Lizzie has been constantly bugging me to finish this report which I said would be done about 10 days ago. The stupidest thing is that I do so little, there's no excuse for me to be as lazy as I am; but hey, you just have to love me the way I am.
Sunday
I woke up at midday on Sunday morning, slightly hung over and very disappointed by last nights 'headlining' act. It didn't help with my usual level of first-3-hours-after-I-wake grumpiness, but I somehow managed to put it to one side and drag myself down to the NME stage to see Frank Turner with Lizzie and my mood changed instantaneously. Having only heard a few of his songs before I was skeptical of how good a full set of his would be, but I had to eat my words as he gave a full 40 minutes of great acoustic tunes with really got the crowd going.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PrkdYXJK6_A
This was actually taken from a short set he did at the BBC introducing stage shortly after his set (his full set wasn't on TV).
As Frank Turner ended I wandered around and tried to find Tom and Fiona, and after some half-arsed searching I wandered back in to see Deadmau5, who despite headling the dance stage, was playing in the early afternoon (I'm assuming because he had to go and play Creamfields or Notting Hill in the evening). I actually missed half the show because of a distinct lack of phone to tell me the time, but the parts I saw from the back of the crowded tent were pretty awesome. I definitely thought it was a shame I didn't see the full set, so I'll have to catch some sometime soon.
After Deadmau5 I headed back to the campsite to eat, drink and chat about how amazing the final night was going to be; the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, followed by Bloc Party then Radiohead.
At about 6:30 we rolled down to the main stage to see the band who Lizzie and Abbie had been really excited to see all day and they certainly didn't disappoint with their very own brand of weird rock, it seems that Karen O is; and has always been, everything Lady Gaga strives for, but does it while managing to keep credibility and put out good music.
I'm kind of tilted that this was the only performance highlight I could find;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/yeahyeahyeahs/
Bloc Party were next to hit the stage with their soulful styled rock anthems getting a slightly rained on crowd into the mood to jump around and sing along. This was the third straight year that this band had played at Reading (and according to the band, their last for a while), and they seemed as fresh and eager to please as first timers. Despite the fact I'd never really been into this band before, I really enjoyed their set and put me in a great mood for Radiohead.
Again, the good people at the bbc have decided to remove all but 40 second clips of all their bands, so this will have to do;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/blocparty/
As Bloc Party left the stage a nervous wait began as roadies started to set up for debatably the greatest band in the world, and I'm sure one that will be looked at half a century from now with the likes of your Pink Floyds and Led Zeppelins. Having seen them the year before on tour I know that they have a very liberal choice of setlists, ranging from random songs on EPs to their mega-hits from The Bends and OK Computer. Being such a huge fan I would have been happy with either Karma Police or Stop Whispering. What I was not expecting was them to open with Creep, a song which they didn't play in concert for 10 years from 94 to 04.
To be honest, it shows why a band like Radiohead are where they are today, they gave the people what they want. I'm aware that not everyone in the tens of the thousands watching the main stage that night was as bigger fan as I am, and wanted to hear their hits. Radiohead somehow produced the best setlist I think i've ever seen in;
* 1.Creep
* 2.The National Anthem
* 3.15 Step
* 4.There There
* 5.All I Need
* 6.Nude
* 7.2+2=5
* 8.The Gloaming
* 9.Climbing Up The Walls
* 10.Street Spirit (Fade Out)
* 11.Reckoner
* 12.Karma Police
* 13.Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
* 14.Just
* 15.Idioteque
* 16.Exit Music (For A Film)
* 17.Bodysnatchers
* 18.You And Whose Army?
* 19.Lucky
* 20.These Are My Twisted Words
* 21.Jigsaw Falling into Place
* 22.Paranoid Android
* 23.Everything In Its Right Place
Sitting here in front of my computer I'm having trouble finding the words to really express how awesome those 2 hours were, basically just singing/dancing and generally rocking out to some of my favorite songs around thousands of other people who were also near the front who were singing/dancing and generally rocking out to their favorite band. As Jonny finished the last notes to Everything In Its Right Place, I left the main stage almost shaken at how much I'd enjoyed the set. Definitely the best band in a really great 4 days.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/radiohead/index.shtml
F U BBC for not having it all up.
