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Machine Head / Bring Me The Horizon / DevilDriver

[For more photos from this gig, check out the following two Flickr sets: Machine Head / DevilDriver]

We’d been waiting for this gig for a while, but unfortunately Gillian hasn’t reacted well to the whole pregnancy thing and was exhausted on the night with a huge pile of work to catch up on as well. As a result, I drove over to the SECC myself where I found that I couldn’t even pass my ticket off to a tout. Apparently sales hadn’t been that great. Mind you, last year’s gig was at the much smaller Academy and I do recall thinking it was quite a jump in scale.

I got there in time to catch the last three or four songs by DevilDriver who were pretty good. Unless I’ve seen them at a festival somewhere, the last (and first) time I saw them was in Brisbane in 2006 (details on the travel blog). What little I saw tonight impressed. High tempo, a good front man in Dez Fafara and the crowd on their side made for a good 15 minutes.

Frankly, I was amazed they were opening. Given the style of music, they’re a natural warm-up band for Machine Head. Certainly better than Bring Me The Horizon who had the longer second slot.

Now I’ve not heard much in the way of positive press about BmtH. In fact, I’ve pretty much heard nothing but detrimental comments, to put it kindly. When they came on stage at Sonisphere last year, the Slayer fans were walking back towards the campsite after a 60-minute set. The majority actually took the time to stop at the stage and boo for a considerable length of time.

After tonight’s 45 minutes, or however long it was, I can see why. Bring Me The Horizon are – simply – ****. Watching them reminded me of Daphne and Celeste being shoved on stage at Leeds Festival back in 2000. Completely out of place, incapable of realising it and blundering on regardless. Car crash stage performers of the worst ilk.

While they certainly have their fans, the vast majority seemed to be girls aged around 14. Though there were a couple of hundred of them, they were easily outnumbered by the majority of the crowd who boo’d them between each track. The singer’s cry of “Boo louder if you love us” simply resulted in the crowd chanting “****! ****! ****!” instead.

I simply cannot fathom why the promoters put them on the same bill as Machine Head and DevilDriver, and certainly why they were given the more prominent support slot.

Ah, well. It’s all in the past and – despite my ears wanting to crawl up my arse to spare me the torment – I survived. Which is a good thing because Machine Head were on next.

Regular tourers, they’d hit the Academy last year with Hatebreed in support and put on a moderately OK show. Not their fault, it was one of those nights where the sound at the Academy left a lot to be desired. Here at the SECC, though, you do get your moneysworth from the sound system and Robb Flynn and co. really put it through its paces. Arriving on the back of a great new album, they let rip with a great variety of new and classic material.

Taking time to talk to the audience, it’s obvious that Flynn loves his job. A huge smile on his face between songs, all the posing you could wish for,

awesome riffage and skin-bashing… there are few metal bands today that are on a par with Machine Head for sheer live power. Despite the fact that their newer songs does tend to run for a bit too long, they don’t seem to drag the way recent Iron Maiden material does. There’s no huge stomping Eddie, but on the other hand the music is better. A fair swap, in my opinion.

I honestly think the pit was the largest I’ve seen outside of a festival setting and it was well used by a huge number of people. There isn’t a song that you

can’t mosh to in their catalogue: new titler “Suffer Unto The Locust”, Dimebag Darrell-inspired “Aesthetics of Hate“, Xbox owner favourite “Halo”, surprise inclusion “Bulldozer”, classic “Ten Ton Hammer“, compulsory “Davidian”… the list goes on. Not a duff song all night.

Great crowd, great sound, great light show, great venue. Only a shame that a ticket went to waste.

Alter Bridge / Black Stone Cherry / Theory of a Deadman – Glasgow SECC

What a line-up. Three cracking bands on one ticket, only a shame that it meant an early door-time and that we missed the first half of Theory of a Deadman. What little we caught – about five or six songs – was good stuff. I enjoyed it enough to want to get tickets for their upcoming headlining show in February anyway.

After a very brief set change, Black Stone Cherry arrived to huge applause and played their way through an excellent set. Their blues-influenced rock works well on CD and is just as catchy and enjoyable live, especially coming from a band with so much charisma. I’ve never even seen pictures of the band, and they really weren’t what any of us were expecting. The guitarist and bassist look like they walked right out of recording the next Status Quo album, the drummer could pass for The Muppets‘ Animal and lead singer Chris Roberston looks like a chunky sociology teacher.

Appearances are nothing to go by and Robertson has an incredible, and fairly unique, voice. You hear him sing and you know it’s BSC you’re listening to. For a band in a support slot they owned the stage as well as any headliner, playing tracks from all three of their albums. I would say there was a toal of about one-and-a-half songs which involved the crowd taking over vocal duties. Again, not something any old support act could get away with.

