actually the venue are quite keen for an August gig but with only a couple of weeks to pull something together (you need at least a month to promote these things) I'm not sure how realistic it is. (I'm currently pondering!)

September
We're hopefully running a second Showcase gig on the 28th September, in association with the LGS. Last time we had well over 100 people through the doors, which to be fair is pretty good for a Sunday night in Leeds. Obviously this rather depends on whether I can find bands willing to play, of course. I may slap up a more detailed FL post about that soon, but in the meantime any interested parties please contact me by email!

October - December
Will hopefully involve more gigs and stuff, but I'll update on that next week.

2009+
This is probably a good place to mention something a fair number of you have known for some time: I have no intention of doing another Woolstock next year. Having recently gotten married, the next step in the non-club gameplan is to genetically engineer an army of small hairy monkeys to take over the world. After several years of energetic research we intend to start our actual experiments shortly... obviously it's a very inexact science and it simply isn't tenable to gamble that the timings would work out in a, ahem, "convenient" manner! I'd like to believe that there will be a fourth Woolstock at some point in the future, but that said I think that W3 rather pushed the idea (and me!) to the limit, so equally it would be a good one to go out on.

Aside from Woolstock, I rather suspect that if Black Sheep continues into 2009 then my involvement there is likely to come under review too. The monkeys notwithstanding, it's also possible that we'll be moving out of Leeds before the end of this year... but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it!

meta fekker

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 10:08:41 GMT

I indulged in a little realignment of my FL yesterday (cull! cull! cull!).

Oh the drama.

Basically there's a load of dead journals that I never got around to removing, communittees that I no longer read (or are no longer active) and a handful of non-friends that no longer post publicly so it seemed a little pointless them being there.

This is part one of a two part process, although - given that it's taken me over four months to actually get around to doing this part - I wouldn't hold your breath.

weekender

Tue, 17 Jun 2008 15:07:01 GMT

So, a quick update as I'm still annoyingly busy.

- Doctor Who last week was all style and no substance, rather like... a shadow (yes, I know, I know). One day when I'm not too busy (did I mention that?) I shall write a grand opus on post-millenial Who, that will probably centre around why The Idiot's Lantern is - pivotally - where things went Wrong. Which is extremely relevant here but I don't have the time to explain why. However to give my fellow obsessives something to ponder on, it wasn't the taboo-bursting resolution to the shadow issue that offended me most, nor was it the bizarre (and frankly disturbing) "happy" ending, no... it was the books flying off the shelves. Just think about it, seriously.

- During the week we went to the cinema (for the first time in ages) to see Indiana Jones. Despite Ford's apparent inability to actually stand upright (which made the stunt doubles easy to spot) it was entertaining enough rubbish. I particularly like the sand-based temple door thing, but frankly the baddie was a bit lame.

- We've been playing Lego Indy on the PS2, which is annoying and addictive in equal measures.

- We've also been house hunting, which I'm also tempted to describe as annoying and addictive in equal measures!

- At some point in the last couple of weeks the people from across the road decided to fix (as in cement) our kerb as they were doing their own. This was extremely generous but slightly embarrassing at the same time.

- Went to my brother's barbeque. There is a very long diatribe about this waiting to be posted, quite possibly in a filtered fashion.

- I was very happy with the way the Lahannya gig went on Saturday, in terms of audience and stuff it justified itself, so with only a very minor reservation I do think this is the way forward.

- Conversely Transmission was, to be fair, very poor indeed. Normally I'd accept this as part of the ebb and flow of such things (what with other stuff being on and the inevitable post-Woolstock fatigue) but there is the niggling possibility that the pre-gig itself (regardless of being a separate entity) may have had a negative impact. Still, I adored the last half hour or so.

- This Saturday's Who was actually so different I quite enjoyed it, at least once it got going (about 15 minutes in). It's probably cruelly unfair but the lack of Tate probably helped too. On the subject of Who (again), it really has been a piss-poor series overall (which is particularly galling as last year's was excellent) and I'm fairly certain that the next few weeks can't possibly live up to expectations.

...and looking forward...

This Sunday I'll be shunning the delights of sheep and, together with my good lady wife, venturing forth over the Pennies to visit the infamous Limelight in Crewe... which for better or worse I'm mildly curious about. It's a free gig featuring Rhombus, Violet Vortex (I think) and my new favourite band, Dyonisis. See how I can't help but plug stuff in my posts, even when they're nowt to do with me?!

Oh and finally, a week Saturday is my Birthday. I mention this now so that when nobody gets me a card I'll know that you're all bastards, rather than have simply forgotten.

on on on cried the leaders at the back

Fri, 13 Jun 2008 08:45:41 GMT

Morning all.