As I think back about that weekend, it's certainly the great performances by the likes of Radiohead, Florence+The Machine, The Prodigy and Frank Turner that I remember rather than the child like attitude of the Kings of Leon or the general terrible set by the Arctic Monkeys. I'm afraid I had to leave a ton of stories out to keep this SFW (my parents read this blog), but if you catch me on facebook/IM then I'm sure i'd be able to fill you in.
I'm certainly looking forward to hitting up a festival next year. I feel slightly old for Reading, so that may not happen unless the lineup is amazing again. Might hit up Global again if people are going. I suppose it's useless talking about until the lineups are announced.
Just a quick poker update. I've basically bricked the WCOOP, cashing in about 1/10 events, but my non festival results have been okay so I'm only stuck 1/2k since the start. I also won a live £200 HORSE event last tuesday for £2500 or so, basically proving I am the master of all games.
The end of September/beginning of October will be pretty busy with all the yanks in town for the WSOPE/EPT London. As well as that, my good friend Marty MF Mathis is coming to stay for a bit before he hits up Europe for a few months; and who knows I may join him for a bit.
Thanks for reading this huge tl;dnr
xxx
Thursday, 17 September 2009
Friday, 4 September 2009
Reading TR part2 +WCOOP
Well it's been a long 24 hours since I promised i'd put part 2 up (mostly because it was closer to 72) but that's mostly because other than 2 short trips to the gym i've been glued to my computer screen. Last night I made the final table of the Daily 30k Guaranteed but ran Queens into Aces vs the chipleader to come 6th for a mere $1500. FML!
So back to Reading;
Saturday;
I woke on Saturday morning with the familiar headache and bad back that I'm now growing quite fond of, almost like I couldn't be having fun at a festival without them. I managed to resist the urge of Fightstar on the main stage and decided to accompany Lizzie, Abbie and Laura to Spinnerete on the NME stage who gave a good rocky half hour of songs that despite not knowing, I was more than happy to dance along to. Unfortunately, the BBC chose not to record this set for TV, so you'll just have to take my word for it.
After the set I left the girls to walk back to Tom's campsite to meet up with him, and we decided to go straight back into the festival and chill in the comedy tent for abit. It was pretty good to sit there and chill for a few hours, even if some of the comics were abit suspect.
Firstly we saw Jessica Delfino who, although showed some merit was stifled by a) not being very funny and b) because she wasn't very funny the crowd begun to talk so it became harder to hear her. She occasionally hit upon some genius one liners but finding a laugh seemed quite similar to finding the proverbial needle in a haystack.
Then we saw Gary Delaney, who strikes me as everything you might find at a Jimmy Carr concert. He stood there for about 30 minutes and delivered roughly 150 simple buildup-punchline jokes, which were admittedly very funny in places. Although I enjoyed his set, I kind of felt cheap for enjoying such a basic brand of comedy afterwards.
Lastly and most controversially, Doug Stanhope an American comic who can only be described as a cross between Frankie Boyle and Jerry Sadowitz. If Gary Delaney made me feel cheap for laughing at his set, Stanhope certainly made me feel dirty for his racist/sexist/masochistic/narcissistic view of life. Tom's girlfriend Fiona did, however, not laugh and actually started heckling him (safely from the back of the tent) and got up and walked out before the end of his set. Luckily she returned after and we all went back to our respective campsites.
As I got back to the campsite, everyone was there getting food and tanked up for the evening bill of the Prodigy, followed by the Arctic Monkeys and as the time came nearer we slowly trundled towards the main stage.
In short it was an evening of incredibly ups and downs. We got to witness one of the really great live bands of our generation in the Prodigy, who made close to 100,000 people dance/mosh/sing along to their rocky dance tunes. The one small downside of the performance for us was that we were just in front of the second set of speakers, putting us in quite a quiet spot, making it a bit too quiet for our youthful ears that are used to music on full volume.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/prodigy/
(You may need to confirm you are over 16 to watch this video)
Unfortunately for us, whatever comes up must come down as we went from one of the best live bands of our generation to one of the worst. The Arctic Monkeys did not only have the same 'fuck you' attitude as the Kings Of Leon, but they couldn't back that up with a really good quality set. They played almost all of their new album which was released about a week before the performance (and in that week was completely panned by the press), leaving the crowd with not much to do but stand there and wonder how a band like this could ever headline a festival of this stature, much less win a Mercury music prize. I wouldn't really advise watching, but I may as well keep with the rest of the report
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/arcticmonkeys/video3.shtml#emp
As it's 4:30 and my tournaments are just starting now, I shall have to leave Sunday until tomorrow. Good luck to all my poker people in the $215 Pot Limit Omaha tonight as well as the $200 rebuy NL Single draw and the $109 8 game.