For a second time that night, I found myself looking forward to seeing an act live again – this time on their March tour.

A credit to the engineers and crew saw Alter Bridge themselves take to the stage after another remarkably short delay to begin their hour-and-45-minute set. They ploughed through the opening four songs without so much as a pause for breath, covering both old and new material. The band is very much Myles Kennedy‘s baby, but the rest of the band put in every bit as much as the lead.

It was, however, Myles’ birthday and he got the rousing chorus you’d expect from the crowd.

The set covered all aspects of the band’s three albums, from the heavier rock to the solo, acoustic ballads. Note perfect for the duration, there’s no doubting their abilities as performers but I would have to give them one piece of advice – drop the wanky alternating guitar solo crap. It went on for far too long and we could have had at least one, possibly two more songs in the time it ran on for.

Alter Bridge — Image by Iain Purdie via Flickr

Whinge over, anotherÂ exhilaratingÂ performance from a top notch quartet which rounded off a superb evening of music. The three bands fit together well musically, in my ears. If you like one of the groups then the others are definitely at least worth having a listen to.

As I said earlier, the two supports have sold themselves a few more gig tickets by virtue of their performances. I can’t wait!

Alter Bridge Live Cardiff Motorpoint Arena 23/11/11 (liveandloudrock.wordpress.com)

Getting BT fibre-optic broadband

Hint for anyone planning on moving to BT‘s fibre optic broadband – forget the packaged HomeHub3 and go for a router capable of 300Mbps throughput on the wifi. We’ve gone for a NetGear though there are plenty of alternatives.

Reason being that most areas have 40Mbps (max) broadband speed with a quoted rise to 80Mbps within a few months, peaking at 300Mbps. Some areas already have 300Mbps.

The HomeHub3 is only capable of transmitting a wifi signal of 130Mbps. Therefore, even though it could theoretically be yanking 300Mbps up the “pipe” from the internet, it can only get it to your computer at less than half that speed. In other words, the kit BT are shipping is already out of date. Find a solution tailored to your needs at https://boostpoorsignal.com/distributed-antenna-system-installation-companies/.

The WNR2200 we went for is small, white (therefore colour-coordinated to please my other half) and sits perfectly on top of the supplied BT fibre modem. It’s also only about Â£50 if you pre-purchase via PCWorld’s (*spit*) website and collect it in store – saving you Â£60! Though there was another option, even cheaper – Â£25, from a manufacturer I’ve not heard of before.

If you have an existing ADSL modem router… pass it on to someone else. It’s useless with fibre. You need a cable modem, i.e. one with a “WAN” input socket on the back, not an ADSL one. OK, technically you don’t need the “modem” part of it as BT supply that, but that’s what to look for on the boxes.

Confusingly, lots of retailers started labelling all of their ADSL kit as appropriate for “BT Connections”. Obviously, this is no longer the case as it depends on whether you’re using ADSL or fibre now.

Rum Diary / In Time

Two films for the first time in a while. It should have been three, but despite battling traffic (and a slightly dodgy sat-nav) to get to the cinema in time I arrived to find out that the performance of Tintin I had aimed for wasn’t on. Not for the first time has Cineworld’s web site lied to me. Boo. So, McDonald’s for dinner and then back across the car park for the first of two films.

The Rum Diary

“We’re out of rum.”

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Alcoholic writer arrives in Puerto Rico, gets involved in local (dodgy) politics. Weirdness and mild amusement ensues.

See it if you like: Slightly weird, off-kilter dramas and/or Johnny Depp.

If you know of Hunter S. Thomson then you’ll know what to expect. Slightly off-centre characters, a touch of illegal drugs and a vat of alcohol form the basis of this entertaining story. Set in 1950’s Puerto Rico, Depp plays Kemp – a reporter brought in from the US to work for the slowly dying local rag.

Disillusioned and drunk, Kemp wants to write about what’s wrong with Puerto Rico. His editor, on the other hand, wants fluffy pieces about bowling alleys and sandy beaches. Unwittingly, Kemp ends up embroiled in one of the very corrupt escapades he despises.

Buddied up with a completely brain-fried Swede (Moburg played by Giovanni Ribisi) and a burnt-out photographer (Sala – Michael Rispoli), he soaks up the island, gets arrested, meets the girl of his dreams, annoys an underworld boss and rails against the bringing-down of the newspaper he was brought in to work for.

There are a handful of genuinely laugh-out-loud moments, and sadly the funniest of these is in the trailer. Other than that, it’s just continually amusing. Largely this is due to the performances from the cast as a whole. The dialogue is poetic and insightful in places, while quick-witted in others. A genuinely nice mix.

It is also, however, a little slow going and the last act does feel a bit “cludged together” just to get the story done.

