November Rain

before i started writing here today i stopped to contemplate whether i'd find a statistic that confirmed just how much rain has fallen in the past month. i decided against it, this is one place i don't need to provide evidence to support an arguement. if you don't believe me, please let me know how you've managed to stay dry in the last four weeks.

at the time of writing i'm currently knee deep in my first traditional 2,500 word assignment of the year and about to dive head first into the sea of bringing it all together over the next few days ahead of the deadline next Monday. what's amazed me is how out of practice i really am. my usual online haunts of journal archives i rinse for anything remotely intelligent to include aren't coming through for me like they used to and the less said about anything written in books the better. i guess it's not so strange that it's taking me time to find my rhythm with it all, the last i wrote was in April and an incredible amount has happened since then. my first week of December is set to consist of 4 or 5 intense library sessions with regular consumption of Costa's Tomato and Cheese twists and Piper's crisps. bring it.

the big assignment this term has been Campaign Planning, the content itself not all that complex, but the time it's taken up, phenomenal.. it's had an unusual, unique structure, with our lecturer acting as a client, posting briefs for individual small tasks at various points through out the term, each with it's own turn around time frame, some a couple of weeks, some as little as 48 hours. it's proven unpopular with many, but at the very least it's been an experience with two more tasks still to be set (one over twitter!). perhaps the most memorable moment was inviting a friend from another circle of my life onto campus to deliver an invitation to the "client"..

as for my dissertation progress in this first term, minimal to non-existent.

Anti Freeze Season.

sure as the changing of the seasons, each year i will inevitably begin to freak out a little come November. i think its the daunting realisation that the turn of the year is a month away and that the last one didn't really seem all that long ago. did i get round to everything i planned to do this year, if i did, did i do it justice? although i'm head first into the thick of it, am i ready to stand the long stretch of winter ahead?

my day to day life has me feeling a lot like my busy schedule is merely a list of times and places i need to attend for everything to continue moving forward. if my attendance allows me to have a contribution it helps to take the edge off it a a little but even at the best of times i find i'm left with increasing less chances to stop and write, let alone think.

then something stops me in my tracks, just like it always manages to in fast times. i received a message from a guy who had purchased a copy of our EP from the store and a few days later recieved a t-shirt as a present from his girlfriend. he was mailing to say that he enjoyed the disc but also that he was planning to make the journey to Bournemouth in December for our headline show. i've since figured out he'll be making a 2 hour trek to get here. if there was any doubt before now, this has to be a good show, people give a shit. an amazing, unexpected inspiration.

if you haven't already you can pick up a package deal of the EP and a ticket for this show (worth £4 face value alone) for just £5 from http://www.canada-water.net - Pierre says it best in the video below..

soundtrack of my life.

its been a few months since i've written about any of my latest record purchases here, and there's a good reason for this that will become apparent before long. for the sake of this post i'll note that the following releases have been on regular rotation since September:

Paramore - Brand New Eyes, Third Eye Blind - Ursa Major, 1997 - Notes From Underground, Joshua Radin - Simple Times, Frank Turner - Poetry Of The Deed, The Academy Is - Lost In Pacific Time, Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly - Covers EP, Beyonce - I Am.. Sasha Fierce (for real.)

One Shot Farewell

the past month or two all of my best writing hours have been filled with replying to e-mails, sorting out promo, adjusting print templates, power reading contracts, generally everything about being in a band and putting out a record that doesn't actually directly involve music. fortunately in recent weeks the rest of my time has been spent finally getting and out playing shows and seeing copies of our debut EP 'One Shot Farewell' exchange hands in crowds.

it's been an absoloute blast and i probably wouldn't wish any of it had worked out differently, even discovering my arch nemesis at the printing plant was a learning experience. many years back now in all my naivety i'd attempted to start a label, with a string of good intentions that lasted about a year before i realised i probably couldn't actually legitimately put out records aged 16. in the past two months i've probably done 100% the amount i did in that year and then some.