Later taters xx
So back to Reading;
Saturday;
I woke on Saturday morning with the familiar headache and bad back that I'm now growing quite fond of, almost like I couldn't be having fun at a festival without them. I managed to resist the urge of Fightstar on the main stage and decided to accompany Lizzie, Abbie and Laura to Spinnerete on the NME stage who gave a good rocky half hour of songs that despite not knowing, I was more than happy to dance along to. Unfortunately, the BBC chose not to record this set for TV, so you'll just have to take my word for it.
After the set I left the girls to walk back to Tom's campsite to meet up with him, and we decided to go straight back into the festival and chill in the comedy tent for abit. It was pretty good to sit there and chill for a few hours, even if some of the comics were abit suspect.
Firstly we saw Jessica Delfino who, although showed some merit was stifled by a) not being very funny and b) because she wasn't very funny the crowd begun to talk so it became harder to hear her. She occasionally hit upon some genius one liners but finding a laugh seemed quite similar to finding the proverbial needle in a haystack.
Then we saw Gary Delaney, who strikes me as everything you might find at a Jimmy Carr concert. He stood there for about 30 minutes and delivered roughly 150 simple buildup-punchline jokes, which were admittedly very funny in places. Although I enjoyed his set, I kind of felt cheap for enjoying such a basic brand of comedy afterwards.
Lastly and most controversially, Doug Stanhope an American comic who can only be described as a cross between Frankie Boyle and Jerry Sadowitz. If Gary Delaney made me feel cheap for laughing at his set, Stanhope certainly made me feel dirty for his racist/sexist/masochistic/narcissistic view of life. Tom's girlfriend Fiona did, however, not laugh and actually started heckling him (safely from the back of the tent) and got up and walked out before the end of his set. Luckily she returned after and we all went back to our respective campsites.
As I got back to the campsite, everyone was there getting food and tanked up for the evening bill of the Prodigy, followed by the Arctic Monkeys and as the time came nearer we slowly trundled towards the main stage.
In short it was an evening of incredibly ups and downs. We got to witness one of the really great live bands of our generation in the Prodigy, who made close to 100,000 people dance/mosh/sing along to their rocky dance tunes. The one small downside of the performance for us was that we were just in front of the second set of speakers, putting us in quite a quiet spot, making it a bit too quiet for our youthful ears that are used to music on full volume.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/prodigy/
(You may need to confirm you are over 16 to watch this video)
Unfortunately for us, whatever comes up must come down as we went from one of the best live bands of our generation to one of the worst. The Arctic Monkeys did not only have the same 'fuck you' attitude as the Kings Of Leon, but they couldn't back that up with a really good quality set. They played almost all of their new album which was released about a week before the performance (and in that week was completely panned by the press), leaving the crowd with not much to do but stand there and wonder how a band like this could ever headline a festival of this stature, much less win a Mercury music prize. I wouldn't really advise watching, but I may as well keep with the rest of the report
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/arcticmonkeys/video3.shtml#emp
As it's 4:30 and my tournaments are just starting now, I shall have to leave Sunday until tomorrow. Good luck to all my poker people in the $215 Pot Limit Omaha tonight as well as the $200 rebuy NL Single draw and the $109 8 game.
Later taters xx
Tuesday, 1 September 2009
Whoop whoop Reading TR Part 1
Wow, I've been the shittest blogger in the world recently, but life's been abit busy with poker and the like. That's the excuse and i'm sticking to it.
I thought I'd hit up the blog scene again because I just came back from a wicked weekend at Reading festival 2009, in which I saw some really good bands and had a really good time in general.
The weekend really started on Wednesday night when i decided to play a bunch of tournaments through the night, which proved to be a good idea because I somehow managed a 7k heater in about 100 games. I woke up the next morning with a spring in my step, knowing that I'm now well over half way into the huge hole that is my makeup.
