9/9/2011 -

Last night I got to scratch something else off my bucket list. I got to see Brian Wilson live at  the Grand Canal Theatre in Dublin. To think I had just bought a ticket a week earlier, and had almost missed the last chance to ever see him live again, as Brian announced this would be his last tour ever. And how can you blame him...

Brian Wilson is an old man. He sits on a stool the whole gig, in the middle of the stage and with a keyboard in front of him he barely touches. Every now and again he seems absent minded, with his head down low, showing the marks of his history of mental illness. Every now and then he actually turns his back to the audience and watches the band play, as if he were merely observant of the rendition of his songs and orchestrations rather than the protagonist. But it hardly matters.

Firstly, anyone who knows a bit about the Beach Boys knows that Brian Wilson was never the showman in the band - he was the quiet one on stage. Mike Love was the emcee, and a bloody great one at that. As a matter of fact, Brian despised playing live concerts so much that he quit and was replaced on bass by Bruce Johnson while he got to write masterpieces like Pet Sounds and Smile at home for the Beach Boys. One has to wonder whether he would still be playing live concerts at this age had it not been for his father selling his whole back catalogue for nothing back in the day.

A man like Paul McCartney can still shake up whole stadiums with his showmanship. But Brian Wilson was a modern musical genius who never put as much thought about his showmanship as much as he did with which way the accordion faced the microphone. He belongs in the studio.

Still, when you are the man responsible for such amazing songs as 'California Girls', 'Fun, Fun, Fun', 'Don't Worry Baby' and arguably the best album ever, 'Pet Sounds', people are gonna want to see you live. So, it is an absolute privilege to get to witness the man in person. To hear his vocal harmonies live. To feel the vibrancy of his songs. Then you realise that the placement of Brian Wilson at the centre of the stage behind a keyboard becomes a metaphorical vision of a man sitting behind a desk, writing a metaphorical masterpiece and then stepping back and admiring it, and seeing other people wonder at it amazed. Brian Wilson absolutely defines the role of a songwriter, and the impression you get is that he tours the world taking his songs with him not because he loves to perform or because he craves attention or publicity, not even because he has a political activist motivation - but because he simply wants to see others enjoy them and boast them as his songs, without any malice or greed. 

As a matter of fact, at some stage Brian said to the audience - 'with this next number, we're going to show you we are a great band. We may not be the best band ever, but the guys down the road got nothing on us.'  It was funny, we all laughed, but then you think 'for god's sake, did the man that wrote Good Vibrations actually just say that? Shouldn't he be saying things like 'we're fucking awesome, 'cos my songs are great, thank you goodnight'?

The theatre setting was strange. Maybe it's different in the States, but here in Europe, people tend to be more quiet and restrained in a theatre. So, while during his Gershwin numbers you really got to admire it, it seemed strangely restrictive during songs like Surfin' U.S.A. and Dance Dance Dance. 

I did not give a flying fuck, I danced anyways. I was at the back row near the sound guy and at first I felt awkward being one of maybe only four people getting up to dance, but then I thought 'I am in the same room as Brian Wilson. Life is good right now' and shook it up. Everyone did get up for the encores, and they also got up, randomly, for Do You Wanna Dance. which was kick ass.

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PART TWO (Because this post is about something so important to me that I feel the need to break it up into two parts): the personal part

Unlike a lot of people I know, I got into the Beach Boys much earlier than the Beatles. I guess the reason was very simple; my dad owned a compilation of theirs and didn't own one of The Beatles. Not that my father ever listened to The Beach Boys, and I still don't understand whi he had it, but he had it, so I listened to it. It was almost natural that I should like it.

Going back in time, I remember I must have been about 5 years old when I was in a school play, and we did a dance to the song 'Surfin' U.S.A.' and I specifically remember being so excited about the organ and guitar solo every time it came up!

Okay, so I bought my first copy of Pet Sounds when I was 18, so I wasn't so young. But I remember seeing it in Bell Book and Candle, the best record store in Galway, and my vision going blurry. Before I knew it, I had walked to the counter, paid for the album and starter walking home, because I had spent all my bus money to pay for it, anxious to listen to it. To this day it remains my favourite album all time.

