Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Videos for the discerning eye.

Click the image. It's a link to a website. It's Youtube, after a haircut, a good shave, with a nice Armani suit on. It's basically Youtube and Vimeo videos, hand picked apparently . The interface is nice and clean. And most of the videos are REALLY of good quality, in terms of image quality and content.


And this video is really nice. The Wayfarers and bad girl spunk is cool imo.


And this video is really interesting. Such a cool store, and kudos for small business owners! Power to the people.

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Floriade 2010



My attempt at videos. Was frustrating working with iMovie. Output quality is really bad imo. Video is not sharp. Oh well.

Taken on Saturday. Was quite a chilled and relaxed event.

4 for 4.

Monday, September 27, 2010

Parkway Drive Deep Blue Tour

2 concerts in 2 weeks. Man, my studies are being neglected. I have an assignment due in 2 weeks. I'm way behind my work and at this rate, I'm not gonna be ready for my finals. Oh well.

Parkway Drive Deep Blue Tour, Royal Theater National Convention Centre, Canberra, 25 September 2010.

Went alone, since I don't know anyone who is into any of the bands. Bought some merch. Got in the hall. Tried to find a nice spot. There were a lot of kids. I would peg them as being around 15-17. They looked pretty bad. After the concert, I saw many of them smoking outside the building, like it's no biggie. I guess it isn't for them. You see kids walking around with smokes here in Australia. Anyway I felt a little intimidated by the crowd. Felt very out of place.

Anyway I managed to find a spot, one or 2 people behind the barrier on the righter side of the stage.

The lineup for the night was: 50 Lions, The Ghost Inside, The Devil Wears Prada, Parkway Drive.

First up was the 50 Lions. Hardcore band. They're ok. I kinda liked their Self Titled 7" but their set was kinda forgetable.

The Ghost Inside
Frontman Jonathan Vigil

The Ghost Inside
Guitarist Aaron Brooks

Next was The Ghost Inside. They set up their own gear, which I thought was quite humble and respectable. They opened with "Unspoken" which is a song I quite like. Other songs which I remember on the top of my head was "Faith or Forgiveness" and "Chrono". They weren't as popular among the crowd, but was cool that some of the crowd knew the words. The guitarist Aaron Brooks kinda looked like Owen from Grey's Anatomy. All in all, a good set, felt a bit short though.

The Devil Wears Prada
The Devil Wears Prada.

The Devil Wears Prada
Guitarist Jeremy DePoyster singing the girly part clean vocals.

After The Ghost Inside were The Devil Wears Prada. There were girls standing in front of me and they were like mad crazy. They were like shouting and screaming, and reaching out to the stage when guitarist Jeremy DePoyster and bassist Andy Trick got to the right side of the stage. DWP was more interactive with the crowd as compared to TGI. Guitarist Jeremy DePoyster shouted something and pointed at the girls in front of me, and Keys James Baney climbed onto the barricade and reached out to the fans. Songs played were "Danger: Wildman", " Assistant To The Regional Manager" and "Outnumbered" just to name a few. Mike Hranica was wild screaming out throughout the set, not lacking in energy and enthusiasm. All in all, good show, but fangirl-ism was a bit annoying. Oh and they also said how they're Christians and they're there doing what they do because of Jesus, which was kinda cool, I guess. Didn't really see the point though as I don't know what that would achieve. Oh well, props for their faith and openess.

Set up
This is where I sat.

Parkway Drive
Parkway Drive

Parkway Drive
The sea of people.

Last band to play were Parkway Drive. By then, being a short Asian, I decided to move back to the seats and just chill and watch the show from the back. The hall is split into 2, with the floor standing area in the front, and a seperate elevated seating area. Asshole bouncer didn't let me go through, when there were like so many other people sitting in the seated area. But got a nice tip from a friendly dude, I just had to just use another entrance which was not guarded. Thank you random dude. Anyway Thank God I did get to the seats. When PWD played, the crowd just turned into animals. Circle pits. Wall of death. I wouldn't have made it out in one piece. Parkway Drive definitely have a God-like status here in Australia, and I guess Aussies have a lot of pride for their home-grown culture. The PWD set was pretty cool, with fake coconut trees on stage and weird guy with jew-fro crowd surfing on a inflatable boat and mosh camera attached on helmet. Towards the end of the set, the jew-fro clown mooned to crowd. Dispense of free merch by making the crowd scramble for a AFL ball as they did the Wall. Making them reach for free tee by dangling a it from a fishing line. The sea of people jumping up and down like a rough night with waves crashing and water churning. It was wild. PWD played a good mix of oldies and new ones, "Idols and Anchors", "Sleepwalker", "Unrest", "Smoke'em If You've Got'em", "Carrion".

