Live in Edinburgh This Week – 14th December 2008
Even looking at gig listings makes me feel a little weak at the moment. Gigs mean bars, and bars mean booze, and even two days after our Christmas bash at Toad Hall the prospect of ever drinking again feels just a little scary. In terms of industrial levels of weapons-grade levels of drinking I don’t think I’ve ever been to or hosted such a fearsome train-wreck of a party.
The Divine Comedy – A Drinking Song
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Basically, I crashed just after 5am, rose at 9am to go and stumble blindly around a football pitch, before coming straight home and pitching into bed again until 9pm. I am reliably informed that Ally, Dylan, Mrs. Toad, Neil and Mrs. Toad’s brother carried on for a little less than another hour before collectively collapsing in random places all over the house, and my last.fm profile shows the last song being played at about ten to six. Apparently the Tannoy monitor speakers which came with the Toad Session recording setup were so abused that they shut themselves down to prevent overheating. I can only imagine what might have been audible to the general public, but fortunately the police were not called. I can only assume that the lady next door is deaf, long since dead, or just generally terrified of even speaking to her degenerate neighbours.
Shame on all of you who missed it. But then, maybe you did yourselves a favour. Oof.
So, erm gigs. Ah, whatever, you’re on your own this week people, I am not going anywhere near beveraging establishments, at least until tomorrow’s Fresh Air Awards. Oh shit, is it that soon?
Saturday 20th December 2008: Broken Records at the Picture House.
It’s to be proud of that Edinburgh finally has a band considered big enough to be invited to headline a venue this size. I suppose Idlewild count as an Edinburgh band, and they’re pretty big, but basically the last time things were doing this well in this particular city was when Josef K, the Shop Assistants and the like were making waves in the early 80s, as far as I’m aware. Broken Records have spent this year as the flagship band from these parts – the only consistently touring message to the rest of the country that things in this part of the world are very , very healthy indeed.
Broken Records – Wolves (Toad Session)
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Saturday 20th December 2008: Cherry Poppin’ Daddies at the Voodoo Rooms.
I have no idea what they’re like these days, but I remember them emerging at the heart of the late-90s swing revival. I have one of their albums, it’s great fun, and I assume this gig will be just the same.
Cherry Poppin’ Daddies – When I Change Your Mind
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Saturday 20th December: Henry’s Cellar Bar Christmas Party, with eagleowl, Gasgiant, Rodent Emporium, Bukkake Birthday Party, Norman Silver & the Gold & The Incendiary Bats.
I don’t know half these bands, but erm, eagleowl are good and it looks like it should be a jolly splendid old bash. No criticism of any of the individual bands involved, but it makes absolutely zero sense as a lineup, just superficially listening to the MySpace pages. Mind you, it’s a party I suppose, not an episode of Jools Holland. Just stay off the booze – I promise you you’ll regret it.
eagleowl – Blanket
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Is that everything? Probably not, but fuck you, I don’t care. I am going to continue staring vacantly at my monitor for the next four hours and then scurry off home as soon as humanly possible to hit the sheets once more. Fucking gin.
Wish I could have been there Mr Toad, so many opportunities to drink and so little time at the moment. Honestly, someone needs to invent something that’s fun to do in large groups of people that doesn’t involve alcohol and very loud music.
think you might have missed a Broken Records gig….tho i maybe wrong
Oh fuck. The fucking Picture House. I’d forgotten about that because I never, ever check their fucking listings.
i’m now a fan of that Blue London Gin you bought…it’s lovely
Also, there’s Fantasy Island and St Jude’s Infirmary playing that Mill thing at the Caves on Thursday.
But that’s about all I could find this week.
Sorry I missed the party.
Though in many ways I’m pretty glad as I doubt my body would have coped very well.
Bart picture this…..2:30am Dancing in the Dark being played full blast and i mean full blast…..and me and assorted other dancing like fucking numpties……awesome
I’m now a fan of Asda Smart Price gin.
that gin was so rank……..Dylan you’re a bad man
There, listings fixed.
Bart, it was total fucking carnage. And Dancing in the Dark was the most popular song all night. We are trying to persuade Jamie to the make the next Broken Records tour a Bruce Springsteen Tribute Special.
It was a stroke of genius putting that song on.
That’s about the last thing I remember!
The only reaction close to the universal arms-aloft euphoria created by Bruce was Neil bounding in from the kitchen when he heard Motherfucker start up.
Cripes.
Who made the biggest fool of themselves?
I heard somewhere that Dylan slept with a horse?
Is this true?
nah not true…..it was a wonky donkey…..