on the flipside, the live shows have all been a lot of fun and completely different to anything before now. i've found myself getting a lot more nervous before shows than i used to. i think i've decided its a good kind of nervous tho, it just seems to mean more now and i want our bands live show to live up to any expectations we've set for ourselves. it was good to go back to Horsham and Hythe the week before the EP was "officially" released, and sell the first batch of copies, then the last minute slot in Southampton we had last weekend was a surprise success and as for this weeks iBar show, that was insane. i've never seen the room so packed. it was cool to do something a little unique for that show, going out and playing the EP from start to finish for 15 mins of condensed mayhem.

although it feels a lot to me like the end of a cycle now the EP is finally out there, it spins on.. from here its more shows to pave a name for our band outside of our current stomping ground and hopefully more press/reviews etc. to start to get some feedback on how well we did this time around.

help a brother out, pick up a copy from http://www.canada-water.net

Manchester

back in March, our good friend Heps left for pastures new (namely a job promotion) in Manchester. two weeks later he was home.. for the weekend at least. in fact, there hasn't been many weekends between then and now that he hasn't been home. this weekend a handful of us finally made the journey up to him instead.

there was no heavy drinking (but perhaps there should have been at those Northern prices!) instead we had quite a civilized stay in the fair city, of which we mostly saw the nicer more suburban areas on the outskirts closer to where Heps lives and works. the centre of Manchester itself actually bared a lot of resemblance to another city, as you'll see below..

our two night stay probably could've benefited with an extra day to see more of the place, but in our short time we managed to.. drive out to Knutsford and have a guided tour (in the car) of the place where Heps works, be convinced that Knutsford town centre is basically Dorchester, take a tram ride from Sale into the city centre, pace around an art gallery, window shop in the centre, have dinner and drinks at the unusual indoor street that is 'The Printworks', see a guy be literally thrown out of a bar, experience Adam's surprisingly good breakfast cuisine (twice), stop for a photo outside Old Trafford football stadium, be in awe of the enormity of the Trafford Shopping Centre, brave a burrito for the first time (with mixed results).

in conclusion, the first Heps-Northern-Fest was worth going the distance, but maybe next time an extended stay may be in order..

New Units

so i've just completed my first two week rotation of this terms timetable at Uni and i'm definitely feeling this year a lot more than i did first or second. i think its largely due to the fact this year i was able to chose three out of my four units (not including the dissertation "double unit"), each choice was a gamble in its own right, but i'm pretty sure i got it right.. at least i know i did with Interactive Media Strategies and Marketing The Media, Creative Analysis could still go either way for me.

i made some bold statements in the second half of last year that i was confident i didn't want to go into the so called advertising industry when i complete my course, but coming back to Uni after a summer in the public sector, the whole subject area i study feels refreshing. i don't think i'll be going back on my statement anytime soon, i know for sure that i'm not built for the cut throat ad agency world, the way those people operate isn't in my DNA, but i'm definitely more determined to utilise my degree in someway that makes these three years worthwhile.

there seems to be a big emphasis this year on embracing web 2.0, partly because of my chosen units. Mike Molesworth, my lecturer and seminar tutor for Interactive Media Strategies has been driving home the importance of blogging. of course i couldn't agree more, but i think an issue occurs when people are forced into writing. the first post you'll read always seems to center around some underlying resentment, which always makes for a great read. the second post, if the person ever makes it to this stage is more often than not an apology for not keeping up regular posting and the good intentions generally fizzle out from here.

what we're left with seems to be an internet full of barely started, half finished blogs that exist only to link out to equally empty accounts on pages like twitter and LastFM. i think what it comes down to is the age old case of peoples intentions to start with. i firmly believe that you'll only ever keep up something you genuinely want to do or actually enjoy. its for this same reason that i can neither skate nor play guitar despite at some point in my life trying to learn. so in conclusion my message to trial bloggers is this.. only go ahead and sign up for that Wordpress or Blogger account if you really have something you want to say or write about and to coin an old phrase "write what you know", for me Woody Allen will always be the patron saint of this rule.