It seems ages since I last updated, although to be fair I have been very, very busy. Fortunately my manager has generously had the day off so I have the luxury of time to write on here. Christ I'm busy at work, it's not so long ago I spent half my time tossing it off online, but now I've got three projects on the go simultaneously, all of which think that they're the most important. At home we've been equally busy with sorting out the house and house-hunting (and, ahem, playing Lego Indiana Jones), hopefully our house will hit the market next week. Oh, that reminds me, thanks for the info John, sorry I didn't get back to you. Frankly I thought that after Woolstock I'd have lots of spare time but it hasn't worked out that way. Once again I'm hideously behind with emails and everything.

Ah, yes, I'd best say something about Woolstock hadn't I? It's funny how it already seems so long ago. You know how I'm never interested in stuff once it's over with (always on to the next thing, which is this case is Transmission and Lahannya tomorrow, plug plug!) but I will just say I thought it all went very indeed. Admittedly in doing 13 bands over three days I think I've effectively found my elastic limit!! So while I'm happy that I did pretty much everything in my ability to make it as good as I could do. let's just say I don't think I can actually top this one!

As I'm talking about Woolstock anyway, before I put it to rest I feel obliged to do the inevitable cod-oscars speech. I know, I know, I don't like these things because they tend to sound self-congratulatory, but in all seriousness it is important (at least to me) that I acknowledge the people that helped out, because frankly I couldn't do this on my own and I'd absolutely hate anyone to get that impression!

So I'd like to thank the following...

- The wonderful Mrs Walker for indulging me in these follies. She puts up with so much and I am eternally grateful.

- All the musicians who played at Woolstock without whom, obviously, there wouldn't have been any point. The whole weekend ran ridiculously smoothly (I still can't quite believe we stayed on schedule all weekend) and this is a tribute to the goodwill and professionalism displayed by all.

- It seems terribly inappropriate to single out any one person specifically, but I'll do it anyway and thank Rikky, without his help and input Woolstock wouldn't have expanded to three nights or included the industrial/ebm/etc bands.

- From the Subculture Ryan and Keiran. How like a god Keiran is. Words cannot describe the time and effort Keiran put in over the weekend, absolutely nothing was too much trouble for him and he simply just kept coming up with the goods time and time again, no matter what. Undoubtably man of the match and I want to have his babies. Ryan also exceeded my expectations and was a pleasure to work with... I think it would be very hard to find fault in the sound all weekend, and did I mention we stayed on schedule all weekend? That would be Ryan. Also, of course, I'd like to thank Sarah for the use of her venue, without which I probably wouldn't have done a third Woolstock. Oh, and for the keyboard stand.

- Howard for the DJing and Jess for doing the door all weekend. Sterling work as usual.

- Mixel for once again working wonders with flyer/webside design when he really had better things to worry about!

- Jack and Nik for transport and logistics.

- Katie for the soldering and cabling.

- Absolutely everyone who helped promote Woolstock either online or by distributing flyers. In many ways this is perhaps the most important thing as you can put together the best line-up in the world but it would be pointless if nobody knew about it. There are too many people to list here (and if I tried I'm sure I'd miss somebody!) but I will just mention Spooky, Jack and Alice who I suspect did the bulk of the work.

I pray I haven't missed anyone out, if I have I'm really really sorry!

Incommunicado

Wed, 28 May 2008 10:43:07 GMT

I'm going to extremely busy from this point onwards, so I'd best apologise for the fact that I'm unlikely to be replying to messages and emails or basically anything not directly pertaining to Woolstock until at least Monday at the earliest. To be honest I've already let a lot of the speculative stuff slide so I'm going to have a lot of catching up to do.

Anyway, there you go.

Wed, 28 May 2008 08:55:53 GMT

Morning all.

And lo I did stand on the precipice, looking down on the carnage that will be Woolstock, and the abyss gazed back into me.

Woolstock is a mere couple of days away. Let me remind you of those 13 bands again, but for a change I'll do it in reverse alphabetical order (because I've spent 38 years at the wrong end of the alphabet and I know the pain): Zeitgeist Zero, XP8, Uninvited Guest, UberByte, Spares, RazorBladeKisses, Novus, Modulate, Manuskript, Inkubus Sukkubus, Dyonisis, Corrosion and Action Directe.