Of course, as I grew up, my love for the Beach Boys just increased. Now I consider them one of my very favourite bands. But I also came came to learn about Brian Wilson himself. His fears, struggles and mental instability that helped him create all those masterpieces. In fact, all those harmonies couldn't have been contained in any ordinary brain - you need to have the brain of a genius to be able to invent so many harmonies at the same time to really create something so ground breaking, and fit it around the rock and roll genre, updating it and leaving a huge mark on the music that came after The Beach Boys.

Brian's vulnerability made me love him even more. Jim Morrison sang about getting wasted. Jimi Hendrix got over by singing about sex. Brian Wilson sang about being a kid, and getting married, and simply being happy. In one of his best songs, In My Room, he sings about how there is one, and only one place where he feels safe. Remember, this was one of the biggest names in world music at the time, and he was openly admitting to being insecure and scared of the outside world. This is something I can easily identify with. Sometimes the future, the outside world and everything that might burst my bubble makes me so nervous that I can hardly breathe. I put on a Beach Boys song, and I find serenity and tranquillity again.

On a more general note, I think everyone should be allowed to see their musical heroes live. Music is still one of those forms of art where live performance matters more than anything. If cinema is the equivalent for films, we know how much they are suffering. The theatre is only for a certain type of crowd, and the more tasteful it is and the less people are going to want to see it. My point is that whether you like Justin Bieber or Brian Wilson, what you get out of a live show of theirs is something that you will never, ever forget. I can think about last night for a whole life and have a smile on my face and a warm feeling cross my heart.

PART THREE: the stand out moments

It started off with the songs from the last record, 'Brian Wilson Reimagines Gershwin'. It was very sophisticated. I knew all the songs from it, and I must say they sounded much better live than they did on the album, but the theatrical setting and the whole atmosphere that came with it must have helped too.

I really enjoyed them. Of course, when the Beach Boys numbers started rolling in, the audience came from being observant, mature and reflective to being excited and fired up.

The first time everyone got up to dance was with Do You Wanna Dance. Everyone got up after the keyboardist told us to forget about the place being a theatre and get up to dance. It was great, cos up to that point I didn't know whether I would be allowed. I think I sat down twice more after then, and stayed up for the rest of it.

God Only Knows got a standing ovation that seemed to have lasted for ages. I couldn't stop clapping, and neither could anyone else. Word on the internet was that it lasted for two minutes. Hey, I have never seen that happen, EVER! so I had goosebumps. 

Heroes and Villains, musically speaking, was probably their best performance of the night. I love the song, but hearing it live was just perfect. Most of those musicians would have recorded this song with Brian for his Smile album a few years ago, so maybe that's why they did it so flawlessly. Nevertheless, I thought it was the best, it was very trippy, irresistibly poppy and just amazing.

I could have cried when Brian Wilson came out at the last encore for many reasons. One, that song 'All Summer Long' is an amazing song, but it's also so nostalgic and made me wish I could have been young then and not now. Two, I knew that now, Brian would definitely be done, and I would probably never see him live again - but he left me with an experience and a feeling of joy that I had hardly ever felt before. It was the perfect song to close the amazing gig with.

Then, in the end, Brian said something that puzzled me. 'Thank you Dublin, see you soon'. I thought this was the last tour, Brian!...

5/9/2011 - PARAPSYCHOLOGICAL HEAVEN or my thoughts on the abilities of individuals to communicate with entities from the other side of the light and the ability of television producers to exploit that

I went back home tonight, had dinner with my family. Then we watched a bit of TV together and we ended up watching a show about parapsychology.

Parapsychology is the science of communication between humans and entities and presences from the other side of the light i.e. spirits and ghosts. It is also something that my parents are really into.

The TV programme showed a crew going to places, like scenes of brutal murders, abandoned prisons, decaying insane asylums etc., along with a few mediums and equipment that was able to record ultrasounds and hence the voices of the dead. There was a bunch of other equipment to measure the thermal values of the different rooms. Yes, I did think it was entertaining, although undeniably cheesy. But while my parents deeply believed in everything that was shown and never doubted most of the evidence that was given that ghosts were indeed in those settings, I was very doubtful.

One of the things the show made use of was EVP, which stands for Electronic Voice Phenomenon. These are electronically generated noises that are recorded but unplanned and unintended. The show made use of it as if it was the spirits saying words, and the way they shot the whole sequence, you would have believed it, because it did give you the creeps.