Wake Me Up When October Starts.

date: Monday 30th August

location: Wigmore Lane, Reading Festival

time: 9:00am

another Reading year was committed to memory, sealed with the long and winding walk from our campsite to the drop off / pick up point at Wigmore Lane, where today a notably fresh Tom Macleod was parked up next to Adam, who'd already moved his car from the festival parking. our camping bags were loaded into Adam's car to return to home, and we loaded into Tom's car to make the journey back to Harrow, London. the five of us had an EP to finish and now was deemed a better time than any.

date: Tuesday 1st September

location: Kari's House, Brentford

time: 9:15am

i woke up back in the same room at Kari's house where we'd stayed less than a few weeks ago when we were last in London. the idea of coming straight back to London directly after 5 nights camping in a field, without even having a chance for shower wasn't the most appealing set of plans we've ever made, but if needs must. staying at Kari's was the closest we would get to going home after our first day at the studio, and weirdly enough it did actually bring us the home comforts we needed to survive a second day, a shower, a mattress etc, but i think it was seeing our empty bottles from a heavy night there a few weeks before that really made us feel oddly at home.

date: Saturday 5th September

location: Stanstead Airport

time: 6:30pm

despite our best attempts to make up for time lost stuck in traffic due to an unexpected junction closure, we'd missed baggage check in by little more than four minutes. unwillingly to travel with just hand luggage, we weren't going to board the plane to Nice. while the guys debated our options, i decided to go sit outside and take a few minutes to myself. having since told the whole story time and time again i have little want to repeat it all again. in summary, it was a casually arranged trip that had a number of flaws in the plan which i'd overlooked by being so tied up in everything else i'd been doing in August. my opinion is that it was a blessing in disguise and i'll never look back in regret at missing that flight, just forever remember that it was only by four minutes, and that the technicality is the making of a good anecdote.

date: Thursday 10th September

location: Wookey Hole Caves

time: 3:00pm

after missing the flight to France i decided that what might be better for me than disappearing off anywhere else, was a week at home and how right i was. i had time to catch up on everything i left on wayside last month and come out each day feeling truly refreshed, or in the case of this particular day of the week, in awe of the inside of a cave. a small part of me did wonder if perhaps i'd have a similar reaction to that which i had at the shock of being so high up at Wembley Stadium a few weeks ago. today the only uneasy feelings i had was the hangover from a drinking session the night before which saw, quite possibly a new record number of cocktails thrown back courtesy of half price happy hour(s) at Mai Tai.

date: Tuesday 15th September

location: my bed, Hamworthy

time: 1:15am

since finishing the last of the EP on Sunday with Frankie, everything else has suddenly come into play again, artwork, merch, shows, press.. we had a band meeting of epic proportions tonight that left me feeling a little wired. coupled with the tight feelings in my chest i was struggling to let myself fall asleep. i sat on the end of my bed, with my head in my hands trying to figure what to do, i ran through options and skipped to the slightly overdramatic end, it was time to admit defeat. these unexplained symptoms have been going on for far too long now, i need answers.

date: Wednesday 16th September

location: Doctors Surgery, Poole

time: 6:00pm

after i finally fell asleep sometime between 3 and 4am, i woke up feeling a little better than i did the night before, i decided it was still best to make a long overdue doctors appointment to discuss how i've been feeling. yet when i got there the focus shifted completely from any other recent symptoms to the intense pains i was feeling on the left side of my body from about 4pm. i walked away reassured that this was a muscular inflammation, and probably the reason for the tight chest i was experiencing the night before. i still had no explanation for the other unexplained symptoms.