More than ever, it feels like I'm preparing for war. But I do feel prepared... pretty much all I have to do now (bar the inevitable last round of spamming) is print off loads of stuff like running times (pretty much everything was written weeks ago) and collect the t-shirts from the printers. In many ways I've done my bit now... aside from hopefully making things run smoothly on each day, my main remit and purpose from now on will be dealing with things going wrong. Which at the moment I've approaching with a zen-like calm because obviously I've no idea what they will be! Admittedly I am a little worried about the technical demands I'm placing on the venue, but we've been over them (and the sound enginner has been over them) and I'm assured everything is in hand. It is essentially the same team who did the second day of W2 and apart from the soundcheck taking forever everything went extremely well.

So yes, Friday I'll be very busy sorting out the lights (and no doubt precariously hanging off ladders - oh I hate heights) and then programming them in situ. I had hoped to get that done last Sunday but in the end I've sacrificed that preparation for better positioning. I'm still going to have a good few hours to play with them which will be more than adequate (they're only spots after all) and at least it'll give me something to do. Seriously now, soundchecks are hellish boring... I don't doubt they're dull for bands but at least they can bugger off after they've done their bit!

I could write more but I've got spamming to do. Tickets are still on sale on the website and obviously you can pay on the door. On, and please help spam!! This is it, time to tell everyone you're coming and how great the bands are! This will be my last time of asking! (Which I'm sure will come as a blessed relief to many of you!)

I wish you were here, twisting my arm and bending my ear

Fri, 23 May 2008 07:06:46 GMT

Morning.

I've been terribly, terribly busy of late, so my visits here have been a little spam-centric. Work is hectic, another big demo yesterday and then the main one wonderfully timed to be the monday after Woolstock. I had booked the day off... "had" being the operative word.

Anyway, last weekend was a milestone in that we took the last box of stuff to storage (which is just as well as we can't physically get into the storage room now) and booked an estate agent to come and value the house. Regarding storage I was rather dismayed to discover that the t-shirt board we've used for the last couple of Woolstocks wasn't handily near the entrance. In fact it isn't in evidence at all, so I guess we'll have to improvise somehow. Also not easily to hand are the light stands, but I'm hoping I know where they are and we won't need to move too much to get to them. The lights themselves are just in the door so no worries there.

Also at the weekend we took a load of tat to the charity shops of Headingly and I picked up a brand new (shrinkwrapped!) copy of Starry Eyed and Bollock Naked for a couple of quid. Without delving into the subject too far, it's curious how contemporary some of it sounds (or alternatively how backward a lot of modern ebm/industrial is). "Is This The Only Way To Get Through To You" doesn't sound dissimilar to a lot of modern stuff, and "Twin Tub With Guitar" is almost Thrill Kill Kult covering Caustic. Almost.

I really enjoyed Doctor Who on Saturday, which sadly isn't something I can say for the rest of the series so far. I suspect the large cast meant that Tate got sidelined (but still managed to slip into "character" at least once) and variations on the Doctor's poisoning routine have already been done to death, but apart from that it was an entertaining pastiche.

This week we also picked up our wedding album, which typically they've got wrong. This means yet another trip over to York next week. Tomorrow is my good lady wife's birthday so we're off for a day out to an animal sanctuary, the tickets for which were a wedding present.

Sunday will be Black Sheep, with a Bad Wisdom-y type thing 7pm-10pm and then I'll take over until we close, which will probably be late as it's a late licence job. Tickets will be on sale for Woolstock, as I'm evidently in plugging mode.

Finally Woolstock is now only a week away - so once again, please help give it a plug!! I felt quite stressed about it a week ago but since then a lot of things have fallen into place and I feel - at least in terms of what I need to do - well prepared. I just hope everyone else is!

Mon, 19 May 2008 11:09:52 GMT

Help! Cabling!

I know, I really don't have a clue, do I, so...

What sort of cabling would you use to join 5 pin DIN plugs? Ideally a link to the correct one on the Maplin site would be helpful!

Basically I need around 12-15 metres of cable which is going to cost a bomb when I can only find 5 metre lengths and 3 metre extensions. So knocking it up myself seems the best option. (Although admittedly that's a very loose interpretation of the word "myself".)

Oh, and how lossy is it?

Tue, 13 May 2008 12:57:33 GMT

HELP! - Leeds centre!

I'm knocking up something for the Woolstock bands about where to park, and I need to know whether the car park behind the Casino/old Leeds Met building is free after 6ish.

Does anyone know or live/work near enough to check for me please?!

Fri, 09 May 2008 18:01:45 GMT

Help! (Leeds people only, for obvious reasons!)

Does any on my friends list have access to a soldering iron who could swap a couple of wires around on a plug for me?

Basically it's a 3-pin DMX lead and I need the data+ swapped for the data- (as my controller and lights inevitably don't share the same polarity).