One of bits was set in a castle inhibited by spirits of all sorts. They recorded for ages, and in the end came back with a feminine voice that seemed to have been saying 'help, I am trapped in time'. I wonder, would someone who was really trapped in time really ever know of being trapped in time? No matter, the average viewer would believe it, without knowing that those mics are so sensitive and catch signals the human ear cannot because it is picking up things from other wavelengths - but it's not the voices of ghosts it's getting. It's static and stray radio transmissions of all sorts.

I think that if a plane flew over the plane and the captain spoke on the intercom, saying 'we'll be landing shortly', the average human television viewer would be so scared that he or she would probably start riots of panic thinking that an alien invasion would be imminent.

3/9/2011 - KEEP ME AWAY FROM INTERNET FORUMS or how somehow I manage to be either despised or loved on the internet, but never ignored - unless, of course, you talk about this blog

My tastes may be old fashioned, in the sense that I would rather buy a record on vinyl than download music on the computer, watch a good old silent film than a CGI filled Hollywood blockbuster etc. But when it comes to the internet, I am fully appreciative of its function. There is no better means of communication, and in many ways it is the most 'real' means of communication in my opinion. It is also, obviously, much smarter than television (a medium I am not an owner of, and happily so).

Of course, the internet is filled with assholes, people that generally get a kick out of mocking or making fun of others to the point where it gets cheaply insulting and a representation of ignorance. No matter, the world is ignorant in itself...

I am often a rather uncomfortable character. I have strange views and beliefs that actually goes against even the views and beliefs of the minorities. For instance, I am neither left winged or right winged - I am totally apolitical. So apolitical that anarchy to me represents a useless and frivolous utopia. I am a vegetarian, which to the majority is a world represents weakness - but I say, what's weak about drastically opposing any kind of murder? I will save this argument, for it is something I will probably discuss in another post.

Back to the subject at hand - lately, as I explained in my last post, I have been desperately looking for a suitable replacement for the guitarist of our band that decided to quit. My posts on the internet have been rather futile, and in the space of two days, on two different forums, I was banned and ridiculed.

I have no shame, nor do I have anything to be ashamed of, so here is the account of my latest misadventures on these two forums.

One of them was boards.ie, an Irish website. The drummer in the band posted, upon my request, a notice regarding the search for a guitarist. This was the second time we put up a post for a guitarist, and the first time was as useless as the second time, as we never got replies. So, once again disenchanted by the possibilities of us finding a guitarist on that website, I posted on the thread:

'this website is useless for finding musicians, mate'.

That is when the world seemed to have collapsed.

Right away I got a warning from the forum moderator, appalled by my behaviour, and eventually from a member of the leading staff of the website, saying that I was risking a ban, which would be issued upon me instantly if I dared to post anything else on that thread (the thread regarding my band and the same thread that existed because of me!). But I, never one to back away from a challenge, posted almost immediately by quoting the warnings and following them up with a sarcastic:

'LOL'

BAM!!! Private messages, e-mails and replies telling me that I was banned...for a whole week! Now, this isn't because I 'ruined' a thread. This is simply because I dared to give out about the website on the website. It's bloody censorship, and it's downright wrong. The official reason behind my ban was that my criticism was not constructive. But come on, people, forums aren't so complicated to figure out - what kind of constructive criticism could I offer to something that works on a simple formula that couldn't be changed...

Moving on.

My quest for a guitarist continued. I posted the notice on a local Galway website dedicated to its music scene. In it, I let loose and specified that we hated the guitarist for quitting the band cos he left us hanging after we had made so many commitments and so on. Long story short, I NEVER GOT A HELPFUL REPLY!

The people on the forum, definitely having loads of time on their hands, immediately started shooting on me being so personal on the initial thread, and making fun of me for some reason I do not understand. Eventually, it even got down to people advising me not to start a band and instead go to college and get a real job. Now, this is supposed to be members of the local music scene! The explanations are two; one, is that they are all miserable failures with nothing better to do during their day but prevent other bands stealing their saturday night slots in run down bars around the country. Two, just regular trolls looking for something to do between masturbation sessions.

Either way, after numerous posts that did not help my initial quest, I ended up targeting one guy who had given me the friendly advice of sticking with being an average Joe (like predisposition for art is something anyone can just give up) and called him things like 'gobshite' and 'miserable cunt'.