date: Friday 25th August

location: Becky's new house, Southampton

time: 10:30pm

i'd been trying to explain to people how i've been feeling fragile and that i'd be taking it easy tonight, "taking it easy" not being a term you'd necessarily associate with a night at Jesters, but its hard to really sum up what the dizzy spells and lightheaded moments actually feel like.. one minute i'm fine, the next i'm sat in a room surrounded by people and yet i feel some how out of sync with what's going on. yeah, the doctor didn't quite get it at the appointment i'd had earlier. confused they told me to book a blood test.

date: Monday 28th September

location: Upton House

time: 9:45am

perhaps i'd taken a risk with two nights out drinking at the weekend, even if i had only had a couple of units each night, but i was determined that i wasn't going to let whatever the hel it is thats up with me keep me confined to my room with repeats of the same shows i've been watching all summer. surprisingly i'd actually been ok over the weekend and i'd even go so far to say that getting out actually did me some good. for some reason this morning it had caught up with me and my unfamiliar, slightly surreal surroundings were only spacing me out even more. the door to the conference room opened and the somewhat inspiring character the four of us had met earlier this summer walked in. i'll write more about was planned here today later this year..

date: Wednesday 30th September

location: Poole General Hospital

time: 2:15pm

i'd arrived 20 minutes early. it was either 20 minutes too early or 20 minutes too late. since i'm starting to take my a health a little more seriously i opted for the early option. i've never been terrified of needles, but i always get anxious about anything that defies the logic we carry in every day life. in this case, the idea of piercing your skin and drawing out blood. the 20 minutes seemed to last forever, countless names being called before me. in keeping with how my minds being working of late i started over thinking irrelevant things, but mostly, i wonder what the nurse will be like? 10 minutes late, what could only have been meant as my name was called.. "Liam Toombs?" - time to take another step in figuring all this out.

Reading V

five years in and for most of us Reading has become more a national holiday than standalone event, it just happens nowadays. if there was any clarification required for that statement this year was a fine example, everything just falls in to place with minimal effort. we don't make half the mistakes we might have done in previous years, simply because we've been coming for so long. to put it simply, we've got this festival down to a fine art. 

its safe to say that i don't get quite as excited about it as i might have done a few years back, showing up on the Tuesday night hoping to get in before anyone else (for the record, according to security we were the first people who tried) but despite that, i still love this festival. with the addition of some best friends and new faces joining us for the weekend for the first time it almost definitely topped last year for me, but possibly the best addition of all this year was Greg's genius scavenger hunt on the Thursday night that resulted in Ed getting the band initials CW branded on his body for life. 

the bands. (rated in L's as suggested by Greg)

Friday.. Sonic Boom Six (LL) its undeniable that its good to see a band that has worked so hard in recent years finally make it to the main stage, they give it an enthusiastic attempt but its debatable whether they pull it off, the heavy downpour works against their favour also.. Manchester Orchestra (LLLL) the set is everything i hoped for in a live show on hearing the record, its perfectly executed despite some initial sound problems, thrashing through cuts from latest record 'Mean Everything To Nothing'.. New Found Glory (LLL) the band get off to a strong start opening with All Downhill From Here, unfortunately as the set goes they sound tired and the ever poor main stage sound volume bleeds any energy left from the set.. Jack's Mannequin (LLL) an incredible crowd response for the former Something Corporate frontman's second, equally successful band, the Festival Republic tent is rammed and the atmosphere makes for an enjoyable set even for those unfamiliar Andrew Macmahon's new material.. The Aggrolites (LLL) although i only caught a very little of the set, the band play unbelievably tight and i'd highly recommend the band to any old school ska or reggae fans.. Fall Out Boy (LL) the first big disappointment of the weekend, the band appear burnt out and it generates a lack of enthusiasm, a poor choice of set list also.. Bouncing Souls (LLL) another solid set from the 20 years young punk rock vets with a set list drawing from a good mix of their long spanning discography, surprisingly, the newer tracks shine brighter than any.. Kings Of Leon (LL) what appeared to be a fairly good headline performance was tarnished entirely with a cliche rock stair hissy fit towards the end of the set.. Billy Talent (LLL) an incredible live band, they do justice to their headline slot on the Lock Up stage, bashing out all the hits back to back, when they do break the inbetween song stage banter is drowned out by continuous crowd chants of 'Fuck The Kings Of Leon!!, Fuck The Kings Of Leon!!". 