Was tempted to get a PWD shirt that said "What The Fuck Have I Become", a line from their new song "Unrest" but thought it not wise. Instead I got a DWP tee instead.

All in all a good night.

Oh and Matt, if you're reading this, got you a white DWP tee. You like white right

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

20100913-IMG_0455

When one doesn't want to study, one makes a Gundam.



And watches really cool videos on the Youtube.

Sunday, September 19, 2010

World Magnetic 2010 Sydney

Metallica Sydney Acer Arena 18th September 2010

[Can't Get The Pics Uploaded. Annoying.]

Had the privilege to go see Metallica, one of the Big Four Bay Area Thrash Metal Legends. Opening bands were The Sword which existence I never knew of and Fear Factory, a very influential band and a legend in it's own right.

Doors opened very early and The Sword came on at 7-ish, played probably around 5 songs. Fear Factory followed suit, playing around 7 to 8 songs. I have never really listened to Fear Factory prior to this concert, but they were good. Heavy ala chug-chug power chords and noodly riffs coupled with blast beats would make any metal aficionado move his or her head in a up-down fashion, how can one complain? Don't really remember the titles of the songs, but from the top of my head, they played "Self Bias Indicator", "Fear Campaign" "Powershifter".

When Fear Factory finished their set, the engineers got busy for about half and hour, the lights went dark, and Acer Arena came to life.

Metallica's set started out with "This Was Your Life". Twas rather amusing as well as dramatic, with the whole stadium in darkness and James Hetfield singing the verse under the spotlight, and finishing, light goes off only to reappear at another random spot on the stage continuing the next verse or chorus. Stellar opening with laser beaming all across the stage from 4 monolithic coffins dangling from the ceiling.

For the next one and a half hours, Metallica made it evident that they are one of the best Metal bands ever, playing a few songs from their latest album, but more importantly not forgetting to play their classics. The set list in chronological order for the night:

1. This Was Your Life
2. End Of The Line
3. Fuel
4. Fade To Black
5. Broken Beat Scarred
6. The Four Horsemen
7. Sad But True ( I can't believe I didn't know this song, after listening to Black Album countless times but manage to mishear this as Take Control. Ironically, it's sad but true. Clearly I'm not a very good fan. In my defense I listen more to the guitars than the lyrics.)
8. Sanitarium
9. All Nightmare Long
10. One
11. Master Of Puppets
12.Fight Fire With Fire
13. Nothing Else Matters
14. Enter Sandman
15. Breadfan (Would have prefered if they did Am I Evil by King Diamond like they did in Melbourne)
16. Hit The Lights
17. Seek And Destroy

There were a few odd moments throughout the night. James Hetfield can say very weird things. "Do you life the new album? You better..." and "You make us feel good" were just a few to mention. And throughout the night, Lars Ulrich acted like a drummer who was all too hungry for recognition (Just my honest opinion. A drummer should just stay behind the drums until the set is done.) There was also flames going up all over the stage with it's warmth reaching me all the way up on the Upper Concourse, which is apt for "Fuel". And black balls dropped from the top for the closing song "Seek and Destroy", causing chaos off and especially on the stage, with these black balls knocking off mics and hitting equipment causing the roadies to hustle around try to prevent destruction of equipment. Clearly they didn't think that one through.

It was a good long night. And got too see Kirk Hammett play live, on his pretty ESPs. Shame that I couldn't be on the floor, and I guess I should have learned up more lyrics, but I'm thankful that I've manage to check them out live. I confess I'm not he most metal of fans, heck I don't even have my long hair anymore,but Metallica was one of the first bands I listened to and led to my preference for music with a heavier flavour and for that I'm in debt.

Thanks to Aron for asking me to go along.

Saturday, September 11, 2010

See, you can win the rat race
But you're still
Nothing but a fucking rat.
Parkway Drive - Unrest
Deep Blue (2010)

Thursday, September 09, 2010

To go for Deep Blue tour or not. Hmmm. Parkway Drive, seen them twice now. But The Devil Wears Prada and The Ghost Inside and 50 Lions. Tempting.

Wish I had people who want to go. Maybe I should just buy 2 extra tickets and guilt trip people into going. Or maybe I just need new friends. Hmmm.