I won't get into it too much, but the whole thing uncontrollably developed from there into a jibe fest. Some guy, who must really have been bothered by my posts, decided to post links to various of my pages. Which is fine with me, make fun of me, I don't give a fuck. But when you make fun of the band, that is when I want to look you up and if I ever know who you are, give you a beating.

I'm a lover not a fighter, but hurt my pride and I'll shove your teeth down your throat, and I'll do it too, because I'm a mean hothead if you mess me.

The thread is still going on, and this is the link to it.  http://www.screamformegalway.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=musicians&action=display&thread=4057

Unfortunately, you have to be a member to view it, and I wouldn't bother signing up though it takes a few seconds. I think what annoys me the most about this thread is the people that keep saying this is the best thread ever. I don't really know what to say, some people are like that, they get a kick out of mocking people. I do it too in real life.

The only thing is, they know my name, and I don't know theirs, and that really bothers me. I know most are metalheads. But I really would love to know who they are...oh boy would I ever!

25/8/2011 - KEEP YOUR FRIENDS CLOSE AND THEN LOSE THEM or how I now do not believe in friendship anymore and probably never will again

I write this blog in bitterness, in absolute certainty that the so called former friend will never read it.

I will name names, I don't give a crap. I am just that mad.

I never had many friends, never really cared for having them. I am a solitary wolf, I am a loner, I like being in my own company, and I generally prefer to be alone rather than with fickle friends or two faced people. Martin was a great friend. We met in primary school, and we used to be outsiders. We spent our breaks talking about music while the other boys and girls were busy being stupid, as you usually are at that age.

We went to the same secondary school and went to art class, where our music and film conversations continues. Then I moved and we lost sight of each other.

We met again two years later when I had just started a band along with another friend of mine. We were looking for a guitarist to replace our two guitarists who didn't have a clue. Martin had a clue. He knew music, he knew theory. God, he wasn't the most exciting drummer, he strummed as blankly as a whiteboard and avoided solos because, I always guessed, he never had the balls for them. But, bottom line is, I did admire his compulsive way of playing the guitar. There was no feeling in his guitar playing, he had no stage presence and more often then not, he put us all in a bad mood during band practice. But he would come up with some complex riffs which would make the song sound different.

We spent a while creating a certain sound with the band. Later on, when we became Lexington 125 and got a second guitarist, we established a kind of punky sound that was very new wave. Funky basslines, impulsive/compulsive guitar playing, my slutty vocals and davy's metronomic drumming. Things seemed to go fine.

Martin and I used to spend a lot of time together. We went to gigs together, Jonathan Richman, the Human League. We spent days together. We planned things for the band together. Then, from one day to the next, he became alienated.

He had always been chasing this moustached girl with a Yoko Ono type of personality. He bought a bass and started playing with the two ugliest people to ever start a rock band. He busked and played in small venues in town, disastrously. Friends of ours complained about the way they murdered some of the songs that we, as Lexington 125 would have been playing at the same time.

They went up to play a protest festival, and it was pretty awkward that, during the recording of our EP, the guy who did the recording who had been at the festival, had heard of this three piece band that had gone on stage with the worst sound and had had everyone talking. That was his band they were talking about, though he never knew.

So, after about 700 euro was spent on the recording, most of them out of my pocket, a 200 euro photoshoot with his ugly depressing long face was completed and after all the two years together in the same band and all the work that was put into the planning for the lauch of our EP and the start of our gigs to coincide with the start of the college year, my good friend Martin decides that he wants to quit the band.

Last weekend would have signalled the start of weekly band practices to prepare for what was shaping up to be a good month gig-wise. In the space of two days we had had two good offers to play, both of which were of course declined after this weekend. You see, on the day of practice, we couldn't get to him. We went to his house, called every phone number we possibly could, and he never answered. We did practice without him. The bassist Cian was so annoyed he actually said 'man, why don't we just get rid of him. He's shit anyways. He plays shitty riffs and makes them look difficult'. Davy had always wanted him out. James just shook his head in disappointment. He did agree with me, though, that Martin was, as far as we were concerned, irreplaceable.