Saturday.. Polar Bear Club (LLLL) possibly one of the most underrated bands emerging from the states at the moment, they play both aggressive and tight, most stand further back appreciating a fine set, but the die hard fans are at the barrier lapping the whole thing up.. Chuck Ragan (LLLL) another great offering from the Lock Up stage, Chuck plays alt. country with a punk rock influence in a similar vein to Frank Turner with a live band consisting of some impressive players.. The Rakes (L) the 22 seconds i caught of them on the mainstage was alright (see what i did there?).. Metric (LLL) a beautiful and majestic sounding set of light electro, vocalist Emily Haines holds her own as frontwoman on the sizeable NME stage.. Set Your Goals (LLL) a triumphant performance with countless circle pits and sing a longs, unfortunately its the sing a longs that provide the only audible vocal parts in the tent, this makes for a somewhat difficult set to appreciate.. Them Crooked Vultures (LLL) who cares what the hel they played or how good it was, that's DAVE GROHL on drums!.. Rival Schools (LLLL) the Lock Up deliver once again with a reunion show from this previously disbanded act, if you like your Bleed American era JEW this is a band to get familiar with, the new material shows much potential.. Maximo Park (LLLLL) the only band of the weekend i saw on the main stage that truely appeared to make good use of it, Paul Smith is an entertainer through and through, the added feature of a brass section was charming, cuts from all three albums sound stunning.. The Bronx (LLL) a little bit fucking terrifying, but in a good way.. Glasvegas (LLLL) playing a similar set to that of their support slot to U2 at Wembley Stadium two weeks ago, it goes to show how much difference venue can make, at Wembley the set drowned under the enormity of it all, here on the NME  stage it all works very well, perfect melodramatic shoegaze for a melancholy Saturday evening ahead of a night of drinking.

Sunday.. Kids in Glass Houses (LLL) coming bounding onto the stage from a slightly different angle, opening with a heavier track from debut album 'Smart Casual' and playing it with a more aggressive streak, its debatable whether they pulled it off but for the most part the set is an enjoyable one.. 30H!3 (L) a lot of people show up at the Dance stage to enquire as to what all the fuss is about, honestly there really isn't a lot to fuss about and most (including myself) move on.. Lethal Bizzle (LLL) always an entertaining set, Maxwell gives as good as you'd expect from any London grime star claiming his set to be "the best fucking set of the weekend" its welcomed as harmless and probably regarded as not far from the truth when comparing the set to many acts of a higher callibre who will inevitably fail to match the crowd response Mr B gets.. Frank Turner (LLLLL) it was dubious whether Frank, every man's best kept secret would be able to put on quite the same show to such a large audience, of course he pulls it off by quite some extent, its an utterly fantastic set, there aren't many that can play a set thats comprised almost entirely singles and still make it feel so so good.. Grammatics (LLLL) possibly a new best secret to keep, but then maybe hindered by personal preference, either way if you're into the bands sound there's a good chance, like me, you would have really enjoyed this set.. The Gaslight Anthem (LLLL) seemingly managing to shake the Bruce Springsteen associations they were met with upon first receiving coverage from mainstream radio, its apparent that people are into this band based on the strength of their material rather than just because "they sound like The Boss".. La Roux (L) in all my years i have never seen the Festival Republic stage so busy, the crowds stream out into the main field of the arena, i give up within the first minute of her taking to the stage.. Lostprophets (LLL) the sound falters somewhat with the absence of a second guitarist but their number of sing a long hits makes for a good festival closer.

since it went down so well last year i will be posting a video of festival highlights again sometime soon when you least expect it. 

2010 tickets are booked, bring on Reading VI..