I did enjoy it, but I don’t think it’s the rolloer-coaster ride of hilarity the trailer made it out to be.

In Time

“Don’t waste my time”

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Time is now currency. Run out and you die. Have loads and you’re effectively immortal.

See it if you like: Sci fi thrillers with a twist, and not having to use your brain too much

I love the premise for this film. When you reach 25 years of age, a little clock kicks in on your arm giving you a year to live. Every second on that clock is currency which can be used to buy things. On the downside when it hits zero, your heart stops. In the meantime, your body doesn’t age.

But how is this currency controlled? What happens when people realise they’re running low, or if they manage to amass a fortune? In TimeÂ gives its answers to these questions along with a story of what happens if one man, Will Salas (Justin Timberlake), tries to level the playing field a little.

This isn’t a brain-bender along the lines of Total RecallÂ or Inception. It’s a far simpler and the premise isn’t explored beyond the fact that the world simply is like that. No history, no major twists. The overall theme would likely appeal to all those 99%Â protestersÂ – isn’t it a little unfair that so many people struggle and suffer while a small percentage have the vast majority of the wealth?

Salas, living in the ghetto just getting by day to day as his job tops up his time, finds himself the beneficiary of a windfall. A hundred years. He decides to use it to get into the more exclusive districts and find out who’s controlling all this time. After all, someone’s making a profit from people “timing out”.

He ends up paired up with excessively-skinny waif Sylvia (Amanda Seyfried – seriously, could get legs be any thinner and still carry her weight?) while being chased by Time Keeper Leon (Cillian Murphy) as he fights to expose the high-end corruption that’s costing ordinary people their lives.

It’s a nice enough popcorn movie with some decent action sequences and, as I said, a great premise. It’ll never be a classic but I don’t think it’s trying to be.

Certainly not Â waste of time.

The Darkness / Foxy Shazam – Glasgow Academy

[photos of this gig are in this Flickr collection for Foxy Shazam and this one for The Darkness]

It’s not often I’ll go on about a support act, but Foxy Shazam deserve a mention. There was another opener, but I have no idea who they were – even the Academy’s website didn’t bother to list them. Foxy Shazam, though… wow. The first time I heard their name was when I checked the aforementioned website to find out who was supporting about an hour before the doors opened. After a quick peak on YouTube, I decided “yes, I should get there early enough for this bunch”.

They were most definitely, for me, worth turning up for although opinions were divided. I was stood behind a woman who looked like she was wearing a huge blonde wig. I happened to glance at her ridiculously decoratively nailed fingers as she texted someone. “Just not getting this. Singer’s a bit of a knob.” This from someone Â who’d paid money to see Justin Hawkins & co, and who was wearing a Steel Panther t-shirt. Two of the biggest “knobs” in frontsmen, and she reckons someone else is a bit of a nutjob?

In fairness, he was a bit of a knob. But a funny one, and certainly the most hyperactive lead singer I think I’ve ever witnessed on stage. Hell, the whole band were in permanent motion and there are 6 of them. I’m amazed there weren’t any accidents. The keyboard player with the huge beard spent a good portion of the set with one or both feet on the keys, or trying to play the huge instrument like a guitar. The bassist, at one point, had his guitar balanced by the head end upside down in one hand above his head. The singer, towards the end, was sat on the guitarist’s shoulders.

The Darkness — Image by Iain Purdie via Flickr

Mental. What they crammed into a thirty minute set, many other bands barely manage to hit you with in ninety.

Oh, and the songs weren’t half bad either. Definitely one to watch out for.

And shortly after, the headliners. The Darkness blasted on stage to a rendition of “Black Shuck”, the brothers Hawkins acted as if the band hadn’t been on a forced hiatus after the lead singer decided that cocaine was a viable alternative to three square meals a day. Tight, fun, bouncy and loud.

The only other time I’ve seen them live was at Leeds Festival when they were still riding high with the one album under their wing. This didn’t make for a good set as the album is only around 45 minutes long and they played for ninety, which means a huge amount of filler including two unfinished songs. This time, however, was much improved.

Beginning the gig inside a huge cage, drummer Ed Graham was “released” part way through – the only major piece of stage work. The rest of the gimmicks relied on a couple of indoor fireworks and a ton of lights. And it worked just fine, thanks.

I think the band have had their day and are about where they should be after all the ridiculous hype around them when Permission To LandÂ came out. They pretty much filled the Academy (not quite as much as Motorhead the other night, but still packed out), and the crowd had a whale of a time. The place was visibly jumping when the expected encore of “I Believe In A Thing Called Love” began.

Not the huge stadium-filling megastars their record obviously thought they should be a few years ago, but damn good fun all the same.

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