Saturday night we went out and met a guy we knew and who knows Martin as well. We find out he has been badmouthing all of us, and telling everyone how bad we were, and that's why he quit the band 'months ago'. I got mad instantly. After all these years as friends, I was ready to put it all behind and kill him. It's one thing him telling us to our faces - another to hear it from someone else.

I could hardly believe it also because the guy practically started the band, and now with this move right when I had said things were going to happen and after we spent something like 1000 euro on getting it ready (most of that money was mine too), he just walks away and leaves us hanging. On our Facebook conversations, he even seems to want to come across as the victim.

From one day to the other, Martin has gone from being one of my very few best friends to being the person I despise most in the world. He is nothing but scum. He is the guy that might prevent me from achieving my dreams, after I thought he would have wanted to achieve them just as bad as me. He is nothing but a backstabber. Right now, I hate him so much, that I realised what Jim Cornette meant when they asked him about what he thought of Vince Russo and he replied 'If I could figure out a way to kill him and not be done for it, I would. But it's not possible, so we're in the clear'.

Now I wonder, is it really ever worth sharing anything with another human being? Is it really worth it having a friend, when no matter what a great friend they are, they're always going to end up letting you down and stabbing you in the back? Is it ever worth dreaming when someone is always going to end your dreams, even the person you thought would have killed to have that same dream come true?

I realise not that it's really not worth it. If Martin let me down, after all we went through and after everything we did together, our adventures and misadventures, everyone will let me down. I am forever embittered and hateful. I'm a natural born actor, I can get away with never letting it show. But fact of the matter is, I would much rather be left alone now.

26/7/2011 - MISSING MY CHLOE or how it's only been five days without my dog and I'm a mess

Today, I miss my little pup - a little over one year old yorkie called Chloe.

My family is gone on holiday in Italy and I am looking after the house and my grandmother, who is staying in Ireland because she can't stand the heat. But staying in the house without that little thing running around the house just doesn't feel right.

To think that little over a year ago, I would have been one of those guys who never had time for dogs, didn't understand animal lovers and was actually a little scared of them. When my sister begged my parents to get one, I was a little annoyed because, well, I thought she would take over the house.

When they came home with her, you should have seen her! She was the tiniest thing. And here was me, cold hearted and frightened by this tiny creature - big man! For days I refused to let my heart be warmed by her adorableness and playfulness. I stayed as far from her as I could, though she kept trying to make friends with me, always coming up to me, leaning against my legs on two paws and looking up at me with her tongue sticking out. Everything about her genuinely looked like she was saying 'love me! I'm adorable!'.

Still, nothing.

A few weeks later, I was uber-stressed by college work and the end of the year assignments piling up on me. I was building the sets for one of the end of the year films that we would be shooting - I was acting as production designer for it. It had been a busy stressful day, and I had lost the stapler - one of those ones used to stick things on the walls. I turned the house upside down and inside out trying to find it but it was all useless, and all the while, Chloe kept hanging around me, pacing furiously and excitedly at my ankles trying to get some sort of a reaction from me. I'm bipolar, and it doesn't take much to turn me into an emotional mess. So, feeling the way I felt, I collapsed on the couch and got ready for the usual depressing thoughts to fill my head.

That's when Chloe must have realised something was wrong. She calmed and looked at me for a while. Then, she climbed on the couch and on my lap and laid there, calm and quiet.

It was the kindest thing anyone had done for me in years. It actually made me cry tears of tenderness. Ever since then, she has been my best friend, the best friend than anyone could imagine - I am just sorry that I had to wait til I got old to experience the kind of love that only a dog can give; a disinterested kind, as if loving someone was more than the right thing to do, but only natural and not to be questioned. Not to mention that having a pet around me has been nothing but good to me in an emotional sense.

But now I feel sad, thinking about her being in the kennel where she will stay for another ten days or so until my parents return, and I will eventually leave this house. I think that Chloe will be the thing I will miss the most. And you know what the most heart warming thought is? I know that right now she is thinking of me too, and all of us, and though she must be having fun playing with all the other dogs, she will be the happiest creature ever when she will come back.

Bless her.

26/7/2011 - PANIC OF BLONDIE or how I haven't recovered from seeing a bunch of old new wave punk rockers live

Many people would be more excited to see bands like The Script, Muse and the Foo Fighters nowadays. I have absolutely no time for them. Most of my favorite music doesn't come from today; a clear evidence of that is the fact that I am still a vinyl buyer - I have bought some real gems in the past that wouldn't even be issued on CD anymore.

