The search is on, with only 1 month left in my contract I’m on a mission to find the perfect job, no not Empire Magazine (sigh!! That’s my dream job), by perfect I mean the money… with so many European cities still to see and many more weekend gigs and pub crawls ahead, I am looking for the job that can finance it ALL.
But if you happen to know anyone who works for Empire, give them my number…
This is a shot I took of Tom Sturridge and my cousin Bells (the red bangs to his right) way back in March at The Brady Arts Centre…
Its quite late in the night when we took this, so you can imagine we were all into ahem high “spirits” at this point…
I had a few plans when I moved to the UK, Work and Travel!! Naturally, the recession has put a little damper on those plans, so instead its been just work with the occasional day out sight seeing in London.
So how excited am I that I can say on the weekend I was taking down with a bug.. the travel bug! and it all started in the beautiful city of Rome. It wouldn’t have been my first choice of European cities to venture to for my first time, but it was my Bros bday and since he was born in Italy we thought it would be fitting to visit the scene of the crime =D
We managed to squeeze in 1 weeks worth of sight seeing in 2 days, choosing the most obvious attractions such as The Colosseum, The Forum, The Pantheon, Trevi Fountain and Vatican City… My favourite being the Basilica Nova (pictured below, that’s me in white and blue all the way at the bottom of the picture, how huge is that thing?!).
Now that I have been, I am more motivated than ever to keep going, all I have to do is find a job that not only pays enough to keep me living in London (and doing what I love to do, Gigs and Bars) but it also has to be enough to keep me on the Trains, Planes and Automobiles as I continue on my National Lampoons European Vacation…
Arrivederci!!
Wahoo!! Finally I can tick off another one of my “Top 5 Wish List”… and not only that, it was number one on the list too, yes that’s right Easter Weekend I saw Wicked at The Apollo with my friend Miss Em.
And it was brilliant, in fact it surpassed my expectations so much I actually welled up during the performance of “Defying Gravity” (yes I’m a sensitive soul)… so please forgive me for what I am about to say, I really do hate being one of those people but… I just have to say it “Its so different from the book”.
I can’t believe how long it has been without some quality time with my laptop (NB this isn’t even my laptop, I’m up in Stamford using my Bros)…
Started the weekend with a rather nasty head cold, 24 hours in bed watching bad television and drinking Lemsip I managed to nip it in the bud long enough for my Sunday adventure in the big city with Bells and The Aunty. We started in Convent Garden with lunch, wandered around the markets buying scarfs and then how bout this for right place right time, we were lucky enough to catch a little improv dancing from an elderly gentleman (bless him, he was so into it) to the Radiohead song “High” sung brilliantly by the busker, it was classic!!
It was then our turn to do a little booty shaking, this time to the tunes of Jason Mraz at the Hammersmith Apollo, I have been a fan of Mr Mraz for 5 years now (first introduced by a friend way back in Sydney in 2003), and as much as I love his shows normally, this one was a little disappointing, I’m a huge fan of his older stuff and this was all about promoting the new album, but he got the crowd bopping so my Fedora Hats off to you Jason for another memorable gig… also, I want to send a word out to the drunk guy sitting in front of me who was desperately trying to impress his date/girlfriend, if dancing and bopping your head around like a jack in the box doesn’t do it for her She’s just not that into you.
Which then leads me to Easter, to be continued in another post… watch this space
I don’t know if you are aware, but a film version of “Where The Wild Things Are” is coming to a cinema near you this year, and just by chance I discovered this parody today on You Tube, its a trailer for the book “Everyone Poops” (shame on you if you don’t know that book!!).
I met him a couple of years ago at a Buffy convention (yes I am a sci-fi nerd from way back) and he was the nicest guy, I had a cold at the time and he so genuinely urged me “to drink lots of fluids”… there could have been a few more deep and meaningful exchanges between us (I’m sure there was), but its funny the little things you remember so vividly.
Andy Hallett, a singer who gained fame playing a green-skinned demon on cult US TV series Angel, has died of congestive heart disease aged 33. (I can’t believe how young he was)
Hallett was taken to Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in Los Angeles after having problems breathing and died there on Sunday, his agent Pat Brady said.
Mr Brady said Hallett’s death followed a five-year battle with a heart condition.
The star proved himself a fan favourite on Angel as Lorne, a green-skinned, red-horned good guy demon who ran a karaoke club and could read a person’s aura when they sang.
He appeared in more than 70 episodes of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer spin-off between 2000 and 2004.
I don’t know about you, but I have this theory belief that when expectations are placed on anything, it can by no means ever measure up to them… no expectations, no disappointments!! Simple.
So when I started to get excited about going to see Bobby Long and Marcus Foster perform on Friday night at The Brady Arts Centre, I just knew that something would go wrong (insert impending doom music), you see as much as I looked forward to the other times, I was never this excited, hence the impending doom feeling.
Turns out the only thing that was wrong, was me!! It was a great night, and I might even be so bold as to say its up there in my “top 5″… here ’s the sitch:
1. First time seeing Marcus Foster live… I love his sound, its so unique and he puts on a great show.
2. Bobby Long was brilliant, again… seriously, that boys singing gives me goosebumps.
3. Tom Sturridge was there again… and this time he brought along Eddie Redmayne (I must shamefully admit though that I didn’t realise it was Eddie at the time, all I knew was that he looked familiar, and I said it to V and Bells too “I swear that guy is an actor, he looks like Kip Pardue”).
Please tell me you see it too?!?!
Anyway this isn’t why the night was so great – the best part is number 4.
4. We actually talked to Tom, and I have to say he is just as adorable in person as he appears in the media, and very shy. “shiest guy in the universe” as quoted by him… Seriously, you just want to pinch his cheeks and give him a big hug, but in the end we just settled for a handshake and a kiss on our cheeks (two times in Bells case, Lucky!!)…
Tom and friend at Brady Arts Centre Gig
I have spoken briefly about Marcus before (refer to Introducing Bobby Long), he is one of the three talented British lads whose popularity has exploded (especially with the young female demographic) since the release of Twilight the Twilight soundtrack to be exact, he is so cute, I just want to ping his curly locks, Sigh!! (yes I’m totally crushing on him at the moment)… and up until now I have had to settle for constant repeats of his tunes on Myspace, but Friday night I finally got to see him perform live… yay!!
What I really like about Marcus, Bobby and Sam (more to come on him later) is that each ones music is so different, no generic mass produced boy band sounds from these guys!!
So that’s two down and one to go… Sam, its all down to you now.