Thursday;
I woke up lazily on Thursday morning to a call from my friend Lizzie who was already at the festival asking me when I was going to come, I told her 'soon', put the phone down and slept for a few more hours before finally slumping out of bed and plodding towards the train with a bunch of heavy bags/tent/sleeping bag. After 2 hours of napping on the train, I was in the beautiful city of Reading; just one of the tens of thousands of young, happy-go-lucky campers who'd came to see what was probably the best festival lineup in our lifetimes. The first thing we did when I arrived was go to Tesco for get supplies (by which I mean alcohol) with Lizzie's Bury friends, the guys I was camping with, and then go explore the campsite with cider and spirits in hand. Since there was no music until Friday, we just chilled around the fairground and had some bananas. I did prop bet Lizzie £100 to run across the dodge ems while they were going which she promptly snap-called me on and earned herself what she said for her was 2 days work. I think the stupidest part of the bet was that she probably would have done it for about 1/4 of the price, but at any rate it was a fun start to the weekend.
Friday;
I woke up on Friday morning with the familiar headache and bad back that is usually created by the combination for booze, bananas and sleeping in a tent, but I wasn't going to let that ruin what looked like a fine day of music. There was a slight drama at about 10am, when Lizzie went to withdraw some cash and she found herself with £2k less than she thought she had, after much nail biting and talk of identity theft and a 60 minute walk into Reading city center we found that Lizzie is in fact terrible with money and had simply spent about £1500 without knowing it in the last few months. At least the journey back to the campsite was much more fun than it's counterpart, with us taking the piss out of Lizzie for the absurd situation she got herself in.
We got back to the festival at about 2:30, just in time to be convinced to go to the arena and check out Little Boots, who I really enjoyed. Her girly brand of electro-pop was a great way to show the world my dance moves in what was just generally a really fun and upbeat set. I wanted to try and embed some video clips into this, but the bbc website is being rubbish and protecting against that, so I'll just have to give links;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/littleboots/video2.shtml#emp
We then headed back to the campsite for a quick half our alcohol refuel before going in for the rest of the evening. First up on the bill was New Found Glory, who Lizzie and I saw in honour of our friend Emo who couldn't make it to the festival despite having tickets. It was pretty good to rock out to abit of emo/pop-punk that I haven't really heard for 5/6 years, I think the last time I saw them when when they were supporting Greenday in 03.
After that we met the rest of the group of people we were camping with to go and see Florence and the Machine, the band I was most looking forward to that day. About a month previously, I had bought her album and had been slightly embaressed to admit that it was pretty much the best album I'd heard this year. After her performance on the NME stage, I'm certainly not ashamed anymore. She gave an amazing performance that could be confused with an aging rocker who'd given hundreds of festival performances. I literally can't give high enough praise about how good she was;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/florenceandthemachine/index.shtml#emp
edit; can't find a one song clip of that performance, so just watch as much as you want (the 30 minute highlights are well worth the watch fwiw)
After Florance I was pretty buzzed, and having met my friend Tom and his girlfriend we rushed over to try and check out the end of Placebo (which we just missed) so we hung around for abit checking out some random bands/comedy performances before eventually deciding to go and see the Kaiser Chiefs.
We obviously weren't expecting much, but I've got to say they were quite a lot of fun, we danced it away and ate some bananas while not so quietly asking when they were going to do the one where he predicts a riot. I liked that they didn't take themselves too seriously and just played some good rocky tunes;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/kaiserchiefs/
(go to about 22 minutes in for the best performance of the set)
Suitably pumped up, we waited for the Kings of Leon, who were the evenings headline act. The crowd really started to fill up and get tight, it seemed as though everyone at the festival had really wanted to see KoL and to be honest, the vast majority of them were bitterly disappointed, not by the performance which in my estimation was a very good, rocky show, but the 'fuck you' attitude of the band, who at 4 different points were complaining about seemingly nothing, only to end their show with no encore and the lead singer giving the 50,000+ crowd the V. Despite that, the music was pretty good, and I'd probably go and see them again;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/kingsofleon/
(watch from 16:55 for a perfect example of both a great musical performance and class douchbaggery)
Will hit up a part 2 tomorrow
loves and hugs xx
I thought I'd hit up the blog scene again because I just came back from a wicked weekend at Reading festival 2009, in which I saw some really good bands and had a really good time in general.
The weekend really started on Wednesday night when i decided to play a bunch of tournaments through the night, which proved to be a good idea because I somehow managed a 7k heater in about 100 games. I woke up the next morning with a spring in my step, knowing that I'm now well over half way into the huge hole that is my makeup.