Well, one of my favorite bands is Blondie. I have loved them since I was seventeen; I came across them in the crummiest of ways.

During that school year, I had virtually no life. I used to get with this Australian girl called Scarlett, and she was very sweet, she was one of those girls who talk a lot, and that suits me fine, cos sometimes I just like to listen. Anyways, apart from her, I used to go to a drama group but never did much apart from studying to get enough points at the Leaving Cert for the college course I ended up doing. My father had this box of tapes that hadn't been listened to in years. I never really found anything that interested me much, but that is how I learned to listen to albums properly whether they were good or not, and really helped me shape a varied taste in music.

Anyways, one of those tapes was this blank tape with no case and no title on it. On the morning of my first exam, I threw it in my walkman and headed towards the school.

A phone ringing, once, twice - then Debbie's voice, in a monotone howl, beginning to express a bored frustration at a boy that wouldn't answer her call. The music kicked in a few moments later, and it was punk, with a raw guitar sound, exciting rhythm section and a poppy keyboard.

It was only when it got to Heart of Glass that I realised it must have been Blondie; I had heard the song before, but of course I thought Blondie was the name of the girl and not the name of the band. Furthermore, because back then I had no wide access to the internet, I didn't know much about them and thought other people wouldn't have either, so I treated them like some obscure discovery I had made.

I listened to that tape so much that it fuelled my dreams of starting a band - and I would do it for the first time only a few months later.

For the next while I kept carrying that walkman in my bag because it was the only way I could listen to Parallel Lines. Imagine my excitement when, a few months after I discovered them, I heard that they would come to Galway for the arts festival, to celebrate the anniversary of the release of that album!

Back then I had no money. I also used to fight fiercely with my parents - I still do, but around that time their money was my only money, though I hated to ask them for it. The ticket cost about 40 euro. I grind my teeth and clenched my fists and asked my parents for the money. I was surprised when they agreed to get it for me.

After buying the ticket, I walked to the town square where my friends were and could not think straight. I sat under a tree, opened the envelope and stared at the ticket for at least half an hour, ignoring anyone that tried to start a conversation with me (although that's not something I rarely do!) My heart was broken when only a few days later, after coming home drunk and an emotional mess, my parents informed me that we would be leaving for 'official family reasons' to go to Italy on the day of the concert.

It seemed like they had done it on purpose. I would be forced to go on this Italian trip and miss a band that had become one of my favourite and one of the most important for me. I had begun to consider Debbie Harry the most attractive woman that ever lived, and even started to mimic a lot of her stage poses in my band's gigs - which sounds stranger than it actually is.

2008 turned out to be a terrible year - I was frustrated by college and so disappointed by it that I dropped out for a month, my love life was absolutely half hearted and forgettable, my parents and I fought every day and I had to give my Blondie ticket away to a friend, sure that I would never get another chance to see them again.

Three years later, a few months ago, I open up the papers, and read what I thought could never have happened. Blondie to play the same venue, at the same festival. I stared at the article with eyes wide open...

In three years, my love for Blondie had only increased. I bought their records, I found out more about them, and my love for Debbie Harry became one of those facts that most people know about me. I learned to appreciate Chris Stein's amazing guitar skills, Clem Burke's exciting drumming (with stick flying in the air during performances) and admired the band's guts in letting themselves be influenced by genres like disco, reggae and rap a well as being a kick ass pop punk band before pop punk became utter shit (ahem, from Green Day to the bloomin' Jonas Brothers).

...I got up off the seat and for the first time in weeks realised how great it was to finally have money. 

Holding a ticket in my hands, I remembered what it had felt like three years ago. A week from the concert, I was a nervous as if I would have played on stage with them. I got so excited I genuinely thought that as soon as I saw the band walk to the stage I would either start crying (like Take That fans in the early nineties) or just faint (Beatlemania style). I hoped one of my very few true friends would come to the gig with me, but when it got to the day, and the butterflies in my stomach had multiplied, it was clear that if I was going to go with a friend, I would have to pay for the ticket - which is what I ended up doing. Now at least I would be safe...somewhat.