He collapsed on his back on top of the vaulting horse. Neil almost climbed in bed with our house guests before collapsing in the middle of the floor in the spare room, and Ally ended up decorated like a Christmas tree. I, like Dylan, have little memory of anything after about two or three am.
I think we polished off about four bottles of gin, though.Two Tanqueray, one Plymouth, one London Gin, and some of that god-awful Asda stuff that Dylan bought to be a smart-arse.
As to wine and beer, well there’s disturbingly little of that left.
bart – it was like watching a big gay rugby scrum when dancing in the dark came on.
Euan, we’re trying to be all indie and alternative here, for fuck’s sake. The less said about Dancing in the Dark the better.
“…CAN’T START A FIRE….”
honestly bart. think big, gay and rugby scrum. if only a video existed.
cathy has photos
You keep going on about big gay rugby scrums, Euan.
This concerns me.
Sigh, I haven’t attended such a party in rather a long time. Makes me nostalgic for the more raucous student days.. though not the hangovers, and definitely not the gin hangovers. Especially not the gin hangovers ensuing after 3 hours sleep post-St Patrick’s Day, then accompanied by clambering into formal dress, and into the back seat of a car for a 2 hour drive to watch your team get humped at Hampden in a cup final. Urgh..
Could be worse, you could have been playing. I was blundering about the pitch like a newborn hippo on Sunday morning. It was all I could do to stay upright, even when standing still.
weren’t you dancing Euan?
Is there any of that bladder of cider left?
someone told me that Floyd was seen jumping onto the Chicken drumsticks…….i only found this out after i had consumed around 12 legs
i feel ok tho
Where the hell did you find a 12-legged chicken?!
You didn’t know that a paella had bones either, if I recall, Tom.
Any dubious bacteria you may have consumed probably stood no chance whatsoever against all the alcohol.
You didn’t know that a paella had bones either, if I recall, Tom.
well i did….cos i hurt my teeth
There was chicken meat attached to those bones earlier in the day, but the long, slow cooking method resulted in chicken so tender it literally fell off the bones!
I didn’t deliberately put bones straight in the paella. That would be weird.
You lucky fucking bastards. Me? I contracted food poisoning on Saturday night & spent most of it (on my own – TWoTH was out at a Christmas ‘do’) either blacking out or throwing up.
From about 6.30pm Saturday I was stumbling about in a dizzy fug, ending up in the bathroom for about an hour (which was the coldest room in the house), passing out sat upright on the toilet (fully clothed).
When I came to, it took ages for me to be able to stand up without the room disappearing into a magic eye sketch. I made it to the studio despite feeling very odd indeed, blacking out again on my desk. I was awoken some time later by my tummy what wanted to pop up to see what all the fuss was about. Managed to get as far as the door before heaving every last dribble of stomach juice into my waste basket.
Up until then I hadn’t thrown up for nearly 10 years – from illness or being pished. And I made those awful hoiking noises, you know the ones: when you’ve emptied all the moisture from your gut & all that’s left is stomach lining & fuck all else. I felt so very old right at that point. Sadly, I managed to get into bed (by 10pm) & pass out stone cold sober.
The following day (Sunday) TWoTH’s mother was visiting & took us to lunch (which I really didn’t want), with me still feeling far from ideal. The nasty meal didn’t agree with me so I spent the remainder of the afternoon trying to avoid soiling & giving myself a tramp’s blanket.
The upshot is, I was too fucking ill to go & see (& interview) The Vivian Girls & Nat Johnson on Sunday night. Balls & bollocks & bastards. So, reading all your jolly times at the Toad Hall bash makes me feel even more rotten that I do right now. Bleaurgh.
Whinge whinge whinge.
aye, as opposed to binge binge binge.
That’s just a gin hangover, mate.
Few of those up here on Sunday too.
So DC, was this another water purification system malfunction? Or more of a scampi malfunction?
Reheated Chinese Takeout gloop malfunction, I’m guessing as that was the only thing that passed my lips that day.
The only thing that passed your lips inwards, you mean. It sounds as though your entire duodenum may have passed them outwards.
Rats, beat me to it.
What a sympathetic bunch we are. I bet it was very unpleasant, DC, you poor little poppet.
I had the same joke half-typed before bothersome work got in the way.
Ooh!
What do we have on C&B’s gallery of avatars today?
Something soothingly sensible after the crazed child and the macabre ostrich.
I was going to use the Withnail & I quote, but it was difficult to conjour up the sound made by Withnail (flobbing that great big grey bile ball) in order to successfully make the point in a funny way.
I’m always on the lookout for new whimsical avatars. I’m thinking something scatalogical for the New Year.
It’s weird, because depending on which computer I use I see a different avatar for myself. For example, this computer at work still shows the ostrich, whereas at home I get the leaf.