Thursday;
I woke up lazily on Thursday morning to a call from my friend Lizzie who was already at the festival asking me when I was going to come, I told her 'soon', put the phone down and slept for a few more hours before finally slumping out of bed and plodding towards the train with a bunch of heavy bags/tent/sleeping bag. After 2 hours of napping on the train, I was in the beautiful city of Reading; just one of the tens of thousands of young, happy-go-lucky campers who'd came to see what was probably the best festival lineup in our lifetimes. The first thing we did when I arrived was go to Tesco for get supplies (by which I mean alcohol) with Lizzie's Bury friends, the guys I was camping with, and then go explore the campsite with cider and spirits in hand. Since there was no music until Friday, we just chilled around the fairground and had some bananas. I did prop bet Lizzie £100 to run across the dodge ems while they were going which she promptly snap-called me on and earned herself what she said for her was 2 days work. I think the stupidest part of the bet was that she probably would have done it for about 1/4 of the price, but at any rate it was a fun start to the weekend.
Friday;
I woke up on Friday morning with the familiar headache and bad back that is usually created by the combination for booze, bananas and sleeping in a tent, but I wasn't going to let that ruin what looked like a fine day of music. There was a slight drama at about 10am, when Lizzie went to withdraw some cash and she found herself with £2k less than she thought she had, after much nail biting and talk of identity theft and a 60 minute walk into Reading city center we found that Lizzie is in fact terrible with money and had simply spent about £1500 without knowing it in the last few months. At least the journey back to the campsite was much more fun than it's counterpart, with us taking the piss out of Lizzie for the absurd situation she got herself in.
We got back to the festival at about 2:30, just in time to be convinced to go to the arena and check out Little Boots, who I really enjoyed. Her girly brand of electro-pop was a great way to show the world my dance moves in what was just generally a really fun and upbeat set. I wanted to try and embed some video clips into this, but the bbc website is being rubbish and protecting against that, so I'll just have to give links;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/littleboots/video2.shtml#emp
We then headed back to the campsite for a quick half our alcohol refuel before going in for the rest of the evening. First up on the bill was New Found Glory, who Lizzie and I saw in honour of our friend Emo who couldn't make it to the festival despite having tickets. It was pretty good to rock out to abit of emo/pop-punk that I haven't really heard for 5/6 years, I think the last time I saw them when when they were supporting Greenday in 03.
After that we met the rest of the group of people we were camping with to go and see Florence and the Machine, the band I was most looking forward to that day. About a month previously, I had bought her album and had been slightly embaressed to admit that it was pretty much the best album I'd heard this year. After her performance on the NME stage, I'm certainly not ashamed anymore. She gave an amazing performance that could be confused with an aging rocker who'd given hundreds of festival performances. I literally can't give high enough praise about how good she was;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/florenceandthemachine/index.shtml#emp
edit; can't find a one song clip of that performance, so just watch as much as you want (the 30 minute highlights are well worth the watch fwiw)
After Florance I was pretty buzzed, and having met my friend Tom and his girlfriend we rushed over to try and check out the end of Placebo (which we just missed) so we hung around for abit checking out some random bands/comedy performances before eventually deciding to go and see the Kaiser Chiefs.
We obviously weren't expecting much, but I've got to say they were quite a lot of fun, we danced it away and ate some bananas while not so quietly asking when they were going to do the one where he predicts a riot. I liked that they didn't take themselves too seriously and just played some good rocky tunes;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/kaiserchiefs/
(go to about 22 minutes in for the best performance of the set)
Suitably pumped up, we waited for the Kings of Leon, who were the evenings headline act. The crowd really started to fill up and get tight, it seemed as though everyone at the festival had really wanted to see KoL and to be honest, the vast majority of them were bitterly disappointed, not by the performance which in my estimation was a very good, rocky show, but the 'fuck you' attitude of the band, who at 4 different points were complaining about seemingly nothing, only to end their show with no encore and the lead singer giving the 50,000+ crowd the V. Despite that, the music was pretty good, and I'd probably go and see them again;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2009/artists/kingsofleon/
(watch from 16:55 for a perfect example of both a great musical performance and class douchbaggery)
Will hit up a part 2 tomorrow
loves and hugs xx
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