We avoided the weak support act and got in just as they finished. We had to wait half an hour before the band looked like they were about to walk on. But guess what...I missed them walking in! I was bursting to go to the toilets, so I left, thinking there was no chance they would walk in while I was in the toilet if they hadn't done so yet.

I think that's what saved me. Blondie had already started playing Union City Blue when I made my way through the audience. Debbie had wonderful platinum blonde hair and wore a pair of cheap sunglasses. Chris looked like Andy Warhol's long lost brother (mind you, a look he is probably going for). Clem Burke still looked like Clem Burke, plus a beer belly - but the sticks were still flying in the air.

My jaw had automatically dropped. I had prepared myself to a disappointment. These guys are hitting their seventies - Debbie is 66 for crying out loud. Well, the gig hardly reached the one hour length I think (either that or it just seemed short to me) but they were in top shape. They even did a killer cover of You Gotta Fight For Your Right to Party, they had the place shaking...I mean, these guys are hitting their seventies.

At the end of their encore, Heart of Glass (Debbie walked on, much to my relief, saying 'we can't leave without playing Heart of Glass). This is where my brain started playing tricks on me. After I sang every single word in the song, Clem started started the huge build-up leading to the ending and I stared in awe, amazement and devotion at one of my heroes, Debbie Harry. Almost without knowing it, I found myself blowing her a kiss in the most traditional of ways while she looked in the general direction in which I was standing, before just as I had finished, I dropped my eyes almost embarrassed ('did I really do that? I thought...'). When I lifted my eyes up again, I swear to god, she was still looking over at us, and blew a kiss in what I though was my direction!! I don't know whether my mind was playing tricks on me, it probably was - but that was a moment that kept playing in my mind for the next days, and still has be staring into space whenever I think about it.

I stood around the area for more than an hour trying to get an opportunity to meet the band. Bought the t-shirt and the buttons. Stood around the backstage area and some bimbo who looked about fifteen started screaming at the truck driver that she loved Blondie without knowing that Blondie was the name of the band, which got me real mad - four years ago I didn't know better either...

Everyone gave up, my friend had long gone. I realised I was the only one there when the last security guard walked over to me and said in a tone that was far from friendly:

'I hope you're waiting for lift!'

'What's it to ya?' I replied, equally annoyed (I'm always annoyed at people throwing sarcasm in my direction, especially when a bunch of punk new wave rockers I greatly admire are only a few feet away from me and that woman is the only one preventing me to see them...).

'Look, we can't go home until you leave, so I'm sorry, but you'll have to wait for your lift somewhere else'.

I swear I wanted to punch her right in the face, but she looked like she could have had me easy, and the last thing I wanted to do to spoil my night was to end it getting beat up by a girl... haha.

I stood behind a tree not too far, waiting for Blondie's Beat the Street truck to pass by. But after waiting for a very long time, I gave up... It wasn't gonna happen.

You have to understand, I have been to many gigs before. But none had been more important to me than this one. On September, I am going to see Brian Wilson, and that will probably top the most important gigs list then. But seeing Blondie meant a lot to me on so many levels, most of them personal. Most people came as fans on the band, I came as a rock and roll frontman wannabe who was once greatly inspired by their music before I even knew who they were. A lot of people would have thought Debbie extremely attractive back in the day, but I find everything about her appealing to this day - I don't see why I shouldn't either. And while most of the people I know went of wanted to go to Oxygen, for a weekend of non stop music on three stages, all I needed was an hour concert with three of the original members of Blondie to feel like I had been to the most important gig I had ever been to.

That's how much I loved them.

The Respectable Matt Introduction

Every man person should have a blog this day an age, and I shouldn't be an exception.

The introduction is an obvious choice for a first post. My name is Matt Micucci, though Matt Ayroli has a better sound to it. I live in Galway, but haven't lived here long enough to consider myself Irish and haven't lived in Italy long enough to consider myself Italian. I'm an alien.

I do feel alienated most of the times. I am mostly a bit of a recluse. I don't fall for flavours of the month, I'm not a dedicated follower of fashion and though people think I am vain I'm quite sensible. My bipolarism allows for a flamboyancy and theatricality that suits me fine in artistic endeavours.

I am the lead singer/songwriter and frontman of a band called Lexington 125. I have a BA in Film & TV and consider a future in film critique and history a plan B. Working in a factory all my life would be a damn waste...